I run a casino in the immortal realm.

Zheng Yifei cut off the communication and immediately got up and walked out of the underground secret room.

Although two years have passed since the Hu family's destruction and the issuance of the arrest warrant, Hu Xiaotian and Qin Cang may not still have the energy to keep a close eye on every corner of Xuantian Market.

But Zheng Yifei knew the saying, "Better safe than sorry."

He not only pushed the disguise of the Thousand Illusions Mask to its limit, transforming himself into a middle-aged fat man with a prosperous face and a mustache, but also specially changed into a brocade robe that gave him a slightly nouveau riche air, with a huge jade thumb ring on his thumb.

Even his walking posture has been adjusted, with a pigeon-toed gait, making him look exactly like a rogue cultivator who has just made a fortune outside and come to Xuantian City to seek pleasure.

Tie Feng, Chen Shan, and Lin Bao also changed into black outfits, concealing their Foundation Establishment Great Perfection level and disguising their cultivation as early Foundation Establishment stage. They acted as three taciturn guards, closely following behind Zheng Yifei.

As night fell, the four quietly left Willow Tree Alley and headed straight for the most bustling area in the western part of Xuantianfang Market.

The goal is eight million low-grade spirit stones.

This is no small amount. We can't just play around and win a few hundred thousand every month like before. We have to increase the stakes, and we have to do it quickly.

Their first stop was still Chang Le Fang, which has the deepest historical and cultural heritage.

Upon entering the bustling hall of Chang Le Fang, Zheng Yifei did not linger on the first floor, but instead led his guards directly to the VIP area on the second floor.

The gamblers here are all wealthy and powerful, and the stakes they place are astonishingly high. They play with spirit tickets, with bets starting at one thousand spirit stones.

Zheng Yifei walked to a very popular dice table, pulled out a chair, and sat down with an air of nonchalance. He still didn't use any of his divine sense; he simply closed his eyes and stretched his auditory nerves to the limit.

"Splash—"

The female cultivator, a mid-Foundation Establishment cultivator, vigorously shook the magic artifact dice cup. Each dull thud of the dice struck left a clear trace in Zheng Yifei's mind.

"Bang!" The dice cup fell to the ground.

Zheng Yifei opened his eyes and casually tossed out five spirit notes, each worth ten thousand, onto the "big" character.

Open the pot, fifteen o'clock big.

Over the next half hour, Zheng Yifei displayed an extremely exquisite art of market control.

He never wins every game; he maintains a pattern of winning three games and losing two.

When you lose, pretend to slap your thigh in frustration;

When he wins, he dares to throw down 100,000 spirit stones at once, and even accurately bets on the leopard with extremely high odds and specific points.

He perfectly portrayed a gambler's greed, arrogance, and occasional bad luck.

Although the sentries at Chang Le Fang noticed the extremely lucky fat man, seeing his wins and losses and his emotional outbursts, they simply assumed he was a nouveau riche who had stumbled upon good fortune and did not trigger the gambling den's alarm threshold.

In just half an hour, Zheng Yifei's chips had snowballed to 500,000.

"The feng shui at this table is bad, let's change the channel!"

Zheng Yifei deliberately lost a big hand, stood up cursing, and led Tie Feng and the other two to a pai gow table.

Same routine, same rhythm.

After winning 500,000 at the Pai Gow table, he went to play the Spirit Beast Racing game. Each time, he won 500,000 within half an hour and then quickly left, never over-profiting in one place.

Over the course of several hours, Zheng Yifei changed seats seven or eight times in Chang Le Fang. When he had two million spirit tickets in his arms, he turned around and walked out of the gate of Chang Le Fang without any hesitation.

"Director, where are we going?"

Tie Feng asked in a low voice.

"Go to the Hundred Beasts Pavilion." Zheng Yifei's lips curled into a cold smile. "Two million isn't even enough to fill a tooth gap."

In the bloody arena of the Hundred Beasts Pavilion, Zheng Yifei, relying on his keen observation skills and accurate judgment of the strength of the monsters' muscles and aura, once again launched a crazy money-making mode.

For two whole days, they operated by night and hid during the day, sweeping through five large gambling dens in the western and northern districts of Xuantianfang City like ghosts.

Chang Le Fang, Bai Shou Zhai, Life and Death Arena... wherever he went, he swept away the clouds like a whirlwind. When Zheng Yifei stuffed the last spirit ticket he won into his storage bag, he had collected eight million low-grade spirit stones, not a single one missing.

Back in the courtyard house in Liushu Hutong, Zheng Yifei tossed the storage bag filled with eight million yuan to Tie Feng.

"Tie Feng, you should personally go to Xuan Tian City."

