NFBE Chapter 288 - 230: Realm Breakthrough
Chapter 288 - 230: Realm Breakthrough
At the pool behind Celestial Gate Mountain, Fang Qingyuan followed his usual routine and went to feed the Spirit Fish.
In a short while, this place would be taken over by Zhao E Lian’s men.
Since they all belonged to the same sect, the main branch at Zongshan was unwilling to be too ruthless. Although Lechuan was being forced out, he was allowed to keep the wealth he had painstakingly built over the years.
They had given Lechuan half a year to deal with his own faction. Currently, some of Lechuan’s and Zhao Liangde’s relatives had already been relocated back to Zongshan’s territory.
Thirty years had passed like a fleeting dream. The memories of two generations now came to a close.
Fang Qingyuan was now fifty-five years old, but because of the Divine Technique he had awakened during his Foundation Establishment, his appearance was still that of a young man of twenty-seven or twenty-eight.
In fact, thanks to his Body Refining, Fang Qingyuan’s features had been honed, making him much more handsome than before.
On a blue-green stone by the pool, Fang Qingyuan carefully filtered out the impure qi from the void to feed the Spirit Fish below.
After three years of feeding, only a little over two hundred of the original thousand-odd Purple Spirit Crystal Fish remained.
And these Spirit Fish had grown from the size of a pea to the length of a thumb.
Raising Spirit Fish was not easy, especially a rare treasure like this of the Tier Two Upper Grade. If not for the Qi Eating Technique passed down by Lechuan, likely not even one in a hundred of these Spirit Fish would have survived.
After he finished feeding the Spirit Fish, Fang Qingyuan closed his eyes to meditate on the spot. But what no one knew was that he had already sent his spiritual soul into the Immortal Mansion.
...
Inside the Immortal Mansion, green lotus leaves floated on the surface of a twenty-odd-mu lake.
These were the Black Heart Peng Lotus, Tier One Upper Grade Spirit Plants that Fang Qingyuan had transplanted two years ago. Their seeds had high medicinal value.
Beneath the lotuses, ripples would occasionally spread across the water, created by large green fish at play.
What is a lotus pond without fish? When Fang Qingyuan transplanted the lotuses, he had also added dozens of Tier One Middle Grade Qingkou fish to the lake.
However, these Qingkou fish had been here for too short a time. Their meat was not yet tender and delicious, and they would need several more years.
Past this lake, in another pool with a different view, over a hundred Purple Spirit Crystal Fish were swimming about leisurely.
The Water Spirit Xuanwu was resting at the very bottom of the pool. Sensing Fang Qingyuan’s arrival, it rose to the surface and blew a few bubbles at him.
These hundred-plus Purple Spirit Crystal Fish were much larger than their counterparts in the outside world.
The Spirit Fish outside were only the size of a thumb, while these ones inside the Immortal Mansion had already grown to be half the size of a palm.
The size difference was so obvious mainly because the Spiritual Power in the Immortal Mansion was abundant, and also because Fang Qingyuan had specifically chosen the largest ones to send inside.
Fang Qingyuan would never bother with the old, weak, sickly, or poorly developed Spirit Fish.
For the past three years, he had only ever picked the very largest to bring into the Immortal Mansion. Those left in the outside world were all ones Fang Qingyuan had deemed unworthy.
This batch of young Purple Spirit Crystal Fish would mature in another seven years, at which point they would be ready to be eaten.
However, a ten-year-old Crystal Fish didn’t have enough medicinal potency. Only when they grew for fifty or even a hundred years could they be considered a true tonic.
The Crystal Fish Fang Qingyuan had eaten last time was only fifty or sixty years old, still a far cry from the top quality of a hundred-year-old specimen.
Therefore, Fang Qingyuan figured he should raise these Crystal Fish for many more years. Since he had plenty of lifespan himself, the wait would be worth it.
Besides these Crystal Fish, the hundred-plus-mu Spirit Plantation also contained many old Spirit Plants.
The ginseng, Mu Kui, Black-stemmed Ophipogon, Ice Cup Flower, and other Spirit Plants that Fang Qingyuan had planted back then had now accumulated significant medicinal properties. The thirty-year-old ginseng was already potent enough to be used in medicine.
Of course, Fang Qingyuan had no intention of selling these Spirit Plants, because he wasn’t short on Spirit Stones right now.
A while ago, Fang Qingyuan had held another auction, selling off the remaining fifteen percent of the Yuanling Square Marketplace shares belonging to Lechuan, Zhao Liangde, and himself.
But this auction was not as successful as the last one. The fifteen percent of shares only fetched a price of nine hundred Top-grade Spirit Stones, nearly half the value of the previous sale.
This was because some well-informed powers had learned of Lechuan’s situation. Facing an unknown new Southern Border Beast Taming Sect Master, the Yuanling Square Marketplace shares now carried much more risk.
Even so, Fang Qingyuan was very satisfied with an income of nine hundred Top-grade Spirit Stones.
Adding the two thousand top-grade stones from before to the proceeds from this auction, Fang Qingyuan had earned a total of nearly three thousand Top-grade Spirit Stones from the Yuanling Square Marketplace.
In addition, Fang Qingyuan quickly liquidated the various treasures gifted to him as tribute, which brought in another three hundred Top-grade Spirit Stones.
Thus, Fang Qingyuan’s net worth had reached over thirty-two hundred top-grade stones, more than ten times that of an average Foundation Establishment Cultivator.
