761

Chapter 761 – Towards the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom

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In the early morning, the sun had not yet risen and Divine Phoenix Island was enveloped in a thin morning mist. Lin Ming bid his farewell to his parents, Qin Xingxuan, and Mu Qianyu, then he brought Demonshine along with him as he followed Li Yifeng and his entourage out towards the four Divine Kingdoms.

In Li Yifeng's group of four, there was Qing'er and the quiet young nun that Lin Ming had seen before, as well as an unusually pretty young boy who wore all white.

This beautiful youth was like Li Yifeng and both of them favored folding fans. However, with just a glance at this youth's pale face, delicate hands, and lack of an adam's apple, it was obvious that this was a woman dressed up as a man.

"You're already acquainted with Qing'er, Brother Lin. As for this young nun, her Buddhist name is Jingchan, and this young sir here is Sir Murong." Li Yifeng introduced Lin Ming to his companions. He grinned as he heavily accentuated the words 'Sir Murong', causing that 'beautiful young man' to squint her eyes.

Lin Ming thought this was funny. In truth, once a martial artist reached a certain boundary it was extremely easy to distinguish between men and women, much less even mortal commoners could tell that this 'Sir Murong' was a girl. Unless one had extremely skillful appearance changing techniques it was near impossible to fool others. Since this 'Sir Murong' knew all this perfectly well but still dressed as a man, the only explanation was that she liked this sort of dressing up.

It wasn't strange for extraordinary young elites to have unusual hobbies like this.

Lin Ming didn't bother ruining her fun. He cupped his hands across his chest and said, "Young Master Jingyuan, Sir Murong, well met."

Seeing Lin Ming being so respectful, Sir Murong actually had a rare favorable impression of Lin Ming and cupped her hands in return. As for Jingyuan, she gathered her hands together and spoke some Buddhist sutras.

"Brother Lin, during this journey to the four Divine Kingdoms we will have to travel several million miles. First we'll go north to the Great Zen Region and then enter the River Region and from there we can go to the Profound Canary Province… although most of this journey will be made through transmission arrays, we'll still have to spend a month or two in my spirit boat. During this time, Brother Lin may feel free to do as you wish. You can enjoy the scenery or you can close up in training."

Li Yifeng's spirit boat was 10 times larger than a normal spirit boat and the interior was lavishly decorated. The tables and chairs were all made of spirit wood and the floors and beds were all covered with rare and precious beast skins. Every room gave off an atmosphere of opulence and grace. It was apparent that Li Yifeng had spent a great deal of time and effort on this spirit boat.

"Brother Li, is your Seven Star Divine Kingdom a great distance away from the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom?"

These past days, Lin Ming had also asked about the basic situation of the four Divine Kingdoms. The four Divine Kingdoms were divided into the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom, Sublime Smelting Divine Kingdom, Asura Divine Kingdom, and Seven Star Divine Kingdom.

These four great Divine Kingdoms held over a dozen well known and famous Emperor powerhouses. In addition to all those other Emperor level powerhouses that remained hidden in the world, every Divine Kingdom had nearly 10 Emperor level powerhouses, or perhaps even more.

Of the four Divine Kingdoms, the strongest was the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom. The Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom was famed for its alchemy techniques and the entire country was rich in wood spirit jade and all sorts of heavenly materials that were useful for alchemy. It wasn't an exaggeration to say that nearly every martial artist within the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom was familiar with alchemy. Even if they weren't an alchemist they would still have some superficial knowledge of alchemy.

Second to the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom was the Sublime Smelting Divine Kingdom; they were famous for their refining techniques and their lands held all sort of deposits of precious metals and minerals. Within the Sublime Smelting Divine Kingdom, nine out of 10 martial artists were refining masters. Nearly every inherited heaven-step treasure of the Sky Spill Continent that didn't originate from ancient times came from the Sublime Smelting Divine Kingdom.

Coming in third was the Asura Divine Kingdom. They were a relatively isolated and independent Divine Kingdom. Although they were far weaker than the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom and the Sublime Smelting Divine Kingdom, this was mainly due to the fact that there weren't any special resources located within their borders. The Asura Divine Kingdom was a land of mostly demonic path martial artists and the social customs within were considered quite barbaric. In fact, publicly killing someone on the streets couldn't be considered uncommon or exciting.

And last of all was the Seven Star Divine Kingdom. They too didn't have any special resources, causing the development of their Divine Kingdom to be greatly limited. The Seven Star Divine Kingdom was well known for their array formations, but no matter how strong array formations were, they were still auxiliary skills. In terms of enhancing a martial artist's cultivation, they were naturally inferior to the mass production capabilities of alchemical techniques.

