Becoming an immortal from a canal worker

Chapter 171: A Higher Level of Power, the Golden Python

The figure stood above Tianyan City, hands behind his back, overlooking the entire city.

Chen Ping looked up, his breathing slowing down.

The old man lay on the chair, chuckling as if watching a spectacle.

In the sky, the figure lowered its head slightly.

Then, he gave a soft hum.

The sound was extremely soft, like a casual nasal sound, but the moment it reached Chen Ping's ears, it felt as if someone had swung a hammer into his mind.

The sound materialized, pouring down from the sky, sweeping across the entire Tianyan City, across every street, every courtyard, every room, and every corner.

Chen Ping stood in the armory, feeling the force crushing over his head, like a giant hand turning his body inside out.

Bones, tendons, flesh, and vital energy were all thoroughly searched, leaving nothing to hide.

Suddenly, a strange movement came from inside my arms.

Chen Ping lowered his head. The black wood rat in his arms, which had not yet transformed into a spirit puppet, trembled violently.

Snapped.

A very faint cracking sound.

The puppet threads inside the black wood rat's body snapped the moment that force swept over it. Immediately afterward, its flesh and blood dissolved, turning into a cloud of blood mist that drifted out from the gaps in its clothes, emitting a pungent, fishy stench.

Chen Ping stood there, watching the pale red mist on his clothes slowly dissipate.

If that person wanted to, he could probably kill him with just one palm strike.

Faced with such an existence, all the Yuan Gang Refinement, Dragon Python True Gang, and Tide Abyss Blade are meaningless.

In the sky, the figure did not stop, but walked back the way it came with its hands behind its back. In a few breaths, the figure shrank into a black dot and disappeared at the horizon.

They came abruptly and left just as abruptly.

From the moment they appeared until they left, it was only a dozen or so breaths.

The transparency of the armory dome disappeared, the gray stone roof closed again, the lights dimmed, and everything returned to normal.

The old man turned his head, his cloudy gaze falling on the lingering blood mist on Chen Ping's clothes. He wrinkled his nose and chuckled. "You've got quite a wide range of knowledge, kid. You've even learned the puppet-making techniques of the Slanting Moon Demon Sect."

Chen Ping did not respond.

The old man shook his head, his voice slow and deliberate.

"People in the martial arts world always say that having many skills is never a burden, but that's a bunch of rubbish that will only make you look foolish. If you go down too far down unorthodox paths, you'll easily ruin your own foundation. Don't put the cart before the horse."

Chen Ping kept these words of admonition to himself, remained silent for a moment, and finally asked the question that had been bothering him.

"Senior, just now, what stage of martial arts has that Cui family elder reached?"

The old man glanced at him and chuckled.

"Hehe, that realm is still too far for you right now, but you're really lucky to be able to see a higher level of power ahead of time."

He sat up from the recliner, stretched, and his joints cracked a few times.

"When you become as strong as this person, you'll be a guest of honor for all the powers that follow you."

He didn't answer Chen Ping's question directly, but his words said it all.

Chen Ping suppressed this feeling, took a deep breath, and walked back towards the training ground. The stone gate closed.

He was the only one left in the training ground.

He sat down in the center of the field, suppressed his chaotic thoughts, took out the Golden Essence Iron Core from his bosom, and placed it in front of his knees.

It is about the size of a fist, jet black, with gold patterns running across its surface, and extremely heavy.

Now that the first refinement is complete, the threshold for refining attribute qi has been crossed.

Chen Ping closed his eyes and began to circulate his Qi.

Under the influence of the Qi absorption, the gold and iron cores became transparent. The veins inside the jet-black ore were clearly visible, with impurities, iron elements, and trace amounts of other minerals layered upon each other, resembling a miniature mountain range.

And deep within this mountain range, there is a touch of gold.

Extremely small, extremely pure.

Like a grain of gold sealed in amber, it lies quietly in the core of the ore, motionless and unmoving.

