Starting My Cultivation With Time Management

Chapter 417: Chapter 50: Returning to Shiping Mountain, Training Two Disciples

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For Long Long, the attitude of Long Hu was complex.

At first, she probably was just “a pet used to increase Synchronization Value”, but after recognizing the fox lady’s daring love and hate, Long Hu was neither willing nor able to continue to take her lightly.

Thus, he started by mentioning Qin Beiwang’s marriage proposal indirectly in front of Long Hu, as a kind of heads-up to prevent her from losing her temper upon hearing about it later from the Qin siblings.

Of course, he only mentioned marrying into the Qin Family and taking Qin Ye as a bride for now, deliberately omitting any talk of “sharing a husband” and “merging offspring”.

As a result, Long Hu immediately got angry on the spot, gripping Long Long’s arm tightly and vehemently exclaimed:

“I knew that clan leader was up to no good!”

Long Hu immediately chimed in with indignant righteousness:

“Exactly! How could I, Long Hu, so easily marry into another family?”

“What do you mean ‘so easily marry into another family’?” Long Hu immediately bit his ear and said fiercely, “So if a high enough price is offered, you would agree to marry in, is that it?”

Fearing she would tear half of his ear off, Long Hu could only adeptly respond:

“That’s not what I meant; my point is, of course I wouldn’t debase myself like that. That old man Qin is underestimating me too much. How infuriating!”

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His explanation was indeed too late, although it somewhat remedied the situation, Long Hu was clearly still not reassured, immediately seizing the opportunity to insist:

“You must keep your distance from Qin Ye in the future!”

Normally, Long Hu would certainly tease the fox, with remarks like “Why keep a distance, eh?” “Are you jealous?” “Oh, how adorable,” but since she had bitten onto half of his ear, he could only agree repeatedly, saying:

“I only regard Qin Ye as a friend and harbor no romantic feelings!”

If Long Hu knew his persona, she would force him to swear, but sadly the little fox was short on cunning at the moment and, seeing that he seemed sincere and not pretentious, she let go of his ear and huffed:

“Hmph, if you really do marry into that family, I’ll…”

She intended to say “I’ll ignore you,” but for some reason it didn’t feel threatening enough. Then, as if struck by inspiration, she changed her tune:

“If you dare betray me, no matter where you run, to the ends of the earth, I will chase you down!”

Long Hu spoke with utmost seriousness, but because she looked too young and delicate, Long Long didn’t take it to heart but just stroked her ear—her ear twitched a few times, and her serious expression couldn’t hold.

After cheering up the little fox again, Long Long took his leave amidst her clingy reluctance.

Foxes may be nice, but I still have important matters to attend to.

The next choice was whether to teleport to join Autumn, Ling Yunpo, and Luo for the Great Competition at White Jade Capital, or to teleport to Wei Dongliu to see what trickery the Demon Cult was up to.

Upon careful consideration, it seemed appropriate to visit Wei Dongliu first.

After all, “the one who knows you best is your enemy”, and if the Demon Cult indeed had a surprising gift prepared for the Orthodox Sect’s Great Competition at White Jade Capital, it would be better to investigate under Wei Dongliu’s identity before heading directly to White Jade Capital, lest I come up short.

So Long Long instructed Ah Jing:

“Go to Shiping Mountain.”

[Point Location Four: Shiping Mountain, Tong Xuan Gate.]

[Identity: Wei Dongliu.]

[Mirror Flower Water Moon Template overlay, traveling through time-space.]

Upon arriving in the belly of Shiping Mountain, Wei Dongliu was surprised to find that aside from his two disciples and the Flying Asura, there was no one else present in the Sect Residence today.

Tsk, the absence of those people made it somewhat desolate.

Wei Dongliu called his two disciples over and made a perfunctory inquiry about their cultivation progress.

Though with their mediocre talents, it was highly unlikely they had made any remarkable progress.

“Replying to master,” Guo Jin earnestly said, “The Qi Sea of both disciple and junior sister is roughly one third filled.”

“Hm?” Wei Dongliu’s expression changed subtly as he took their wrists and probed carefully with his Divine Sense.

Indeed, within their Dantian, a rudimentary form of the Qi Sea was faintly discernible.

“`

“How have you all progressed so quickly?” Wei Dongliu asked with a frown, neither pleased nor angry.

His serene reaction did not match Guo Jin and Wang Cong’s speculations, as Guo Jin thought their master would be overjoyed at their rapid improvement, while Wang Cong felt the master would be furious they had not reported their progress sooner.

Nevertheless, Guo Jin answered honestly:

“Previously, Senior Jiang gave us many spirit pills.”

“After my junior sister and I took them, we felt our dantians swelling. Over dozens of days, the Qi Seas within us gradually formed.”