"Brother Lin wishes to go to the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom?" Li Yifeng wasn't too surprised to hear of Lin Ming's request. The Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom was known as a land with abundant treasures and lucky chances around every corner. Every year, a massive number of martial artists would sojourn to the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom in hopes that they would stumble upon some divine heavenly treasure that would allow them to ascend into glory with a single leap. However, the areas that were fraught with lucky chances were all under strict control; Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom wouldn't easily allow outsiders to obtain them.

Even so, a great number martial artists still came to experience the varied martial Holy Lands of the Sky Spill Continent.

"That's the plan. I want to go to the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom to look for some wood spirit jade." Lin Ming honestly said. There wasn't anything to hide and if he spoke with Li Yifeng, perhaps this Prince might even know some channels he could access.

"Wood spirit jade?" After Li Yifeng heard this his eyes brightened, "So Brother Lin was also a lover of jade, hm!"

Li Yifeng said. Then, he swiped his spatial ring and took out a foot long wooden square box. As he opened this box, a very light but pure wood origin energy suddenly emerged. As Lin Ming peered within, he could see four pieces of rough-looking irregularly-shaped green stone. They seemed to be uncarved jade stones; without a doubt, these were wood spirit jades.

In addition, beside these four rough pieces of wood spirit jade was also an exquisitely carved jade horse. The material used to create this was also wood spirit jade.

"A jade horse carved from wood spirit jade?"

Lin Ming was startled. Within the memories of the Realm of the Gods' Supreme Elders, there were many recollections of wood spirit jade carvings, accessories, utensils, and so forth. Lin Ming had only glanced over these things. After all, these sorts of artistic treasures didn't have mu cultivation. What he cared about had only been alchemical techniques from the Realm of the Gods.

He never thought that the wood spirit jade carvings within the Realm of the Gods would also exist in the Sky Spill Continent.

"Haha, this jade horse of mine is quite good, right? I spent a sky high price to win this at an auction. This is an ancient treasure carved by an expert from 10,000 years ago!"

Li Yifeng puffed up, full of pride and wanting to show off to Lin Ming. He obviously held an inordinate amount of love for this jade carving.

But at this moment, a discordant voice suddenly stuck its foot in, "Li Yifeng, I can't believe you used a great amount of the Divine Kingdom's spirit essence stones to secretly buy a wood spirit jade horse! I will report this matter to Sir Shangchen!"

Lin Ming looked up, seeing that the one snappily speaking was that 'Sir Murong'. He couldn't help but chuckle in his heart. A spirit essence stone was a type of spirit stone even better than true essence stones for cultivation. A low-grade spirit essence stone's value was about approximate to a top quality true essence stone.

Li Yifeng's smile froze on his face, "You fake Murong tomboy! If you mess with me I'll bring you down with me!"

"Humph, the spirit essence stones that Sir Shangchen gave you were for you to cultivate, not for you to buy toys!" Murong argued back.

"Who said that wood spirit jade can't be used for training? A wood spirit jade carving is certainly expensive as an accessory, but it also has the effect of enhancing the soul. The further one's cultivation is the more important the role of the soul is! Someone like you simply couldn't understand this!"

What Li Yifeng said was quite true; wood spirit jade was indeed a good material for enhancing the soul.

Besides being used in alchemy, wood spirit jade could also be absorbed by a martial artist for training. However, because wood spirit jade was based in wood origin energy, only a wood-attribute martial artist could use it. Otherwise, using wood spirit jade for training would simply be a waste.

Even if one didn't understand alchemy, a martial artist that wasn't lucky enough to be of the wood attribute could also carry around the wood spirit jade by their side. Gradually, the rich wood origin energy of the wood spirit jade would permeate into the martial artist and nourish their soul.

However, wood spirit jade in its most basic form was rough and craggy; there were many people that didn't feel too well carrying something so ugly and unbeautiful by their side all the time. Thus, the skill of carving wood spirit jade slowly spread, and the art of carving this material became increasingly refined and elegant. Now, there were even some martial artists that carried around wood spirit jade carvings to accessorize, not even purchasing them with the intention of helping to nourish their soul.

"Stop with your loquacious sophistry. If you wanted to help nourish your soul then carrying around a piece of uncut wood spirit jade would be just the same, you don't need to carry around such an expensive jade horse. I will make sure to report this matter to your superiors." Murong said with a haughty indifference, a serious light on her face.

