Time flies, like an arrow, days and months pass swiftly. Twelve years have passed in the blink of an eye.
Inside a cave, Zhang Ling held up a huge earthy-yellow rock, covered with numerous tiny holes.
This was a nest of earth spirit bees, and all the bees inside had been collected into his spirit beast pouch.
He pointed at the rock, and it floated into the air. Zhang Ling then took out two blue jade bottles.
He cast a spell on the honeycomb, and immediately, streams of thick, light-yellow liquid flowed out of the small holes.
These liquids separated into two streams, both pouring into the two jade bottles.
After collecting all the honey from the honeycomb, Zhang Ling took out a few drops of honey and swallowed them directly.
He carefully savored it, finding it sweet with a good amount of spiritual power.
However, the spiritual power converted from this tiny bit of honey only circulated a little more than halfway through Zhang Ling before being absorbed.
And the dense true essence in his dantian didn't show even a trace of fluctuation.
"This is the third time, and it still doesn't meet the requirements."
Looking at the honey in the two jade bottles in his hand, Zhang Ling smiled wryly and left the cave, returning to his own cave dwelling.
In these ten years, the earth spirit bees had evolved three times. Through the cultivation with a large number of spiritual medicines, the queen bees increased by three, reaching as many as six. The number of bees was more than six thousand.
After these earth spirit bees evolved, they could produce honey, but it still didn't meet his requirements.
The bit of mature honey he had obtained from Elder Chen's storage bag had only lasted him a year.
And the spiritual power in his dantian had been refined by less than one-fifth. This made Zhang Ling a bit distressed.
However, Zhang Ling had no other choice. The earth spirit bees were already growing very quickly. Ordinary cultivators couldn't waste so many spiritual medicines on them.
Even so, the earth spirit bees, having evolved three times, could produce a bottle of honey every year.
Although this honey hadn't met Zhang Ling's requirements, he had swallowed a lot of it during his usual cultivation.
To make this honey work better.
Zhang Ling had also gone to Myriad Manifestation City several times, specifically consulting some related knowledge. He even found two medicinal formulas.
One of the pill formulas could use this honey to refine a pill called Yellow Jade Pill, which would quickly increase cultivation. It was especially suitable for late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivators.
He had naturally refined some Yellow Jade Pills, but perhaps because he had swallowed a large amount of honey, its effect on him was very small.
The other pill formula was not for pills, but for a spiritual tea recipe. The materials weren't fixed, and honey from any kind of spirit bee could be used to make it.
Zhang Ling naturally used the earth spirit bee honey to make this spiritual tea. He gave this spiritual tea a fitting name: "Earth Spirit Flower Tea."
The spiritual tea wasn't as good as the Yellow Jade Pill in terms of enhancing cultivation, but Zhang Ling found that long-term consumption could expand meridians and improve physique.
This could be considered a small gain.
The expansion of a cultivator's meridians meant that they would absorb more spiritual energy from heaven and earth during cultivation, which increased cultivation progress to some extent.
And after the meridians became more resilient, they would be faster when casting spells and using magical instruments.
These all proved that the earth spirit bee honey was extraordinary.
Even so, Zhang Ling estimated that he would have to refine at least half of the spiritual power in his body to increase his chances of forming a core.
Such monotonous cultivation continued for several months. One morning, Zhang Ling steered his flying boat away from the cave dwelling and headed towards Myriad Manifestation City.
On the evening of the third day, he returned to his cave dwelling.
Sitting in the cultivation chamber, Zhang Ling looked at the milky-white pill in his hand and couldn't help but laugh out loud.
"Dragon-Tiger Qian Yuan Pill" was the name of this pill. This small pill cost him a full 100,000 spirit stones from the Myriad Manifestation City auction.
Two days ago, Myriad Manifestation City held a not-so-small trade fair, which was why Zhang Ling had left before.
This pill was one of the featured spiritual objects of the auction. The Dragon-Tiger Qian Yuan Pill was so precious that it was naturally used to break through to the Golden Core stage.
The effect of this pill wasn't to directly increase the chances of forming a core, but to allow the spiritual power in the body to condense rapidly during the breakthrough, maintaining a peak state for a long time.
At the same time, it could re-wash the cultivator's body once. It was said that this pill was refined using the demon core of a high-level demon beast in conjunction with rare spiritual objects.
Each cultivator could only take one pill, and the second pill would have no effect.
100,000 spirit stones was Zhang Ling's biggest expense, but being able to win this pill wasn't a waste of spirit stones.