Wei Dongliu fell silent, searching his memory, and quickly found the answer:

Giant Wood Secret Realm.

Initially, at the invitation of Sima Changyan and Duan Fenhai, Ling Yunpo and An Zhisu entered the Giant Wood Secret Realm together to search for the secret medicines and spirit grass therein.

It turned out to be a trap set by Jiang the Witch and others from the Demon Cult: those despicable Demon Cultists had already scoured the place clean of spirit grass, leaving only some Purple Mansion Spirit Grasses of a few years’ maturity to bait the disciples of Shushan into an ambush.

Of course, with Ling Yunpo’s great wisdom, great determination, and great fortune, he managed to turn the tide, narrowly escaping with his life.

As for the gains, if the incidentally acquired Cloud-Parting Eight Trigrams Step is not considered, they ended up with only fifteen years’ worth of Purple Mansion secret medicines, which was disproportionate to the fatal risks they faced.

And where did the majority go? All plundered clean by the Demon Cult in advance!

This is a common problem faced by cultivators: the secret realms you seek to explore may not contain treasures; even if there are treasures, they might have been plundered; even if some remain, they might be traps…

Therefore, Wei Dongliu did not care much and temporarily shelved the matter in his mind, no longer dwelling on it.

Now that Guo Jin mentioned “spirit pills from Senior Jiang,” he quickly realized that they were probably the remnants of that batch of Purple Mansion Spirit Grass.

There are myriad types of spirit grass, each with varying effects depending on the years it had grown.

For example, He Shou Wu requires at least two thousand years of growth to be used as alchemy material for Purple Mansion secret medicines, enhancing Refining Mansion cultivation; He Shou Wu that is less than one thousand years old, however, would at best produce elixirs that replenish True Yuan.

The spirit grass plundered by Jiang Liyan and the others from the Giant Wood Secret Realm likely included a large batch of low-rank remnants like thousand-year-old He Shou Wu.

For disciples at the Refining Mansion stage, who already have abundant Qi Seas and only need to perfect their Purple Mansion, these remnants, although rare, are no longer of great value.

But for Qi Refining Rank disciples who have yet to form their Qi Seas, these spirit grasses could help them rapidly fill their True Yuan and shorten the Qi Refinement period.

Taking into account that disciples with average talents need over sixty years of breathing and Qi cultivation to saturate their Qi Seas, the twenty years’ worth of Qi Refinement cultivation these two disciples have, who knows how many jin of thousand-year-old He Shou Wu they consumed…

Even if Jiang the Witch and her cohort had no use for it, they could have sold it for money! Now that they have bestowed it upon his disciples, it seems they truly intend to form good relations with Tong Xuan Gate.

Wei Dongliu silently took note of this kindness and then asked:

“The Qi Cultivation Technique of our sect, ‘Demon-Vanishing Upper Spirit, Dividing Clear and Turbid Scripture,’ how well have you all practiced it?”

“Disciple has already mastered it,” Wang Cong replied this time.

She extended her finger, pushing a wisp of True Qi from her meridians and out of her body, then directly propelled it forward.

The True Qi struck the waterside grasses, which quickly withered from their roots up.

This was a derivative secret technique of the “Demon-Vanishing Upper Spirit, Dividing Clear and Turbid Scripture” called “Filth-Cloaked Sword Qi”: it involved projecting True Qi from the meridians, while simultaneously transforming its clear and turbid attributes, turning it into Demonic Qi with stronger corrosive properties.

It resembled the Intangible Sword Qi of Kunlun, but due to its classification as Demonic Qi, it lacked some of the ethereal grace and gained more ruthlessness.

Wei Dongliu nodded. For his second disciple Wang Cong to reach this level was truly not easy.

One must know that although Demonic Qi easily injures others, it can hurt oneself just as easily. Transforming into Demonic Qi too early can lead to it accumulating in the meridians, subtly changing the cultivator’s disposition over time, and even affecting their body, causing strange deformities.

His innate “Chaotic Demon Body,” impervious to Demonic Qi, was after all one in ten thousand.

Although the “Demon-Vanishing Upper Spirit, Dividing Clear and Turbid Scripture” differed from ordinary Demonic Cultivation Methods by being able to convert Demonic Qi back into True Qi, thus reducing its harm, Wang Cong’s exquisite control demonstrated that she wouldn’t have to worry about backlash even if she used other Demonic Cultivation Methods.

Wei Dongliu shifted his gaze to his eldest disciple, Guo Jin.

The latter could only smile sheepishly, scratching the back of his head as he said:

“Disciple has not yet mastered it and can only learn from my junior sister.”

“If you continue to be so dull, perhaps I should elevate the junior sister’s standing to let her become the senior disciple!” Wei Dongliu rebuked as he swept away with his sleeve.