While they chatted, they arrived back at the area where Tianzhu Peak is located.
The disciples of Tianzhu Peak wore golden robes, very striking under the sunlight.
Rou’er suddenly remembered something. She tugged Mu Qiuhan’s sleeve and said, “Senior Sister, I remember you have a Snow Wolf fang in your storage ring, right? Take it out and trade it!”
“This Snow Wolf tooth is pretty, but for us wood-attribute spiritual energy users, it’s not very useful. At most it’s decoration, but the disciples of Tianzhu Peak can refine magic artifacts with it!”
Mu Qiuhan looked around. The magic artifacts being traded by the Tianzhu Peak disciples weren’t high grade, but Rou’er was very enthusiastic, so she gave her the Snow Wolf tooth and asked her to choose a magic artifact that could be used to defend against spiritual energy attacks.
Cultivators with wood-attribute spiritual energy have weak attack power. When encountering enemy attacks, they inevitably get flustered first, so defensive magic artifacts are indeed necessary.
Rou’er was picking and choosing there, while Mu Qiuhan casually looked around.
Suddenly, her eyes lit up.
At a stall by her feet was a copy of a “Metal-Wood System Cultivation Manual.”
Mu Qiuhan walked over to the young man in yellow robes behind the stall and said, “I’ll trade you a Foundation Building Pill for this cultivation manual, okay?”
The young man was taken aback when he heard this.
He nodded, picked up the cultivation manual, and handed it to Mu Qiuhan.
So Mu Qiuhan gave him the Foundation Building Pill from her storage ring.
After the young man received the pill, he carefully examined it several times. He confirmed there were no problems and only then put it away.
He seemed confused as to why the woman in front of him would use such a universally desired pill for increasing cultivation base to trade for his cultivation manual.
Meanwhile, as soon as Rou’er turned her head, she suddenly found the person beside her was gone.
Looking again, her Senior Sister had actually foolishly taken a Foundation Building Pill and traded it for a completely worthless beginner-level cultivation manual!
Rou’er was absolutely frantic.
She darted over to Mu Qiuhan, snatched the cultivation manual from her hand, and shoved it back into the young man’s hand.
“No trade, we’re not trading!”
She even wanted to snatch the pill back and return it to Mu Qiuhan.
However, the young man’s movements were too fast; the pill had already been tucked into his robe.
Rou’er, a young girl, felt too embarrassed to reach into a young man’s chest to snatch something, so she could only glare.
The young man was made very uncomfortable by Rou’er’s glare. Only then did he look in Mu Qiuhan’s direction and stammer, “This fellow disciple herself said she wanted to trade.”
But Rou’er still glared at him. “You’re clearly trying to cheat people!”
When the young man heard this, his face turned bright red.
“This… While this is just a beginner-level cultivation manual, it’s Metal-Wood system, unlike the ordinary ones. Metal-attribute spiritual energy has always conflicted with wood-attribute. If one could successfully fuse these two types of spiritual energy…”
“Pah!”
The young man hadn’t finished speaking when he was interrupted by Rou’er.
“You also know that Metal and Wood spiritual energy cannot coexist. Aren’t you just trying to cheat people?”
“Well, well, maybe there really is someone who can cultivate these two types of spiritual energy at the same time?”
The young man’s voice grew increasingly uncertain, while Rou’er’s voice grew louder.
“Let me ask you, you yourself have metal-attribute spiritual energy, have you practiced this cultivation manual?”
The young man shook his head.
“I wanted to practice it, but whenever I practiced halfway, I would feel a tearing force inside my body, so I had to stop.”
Rou’er stared wide-eyed at Mu Qiuhan. “Senior Sister, did you hear that? This cultivation manual can’t be practiced, we shouldn’t get it!”
Mu Qiuhan smiled.
Rou’er only knew one side of it, but she didn’t know that in this world, if there truly was someone who could cultivate two inherently conflicting types of spiritual energy simultaneously, that person was either a cheat or a great cultivator.
It was just a Foundation Building Pill; she was willing to take a gamble.
Besides, this pill was given to her by Perfected Yu Yang before she left. Although she hadn’t found anything wrong with the pill yet, drawing lessons from the past, she had to guard against that woman causing trouble again.
When the young man saw Mu Qiuhan wasn’t speaking, he thought she was starting to regret it, so he quickly took out a delicate bracelet from his person.
“Fellow disciple, how about this? I’ll give this to you as well, consider it a bonus.”
Rou’er quickly took it.
She held the bracelet up to her eyes and examined it closely.
“What kind of magic artifact is this? How come when spiritual energy enters it, there’s no fluctuation at all?”
When the young man heard this, he seemed a bit embarrassed.
“This isn’t a magic artifact, it’s just an ordinary bracelet.”
“One time when I went down the mountain for a sect mission, I found it in a small river at the foot of Fanghu Peak. Maybe a nearby villager lost it. I originally planned to keep it and give it to my future cultivation partner…”
Seeing Rou’er purse her lips, the young man got a bit anxious.
He simply stopped paying attention to Rou’er and spoke directly to Mu Qiuhan, “Fellow disciple, take a look. This bracelet is really pretty, girls will all like it.”
Mu Qiuhan took the bracelet from Rou’er’s hand.
As the young man said, the carving on this bracelet was very delicate. The inside also concealed a twin lotus flower, the symbolism of which was quite beautiful.