With this pill, plus the Cold Jade Pill and Fire Toad Liquid, and in conjunction with the Yuan Spirit Water, Zhang Ling estimated that he could increase his chances of forming a golden core by more than 20%.
And the Dry Earth Skill he cultivated was said to increase the chances of forming a core by 10%.
With a total of 30% chance of forming a core, Zhang Ling began to prepare for seclusion.
After all, he had been at the peak of Foundation Establishment for nearly twenty years.
He wanted to give it a shot.
Even if he ultimately failed, it wouldn't matter. His lifespan was only seventy years old, and Foundation Establishment cultivators could live for two hundred years. He would still have plenty of time to search for spiritual objects for forming a core.
A 30% chance of forming a core was already better than ordinary cultivators. Even the true disciples of those large forces only had about a 20-30% chance. Not to mention other cultivators.
If Zhang Ling didn't even try with such a chance, then no matter how many spiritual objects he had, it would be in vain.
After all, cultivation, especially breakthroughs in major realms, couldn't be achieved solely by piling up auxiliary spiritual objects. It also required a state of mind.
Only those with great perseverance could advance to higher cultivation levels.
Otherwise, if he continued to be timid, and a flaw appeared in his state of mind, then even if he had more spiritual objects, he would probably find it difficult to break through.
As for the cultivated earth spirit bees, if he wanted them to produce stronger honey, he would have to advance them further. It wouldn't be possible in a short time, which was also a helpless thing.
In the following half a month, Zhang Ling did nothing. He was meditating in the quiet room, and he slowed down a lot in his cultivation.
Until a month later, he activated all the formations in the cave dwelling, and the Six Armor Bewildering God Formation was also fully activated by him.
In addition, he released the corpse bear and the twin-tailed cat, and ordered them to guard the mountain where the cave dwelling was located.
As long as other monsters and cultivators stepped into this mountain, they would be immediately killed.
Thus, after preparing properly, Zhang Ling closed the cave dwelling door and attempted to break through the bottleneck and condense the golden core.
...
Inside the cultivation chamber, Zhang Ling sat cross-legged, meditating quietly for some time.
Suddenly, Zhang Ling opened his eyes, patted his storage bag, and some bottles and jars appeared in front of him.
He raised his hand, and a yellow wooden bucket appeared on the ground. Then some jade bottles and jars on the ground flew up, and the colorful liquids inside were poured into the wooden bucket.
The wooden bucket was also wrapped in a layer of glow, and Zhang Ling struck the wooden bucket with a spiritual force. He stirred the liquid inside.
After a quarter of an hour, the liquid in the wooden bucket gradually turned milky white. This was the "Yuan Spirit Water" he had prepared.
Zhang Ling stood up and took off his clothes. He sat in the wooden bucket. He sat cross-legged again.
The quiet room returned to calm.
After seven days, the white liquid in the wooden bucket became as clear as water. Zhang Ling sat back on the original high platform where he meditated. At this moment, he was covered in a layer of white aura.
Carefully feeling his physical condition, he felt refreshed.
Then he raised his hand expressionlessly, and a black jar appeared in front of him. The several spiritual talismans sealed on it instantly detached.
Immediately, a ball of red fire light rushed out of the jar. It contained the fire toad liquid. This spiritual object was for external use.
With a thought, the black jar floated to the top of his head, and a mass of red viscous liquid flew out of it.
Under the control of his divine sense, these liquids gradually lengthened and turned into a layer of crimson film, covering his body.
Then Zhang Ling closed his eyes again. Before long, Zhang Ling showed a painful expression. A layer of heat emanated from his body.
The meridians in his body were constantly twisting, and the spiritual power in his dantian became as boiling as boiling water under the action of the fire toad liquid.
But Zhang Ling didn't open his eyes. A small bottle placed on the ground flew to his eyes.
With a puff, the bottle cap was opened, and a light blue pill flew out of it.
With one mouth, the Cold Jade Pill was swallowed into his mouth. The elixir melted as soon as it entered his mouth, and a cool spiritual power spread from his mouth to his whole body.
Then, the white aura on Zhang Ling's body was also dyed into blue and red auras.
In this way, Zhang Ling maintained his meditation posture, constantly running the Dry Earth Skill, absorbing the powerful spiritual energy contained in these auxiliary spiritual objects.
This process lasted for an unknown amount of time. During this period, he also took several other ordinary auxiliary spiritual objects.
Time passed little by little, Zhang Ling entered a selfless state, constantly compressing the true essence in his dantian. He cut off all perception of the outside world.
...
Spring goes and autumn comes, time flies.
