After binding with a genius, I became an immortal by exploiting loopholes.

Chapter 133 Fourth Level of Qi Refining

Lu Qingchen acted immediately.

In the following days, he purchased the necessary auxiliary materials for the Bone-Healing Pill, including *Drynaria fortunei*, *Drynaria fortunei*, and *Spiritual Marrow Powder*, along with several other ingredients to harmonize the medicinal properties, through Li Tiezhu at the Zongmen Market.

These are not very common items, but they are not too rare either. You can find them by visiting a few shops in the market.

However, the prices are not cheap, especially the Spirit Marrow Powder, which costs nearly twenty spirit stones per packet.

After preparing all the materials, he made a special trip back to his sect.

In the No. 3 medicinal garden of Dingmao on Panlong Peak, Old Sun was squatting on the edge of the field tending to a newly transplanted medicinal herb.

Hearing footsteps, he didn't even look up: "What are you doing here again?"

"I would like to ask Mr. Sun for help."

Lu Qingchen took out the materials one by one and placed them on the edge of the field. "This disciple wishes to obtain a Bone-Regenerating Pill. All the materials are prepared, but I cannot find a suitable alchemist. Elder Sun knows many alchemists in the sect. Could you help this disciple make a connection?"

Old Sun glanced at the medicinal herbs, raising an eyebrow slightly: "Bone-Regenerating Pill? Who will use it?"

"Sun Han is the roommate I mentioned to you last time, the one we pulled out of the mine. He broke his leg and it hasn't fully healed yet."

Old Sun was silent for a while, then put down his work and stood up.

"Why look for an alchemist? I can do it myself."

Lu Qingchen was stunned for a moment.

Old Sun glanced at him: "What, you don't believe me? I've farmed for most of my life. Although I'm not a grandmaster at alchemy, a bone-regenerating pill is no problem for me."

Lu Qingchen quickly cupped his hands in greeting and waited in the herb garden for several hours.

Master Sun's alchemy skills were very efficient. The auxiliary materials were crushed, purified, and mixed in his hands one by one, and finally integrated into a ready-made healing pill for re-refining. A bone-healing pill was then made.

"Take it daily, use spiritual energy to neutralize the medicinal power, and combine it with basic body-strengthening techniques to nourish it for half a month, and broken bones can be reattached."

Old Master Sun put the pills into a small porcelain bottle, handed it over, and added, "But how well he can recover depends on him."

Lu Qingchen accepted the porcelain bottle with both hands and bowed respectfully.

Just as he was about to take his leave, Old Sun suddenly said, "Your master told me."

2

Lu Qingchen paused.

"The matter of the Spirit Path, touching the Spirit Path during the Qi Refining stage, is something I've never heard of before in all my years."

Lu Qingchen remained silent.

"Don't be nervous."

Old Master Sun waved his hand, "Since your master has kept it a secret for you, I won't tell anyone either. I just wanted to tell you to stay so you can cultivate diligently and not waste this opportunity."

He paused, his cloudy eyes obscuring his expression in the twilight: "I initially gave you to Zhou Yuandao because I didn't have much lifespan left and was afraid of holding you back. Now it seems that you don't need anyone to hold you back; you can forge your own path."

Lu Qingchen was silent for a moment, then bowed solemnly: "This disciple will not let you down."

Old Sun waved his hand, signaling him to leave quickly.

Lu Qingchen turned and left the herb garden. After walking quite a distance, he looked back and saw Old Sun squatting in the twilight, the embers on his pipe glowing and fading like a star that refused to go out.

Lu Qingchen did not linger and returned to Qingmu Manor that same day.

Sun Han's hands trembled violently when he took the porcelain bottle.

He gripped the porcelain bottle tightly in his hand, his knuckles turning white, as if afraid it would suddenly fly away.

"Take one pill daily, and use your spiritual energy to neutralize the medicinal effects. Although your cultivation level is not high, your foundation is still intact."

Lu Qingchen said, "With the help of basic body-strengthening techniques, broken bones can be repaired in half a month. The extent of recovery depends on your own fate."

Sun Han didn't say anything.

He bowed deeply to Lu Qingchen, his waist bent so low that he didn't straighten up for a long time.

Lu Qingchen patted him on the shoulder: "Use it as soon as possible, don't delay."

After saying that, he turned and left.

The medication worked even better than expected.

Seven days later, although he still walked with a limp, he no longer needed a cane.

His mobility is now basically the same as that of an ordinary person, except that he cannot run or jump, and he still limps a little when he walks fast. But compared to his previous situation of using a wooden cane and dragging his right leg step by step, it is a world of difference.

Half a month later, Sun Han was finally able to put down the wooden stick he had been using for nearly half a year.

He stood on the edge of the field and tried to walk back and forth several times, taking small steps at a time.

Then he slowly squatted down and buried his face in his palms.

There was no sound, only his shoulders were shaking.

Lu Qingchen watched from afar without going over.

【】

Another month has passed.

With the combined assistance of premium spiritual rice, jade marrow fungus, earth vein spiritual embryo, and green jade marrow, the pure qi in Lu Qingchen's dantian steadily increased.

As the last wisp of pure energy solidified in his dantian, Lu Qingchen let out a long breath.

Three hundred and twenty-four strands of pure energy spun slowly in the dantian at the same time, like three hundred and twenty-four fine threads, each occupying its own space and not interfering with each other.

I've reached the peak of the third level of Qi Refining.

But the real difficulty begins now.

The third to fourth level of Qi Refining is the watershed between the early and middle stages of Qi Refining.

The first three levels of Qi Refining are considered the "initial stage," which mainly involves drawing Qi into the body and condensing pure Qi. As long as one's spiritual root is not too bad and resources are not too scarce, one can eventually reach this stage by following the steps.

