Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
They had roasted beast meat for lunch. Yi Qing had somehow learned how to inspect spirit beast corpses along the way. He picked up some materials from the surroundings and used the leftover flames from the Red Lotus Karmic Fire to roast the beast meat.
Lonemoon respectfully lit a candle for Qing Yi who lay there motionless with his eyes still open. The beast meat was… freaking delicious. As he finished up his fifth beast steak, Lonemoon began to worry about his future.
Ever since he got to know Foodie Shen, his many years of Grain Liberation had slowly gone to waste. The foodie in him—which was present in every Chinese—was unleashed. He had not managed to reign it in. If this carried on, he didn’t know when he would see the results of his Grain Liberation.
Rotten Shen Ying. She destroyed my immortal future and prevented me from achieving Immortal Ascension!
(#‵′)凸
“One more piece!”
After finishing their meal, they surveyed the once beautiful Immortal Pavilion. It had been completely destroyed. Shen Ying’s sword had struck the Immortal Pavilion’s foundation so that all that remained was the elixir-refining cauldron.
“Where should we go next?” Shen Ying glanced at Lonemoon. You’re the boss—you call the shots.
“There’s nothing valuable left here,” Lonemoon answered as he looked at the elixir-refining cauldron. The Immortal Pavilion was in shambles and the pills in the treasury had lost their effectiveness. The Vegetation Spirit was the only valuable thing left in this entire ancient mystic realm, so they had no reason to remain here. “Let’s go inside the cauldron to take a look. Once three months is up, we’ll go home.”
“Please hold on!” The three of them were just about to move off when they were stopped by a voice from behind. Bitao suddenly floated toward them from out of nowhere. “How about the heritage? My two little friends, are you interested in inheriting the heritage?”
Lonemoon’s heart skipped a beat. He had almost forgotten about the Immortal Soul. This was a heritage belonging to an immortal sect after all—there could be many long-lost recipes.
“Now that you mention it… you’ve already tried to hand your heritage down for so long. What exactly does it contain?” Shen Ying asked.
Bitao’s eyes lit up on hearing her question. He obediently floated closer to her and answered, “Let me answer you, Great Immortal: my heritage contains all the recipes for all the pills and elixirs of the Dan Yang Sect as well as all the knowledge of refining pills. My Dan Yang Sect was the top Immortal Sect 50,000 years ago. We had countless alchemists, and many immortals would come to our sect begging for just one pill or elixir.”
“Oh.” So the heritage is just a compilation of life techniques.
“Great Immortal, I promise that whichever of your two subordinates who inherits my heritage will become the next renowned alchemist. He who inherits the heritage can easily refine any of the pills you saw in the Pill Storage Repository earlier.”
The corner of Lonemoon’s mouth twitched. Hey, hey, hey. When did he become Shen Ying’s subordinate? In any case, this heritage did sound really attractive.
Shen Ying blinked. Suddenly, her face lit up as if she had thought of a brilliant idea.
“Are you sure that the heritage contains the recipes for supreme-grade pills and elixirs from 50,000 years ago?”
“Of course! They are all treasures.”
“Oh, then after all this time… aren’t they now outdated?”
“… Ah? Ah!” Bitao went silent.
“Look!” Shen Ying began to explain in a serious tone, “Times have changed and will continue to change. All your techniques were used 50,000 years ago. The outside world must have undergone tens of revolutions right?”
“…”
“Although your heritage doesn’t contain digital products which rapidly become obsolete, but a few years… or a few hundred years would certainly be enough to make the recipes obsolete, right? After all, 50,000 years is enough to progress from the Stone Age to when socialism became popular.”
Bitao: “…”
Lonemoon: “…”
Yi Qing: “…”
Bitao didn’t really understand, but… why did he suddenly feel like he was about to vomit blood? All these recipes for supreme-grade pills and elixirs from the honorable Dan Yang Sect are… really… outdated?
“My two… two Fellow Daoists.” He forced himself to face the two people standing beside him. “Can you please take over…”
But before he could finish, Lonemoon and Yi Qing both took a huge step backward.
“…” They didn’t have to be so practical, did they? This was an ancient heritage they were being asked to receive—how could they despise it so?
┭┮_┭┮
“My two Fellow Daoists, if either of you are willing to inherit this heritage, I… I…” Bitao looked around him, searching for something to offer. He gritted his teeth and with a look of shame, he pointed to the elixir-refining cauldron beside him and continued, “I will donate the Deviant Fire in that cauldron to you. How’s that?” He had to pass down the heritage no matter what. Otherwise, he wouldn’t rest in peace!
