Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit

After Lu Ping stepped out of the pavilion, he found somewhere safe to take out the map for a closer look. Suddenly, a dazzling red light flew from the north and instantly reached the sky above Xuan Qi Island.

A wave of an overwhelming aura covered the entire island and immediately appeared to discover something. The overwhelming aura promptly withdrew as the red light flickered and plunged into the pavilion.

There was a commotion among the disciples, but Lu Ping knew that it symbolized the arrival of Enlightened Master Qu, the real person in charge of the operation.

Back in the pavilion, Lu Ping knew his conjectures about the mission were correct. Zhen Ling Sect had planned for this a long time ago; the Cultivator Sharing Union was just used as an excuse to justify their actions. However, the discovery of the spirit stone mine had unintentionally made the whole operation more complicated.

A few moments later, the two master immortals hurriedly flew out of the pavilion. They gathered the disciples and announced, “Enlightened Master Qu has given his orders. All disciples will now head out and conquer the islands and nearby areas under Xuan Qi Island’s jurisdiction. Should there be any resistance, exterminate them all. Should you find yourself outmatched, especially if you’ve come across Cultivator Sharing Union’s leader Zhang Zhihe, quickly send a call for help and Master Immortal Du and I will be there shortly.”

The disciples answered in unison and accepted their task, no one dared to stay idle. They cast their mystic instruments and spread out from Xuan Qi Island.

Lu Ping chose to head southeast, towards a mini island roughly 50 miles away from Xuan Qi Island. The island held a mini spirit stone mine with a daily production of about 60 spirit stones. According to Xuan Ling Sect’s rules, the collection of resources occurred every five days, which meant roughly 300 spirit stones. It was one of the most important islands under Xuan Qi Island’s jurisdiction.

However, he had no idea how strong the cultivators residing on the island would be. Lu Ping stuffed an Essence Recuperating Pellet in his mouth and thought, Even if I come across a Peak Ninth Rank Blood Refining Realm, I’ll still fight him!

The islands in the sea were divided into four classes. Those with a radius of 10 miles were called mini islands; those with a radius of 50 miles were small islands; the medium islands had a radius of 100 to 200 miles; the large islands a radius of 500 miles and the colossal islands with 1,000 miles in radius.

Zhen Ling Sect was considered a big sect in the North Ocean, but even so, it only had a large island with a radius of roughly 700 miles as its central base. However, they possessed a large spirit mine which the sect had nurtured and cultivated for thousands of years. It was enough for the current development of Zhen Ling Sect.

Lu Ping used his flying skiff mystic instrument and took half an hour to reach the mini island, Huang Yu Island.

He deliberately flew higher to get an overview of the layout. He realized that the island was fairly calm. Perhaps it was due to the late hour, so there were only a few lights coming from the commoners’ residences.

Lu Ping mulled for a moment. He took out the Xuan Ling Sect disciple’s uniform and put it on, then hurried to the place marked on the map. He knows that the island disciples would definitely station themselves close to the spirit stone mine.

Just when he was about half a mile away from the marked location on the map, a cold voice suddenly called out from a rock ahead, “Who are you? What are you doing here?”

Lu Ping felt lucky in his heart. If he hadn’t worn the Xuan Ling Sect’s uniform beforehand, the person hiding behind the rock would have definitely ambushed him.

Lu Ping pretended to be anxious and said, “Senior Martial Brother, it’s me! Master Immortal Zhao Lingqiao has an emergency, he ordered me to come and inform Senior Martial Brother to immediately return to Xuan Qi Island.”

“Oh,” the man replied, “Do you know what for?”

Lu Ping cursed in his heart, and continued to lie, “Master Immortal Zhao said Zhen Ling Sect might be coming to attack Xuan Qi Island. The senior martial brothers residing around the islands are ordered to quickly return to help. Master Immortal Zhao also sent the Cultivator Sharing Union’s members back to report to the sect.”

Only then did the person behind the rock finally walked out. “No wonder you rushed straight to my station in a panic. That’s why!”

Lu Ping watched the cultivator walking toward him while secretly feeling proud of himself. But when he heard the cultivator’s words, his heart skipped a beat and he said, “So Senior Martial Brother has been following me all this time.”

The person shook his head. “It was the warning charms scattered around Huang Yu Island. After you entered the island, the charms were triggered and I immediately knew.”

Lu Ping smiled at the approaching cultivator and answered, “Oh, I see. I thought Senior Martial Brother entered the Blood Condensation Realm and cultivated the divine sense!”