Zheng Yifei solemnly instructed, "Go to the usual place, Fengming Teahouse, and give this money to Zhao Ling. Remember, it must be done secretly. You must not let anyone discover your whereabouts, and you must not expose your connection with Zhao Ling."

"Understood, sir! Rest assured, Director, I have experience!"

Tie Feng solemnly accepted the storage bag, and with a flash, he disappeared into the deep night.

three days later.

Inside a secluded private room at the Fengming Teahouse in Xuantian City.

Zhao Ling handed a delicate jade box with three spirit-sealing talismans affixed to it to Tie Feng, who had come to make contact.

"Brother Feng, tell Brother Yifei that the pills have been successfully refined. They are two top-grade Foundation Establishment Pills, of excellent quality, each with three pill patterns on it."

Zhao Ling said in a low voice, her eyes full of admiration.

Tie Feng nodded, carefully put the jade box away from his body, and without saying a word, quickly climbed out the window and left.

Willow Tree Alley, the secret underground chamber of a courtyard house.

Zheng Yifei sat cross-legged on the futon, looking at the six jade boxes lined up in front of him, and took a deep breath.

"I'm going into seclusion to try and break through to the Foundation Establishment realm."

Zheng Yifei turned to Tie Feng and the other two guarding the door and said in an unprecedentedly solemn tone: "Activate all the third-order concealment and defense formations in the courtyard, and turn the spirit gathering formation to its maximum."

From this moment forward, no matter what happens inside the secret room, absolutely no one is allowed to approach it! Anyone who dares to trespass will be killed without mercy!

"Rest assured, Director, I will defend you to the death!"

Tie Feng and the other two responded in unison, each drawing their long swords and standing guard outside the secret chamber like three door gods.

Zheng Yifei sat at the core of the Spirit Gathering Array, closed his eyes, and regulated his breathing. He circulated the Azure Cloud Technique within his body to its limit, and the spiritual power of the Great Perfection of Qi Refining surged like a river in his meridians. In his dantian, the dense, almost tangible, five-colored vortex was spinning wildly.

"Let's begin."

Zheng Yifei opened the first jade box, picked up a round and plump top-grade Foundation Building Pill that exuded a refreshing medicinal fragrance, and swallowed it.

The pill melted instantly upon entering his mouth, transforming into an extremely pure and immense medicinal power that surged into his meridians like a wild horse unleashed.

"Hmm!"

Zheng Yifei let out a muffled groan, his body jolted violently, and fine beads of blood instantly seeped from his skin.

The medicinal power of the top-grade Foundation Establishment Pill is too domineering, not to mention that he has a rare Five Elements Waste Spiritual Root, and his meridians are much more closed and resilient than those of ordinary cultivators.

What an ordinary cultivator could break through with a single blow was like an impenetrable fortress to him.

He endured the excruciating pain of his meridians being torn apart, gritted his teeth, and frantically circulated his internal energy, guiding the violent medicinal power to widen his meridians and break through the solid foundation barrier.

Two days later, the medicinal power of the first pill was exhausted, and the barrier had only loosened by one-fifth.

Zheng Yifei swallowed the second pill without hesitation.

Then came the third and the fourth.

As time passed, the spiritual energy in the secret chamber was drawn by the spirit-gathering array, forming a huge white vortex that surged wildly into Zheng Yifei's body through his pores.

His body seemed to have become a bottomless pit, greedily devouring all energy.

The five elements of spiritual energy constantly converged, collided, and merged in his meridians. Each cycle brought excruciating torment, but at the same time, it was also causing his physical body to undergo a transformative metamorphosis.

When the twenty-eighth day arrived, Zheng Yifei swallowed the fifth pill.

Quantitative change eventually led to qualitative change.

"Click—"

It was as if some invisible shackle within my body had been snapped, producing a crisp cracking sound. An indescribable sense of clarity instantly spread throughout my body, and all the pain vanished in that moment.

Inside the dantian, the enormous five-colored vortex suddenly collapsed inward at an extremely rapid speed, and after being compressed to the extreme, it exploded with a "boom"!

The gaseous spiritual energy completely transformed into drops of crystal-clear liquid spiritual energy that shimmered with multicolored light!

Foundation Establishment Realm, achieved!

But the changes didn't stop there. The immense medicinal power remaining from the five top-grade Foundation Establishment Pills, combined with the influx of spiritual energy from heaven and earth caused by the foundation establishment of the Five Elements Spiritual Roots, caused the liquid spiritual power within Zheng Yifei's body to surge wildly.

One drop, ten drops, one hundred drops...

The originally dry dantian was quickly filled with colorful liquid spiritual energy.

The five elements interact and counteract each other, creating an endless cycle that makes his spiritual power not only vast in quantity but also far purer than that of other cultivators of the same level.