The essence of gold.

Chen Ping stared at the golden spot for a while, reviewing the process of refining essence in "The Theory of Five Elements Refining Qi" in his mind, and thinking about the similarities between it and the Spirit Gathering Method. He then had a plan in mind. He glanced at the panel in front of his retina.

【Cai Ling (Dacheng)】

Current progress: 1200/1500

Great success.

Nan Qiyue once said that gathering spiritual energy is divided into three levels.

When you first start out, your spirit is like a wild horse, difficult to tame.

When the spirit reaches a certain level of maturity, it begins to obey, but still requires patient guidance.

After reaching the highest level, one is at the level of being dominated by the powerful, and even the spirits floating in the air cannot defy his will.

If he does nothing all day but weave spirit threads, he can weave a maximum of one hundred and twenty threads, but that depends on the amount of spirits around him.

A spiritual thread emerged.

One, two, three strands seeped into the surface of the gold-iron core from the fingertips.

The spiritual threads followed the veins within the ore, drilling deeper and deeper, avoiding impurities and bypassing iron crystals, gradually approaching the core. The deeper they went, the denser the internal structure of the ore became, and the slower the spiritual threads advanced.

Chen Ping wasn't in a hurry. He continued to output spiritual threads, one after another, probing into the interior of the ore from various directions, gradually filling the entire interior of the gold-refined iron core.

The moment the spiritual thread touched that point of gold, the essence of gold was disturbed.

It began to charge.

An extremely fine and sharp aura exploded inside the ore. The essence of gold, like a startled living thing, surged left and right, crashing against the spiritual threads that enveloped it.

Each impact carried a sharp edge, like countless fine needles simultaneously piercing the spirit silk.

Chen Ping's spiritual energy remained completely unmoved.

The spiritual silk was woven thousands of times, making it far more resilient than ordinary silk. The essence of metal clashed with it for more than ten breaths, but could not break through, and gradually subsided.

Taking advantage of the situation, the spiritual silk gathered together and wrapped around that strand of golden essence.

After getting entangled, Chen Ping didn't rush to drag him out.

The "Five Elements Refining Qi Theory" clearly states that once the essence of a strange object comes into contact with the outside world, it will dissipate and disappear into the world.

The essence must be refined within the artifact; if the artifact is damaged, even the slightest crack that comes into contact with the outside world will render all efforts futile. The next step is the second step.

It's also the most difficult step.

The theory of refining the five elements states that when the essence of an attribute is completely trapped, it will actively merge into the object itself. If it is allowed to merge back into the ore, the refining process will fail.

When ordinary martial artists reach this stage, they rely on their control and precision of their internal energy to peel away the ore before it is completely melted back into its original form and forcibly pull it out.

Nine out of ten people fail at this step.

Chen Ping's approach was different.

He didn't force the issue.

The protective energy seeped into the ore along the spiritual threads, attaching itself to the spiritual threads that bound the essence of gold, turning into a catalyst that lured the essence of gold to stick to the spiritual threads on its own.

The essence of gold cannot escape or return; its only way out is through those spiritual threads imbued with protective energy.

Little by little, the golden wisp began to peel away from the core of the ore, crawling out along the spiritual threads, as if it were being absorbed, slowly merging into the spiritual threads.

Chen Ping watched the process intently, not daring to utter a sound.

The next step is the third one. It's entirely based on luck.

All the previous preparations were paving the way for this moment.

When the spiritual threads imbued with the essence of gold leave the ore and come into contact with the outside world, will the essence of gold become restless?

This step has nothing to do with control or the precision of one's internal energy.

It's purely a matter of fate.

Chen Ping carefully pulled the spirit thread back little by little.

The distance between his fingertips and the core of the golden iron was only a millimeter, but he dared not be careless in the slightest and could only move it little by little.

The spiritual thread was slowly pulled out of the ore surface.

That strand of golden essence lay obediently on the spiritual thread, without any agitation.