"Peh, whatever, I'm too lazy to bother with you…" Li Yifeng had a look that he didn't want to waste his time arguing. Then, he suddenly swiveled around towards Lin Ming, his eyes lighting up, "Haha, Brother Lin, if you like wood spirit jade then let me take you to some famous city squares that specialize in wood spirit jade later so you can open your eyes!"

Li Yifeng obviously held a great understanding of the wood spirit jade market, and immediately began speaking to Lin Ming of several vast wood spirit jade city squares, detailing the advantages and disadvantages of each one. Then, after making great flourishing motions about everything, he finally circled back to his own beloved jade horse.

"Look at this jade horse. The exquisite carving details stem from the hands of a carving grandmaster called Xuan Can. As for the jade, it comes from 250,000 year old ancient river wood spirit jade!"

The older wood spirit jade was, the higher quality it would be and the more expensive it would be. Wood spirit jade had a special characteristic; it was able to independently absorb wood origin energy from the heaven and earth origin energy of the world and use this energy to vitalize itself. Thus, although wood spirit jade would slowly lose some of its origin energy over time, this rate was drastically slowed due to its ability to supplement itself. In addition, as more time went on, the wood origin energy within the wood spirit jade would become increasingly pure in quality.

Lin Ming didn't care who this Xuan Can was, nor did he have any interest in ancient river wood spirit jade. But, what he could confirm was that this carved jade horse in Li Yifeng's hands was at most 120,000 to 130,000 years old.

It seemed that Li Yifeng had been suckered by someone.

The truth was that being tricked like this was also normal. It was very difficult to judge the age of wood spirit jade, and even experienced alchemists would make mistakes. The general population probably wouldn't even be able to distinguish between true and fake wood spirit jade. There were experts out there that could use wood-attribute spirit essence stones and some wood spirit jade powder to create fake wood spirit jade that was nearly impossible to distinguish from the real thing.

"Brother Li, could I have those raw wood spirit jade ores?" Lin Ming had no intention of revealing to Li Yifeng that he had been scammed. After all, it was fine as long as he was happy about his purchase, and Li Yifeng might not believe him to begin with.

The reason Lin Ming asked for these raw stones was because he wanted to try his hand at alchemy. He had already studied alchemy techniques for a very long time, and besides trying low level recipes that didn't require wood spirit jade, Lin Ming hadn't yet tried to refine a high level pill.

"Brother Lin wants this raw ore? No problem!" Li Yifeng readily nodded. He liked wood spirit jade, but that was only wood spirit jade carvings. As for that ore, in Li Yifeng's eyes it was no different to spirit essence stones.

Chapter 762 – White Dragon Jade Row

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"Thanks. What is the price on this ore? I'll give you the equivalent market price amount." Although Lin Ming had planned on searching for wood spirit jade, the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom was still an extremely vast region. Moreover, many wood spirit jade-rich locales had been locked up by the authority of the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom. If he wanted to search for his own wood spirit jade then he would need a massive amount of time. If so, then it was best for him to buy as much as he could with his current wealth.

"Brother Lin couldn't be planning on studying alchemical techniques, right?" Li Yifeng saw that Lin Ming wasn't a wood-attribute martial artist, then the more likely reason he would want wood spirit jade like this would be to practice alchemy techniques. Normally, once a martial artist reached a certain boundary, it was common for them to study several auxiliary skills in order to help temper their soul. For instance, Li Yifeng himself studied array formations.

"That is my intention."

Li Yifeng whistled, "Whew, Brother Lin, you just started studying alchemy techniques and you already want to use wood spirit jade?"

Lin Ming laughed out loud, not explaining further.

He understood what Li Yifeng was trying to say. After all, he was only 21 years old so he couldn't possibly have studied alchemy techniques for too long. And, something like alchemy required the accumulation of experience and repeated failures. A newcomer to alchemy would have a very low chance of success, and wanting to practice creating high level medicines was simply a pipedream. And with wood spirit jade being so rare and valuable, using it to train up one's skill was simply far too luxurious.

How could Li Yifeng have known that Lin Ming had interested the complete memories of a Realm of the Gods alchemist? These memories included alchemy skills, experiences, and all sorts of recipes. Lin Ming had already thoroughly integrated most of this knowledge together, and now his success rate for creating low level medicines was already very high.

But in that Realm of the Gods Supreme Elder's memories, there were far too few recipes that didn't require wood spirit jade.

"Brother Lin, if you wish to try, then I can gift you a piece." There were pieces of wood spirit jade ore. Although they weren't low in value, Li Yifeng was still able to give out a piece of two.

"We'll go with the market price." Lin Ming didn't want to owe favors to anyone.

