Longevity with a Turtle

Chapter 47: Chapter 46: Spirit Beast Bloodline

Clutching the jade scroll, he poured his divine sense into it. Instantly, the contents of a book materialized in his mind.

[Yun Family Magazine]

Judging by the introduction, this was a comprehensive guide to the basic common sense of the Celestial South Domain’s Cultivation Realm, meticulously compiled by the Yun family. It was all-encompassing and covered a vast array of topics. Cultivation realms, the Hundred Cultivation Skills, heavenly materials and earthly treasures, magical artifacts, elixirs, spirit pets, and puppets—everything was included.

Chen Jianghe read through it carefully, section by section.

The first part was a geographical record, mainly introducing the terrain of the Celestial South Domain and the territories of various factions. The Celestial South Domain was vast, spanning ninety thousand miles from north to south. A river stretching seventy thousand miles ran from east to west, cutting the domain in half. This geographic divide split the Celestial South Sect into the South Gate and the North Gate.

The Yun family’s home at Jingyue Lake fell under the jurisdiction of the South Gate. The immortal sect examination that Gao Peiyao participated in was also hosted by the South Gate.

Chen Jianghe spent a day memorizing the contents of the geographical record. He was only temporarily staying at the Yun family’s home; sooner or later, he would leave. This geographical knowledge would be of great use to him, ensuring that when he eventually set out to travel the Celestial South Domain, he wouldn’t be wandering blindly.

The second part detailed heavenly materials and earthly treasures, recording various precious treasures that the Yun family ancestors had encountered. It featured rare items like spirit grass, immortal stones, and exotic flowers. Almost every treasure recorded came with an illustration. Chen Jianghe deeply memorized these immortal materials and precious treasures as well. They might come in handy in the future.

Next came the section on the Hundred Cultivation Skills.

He murmured in surprise, ”You can only touch upon the Alchemy Dao and Artifact Dao at the mid-stage of Qi Refining, and the Array Dao actually requires a late-stage Qi Refining cultivation!”

Opening the section on the Hundred Cultivation Skills, the first things that caught his eye were the Four Extremes of the Hundred Arts: Array, Artifact, Alchemy, and Talisman. The basic requirement for practicing the Artifact Dao and Alchemy Dao was actually a mid-stage Qi Refining cultivation.

This was because artifact refining and alchemy both required pill fire—a type of flame only possessed by Great Core Formation experts. Therefore, one had to use other exotic fires as substitutes. For example, earth fire, which was the fire of the earth’s core drawn out using arrays as a medium. Although arrays could draw out the fire of the earth’s core, cultivators still needed to manipulate these flames, which consumed a massive amount of magical power. The magical power of an early-stage Qi Refining cultivator simply couldn’t sustain such expenditure.

As for the Array Dao, only a late-stage Qi Refining cultivator could barely begin to contact and comprehend it. This was because the Array Dao had extremely high requirements for divine sense and was particularly draining on one’s heart and mind.

The Talisman Dao, relatively speaking, was much simpler. One could attempt it at the early stage of Qi Refining. Most importantly, unlike other skills, the early stages of the Talisman Dao didn’t require an inheritance.

Of course, this was only true for the early stages. If one wanted to become a tier one high-grade talisman master, they still needed the corresponding tier one Talisman Dao inheritance. Otherwise, even after a hundred years of exhaustive effort, it would be difficult to draw a high-grade spirit talisman.

Chen Jianghe’s Talisman Dao skills were currently only at the entry level. He could barely draw lower-grade water arrow talismans; high-grade spirit talismans were still very far off. Thus, a Talisman Dao inheritance wasn’t an urgent need. He would wait until his cultivation improved and his Talisman Dao skills advanced to tier one middle grade before finding a way to acquire an inheritance. From the moment he stepped onto the immortal path, he had adhered to a mindset of steady management, gradual progress, and solid steps to plan his immortal dao.

After that came other cultivation skills such as medicinal cuisine, medicine, puppets, winemaking, spirit plants, beast taming, and spirit architecture. Although Chen Jianghe didn’t plan to dabble in these, he still read through them carefully, at least aiming to gain a basic understanding of these skills.

Further on were sections regarding magical artifacts, elixirs, and spirit beasts.

He thought, ”It seems that plump shopkeeper didn’t lie to me. Spirit beasts basically don’t have inheritance cultivation techniques.”

According to the records in the [Yun Family Magazine], spirit beasts’ cultivation realms were divided into nine tiers from lowest to highest, corresponding to the nine major realms of cultivators. For a tier three spirit beast (demon beast), its spirit core would transform, sink into the dantian, and condense into a demon core, allowing it to speak human languages. A tier five spirit beast would undergo tribulation transformation. Upon success, it could shed its beast form and appear no different from human cultivators.