The person shook his head and smiled bitterly. “How is that so easily achieved? I’ve only gathered a few spirit herbs for the Blood Condensation Pellet. Who knows how long it’ll take to gather the rest?”

Lu Ping was overjoyed in his heart when he heard this. “If that’s the case, then please die!”

Even as he spoke, a sword ray had already slashed out, catching the person off-guard. Shocked, he could only throw out a top-grade mystic weapon to defend himself. “You’re not from Xuan Ling Sect! Who are you!?”

Lu Ping answered firmly, “The one taking your life!”

With these words, he gave the cultivator no time to react and released two more top-grade blood charms.

On the other hand, the cultivator’s mystic weapon was slashed in half by Lu Ping’s sword. The sword attack continued to slice down, inflicting a half-foot-long cut on the cultivator’s body. Yet the cultivator managed to avoid the blade from hitting his vital points.

The cultivator quickly took out a pagoda mystic instrument, but before he could cast it, two blood charms knocked the pagoda down to the ground. One must know, the power of top-grade blood charms was only second to the attacks of a Blood Condensation Realm cultivator—they were incredibly powerful.

Lu Ping jabbed his sword out again, forcing the cultivator to put away his interspatial pouch. The cultivator had no choice but to use hand signs and cast out five consecutive spells in an attempt to slow the other’s attacks.

Lu Ping casually slapped a top-grade protective blood charm on his body—he didn’t need to worry about the spells anymore. He proceeded to issue nonstop attacks at the cultivator.

Seeing that all his spells didn’t work, the cultivator couldn’t help cursing desperately, “Top-grade blood charms! What a despicable piece of scum!”

Lu Ping didn’t know if he was scolding him for using top-grade blood charms or for tricking and ambushing him.

Just as he finished cursing, Lu Ping waved his sword one last time and separated the cultivator’s head from his body.

Watching the blood spurting out of the cultivator’s neck, Lu Ping still felt a little uncomfortable even though he had already taken several lives before. He looted two interspatial pouches from the cultivator’s corpse and hurriedly left the scene.

After that, he went to another site and plundered a few dozen pounds of spirit rice. Although there were other places that had more spirit resources, they had yet to reach full growth, so it would be a waste of time to go there now. Hence, Lu Ping turned to leave for another island.

While on his way, Lu Ping took a look at his loot. There were 160 spirit stones in the second interspatial pouch. Normally, the island disciples on duty were tasked with overseeing the resources on the island. In return, they would have a 20% share of the total production of the island resources. It appeared that this cultivator had already taken his share.

One must know, 60 pounds of spirit rice were only worth 20 spirit stones.

On the other hand, there were many valuable items inside of the cultivator’s own interspatial pouch. Lu Ping was shocked to find that the pagoda mystic instrument was a mid-grade defensive mystic instrument. Luckily, he was quick to knock it away from the cultivator’s hands, otherwise, the battle would definitely end in a stalemate.

The pagoda mystic instrument had solved his issue of finding new equipment for when he entered the Ninth Rank Blood Refining Realm. Although he could also cast mid-grade mystic instruments now, it was only just barely. This was only because his arcane energy was much more abundant than the rest. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be able to achieve that much either.

A low-grade offensive mystic instrument; a langya club with a mighty-looking appearance.

Three bottles of Blood Vigor Pellets, top-grade medicinal pellets used in Ninth Rank Blood Refining Realm. They were high-quality medicinal pellets, more than Lu Ping had seen in the past.

Three five-hundred-year spirit herbs used to concoct the Blood Condensation Pellets. Although Lu Ping had two spirit herbs of the same kind already, he still had to exchange them for Blood Condensing Pellets from Zhen Ling Sect.

The Blood Condensing Pellets required 24 kinds of five-hundred-year spirit herbs to concoct. But as long as the disciples were to gather any eight of the spirit herbs, even if they were all the same kind, they could still exchange the spirit herbs for a Blood Condensing Pellet from the sect.

There were also almost 200 spirit stones. The job of overlooking a spirit stone mine sure was a rewarding one. Even when this island disciple was using the best medicinal pellets for his cultivation, he could still save up such a large amount of spirit stones.

Then, there was also a jade scroll used for charm-crafting. This Xuan Ling Sect disciple must also be skilled in that area if he could craft the rarely seen warning charms within the Blood Refining Realm.

Lu Ping placed the jade scroll close to his forehead. He already knew how to craft most of the charms recorded in the scroll already. Other than that, there were also several summaries of the cultivator’s charm-crafting experience as well as the one warning charm that Lu Ping had been coveting.

As for the rest of the spirit materials and junk items, Lu Ping didn’t bother to count them anymore.