The two of them pushed back and forth for a bit, and finally, Li Yifeng listed the price for the four pieces of wood spirit jade. As Lin Ming heard this, he was actually shocked. Altogether, these four pieces of wood spirit jade were 600 spirit essence stones.

A low-grade spirit essence stone's value was equivalent to a top grade true essence stone's, which was the same as over a million low-grade true essence stones.

600 spirit essence stones were worth more than 600,000,000 low-grade true essence stones. When Lin Ming had dug up the buried treasure of the third-grade Moon Seizing Sect, besides some pills and 12 Shattered Heart Demon Crystals, there were also around 7000 to 8000 medium-grade true essence stones. If those were all traded in, that wasn't even enough for one million true essence stones.

The entire buried treasure deposit of a third-grade sect wouldn't even be enough to buy a small lump of wood spirit jade. Lin Ming also estimated that Li Yifeng was quoting him a price on the lower end. To a character like Li Yifeng, not to mention a low-grade spirit essence stone, but perhaps even a medium-grade spirit essence stone didn't mean much to him.

Like this, 600 top grade true essence stones disappeared. Not accounting for the treasures that Lin Ming hadn't exchanged for spirit essence stones yet, Xuan Wuji's wealth had shrunk by 10%.

If things continued at this pace, then Lin Ming would be broke in no time.

'Do I really have to sell that heaven-step Demon God Bone?'

As Lin Ming thought about this, he walked into his own room and began to start his first alchemical recipe using wood spirit jade.

The memories of that Realm of the Gods alchemist had been extremely complete without many holes. His skill, technique, and experience in alchemy had been incomparably profound and complex, far more complex than the inscription techniques Lin Ming had learnt before. If it wasn't for the fact that Lin Ming's cultivation had rapidly risen since then, wanting to study these alchemy techniques would have been nothing but a dream within a dream.

It required a massive amount of resources to raise an alchemist. The reason that nearly all of the alchemists in the entire Sky Spill Continent were concentrated in the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom was that they had adequate resources.

In other words, they were filthy, disgustingly, sickeningly rich.

And putting aside the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdoms, the other three Divine Kingdoms probably couldn't produce a top class alchemist. This was because the consumption of resources was too high; the gains weren't equal to the losses. Also, their alchemy technique inheritance was far too lacking.

But for Lin Ming the alchemy techniques he studied were on an unbelievably higher level than what any alchemist grandmaster of the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom could ever hope to reach.

If it were said that the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom needed to use 100 jin of wood spirit jade to train an alchemist grandmaster, then for Lin Ming to study alchemy by himself might require several thousand jin of wood spirit jade.

This estimate already included the fact that Lin Ming had inherited the foundation of Realm of the Gods' alchemical techniques as well as an immeasurable amount of experience.

What he wished to refine was miracle medicines capable of opening the Eight Inner Hidden Gates and the Nine Stars of the Dao Palace. The lowest level materials for these types of medicines would be ingredients like the profound gold divine fruit and other such heavenly materials. As for the requirements of wood spirit jade, not only did he need quantity but he also needed quality. In the memories of the Realm of the Gods Supreme Elder, top medicines frequently required top quality wood spirit jade that was aged for several million years, or even tens of millions of years.

This had already surpassed the understanding of any alchemist within the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom.

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A month later, Lin Ming and the group made their way through countless large and small transmission arrays, finally arriving at the central region of the Sky Spill Continent. As Lin Ming looked down from his spirit boat, he saw that right beneath him was actually a vast and desolate desert.

"Are we close to the four Divine Kingdoms?" Lin Ming asked, a bit stunned. In his imagination, the four Divine Kingdoms were incomparably lively lands with grand Holy Lands everywhere. But currently, they had been flying through a seemingly endless desert for days now. And before this desert there had been nothing but more deserts upon deserts.

"Haha, we are indeed, we're almost at the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom." Li Yifeng had already guessed what Lin Ming was thinking. He continued, "Don't look down on this desert below us. This area is called

the Thatch Region. West of here is the Northwest Great Desert, which is also Wang Yichan's domain. The Thatch Region is a place where good and bad exist, with bandits and desert pirates everywhere. The reason for this is because there is wood spirit jade produced here, and this area also isn't under the jurisdiction of the Nine Furnace Divine Kingdom."

"I see!" Lin Ming was suddenly enlightened. Hundreds of thousands of years ago, or perhaps even millions of years ago, this desert beneath them had once been a great and lush forest with incomparably rich origin energy and all sorts of heavenly materials growing within. However, because of various geological changes, the spirit veins had withered away and the forest had eventually turned into a desert. The spirit trees and spirit plants had also been buried underground over the passage of time, slowly becoming a land filled with buried wood spirit jade.