Mu Qiuhan really liked it, so she directly put the bracelet on her wrist.
“Okay then, I’ll trade with you.”
“Senior Sister!”
As soon as Rou’er heard this, she practically jumped up.
Mu Qiuhan comforted her and said, “I’ve already formed my Core now, that Foundation Building Pill has limited effect on me. Trading one pill for two things isn’t a loss, right?”
“But…”
Rou’er still wanted to argue further, but Mu Qiuhan interrupted her, “Look how pretty this bracelet is.”
She raised her arm, directly facing the sun.
And saw that the silver-white metal, under the sunlight, actually emitted five-colored light.
The more Mu Qiuhan looked at the bracelet, the more she liked it.
She vaguely felt that the pattern on the inside of this bracelet seemed familiar, but for a moment she couldn’t remember where she had seen it.
At first, Rou’er was still complaining indignantly, but as they continued browsing, various strange and novel items quickly captured her attention.
This girl found everything appealing, but unfortunately, she couldn’t take out anything valuable to trade with others anymore, so she could only chatter on in front of Mu Qiuhan.
One moment she would talk about how good a certain magic artifact was, the next moment she would say how rare a certain pill was.
Mu Qiuhan followed her and browsed through this vast market. After making the round, she actually had some gains.
She was, after all, a disciple selected by Dongtian Peak; even if her resources were meager, she was still richer than that girl Rou’er.
As dusk began to fall, the trading between disciples of the various peaks was almost finished. Everyone began gathering in groups to socialize.
A solemn bell toll came from within the clouds, ancient and solemn.
The sound echoed in the air above the square, lingering for a long time.
The disciples from the eighteen peaks heard the sound and all began gathering towards the main hall in the center of the square.
Mu Qiuhan followed behind Rou’er, moving towards the direction where the crowd was gathering.
Violet Sun Hall was ancient and grand. Above the main entrance hung a huge plaque with gilded words.
The disciples stopped in front of the hall, waiting for the elders to announce the list of selected disciples.
Some people had already started guessing privately which lucky individuals would be chosen by the elders this year to become direct disciples.
Although Mu Qiuhan was standing at the very front of the line, she kept her head lowered.
She didn’t dare cast a spell on herself in this kind of situation to hide her appearance, so she could only hope not to be seen by those old fellows.
The wooden gate of Violet Sun Hall silently opened. About twenty people walked out from inside, both men and women. Five of them had colored embroidery on the shoulders of their robes and wore golden sashes around their waists, clearly different from the plain colored robes of the others.
These were likely the elders from the main peak.
The elder standing in the center coughed towards the crowd of chattering disciples.
“Silence.”
Although the sound wasn’t loud, it quickly covered the entire square.
Obviously, the words contained spiritual energy.
Mu Qiuhan’s eardrums hurt, shaken by this sound wave. While she inwardly complained about this body being too weak, she simultaneously lowered her head further.
She only heard that person say, “The Sect Master and several Senior Brothers are still in secluded cultivation. The disciples selected this time will temporarily first go to the Five Peaks to study according to their spiritual energy attribute. After the elders finish their secluded cultivation, they will undergo another assessment and then perform the master-apprenticeship ceremony.”
The disciples looked at each other in confusion.
That elder didn’t give any further explanation, merely calling the thirty-odd selected individuals forward one by one to issue their respective identity tokens.
Mu Qiuhan received a vibrant green jade slip from the hands of an elder from the main peak wearing dark green robes.
That elder looked at Mu Qiuhan several times.
Mu Qiuhan felt something was wrong. Just as she was about to circulate the spiritual energy within her body to protect several vital points around her body, she heard that person say, “You are that disciple from Dongtian Peak who formed her Core at eighteen? You have wood and fire dual-attribute spiritual energy?”
Mu Qiuhan paused, startled.
She only heard that person say again, “But what a pity, this spiritual root doesn’t look that good.”
“Junior Sister, how come the disciples from your Dongtian Peak are getting worse with each generation?”
Mu Qiuhan finally understood now: this person wasn’t targeting her.
She quietly breathed a sigh of relief and retracted her posture.
When she looked up, she saw Perfected Yu Yang to the side, her face dark with anger.
Facing that person’s provocation, Perfected Yu Yang didn’t engage, merely saying, “These few disciples of mine are young and ignorant. I’ll have to trouble Senior Sister with them in the future.”
That person’s provocation landed on nothing.
Under everyone’s eyes, she couldn’t be too excessive, merely letting out a cold snort.
The ceremony in front of the hall quickly ended.
Perfected Yu Yang called Mu Qiuhan and the other two disciples over and gave some simple instructions, nothing more than telling them to cultivate well and so on.
Mu Qiuhan recalled the scene just now, so she asked one more question. After all, that elder seemed to have some past grievance with Perfected Yu Yang, and she certainly didn’t want to unknowingly become cannon fodder.
Perfected Yu Yang sighed, “My Senior Sister, Perfected Yu Ji, had some old grievances with me when we were young. Although that person is a bit petty, I figure she won’t unnecessarily make things difficult for you juniors.”
Mu Qiuhan, however, didn’t believe her.
Although this Perfected Yu Yang wasn’t someone easy to deal with, that Perfected Yu Ji could remember grievances from when she was young for so many years; she probably wasn’t much better.
Jade Dragon Peak truly had dangers everywhere.
Nice work 👏