“The fire in this cauldron…” Shen Ying began.
Lonemoon and Yi Qing’s faces turned pale and they both moved to cover her mouth.
Please, Patriarch! Could you let this mystic realm off?
————————
In the end, Lonemoon agreed to inherit the Dan Yang Sect’s heritage. The Immortal Soul kept his word and passed down the Deviant Fire from the cauldron as well. Lonemoon split the Deviant Fire in two and gave the other half to Yi Qing.
Yi Qing did not know how to refine pills, but he had quite a bit of knowledge on weapon refinement. The Deviant Fire would be especially useful for refining weapons.
50,000 years worth of heritage wasn’t even worth as much as a Deviant Fire…
Lonemoon studied the heritage closely. It turned out to be just as Shen Ying, that jinx, had said. Apart from some long-lost pill recipes, 80% of the recipes in the heritage were for outdated pills and elixirs. The current pills and elixirs were far more effective and the ingredients required to make them were far more accessible.
He felt as if he had just found education material from a whole other age—the recipes were useless. More importantly, the long-lost recipes were for pills and elixirs that had either been replaced in the Azure World or that had already ceased to exist.. At the end of the day, very little of it had any value.
After he looked through all the recipes, he immediately transferred the recipes in the heritage onto a jade slip. He would hand it to Xi Qiu once he got back to the Dao Repository and allow his disciples to study these recipes freely. At least this would fulfill Bitao’s last wish.
The three of them remained in the mystic realm for over a month. During this time, Lonemoon wholeheartedly cleansed the Deviant Fire. The Deviant Fire was extremely powerful, so it took him a lot of effort just to contain it. This was probably because there was a lot of Immortal Qi surrounding them. After containing the Deviant Fire, his cultivation level—which had remained the same throughout the year—finally began to increase.
However, he had no time to celebrate. He turned around to look at Yi Qing who had also managed to cleanse the Deviant Fire. Yi Qing had woken up early every day to fix their meals and even planned to build a house for Shen Ying while they were here. Lonemoon wanted to vomit blood just thinking about it.
Damn it, there’s no use comparing. Lonemoon felt as if he was a bastard to the heavens—Yi Qing was definitely the true son.
“Let’s go back!” He picked up the broken pieces of his heart before he headed out of the ancient mystic realm. Even after exiting the mystic realm, he didn’t communicate with anyone around him. Instead, he headed straight for Blackheaven Sect.
Lonemoon immediately brought Shen Ying and Yi Qing to the Main Peak’s main hall. He took out the spirit herbs that he picked from the mystic realm from his storage bag. Xi Qiu grinned at the sight of it all, making himself look like a 200kg child.
“There are so many ten thousand-year-old spirit herbs! The trip must have been hard on Uncle-Master and Perfected Yi…” But then Xi Qiu suddenly paused as he studied Yi Qing with disbelief written all over his face. “You… your… your cultivation level… why is it…” Yi Qing was at the Nascent Soul stage when he had left Blackheaven Sect. How did he return as a Soul Formation cultivator? Was he blind?
“He had an epiphany in the mystic realm,” Lonemoon explained as the corner of his mouth twitched.
“Yet… yet another epiphany!” Didn’t he just have an epiphany not long ago? He is advancing so quickly! Xi Qiu suppressed his surprise and tried to think carefully.That was an ancient mystic realm—maybe he was lucky. He bowed to Yi Qing and congratulated him, “Congratulations, Supremacy Yi Qing.”
Yi Qing nodded in response.
“Oh, yes.” Xi Qiu suddenly recalled something. “Was the Upper Azure World…”
He wanted to ask about Qing Yin but before he could finish, he felt the ground shake beneath his feet. The entire Blackheaven Sect began to shake as a blinding white light shone from outside of the main hall.
“Protective Mountain Array!” Immediately, the Protective Mountain Array was activated. Xi Qiu’s face turned pale as he turned to meet Lonemoon’s eyes. “Something’s happening!”
The two of them quickly ran out of the main hall while Shen Ying and Yi Qing followed closely behind.
The entire Blackheaven Sect was now being protected by the Protective Mountain Array. Not far from the array, a huge lotus flower was parked in the air. Atop the lotus flower stood hundreds of unknown cultivators. Each of them were donned in green and white checkered robes, all of them looking down with hostility.
An angry male voice sounded out.
“A little sect like yours actually dared to hurt someone from my Xuan Yuan Family. Hand over the three murderers who killed three of our elders. Otherwise, I will make a bloodbath out of this place!”