Chen Ping held his breath.

The spiritual thread was drawn out an inch.

There was no agitation. Two inches.

There was no disturbance.

The moment the spiritual thread completely detached from the golden essence iron core, Chen Ping's mind was shaken.

Become!

That strand of golden essence followed the spiritual thread back into the body, entered the dantian, and attached itself to the vital energy.

It's like a drop of ink falling into a basin of clear water.

In an instant, gold spread out from the Gang Yuan, and all the Gang Qi in the body was tinged with a faint gold. From the Dantian to the limbs and bones, the Gang Qi flowing in the meridians shone with a faint golden light.

Chen Ping opened his eyes, stretched out his hand, and a wisp of qi overflowed from his fingertips, swirling between his fingers.

The pale golden aura moved through the air, extremely fine and bright, carrying a sharp edge, like a gold thread stretched to its finest.

He flicked his inner energy lightly against the stone wall.

laugh.

A half-inch deep cut appeared on the stone wall, its surface as smooth as a mirror. Metal-elemental qi. Extremely sharp.

Chen Ping stared at the cut for a moment, then a thought struck him.

He reached out, and his inner energy surged forth, condensing into a form in front of him.

A giant python.

A giant, pure golden python coiled in the center of the training ground. Its body was as thick as a thigh, and its entire body shimmered with golden light. Each scale on its body was clearly visible, and the edge of each scale gleamed with a sharp edge, making it look like it was inlaid with a golden blade in the dim light.

Chen Ping reached out and touched the python's body.

Tingling.

He instinctively pulled his hand back, looked down, and saw several bloody marks on his fingertips, with blood slowly seeping out.

The golden python moved slightly, and a few scales brushed past his fingertips, cutting through his jade-like skin.

Chen Ping stared at the wounds on his fingers, his pupils shrinking slightly.

The wound has not healed.

After his skin is injured, blood and energy will flow to the wound on their own, accelerating the healing process. However, a faint trace of gold remains on these wounds, like a thin golden film covering the surface, preventing the skin from healing itself.

The sharpness of the metal element's protective energy has the characteristic of reducing healing and even severing life.

He raised his hand again, bent his knuckles, and tapped the python hard on the body.

clang.

A crisp, metallic clang reverberated through the stone wall, its sound heavy and solid, like striking a piece of refined iron.

The metal-elemental qi also enhanced the defensive capabilities of the giant qi python.

Chen Ping stared at the golden python in front of him and remained silent for a few moments.

If we had had that golden python back then, killing that Lin Gongfeng would have been a piece of cake.

The golden python coiled around him, strangling him, its scales cutting into his flesh. Its sharp intent suppressed the healing, and in the blink of an eye, it could cut him into hundreds of pieces.

He retracted the golden python, his inner energy returned to his body, and golden light settled in his dantian.

Chen Ping placed the now grayish-white waste stone aside, suppressing the surging thoughts in his mind.

The Golden Python incident has proven its power far exceeded expectations. However, the most important thing right now is to solidify the foundation. The Blazing Sun Burning Sea True Scripture has only been entered at a basic level, and there is still a great deal of room for improvement in both the total amount and quality of the Qi.

He took out a rubbing of the "True Scripture of Blazing Sun and Burning Sea" from his bosom, sat down cross-legged, opened the second layer, the section on tempering qi and returning to the origin, went through it word by word, clarified the circulation path in his mind, closed his eyes, and began to cultivate.

The vital energy flowed slowly through the body along the meridians of the Blazing Sun Burning Sea True Scripture. The pale golden vital energy traversed a new path, and with each circle, the quality of the vital energy became more solid.

I don't know how much time passed.

The stone gate of the training ground slowly opened.

A ray of light shone in from outside, casting a long shadow of Chen Ping.

The old man stood at the door, leaning against the door frame, his cloudy eyes falling on Chen Ping, and he chuckled.

"Boy, your master has come to take you to the inner courtyard."