Moreover, a spirit beast of the same realm was generally stronger than a human cultivator. For instance, a tier two spirit beast could defeat a Foundation Establishment ancestor who lacked suitable magical artifacts.

Another point was that spirit beasts, like cultivators, had inherent talents, and their hierarchy was even stricter. For cultivators, talent was determined by the number of spirit roots. For spirit beasts, talent was judged by the purity of their bloodline. They also relied on bloodline inheritances for cultivation.

Bloodline purity was divided from first to ninth grade. The higher the bloodline level, the greater the potential. The vast majority of beasts in this world had a first-grade bloodline. It was extremely difficult for them to awaken their spiritual wisdom and enter the cultivation tiers.

Beasts with a second-grade bloodline were born with the ability to breathe spiritual energy. As they devoured spiritual qi, they would gradually awaken their spiritual wisdom, successfully enter the cultivation tiers, and transform into spirit beasts. However, without a great serendipity, second-grade bloodline beasts would be permanently stuck as tier one spirit beasts.

Beasts with a third-grade bloodline possessed innate spiritual wisdom and cultivated very quickly. Generally, they could cultivate to become tier two spirit beasts. Within the Jingyue Lake territory, a spirit beast with a third-grade bloodline had never appeared. The only instance recorded in the [Yun Family Magazine] occurred at a Qinghe Marketplace auction, where one was bought by the beast taming immortal race Zhou family for the exorbitant price of three thousand two hundred spirit stones. This was significantly higher than the value of a Foundation Establishment Pill.

He reasoned, ”Little Cyan Fish’s bloodline purity is second grade, so Little Black’s bloodline purity should be first grade. It forcibly transformed into a spirit beast. But why does it feel like ever since Little Black became a tier one spirit beast, its cultivation speed hasn’t been slow at all?”

After entering the tier and becoming a spirit beast, Little Black had only eaten a single Qi Nourishing Pill, which amounted to seven or eight years of bitter cultivation at best. Yet its magical power fluctuations gave Chen Jianghe the impression that it was at the second-layer Qi Refining stage, and on the verge of breaking through to the third-layer Qi Refining stage.

In other words, Little Black’s cultivation speed was nearly twice as fast as his. This completely contradicted the records in the [Yun Family Magazine], which stated that first-grade bloodline spirit beasts cultivated at an agonizingly slow pace. It seemed even a notch faster than a second-grade bloodline, though not quite reaching the level of a third-grade bloodline.

He wondered, ”Could it be because of the [Third Transformation Demon Ascension Technique]?”

Normally, only demon beasts with a fifth-grade bloodline or higher possessed inheritance cultivation methods. Because of the spirit platform mark, Little Black had acquired one. Chen Jianghe pondered it repeatedly and felt that the only thing capable of boosting Little Black’s cultivation speed was the [Third Transformation Demon Ascension Technique].

”If it’s truly as I suspect, doesn’t that make my golden finger even more powerful?” he thought.

The faster Little Black cultivated, the more beneficial it was for Chen Jianghe. Not only would he gain a powerful spirit pet, but his maximum lifespan would also continuously increase.

Immediately, Chen Jianghe used his divine sense for internal observation of his spirit platform, communicating with Little Black, who was currently feeding the fish.

”Little Black, do you feel any changes after cultivating the [Third Transformation Demon Ascension Technique]?”

”Changes? Does my magical power doubling count?”

”...”

Chen Jianghe rolled his eyes. The Yun family’s core technique, the Nascent Essence True Water Scripture, only provided a thirty percent magical power amplification. Yet, the [Third Transformation Demon Ascension Technique] doubled Little Black’s magical power. It was glaringly obvious that the [Third Transformation Demon Ascension Technique] was vastly superior to the Yun family’s Nascent Essence True Water Scripture.

”Two-Legged Beast Master, I feel that if I eat one more Qi Nourishing Pill, I can reach the peak of early-stage tier one.”

Little Black’s excited and joyful voice echoed from the spirit platform mark.

Hearing this, Chen Jianghe froze, somewhat dumbfounded. The peak of early-stage tier one was equivalent to third-layer Qi Refining.

It had barely been over six years since Little Black entered the tier and became a spirit beast. Was it already about to rival a third-layer Qi Refining cultivator? Its seven years of progress matched his fifteen years.

Could it be that the [Third Transformation Demon Ascension Technique] bestowed upon Little Black by the spirit platform mark could upgrade innate talent and bloodline...?