Li Yifeng sighed as he reminisced over the past, "For this desert, there have been countless wars fought with rivers of endless blood flowing over the land. Ultimately, no one was able to take sole control of this land and thus it became a free land where all the major powers entrenched themselves. There are also a great number of wood spirit jade transaction sites here with all sorts of wood spirit jade carvings and accessories. These items change hands all the time; that is, this place is a sinkhole for a massive amount of spirit essence stones!"

Wood spirit carvings and accessories had to have a history of several thousand years as well as stemming from the hands of a famous craftsman in order to earn the recognition of being called an ancient jade treasure by someone like Li Yifeng.

The Realm of the Gods alchemist had several memories related to these things. In fact, that alchemist had actually been a wood spirit jade carving grandmaster. Carving wood spirit jade was also a method for alchemists to exercise their focus and precision, helping them in a small way to temper and perfect their own soul.

That Realm of the Gods alchemist had also collected a massive amount of ancient carvings and accessories. Of course, these treasures had a history of at least 60,000 to 70,000 years, with some being hundreds of thousands or even millions of years old. It was far from anything that the Sky Spill Continent could compare with.

"Brother Lin, I'll take you to a place today. This is a good place, with far too many good things inside! I will take you to open your eyes!" As Li Yifeng spoke of that place his eyes began to fill with excitement.

"Okay." What Lin Ming needed the most now was wood spirit jade. He certainly wouldn't refuse going to such a place.

"That's right, don't tell that Murong about this, it will just be us two brothers going. That Murong is really about to pester me to death." Li Yifeng's words held a very familiar tone to them. Martial artists would generally refer to each other as 'brothers' as a sign of politeness, but this Li Yifeng seemed to treat Lin Ming as if they were really brothers.

A day later, Li Yifeng's spirit boat stopped at a small city in the desert. After no resting well for an entire month, he decided to have a good night's rest here and also search for a chance to throw off that annoying Murong. Li Yifeng brought Lin Ming and Qing'er to make seven or eight circles around the entire city before finally coming upon a humble and common-looking stone building.

From the outside, this stone building didn't have a single sign. There were only four words written above the building door – White Dragon Jade Row.

After entering the stone house, Lin Ming finally realized that there was something peculiar going on here. The interior space was much larger than he had imagined, and the furnishings were a bit… crude. Everything seemed to be formed from the rough rocks of the desert. The stone tables and stone chairs seemed to be hewn apart by a saber without even being polished down.

At the side of the rroom was a stone table with some tea set aside for guests. And on the other side of the room were rows upon rows of wooden shelves. Every shelf had a variety of jade carvings and accessories placed upon it, ranging from as high as a foot to as small as a ring. The collection of items was dazzling and diverse.

In front of these shelves was a middle-aged man wearing a leather hat. The man had a sturdy build and there was a thick scar on his face. It was unknown just what sort of beast skin his clothes were made from, but his collar was opened wide and his sleeves were far shorter than his arms. His clothes had heavy-looking metal buttons on them, each of them as large as a baby's fist.

This sort of clothing had a very rugged and barbaric flavor to it; it matched very well to the desert around them.

As the scarred man saw Li Yifeng approach, he immediately smiled in welcome, "Sir Li! No wonder I heard that lucky magpie call from the gates earlier; it seems that I have honored guests visiting today." The scarred man looked rough and cumbersome but his mouth was thick with honey – it was obvious he was skilled at kissing ass. Then he took on a tone of business and asked, "Is Sir Li here to buy something today? We have just unearthed a pair of ancient bracelets, would Sir Li like to take a look at them?"

Hearing the scarred man's attentive introduction, Li Yifeng's eyes brightened. His interest had really been stirred up. "Good, let's take a look."

Just as Li Yifeng's voice fell, another group of people walked in from outside. The man in the lead wore a yellow embroidered dragon robe and he had a pair of green balls in his hands that he was constantly rubbing together.

These balls were actually made from wood spirit jade.

"Isn't that the great Sir Li? Hahaha, I never thought that I would stumble into you here at the White Dragon Jade Row. This is truly serendipity. Are Sir Li's hands itchy and wanting to buy some little souvenirs from here?" The yellow dragon-robed man faintly smiled. From the tone of his voice he obviously came from some great and influential power.

Li Yifeng frowned as he saw this man arrive. It was obvious that he and this man were not on friendly terms.