However, starting from the fourth level, one enters the "intermediate stage," where the speed of spiritual energy circulation, the capacity of the dantian, and the strength of the meridians all experience a qualitative leap.

The price of this leap is the bottleneck.

The bottleneck between the early and middle stages of Qi Refining has trapped countless cultivators with mediocre spiritual roots.

At least three or four out of ten with four spiritual roots will be blocked by this bottleneck for a year or two, and nine out of ten with five spiritual roots will never be able to reach the mid-stage of Qi Refining in their entire lives.

Even a top-grade genius with dual spiritual roots like Chu Yunfeng was blocked at this bottleneck for a period of time.

Lu Qingchen had originally prepared for the worst.

He estimated that it would take him three to six months to achieve his goal—with the aid of the Dao Stele cultivation, he could progress much faster than ordinary people with five spiritual roots, but he never dared to hope that he could catch up with a genius like Chu Yunfeng.

He began to break through the bottleneck in his cultivation using the Dao Stele every day.

The method, as mentioned by Elder Sun in the jade slip, involves simultaneously concentrating spiritual power and divine consciousness in the dantian, using pure external force to repeatedly impact that invisible barrier.

Each impact causes the barrier to tremble slightly, but despite the tremors, it remains unmoved.

The first day, nothing changed.

The next day, everything was the same.

On the third day, he increased his investment in cultivating the Dao Stele.

Golden spiritual light emanated from the light pearl and flowed into the dantian along the meridians.

When he channeled this power to break through the bottleneck, he suddenly realized something was wrong.

That invisible barrier was gradually dissolving in the face of the Dao Stele's cultivation level.

The moment the golden light of the Dao Stele touched the bottleneck, an extremely subtle dissolution occurred on the surface of the bottleneck.

That barrier was not indestructible; in the face of the Dao Stele's cultivation, it was like a thin film that could be slowly dissolved.

Lu Qingchen was deeply shocked.

He had always thought that the bottleneck was a "wall" that needed to be broken through by accumulating enough strength. Once he had accumulated enough, he would exert all his strength and smash through it.

But now he discovers that the Dao Stele cultivation provides a completely different path: it fundamentally changes the spiritual root's capacity to bear weight, allowing the bottleneck to dissipate naturally.

He immediately increased his investment in the cultivation of the Daobei stele.

The egg-sized orb of light in the illusory dantian shrank at a visible speed, and golden spiritual light continuously poured into the dantian, eroding the barrier inch by inch.

Every day, the bottleneck gets thinner.

Every day, the circulation of vital energy in the dantian becomes smoother.

Late on the third night, the last barrier silently crumbled under the continuous erosion of the Daoist's cultivation.

With a sudden tremor in his dantian, all 324 strands of pure energy vibrated simultaneously, emitting a deep resonance.

The gaps between the pure qi were filled by a new force, and the entire dantian expanded outward in a few breaths.

The Qihai point, which originally only occupied a corner of the lower abdomen, has now expanded to cover the entire abdominal cavity.

Upon internal observation, the newly formed dantian space was nearly twice as large as before, with pure qi slowly rotating within it. It was no longer as crowded as before, but rather each had its own comfortable place.

The spiritual energy surged through the meridians, and with each heartbeat, a warm spiritual current was pushed to every part of the body.

That feeling of fullness rises from the dantian, travels up the spine, and rushes straight to the Baihui point. The whole body feels like it is being soaked in warm water, and every inch of the muscles and bones in the body is cheering.

The meridians are also changing.

The meridian channels, which were originally as narrow as a stream, were stretched open by the repeated scouring of spiritual energy, and their resilience was much stronger than before the breakthrough.

Previously, it would take half an hour to complete one full cycle of spiritual energy, and the spiritual energy would always stagnate for a moment before several narrow passes.

Now those passes have been widened by nearly double, and there is no longer any obstruction when spiritual energy flows through them.

Spiritual awareness also increases accordingly.

With his eyes closed, he could sense the direction of the night wind blowing across the leaves of the spirit rice on the ridges outside the house, and he could distinguish the faint wisp of green light drifting from the direction of the protective spirit field. The earth vein spirit embryo was breathing, sometimes bright, sometimes dim, and each breath was clearer than before.

This is not the projection of divine sense, which cultivators in the Qi Refining stage cannot do yet. Rather, it is a more primitive perception—the natural sensitivity to the fluctuations of spiritual energy in heaven and earth after the quality of one's spiritual root has been improved.

He could "hear" the sound of spiritual energy flowing through the root network beneath the field, subtle and orderly.

The biggest change is in the dantian itself.

Before the breakthrough, the pure qi was just scattered wisps floating in the dantian. Now, the 324 wisps of pure qi have divided into four groups, each with more than 80 wisps, and are slowly rotating in the dantian in four directions.

There was a subtle resonance between the four groups of pure energy, like four mirrors reflecting each other, leaving a blank area in the center of the dantian, which would be the place to condense the spiritual palace in the future.

The watershed between the early and middle stages of Qi cultivation is essentially the transformation of the dantian from "storing pure Qi" to "nurturing the spiritual palace".

This blank area is the prototype of the future spiritual palace.

Lu Qingchen opened his eyes and exhaled a long breath.

The turbid air condensed into a white line in the air, which lingered for a long time.

These are impurities that have accumulated deep within the meridians and were brought out by the spiritual energy tide during the breakthrough.

It took nearly five months to go from the 100-day assessment to the peak of the third level of Qi Refining, and less than two months to go from the third level of Qi Refining to the fourth level.

This speed is no slower than that of some ordinary disciples with superior spiritual roots!

But before Lu Qingchen could fully appreciate the changes after his breakthrough, the ancient and unchanging Dao stele deep within his sea of ​​consciousness stirred.