On this day, Zhang Ling sat at the entrance of the cave dwelling, looking at the bright sky, but his mood was a little complicated.
A full three years had passed since he had retreated before, and he had stopped retreating a month ago.
But he didn't come out of the cave dwelling until now. And his attack on the Golden Core also ended in failure.
At this moment, the spiritual power in his dantian was abnormal, more than twice as much as before. But he didn't form a golden core.
On the contrary, due to the spiritual power backlash, many meridians on his body were damaged, but fortunately, he had been constantly swallowing the honey of the earth spirit bees for the past ten years, and his meridians were exceptionally tough.
After taking a few jade bone pills, which were specially refined to repair the meridians, and resting for more than a month, he recovered.
The failure of the breakthrough naturally made him feel bad.
In the following half a month, Zhang Ling didn't practice, but wandered around the cave dwelling every day.
Meow!
Suddenly, a meow of a wild cat came from his ear, and the fat orange cat came to Zhang Ling's feet, with a fat black fish in its mouth.
The orange cat put the black fish on the ground and called at him a few times. Zhang Ling came back to his senses, touched the little cat's head, and looked at the black fish at his feet.
This black fish has black scales, is two feet long, and has a mouth full of dentures. At first glance, it is not an ordinary fish beast. There are some fire patterns on its head and tail.
Zhang Ling looked at it a few times and felt that the black fish was very similar to a kind of flame fish he saw in the monster beast illustration. If he remembered correctly, this was a low-level monster beast living in the earth fire magma.
Touched the head of the twin-tailed cat, Zhang Ling said softly: "Eat it."
Meow!
The twin-tailed cat called out and devoured it in large mouthfuls next to it.
Spirit beasts don't have so many troubles.
Zhang Ling sighed in his heart, watching the orange cat finish eating the black fish, lying on the ground sticking its claws, Zhang Ling suddenly asked. "Where did you catch it."
The twin-tailed cat called out, then raised its head, tilted its head to look at Zhang Ling, and then got up and walked towards a direction.
Zhang Ling smiled and followed the direction of the twin-tailed cat. Now he has nothing to do, it doesn't hurt to take a look.
Seeing Zhang Ling following, the flame pattern on the twin-tailed cat lit up, and its speed suddenly increased, turning into a red shadow leading the way.
Zhang Ling also flashed a light on his body, and a breeze blew under his feet, using the wind control technique to keep up.
After two quarters of an hour, they came to a few volcanoes, and then Zhang Ling followed the twin-tailed cat and squeezed into a volcanic fissure.
There are many such cracks in the volcano, which is not strange. After walking a distance in it, the fire light in front of him lit up.
Zhang Ling and the twin-tailed cat appeared next to an underground magma. In front of them, there was a burst of heat, and they could hear the gurgling bubbling sound.
This kind of place is normal in places with volcanoes.
With a whoosh, the twin-tailed cat next to him jumped up and jumped into the magma.
Zhang Ling was not surprised by this. His spirit beast was originally a fire-attribute spirit beast, and he could break through to the second level. Most of the second-level fire-attribute monsters were not afraid of the high temperature in the magma.
After a few breaths, with a plop, the orange cat jumped out of the magma. He had another black fish in his mouth.
Zhang Ling smiled, patted the spirit beast, and looked at the surrounding environment.
"The current cultivation base is stagnant, and it is not suitable for long-term cultivation."
Zhang Ling thought in his heart, and a white jade slip appeared in his hand. He checked the information in it with his divine sense.
Not long after, Zhang Ling appeared outside the volcano again, and then patted the storage bag. The white bone claw was released by him.
With a flick of the magic formula in his hand, this magic weapon attacked the mountain wall on one side. A rumbling muffled sound came, and a big hole was punched in the mountain wall.
The rocks on the mountain wall were as simple as cutting tofu under the power of the best magic weapon, and a large number of stones fell.
In a short while, a big hole appeared on the mountain wall.
Zhang Ling walked in and ran the spiritual power, and began to transform the surrounding rocks. Half an hour later, a stone room more than ten feet wide was built in the belly of the mountain.
Suddenly building such a stone room is naturally not idle.
He plans to build a ground fire room.
The volcanoes of Fire Cloud Island contain ground fire, which can be used to build ground fire rooms, alchemy and refining weapons.
After coming to this place, his cave dwelling did not have a ground fire room. Zhang Ling has always used the innate fire of the Foundation Establishment cultivator to refine alchemy.
Now that the breakthrough to the Golden Core has failed, it is useless to practice during this period, so it is better to study the art of refining weapons.
This is the decision Zhang Ling just made.
...
