I proved immortality with thunder magic.

Goooo!

As night fell, the eerie, mournful cry of an owl suddenly echoed in the courtyard.

Upon hearing the sound, Yuanbao, a leopard frog enjoying the cool air by the pond, instinctively jumped into the water with a "plop," leaving only its eyes sticking out as it stared intently at the sky.

A huge black shadow flew swiftly across the pond in the night sky and landed on a plum tree in the courtyard.

It was an owl with feathers of green, yellow, and gray. Standing on the tree, it looked like a large cat sitting or lying down. It had a round head, a flat face, and big eyes. Its eyes seemed cute and innocent, but in reality, they concealed a fierce glint.

It stood quietly on the branch, motionless, its eyes fixed on the surface of the pond.

quack!

Thunder-patterned frog Yuanbao let out a croak, then suddenly opened its mouth, took in a mouthful of pond water, and "plop" spat out a water arrow that shot towards the plum tree.

Faced with the incoming water arrows, the owl in the tree simply moved two steps and easily dodged them.

Seeing this, Thunderfrog Yuanbao was not discouraged and launched a second wave of saliva attack.

However, no matter how it attacks, the owl in the tree can always predict the trajectory of the water arrow in advance and easily dodge it.

After spitting out water jets more than ten times, Thunderfrog Yuanbao seemed to have gotten tired of its mouth. With a loud "croak," it dived underwater, as if it didn't want to play anymore.

After a while, the Thunder-Patterned Frog Yuanbao poked its head out from the edge of the pond again, and shot a water arrow at the owl on the plum tree.

This was a blind shot; from the moment it peeked out to the moment it fired, the time difference was less than two breaths.

But the owl seemed to know even better than it where it was about to peek out.

As it spat out the water jet, the owl in the tree flapped its wings and flew out, swooping down towards the water like a cannonball.

Thunderfrog Yuanbao felt a chill on its scalp as dead memories began to attack it. Without thinking, it immediately darted to the bottom of the water.

Even though it had descended quickly enough, a pair of sharp claws still rubbed against its scalp, causing a burning pain.

When it resurfaced on the other side of the pond, several faint red claw marks on its head were clearly visible.

quack!

Enraged, Thunderfrog Yuanbao couldn't help but curse the owl that had returned to the plum tree, and blue-white lightning arcs faintly appeared in its mouth.

It seems it's really angry, and it's even prepared to disregard Zhou Tai's instructions.

Just then, Zhou Tai's voice suddenly rang out.

"Alright, Yuanbao, who told you to provoke it first? It's still a child, why are you arguing with it!"

As Zhou Tai spoke, he stepped forward with a helpless expression to stop the farce.

Nearly a year had passed since he purchased the Clawed Wind Owl egg, and the owl on the plum tree was the hatched Clawed Wind Owl.

Although this hawk owl has only been hatched for a year, it is already more than twice the size of an ordinary owl, and its claws have the power to cleave tigers and leopards.

However, Zhou Tai did not realize that frogs were part of the owl's diet before he raised it.

Therefore, ever since the Sharp Claw Wind Owl hatched, it has been at odds with Thunder Pattern Frog Yuanbao.

The clever Thunderfrog Yuanbao seemed to realize that it would have a great enemy in the future, so when the Clawed Wind Owl was still young, it often deliberately bullied it.

Unfortunately, as the Clawed Wind Owl grew larger, even though the Thunder Pattern Frog Yuanbao was a mid-grade first-tier demon beast, it was no match for the Clawed Wind Owl, which had not yet cultivated, if it did not use magic.

Unfortunately, the Clawed Wind Owl is quite vengeful. Now, every day after dark, it comes to the pond to lie in wait, and whenever it gets the chance, it will ambush the Thunder-Patterned Frog Yuanbao.

This meant that Zhou Tai would rush over to mediate the fight every evening as soon as he heard the frogs croaking.

After stopping the Thunder-Patterned Frog Yuanbao from unleashing its full power, Zhou Tai sternly reprimanded the Clawed Wind Owl in the tree, "Laifu, be more sensible. Stop thinking about sneaking up on Yuanbao. After all, it's your senior, your elder brother. You should show it more respect!"

In this world, owls and crows are considered evil and ominous creatures in many places and are hated by people.

Therefore, Zhou Tai specially named the sharp-clawed owl "Laifu" (meaning "coming for good fortune"), entrusting it with the beautiful meaning of using good fortune to suppress evil.

Unfortunately, the Clawed Wind Owl Laifu wasn't very smart. It couldn't fully understand Zhou Tai's words, only knowing that Zhou Tai had told it not to ambush the Thunder Pattern Frog Yuanbao.

Goooo!

It immediately let out a wronged cry, protesting that the Thunder Frog Yuanbao had attacked it first.

Zhou Tai had no interest in investigating who started it. Seeing that the silly bird wouldn't listen to reason, he could only shake his head helplessly and say, "Forget it, it's better for you two to live separately!"

So they decided that from now on, every night they would call Thunder Frog Yuanbao into the room, to save the two of them from fighting each other every day.

