"Agreed."
Wang Yu was very foresighted, having Huang Kai and the others obtain the official certification. With this, Zhao Shang could legitimately enter the Ice Snow Pavilion's official accounts.
"Then, pleasant cooperation."
Shaking hands with Wang Yu, Zhao Shang felt complex emotions. To restrain his inner desires, cooperate with him, even cede some benefits—
Such a person, even with a Waste Spiritual Root, could absorb every bit of nourishment and gradually grow.
Wang Yu familiarly patted Zhao Shang's shoulder, saying warmly, "Let bygones be bygones. From now on, we're friends. I won't stay in the pavilion's room anymore. In three days, come to this address; I'll introduce you to a few friends."
"Alright—"
A thousand words ultimately condensed into one.
After handling these matters and returning to his residence in the Evil God Market, Wang Yu finally had time to take out the "high-grade Coldblood Pill" bought for five hundred spirit stones.
The pill appeared ice-blue, emitting a faint chill even inside the box. Inside the pill was a blood-red dot, brimming with spiritual energy.
According to the effect description, this pill could help cultivators practicing the "Coldblood Art" gain forty flows of spiritual power, with the effect lasting a full year.
This characteristic didn't mean its effect was exceptionally good; it only indicated the Coldblood Pill's massive medicinal power and difficulty in refinement.
Based on Wang Yu's current cultivation speed, he could only refine one strand of spiritual energy every two days, resulting in only 18 flows of spiritual power per year—and this was with the help of the Placement Rack. Relying on himself, producing 1-2 flows would be impressive.
Taking the pill to refine Qi.
As the ice-blue pill entered his stomach, a cool, refreshing sensation spread from his dantian to his limbs and bones. Wang Yu felt extremely comfortable.
Using his spiritual sense to observe internally, he could see the pill within his dantian, enveloped by gaseous spiritual energy, being continuously refined. Its shrinking speed was almost imperceptibly slow—the refinement difficulty was indeed high.
After a long while, one major cycle was completed. His cultivation progress was noticeably faster than before, but refining the pill's power relied solely on himself.
For the next year, much of his time would be spent on this.
He waited quietly for three days.
At the agreed-upon shop, he introduced Zhao Shang to the three members of the Alchemist Alliance—Zhou Tao and the others. After deciding the types and quantities of the first batch of pills, each contributed their share, purchasing many low-priced spiritual herbs.
Huang Kai and Luo Pinghu, being short on funds, couldn't buy too many ingredients. Wang Yu lent them his remaining five hundred spirit stones, and Zhou Tao contributed an extra thousand to help the brothers complete the first batch of herb purchases.
These spirit stones were to be repaid after the transaction was completed.
The transaction scale of three alchemists wasn't very large, and the profits were limited. Wang Yu didn't participate for now, planning to wait longer.
But Zhao Shang felt the amount was somewhat small. Wang Yu could only reassure him that as the number of alchemists increased, the potential earnings would naturally grow.
This was true, but the alliance's growth must not attract attention. If Wang Yu participated in the future, it would only be to temper his spiritual sense.
Therefore, the progress would be very slow. Even if Zhao Shang was dissatisfied, there was nothing he could do—once on the pirate ship, it wasn't easy to disembark.
As for the Alchemist Alliance, with the Ice Snow Pavilion channel, Wang Yu's previous promises were validated—he could truly deliver.
Huang Kai and Luo Pinghu were thoroughly convinced. Even though his cultivation was the lowest, they respected him more. Only Zhou Tao's mind was more active.
Over time, he might bypass Wang Yu and contact Zhao Shang directly.
That didn't matter. As long as he helped earn spirit stones, minor issues could be tolerated, as long as they didn't cross Wang Yu's bottom line.
Thus, the matter of the Alchemist Alliance was settled.
...
...
**Day 385 of Outer Disciple Life!**
Over a year had passed since his promotion to outer disciple. Wang Yu was about to reach his first cultivation拐点 (guǎidiǎn -拐点)拐点 (guǎidiǎn -拐点).
The "Coldblood Art" reached perfection today.
In his Evil God Market residence, Wang Yu was sensing the changes in his spiritual roots. According to the technique, upon perfection, it could slightly improve the cultivator's aptitude.
This improvement was almost negligible, but for Wang Yu, it was quite important. After all, there was no worse aptitude than a Waste Spiritual Root; anything worse would make cultivation impossible.
"This feeling..."
Through an intangible sense, Wang Yu seemed to see his own spiritual roots—all five elements (metal, wood, water, fire, earth) were present, but each was less than an inch long, pitifully short.
Reflected in cultivation, this meant he had difficulty refining heaven and earth spiritual energy, insufficient affinity, and struggled to sense and capture spiritual energy.
At this moment, as the technique reached perfection, an ice-blue spiritual light emerged from his blood and attached to his water spiritual root.
It visibly shot up a small section, about half its original length. Among the five-element spiritual roots, it stood out like a crane among chickens. Wang Yu's eyes widened.
"Wait—
"This is a slight improvement? It grew almost half!"
But upon second thought, those who perfected the "Coldblood Art" were all at least Great Perfection of Qi Refining. Their aptitude was usually triple spiritual roots.
In comparison, the growth would naturally be微弱 (wēiruò -微弱)微弱 (wēiruò -微弱), and likely, because they were already high enough, this aptitude-improving power was too weak, less noticeable than in Wang Yu's case.
"So, it's actually because I'm weak that the growth is obvious, not because my cultivation effect is good..."
Gaining some insight, Wang Yu continued observing.
He found the water spiritual root not only grew longer but also showed a tendency towards crystallization.
No!
More accurately, it was turning into ice crystals!
"Ice spiritual root?"
Conventional spiritual root attributes were based on the five elements, but变异 (biànyì -变异)变异 (biànyì -变异) spiritual roots could also emerge: ice, thunder, wind, space, blood, Yin, Yang... etc.
They were unpredictable, elusive as fate itself.
This discovery gave Wang Yu more ideas. Perhaps he could尝试 (chángshì -尝试)尝试 (chángshì -尝试) to actively mutate into an ice spiritual root. While five-element spiritual roots had no restrictions on cultivation attributes, they also lacked the advantages of attribute compatibility.
Every bit counted. Every improvement in aptitude was precious to him, and the Placement Rack would amplify this advantage dozens, even hundreds of times.
**[Slot 1: Coldblood Art]**
**[Coldblood Art (100/100): Seventy-two practices per day. Mastery achievable in twenty years.]**
Twenty years... meant a second-grade Foundation Establishment technique derived from the Coldblood Art, with its aptitude-improving effect potentially amplified even further!
Wang Yu had no intention of removing it. After all, perfection was one thing, but the cultivation it fed back was most important.
The number of daily circulation cycles also increased significantly.
**The next day.**
Feeling the efficiency after the technique's perfection, Wang Yu was overjoyed. Originally, one technique placement slot could only refine one strand of spiritual energy every two days; now it was one strand per day.
Currently, he had accumulated about thirty-five flows of spiritual power within him—one-tenth of the way through the fourth layer of Qi Refining. He could break through to the fifth layer in at most seven-plus years.
This was half the time of his earlier estimate of over ten years, and this calculation only included one placement slot's efficiency.
If he used two placement slots + the high-grade Coldblood Pill effect,
the speed would be even faster.
**(End of Chapter)**