Mountain and River Festival

Chapter 483 Earth Fire Mingyi
On the morning of the sixth day of the first month of the first year of Gengshi, the day after Marquis Dingyuan Lu Xingzhou's wedding, the deposed Emperor Gu Zhanting was found to be "missing".

When the guards brought the food, they found the secret room empty, with only a little bit of ashes inside.

This incident, though not insignificant, unjustly burdened Ye Tinglan with a false accusation. Despite the heavy guard of the Tianyao Holy Land, the deposed emperor's disappearance led almost everyone in the court and among the public to believe that Ye Tinglan had taken him away, whether murdered or used for some strange ritual.

Ye Tinglan was speechless, unable to defend himself.

Although people only dared to talk about it silently or in private, and no one dared to say it openly, Ye Tinglan was still extremely displeased. Her divine sense could hear many people's whispers.

She spent her whole life trying to save face and maintain her reputation, but she was too embarrassed to get engaged and marry publicly. In the end, she was inexplicably blamed for something. What was the point of her life?

In fact, Gu Zhanting's cell was under surveillance. Even the King of Hell would secretly record business deals with people using a recording mirror. How could such an important cell as Gu Zhanting's not have something similar?
However, the preset magic weapon was blocked, and it didn't work at all.

This also proves Gu Yiheng's Qian Yuan ability from another perspective. If it weren't for Qian Yuan, how could he have shielded the Huiyang Treasure of Tianyao Holy Land?
"Lu Xingzhou, say something! My reputation is ruined!" Ye Tinglan grabbed Lu Xingzhou by the collar and shook him: "Aren't you full of tricks? Hurry up and help me solve this."

Lu Xingzhou just laughed: "Isn't it good to have a bad reputation? You can just let things go and be a little more carefree in the future. For example, you don't have to deceive yourself about things like finding a man, right?"

"No!" Ye Tinglan said angrily, "Even if I find a man, I can't bear that kind of reputation."

"He was a powerful minister who had deposed and installed emperors, and he was only one step away from assassinating the emperor. Who cares?"

"But wasn't it actually you who deposed and installed the powerful minister?"

Lu Xingzhou: “?”

Ye Tinglan forced a smile, and the hand that was grabbing her collar turned into straightening it: "Who doesn't know that the new emperor's bestowals are all drafted by Marquis Dingyuan? He can promote whomever he wants, and the new emperor doesn't dare to utter a word."

"How did it become that the new emperor doesn't dare to utter a single word? Who spread the rumors?"

"Of course, it was Gu Yiheng himself who spread the word. He wanted to create the image of a puppet being oppressed by powerful ministers, so that a group of loyal ministers would naturally come to serve him."

"...This is a novel approach." Lu Xingzhou was both amused and exasperated. "So we've all become treacherous officials?"

"After all, the treacherous officials of the Grand Tutor's faction are now all vying for the Marquis of Dingyuan's attention, so this treacherous official is probably confirmed." Ye Tinglan said, "He even had someone spread the divination, which reads 'Earth over Fire, Mingyi,' test your understanding of that concept again?"

"The upper trigram is Kun (Earth), the lower trigram is Li (Fire), fire enters the earth, and darkness obscures everything? He feels so wronged."

"Not bad, even though you only learned some superficial skills, it wasn't a complete waste of time." Ye Tinglan's smile was dangerous: "So, are you going to clear your name or not?"

"dont wash."

"?"

"I've never been a treacherous minister before, doesn't this feel great?" Lu Xingzhou said with a grin, "He's the Li below, and I'm the Kun above? That's wonderful, I love Kun."

Ye Tinglan said irritably, "In the past, the Huo family took the blame for all the messy reputation. Now, with him leading us like this, if something goes wrong in the future, the world will blame us instead. And you should know that with the current state of the Great Qian Dynasty, there will only be more chaos in the future."