He had recently reached a crucial point in drawing talismans and really didn't want to waste any more energy on these two guys.

In truth, the difficulty of creating a first-tier high-grade thunder talisman is far greater than Zhou Tai had initially anticipated.

He has been researching for more than a year, and has wasted more than two thousand sheets of Leizhu paper, but has not succeeded even once!

This also made Zhou Tai realize that the Thunder Bamboo Paper had really helped him a lot in his initial ability to draw a mid-grade first-level Thunder Talisman.

However, when drawing a first-tier high-grade thunder talisman, thunder bamboo paper has no advantage.

Even so, he could only use thunder bamboo paper to draw talismans.

After all, if he used better lightning-attribute monster hides as talisman paper, the cost would be too high, and the profit would be far below his expectations.

Taking the Thunder Pattern Frog skin as an example, Sun Jianghai offered Zhou Tai sixty low-grade spirit stones for each skin, and that was only for a first-grade low-grade Thunder Pattern Frog skin.

If it's a mid-grade first-tier Thunder Pattern Frog skin, the price can be as high as 150 low-grade spirit stones!

The usable parts of a single Thunder-patterned Frog skin can only be cut into five or six talisman papers!

Therefore, Zhou Tai would definitely not consider using animal hide talismans unless absolutely necessary.

According to his own idea, only after he has fully mastered the first-grade high-level lightning magic drawing method can he use animal skin talisman paper to increase the success rate, and it must be used on the most valuable chain lightning talisman.

More than two months later, a burst of laughter suddenly rang out from the study on the second floor of the courtyard.

The joyful laughter not only made Yuanbao, the Thunder-patterned Frog in the pond in the courtyard, jump out of the water to look around, but even Laifu, the Clawed Owl who had been sleeping in the aviary during the day, clucked twice and curiously poked its head out to look at the second floor.

Inside the study on the second floor, Zhou Tai was holding a thunder talisman and examining it with a joyful expression.

This first-grade, high-quality Thunder Spear Talisman was the first finished product he had drawn after countless failures.

The success of this Thunder Spear Talisman signifies that his talisman-drawing skills have reached a new level.

From now on, among all the talisman masters in the Spirit Beast Mountain Talisman Hall, apart from those Foundation Establishment cultivators, he can be considered the number one master of talisman techniques in the Qi Refining stage.

Moreover, it is foreseeable that once he reveals this news, people will flock to his door seeking talismans.

"I wonder if, if I were to reveal this information to the sect, they would make an exception for me and allow me to exchange for a Foundation Establishment spiritual item despite being over sixty years old?"

Looking at the thunder talisman in his hand, Zhou Tai suddenly had a flash of inspiration and this idea popped into his mind.

Spirit Beast Mountain has a rule that cultivators in the Qi Refining stage who are over sixty years old are not allowed to exchange for Foundation Establishment spiritual items from the sect.

There are exceptions to everything.

If someone makes a great contribution to the sect, the sect may still make an exception.

However, in the thousands of years of history of Spirit Beast Mountain, such exceptions have been extremely rare.

Zhou Tai felt that he could draw a first-grade high-quality thunder talisman with his Qi Refining stage cultivation, so he could be called a genius. Moreover, he had the talent of thunder spirit root. It was not too much to ask the sect to make an exception for him!

"This matter is not urgent. After I can draw the second and third versions, I will go to Master Zeng to inform him of this matter and inquire about his opinion!"

After a moment of excitement, Zhou Tai quickly calmed down and realized that now was not a good time to bring up the matter.

A single success doesn't always mean anything, because it involves an element of chance.

Only through repeated successes can it be said that he has truly mastered the first-tier superior thunder talisman drawing technique.

For the next few days, Zhou Tai continued to focus on drawing the Thunder Spear Talisman.

After drawing for three consecutive days, Zhou Tai had four Thunder Spear Talismans in his hands, indicating that he had indeed mastered this first-grade high-level Thunder Talisman drawing technique.

But his joy had faded considerably at this moment.

The reason is simple: the success rate of the Thunder Spear Talisman is too low, only succeeding once every twenty or thirty attempts.

So much so that Zhou Tai couldn't say whether his success was due to his outstanding performance or pure luck.

Even so, he could still make a profit, but in this way, the profit from drawing lightning spear talismans was not as high as that from drawing lightning strike talismans.

After all, if he drew the lightning strike talisman thirty times, he could get at least eight or nine finished products.

Inside the study, Zhou Tai frowned as he stared at the four Thunder Spear Talismans on the table, his eyes filled with weariness.

"If I report this success rate, there's really no chance the sect will make an exception for me. It seems I'll have to proceed cautiously!"

He muttered to himself, his heart heavy.

Time waits for no one. In another year he will be sixty years old, but he still doesn't know where to find a Foundation Establishment spirit material.

Now, every time he thinks about this, it adds a touch of anxiety to his heart.

In the days that followed, Zhou Tai continued to devote most of his energy to drawing Thunder Spear Talismans, and did not tell anyone that he had drawn Thunder Spear Talismans, but silently accumulated the number of Thunder Spear Talismans in his hands.