An ordinary Early-stage Foundation Establishment Cultivator, if they were a Loose Cultivator, would have a net worth of around one hundred Top-grade Spirit Stones. Even one who was skilled in business and possessed a cultivation-related craft would not exceed three hundred-odd Top-grade Spirit Stones.
The only exception would be veteran cultivators who had been stuck in the Foundation Establishment Early Stage Realm their entire lives; their net worth might be more substantial.
As the Vice Master of the Southern Border Beast Taming Sect, Fang Qingyuan had been second to one and above millions during his years in power.
Twenty to thirty Foundation Establishment Cultivators had to curry favor with him. If he had decided to unscrupulously amass wealth, the Spirit Stones he could have obtained would have been far more than this.
But that would have been akin to killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. Before this whole affair with Zhao E Lian, Fang Qingyuan would never have done such a thing for the sake of the sect’s development.
And now, even if he wanted to, it was too late, because Zhao E Lian would not allow it.
The main branch at Zongshan had already sent people over. As soon as the deadline arrived, they would take over everything. In the meantime, these people weren’t idle; they were closely monitoring the movements of Lechuan’s faction to prevent any harm to the interests of the Southern Border Beast Taming Sect.
After obtaining these Spirit Stones, Fang Qingyuan no longer concerned himself with the administrative affairs of the Southern Border Beast Taming Sect. He now devoted himself daily to his cultivation, focused solely on rapidly advancing his realm.
Through this ordeal, Fang Qingyuan realized that no matter how well he handled the sect’s affairs, in the end, he was just paving the way for someone else.
Only cultivation, the steady and solid growth of one’s cultivation base, truly belonged to him.
He had been forced into the position by Lechuan in the first place. Over the past few years, Fang Qingyuan realized he hadn’t been as happy as he was back on Yuanling Mountain.
’So be it.’ Fang Qingyuan had actually come to terms with it. ’I can’t stop Zhao E Lian from coming anyway. All I can do is lie flat and accept it. In any case, I’ve got the Spirit Stones, my cultivation is advancing by leaps and bounds, and I haven’t lost out.’
At this thought, Fang Qingyuan suddenly felt a weight lift from his heart, as if a long-held frustration had dissipated. He gazed at the lush, verdant scenery within the Immortal Mansion, momentarily lost in the sight before him.
’Oh, Immortal Mansion,’ he thought. ’As long as I have you, this current setback is just a small pothole on the great path of my life. I need only lift my foot to step right over it.’
Just then, outside the Immortal Mansion, an aura of enlightenment and transcendence enveloped Fang Qingyuan. Unconsciously, the bottleneck of the Early-stage Foundation Establishment, which he had been at the peak of for three years, was quietly loosening.
A massive vortex of Spiritual Power materialized in the sky, its source descending directly onto Fang Qingyuan’s body.
Five Elements Spiritual Power surged into his physical body like a tide rushing into the sea.
Yet, faced with this torrential wash of Spiritual Power, Fang Qingyuan remained unmoved. He welcomed this wild tide of Spiritual Qi, a force that would have caused other Foundation Establishment Cultivators to lose their composure.
He cultivated the True Manual of the Five Spirits Transforming Baleful Qi, so his Magical Power was already double that of cultivators at the same level. Combined with his Five Elements Undying Body, his body could now contain five times the Magical Power of his peers.
So, what would have been a terrifying deluge of Spiritual Power for other Foundation Establishment Cultivators, Fang Qingyuan savored like sweet nectar.
After three days and nights, just as the first wisp of purple qi appeared between heaven and earth, Fang Qingyuan snapped his eyes open on the blue-green stone.
He felt the Magical True Essence in his body, which had nearly doubled in strength. A long, joyous cry escaped his lips, startling the countless creatures in the mountains.
For the first three layers of Early-stage Foundation Establishment, each advancement increases one’s total Magical Power by a third. However, when breaking through a major bottleneck like the one from the early to the mid-stage, the total amount of Magical Power doubles outright.
That was why a Late-stage Foundation Establishment Cultivator could easily handle seven or eight Early-stage Foundation Establishment Cultivators.
"What are you screaming about?"
Lechuan’s words instantly extinguished Fang Qingyuan’s visible joy. Fang Qingyuan turned his head and saw Lechuan meditating on a cliff ahead.
"Master, when did you arrive?"
"I arrived just as you were breaking through. You’re quite reckless. A breakthrough is such a critical event, yet you weren’t being careful at all. As your master, I had no choice but to stand guard for you."
Hearing Lechuan’s reprimand, Fang Qingyuan just chuckled. He wasn’t about to tell Lechuan that he was protected by his Bee Queen Divine Technique, and that ordinary riffraff couldn’t even get within thirty li of him.
Only a Mid-stage Golden Core Cultivator like Lechuan could have approached him so silently during his breakthrough.
"To reach the Foundation Establishment Fourth Layer in less than seven years after entering the Foundation Establishment Realm... even with the help of the Purple Spirit Crystal Fish, your cultivation speed is quite fast."
Lechuan walked over to Fang Qingyuan’s side. After praising him, his tone shifted.
"The early stages of Foundation Establishment are easy to cultivate through, but after you reach the mid-stage, you can’t just keep thinking about taking shortcuts. And now, you should start considering the direction of your Core Theory."
’Core Theory direction?’
Hearing Lechuan’s words, Fang Qingyuan felt a sense of helplessness. When it came to his own Core Theory, he was utterly clueless.
Seeing Fang Qingyuan’s reaction, Lechuan pondered for a few moments before asking a question:
"Qingyuan, what is your greatest ambition in this life?"