Lu Xingzhou stroked his chin: "If we guide them like this, we can create the Four Traitors of the Great Qian Dynasty: Lu Xingzhou, Ye Tinglan, Pei Qingyan, and Sheng Qingfeng, right?"

Ye Tinglan was both annoyed and amused: "You seem quite happy about this, don't you?"

“Guidance is one thing, but it’s not so easy to make baseless accusations,” Lu Xingzhou laughed. “Besides, we really do have surveillance cameras.”

"Your black flames don't have the ability to take photos, do they?"

“The Myriad Soul Banner has the function of extracting and projecting the memories of Yin Souls, and Black Flame, as the main soul, can project its own memories. It’s just that the Myriad Soul Banner’s ability is insufficient now, but it will be able to do so when it is upgraded to a certain level.” Lu Xingzhou laughed and said, “Gu Yiheng really dares to shift the blame onto us. I’ll give him a world tour of his famous patricide scene.”

Ye Tinglan's anger turned to joy: "I knew you had a backup plan."

Lu Xingzhou pointed to his face, and Ye Tinglan tiptoed and kissed him.

Dugu Qingli, who was standing by, was speechless.

Seeing her master becoming increasingly shameless, Dugu Qingli couldn't help but ask, "Could you please tell me first what level of upgrade is needed for the Soul Banner?"

Lu Xingzhou said, "Qian Yuan." Ye Tinglan's kiss almost turned into a bite: "Lu Xingzhou! Why don't you just die!"

Is it so easy to achieve the Qian Yuan realm? Aside from visitors from the ancient realm, there have only been two Qian Yuan realm cultivators in this realm so far: Gu Zhanting and Ye Tinglan. Moreover, Gu Zhanting's Qian Yuan realm only lasted for the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, and Ye Tinglan's Qian Yuan realm is still suppressed and hasn't dared to manifest yet.

Leaving aside the distant Qian Yuan era, the Huiyang Great Barrier alone has already killed countless heroes and valiant men in the world.
Huiyang is the highest grade in this world, and there are only a few of them on the surface. Normally, the first grade is the top grade in the world. Look at the status of Pei Qingyan and Huo Liancheng. Even if you include all the top grade cultivators who are in seclusion and do not care about worldly affairs, and even include all kinds of demons from the sea and overseas, there are at most a dozen or so. It is hard to say whether there are more than twenty.

Lu Xingzhou's advancement to the First Rank in such a short time is indeed impressive, but breaking through to the Radiant Sun Heaven realm will likely take several years. Not to mention the Qian Yuan realm—is that even a normal person's goal?

Of course, personal cultivation and magical artifacts are not the same thing. In fact, the Soul Banner is already at the Radiant Sun level, and it would be a little easier for him to cultivate to the Qian Yuan level. But how much easier?
Lu Xingzhou said, "It's not as difficult as I imagined, especially when it comes to the Soul Banner alone... Please take a look at this first, sir."

With a loud bang, a pill furnace appeared in front of us.

In an instant, the celestial energy flowed and radiance shone brightly, as if colorful clouds and celestial music were swirling around.

Ye Tinglan and Dugu Qingli subconsciously held their breath.

I've always known that the Huo family has a celestial-grade alchemy furnace... but without seeing it in person, I really can't understand the concept of this so-called celestial-grade furnace.

After all, the Tianyao Holy Land had collected enough ancient treasures, and while there were few at the Qian Yuan level, there were still some. Ye Tinglan once thought that even the strongest would only be at the peak of the Qian Yuan level, and although everyone didn't have that many, they could still understand it.

But upon seeing it in person, I realized that it was beyond my comprehension.

"Could this be the 'Formless Level' mentioned in ancient books?" Ye Tinglan finally exclaimed, "How could such a thing possibly exist in the world!"

If such a thing existed, then simply throwing in some herbs would probably allow it to spontaneously transform into an elixir. In the hands of a skilled alchemist, refining an elixir surpassing the quality of this world would not be difficult at all. The limiting factor in the quality of the finished product would be whether such high-end medicinal herbs were available in this world.

No wonder Huo Xingyuan easily achieved the first rank, no wonder Huo Liancheng was able to break through to the super rank, and no wonder Gu Zhanting was able to attempt the Qian Yuan realm.

Especially the two from the Huo family, they definitely don't have any good talent. Logically speaking, even if they practiced until they died, they would never have a chance to become a top-grade cultivator. They succeeded entirely because of this alchemy furnace.

"That day, I asked Jiang Duxu to break into the Huo family and retrieve the alchemy furnace. Jiang Duxu didn't covet it; our agreement was that he could borrow it for a few days to work on it, and he returned it to me today," Lu Xingzhou said. "Jiang Duxu said the item is absolutely top-notch, but unfortunately, the medicinal herbs in this world are a drag, so we can't refine any really good pills... It almost made him consider returning to the ancient world..."

The fact that this item could make a stowaway who had gone through so much hardship to smuggle himself down from the Ancient Realm want to go home shows how attractive it is; it's a treasure that's extremely rare even in the Ancient Realm.

Lu Xingzhou himself was already mentally prepared. This thing could refine an Anuo, which was a miracle of creation, and it might not even be at the Formless level... Ye Tinglan and Dugu Qingli had never even thought about it, but they were quite shocked. After a long while, they said, "You mean you want to use the pill furnace to refine pills to break through? With the grade of this pill furnace, the pills refined will most likely not have the problem of unstable foundation. It is indeed a shortcut."

"Yes. Our resources are far superior to those of the Huo family. We can refine quite a few Huiyang and even Qianyuan-level pills. Sir, you can look for more relevant medicinal materials. With these things in our hands, it's much more efficient than the Huo family secretly trying to produce them."

Ye Tinglan hummed in agreement: "I understand, that's definitely possible."

“Furthermore, although the alchemy furnace is not used for refining weapons, the Soul Banner is a very special thing. It can be placed in the furnace to be nourished by the Qi of immortal spirits, which is similar to nourishing the soul. It will be easier to upgrade later.” Lu Xingzhou said, “Master once suggested that I get a natal magic weapon. Now it seems that it must be a Soul Banner.”

Ye Tinglan sighed.

Although they didn't really want Lu Xingzhou to continue using this evil artifact, since they had already come this far—Black Flame was well-trained, and even a superior-grade soul was within the Soul Banner—giving it up now would incur too high a sunk cost, and no one was willing to do so. Furthermore, they still needed the Soul Banner to reenact the famous scene of patricide, so they had no choice but to continue raising it.

He could only say, "Since you've decided to continue using the Soul Banner as your natal magic weapon, then go ahead and use it. Also, I'd like to suggest you get a weapon. Even if you don't need the advantage of a weapon, its power-enhancing effect on your cultivation techniques is still worthwhile."

"I've considered it, and I still think it's more reasonable to focus on a ring. It represents yin and yang, which aligns with my concept of yin and yang. Do you have any material suggestions, sir?"

"The ice crystals and cold iron that Si Han gave you as a wedding gift can be used to forge a Yin-attribute ring. As for a Yang-attribute one, I'll find one for you from the Tianyao Holy Land's collection." Ye Tinglan was very pleased that her little man listened to her opinion: "What are your plans for the next step?"

"I'll take these next few days to digest what I've learned, forge my rings and refine my pills. I'm waiting for a personnel appointment."

"What appointment?"

"Gu Yiheng is going to start a purge and inspection of whether officials across the country have become corrupted, and I want to be the inspector. Firstly, so that I can personally take charge of this matter and have a clear understanding of it, and secondly, it will be a good opportunity for my personal development."

Ye Tinglan pondered for a moment and felt that it made a lot of sense. Then a light lit up in her heart: "Qingli always uses the excuse of wanting to train, but in reality she wants to run to Dongyue Hanchuan. It's better if she doesn't go there. She can accompany Xingzhou as his guard and train with him."

(End of this chapter)