Mortal Alchemy

Inside Chen Ping's Daoist sanctum.

Sword Qi was sharp as he cultivated the second level of the Azure Lotus Sword Art.

Holding the second-order spirit sword bestowed by his master, he thought, "The Azure Lotus Sword Art has techniques at the second level."

"And with the second-order spirit sword's cooperation, its power will increase by at least 10% on the original basis!"

Refining Ji Changsheng's soul, Chen Ping cultivated the second level of the Azure Lotus Sword Art extremely quickly.

At the same time, he was also adapting to the power of the second-order spirit sword.

The Azure Lotus Sword Art has a total of thirteen forms.

It must be used in conjunction with the Azure Lotus Sword Yuan, and even the Azure Lotus Sword Crystal, to maximize its power.

Through memory comparison, according to Chen Ping's current cultivation level and spiritual power, ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivators are no match for him in a single move.

The improvement of his own strength was a joyful thing for Chen Ping.

A few days ago, Meng Huang'er privately reported to him that the four local Foundation Establishment families were not simple.

This made Chen Ping vaguely feel that the four major Foundation Establishment families had something wrong.

The past few market owners had died in office, but the four major Foundation Establishment families were fine.

And the local cultivators' purchasing power was not bad. Meng Huang'er's pill shop had made a net profit of three thousand spirit stones in half a month since it opened.

Chen Ping's stored pills were almost sold out, so he could only let Meng Huang'er temporarily limit the sale of pills, otherwise he wouldn't be able to handle it.

At the same time, after Meng Huang'er's investigation, the resources of many local cultivators were sold to the four major Foundation Establishment families, and these Foundation Establishment families sold them to the outside world, which meant a bit of monopolizing the resources of the Floating Light Market.

Meng Huang'er also discovered that there were Qi Refining cultivators secretly tailing them, which made her a little nervous.

However, with Chen Ping sitting in the market owner's Daoist sanctum, no conflicts had yet occurred.

At the same time, the four major Foundation Establishment families finally spoke, wanting to invite Chen Ping to meet.

At the same time, the treasure-hunting ferret, which had disappeared for half a month, appeared, chirping excitedly at Chen Ping.

Chen Ping's expression changed slightly: "Ferret brother, did you find a treasure in Dongyue Mountain?"

"Chirp chirp!" The treasure-hunting ferret nodded.

Chen Ping pinched his chin and pondered for a moment, then summoned a maid: "Tell the four major families that I want to retreat and have no time to meet them for the time being. I will keep the appointment after I leave seclusion."

"Yes, Young Master." This maid was a local. Chen Ping had carefully selected two of them to clean up and solve some chores on weekdays.

Then Chen Ping tore a stealth talisman, activated the Turtle Breathing Technique, seemingly retreating, but actually quietly left the market Daoist sanctum and headed towards the vast Dongyue Mountain.

……

The Four Great Foundation Establishment Families.

Inside a pavilion outside the Floating Light Market, dozens of cultivators stood here, silent.

Four Foundation Establishment cultivators in different clothes sat here, their faces unhappy.

"Bang!"

The tea table in the pavilion was smashed to pieces.

"This market owner Chen Ping has a good airs. Our four major families joined forces to wait for him, but he dares to leave us hanging!" He Chengzhu said coldly.

Zhang Daosheng frowned slightly: "It's better not to say this, in case someone hears it."

He Chengzhu's face was unhappy: "Are you afraid of him?"

Shang Yangxiu sneered: "Okay, we can't do anything to him if he shrinks in the market. How should we deal with the newly opened pill shop in the market?"

"Without our permission, he made money by opening a shop without asking our four major families if we agree."

Han Yu coldly said:

"Just destroy it directly, kill the Qi Refining female cultivator, and also explore the bottom line of this new market owner."

"Okay, let's settle it like this. First, find a few people to find trouble, and then we will come forward to destroy it in accordance with public opinion."

……

Chen Ping stepped into Dongyue Mountain, where the spiritual energy was extremely rich and the ancient trees towered into the sky.

He immediately judged the attributes of the spiritual veins here by means of a spiritual planter:

"Third-order wood, water, and earth spiritual veins are a good place to plant and ripen spiritual plants..."

Chen Ping's heart was fiery. The speed of ripening second-order spiritual plants with third-order spiritual veins was extremely fast!

He didn't need to plant second-order spiritual plants himself stupidly, just buy them at a high price.

For example, a second-order spiritual plant that is thirty to fifty years old can be ripened to a hundred years old in perhaps three or four years.

Moreover, Dongyue Mountain seems to be undeveloped. There may be many second-order medicinal herbs and spiritual plants inside.

This was also a clue that Chen Ping discovered. A place with third-order spiritual veins did not produce spiritual plants and medicinal materials, but only spiritual fish and spiritual beast meat. This matter was already suspicious.

Either the four major Foundation Establishment families were up to no good, or Dongyue Mountain had not been developed.

At the moment, Chen Ping went deep into Dongyue Mountain and did not find many powerful monsters.

There were only three or five second-order monsters.

With the abilities of the four major Foundation Establishment families, they were fully capable of eradicating them and recovering Dongyue Mountain.

But they didn't do this, which clearly meant something was wrong.

The four major families had been rooted here for three or four hundred years. No one had entered the four major sects, and no Golden Core cultivator had appeared.

These questions puzzled Chen Ping, but judging from the current situation, he had to be wary of the four major families.

The Eastern Xuan Sect was very powerful, but the four major families could completely ignore the Eastern Xuan Sect's orders because of the distance.

After going deeper into Dongyue Mountain for more than ten miles, the treasure-hunting ferret in his sleeve crawled out of his sleeve: "Chirp chirp."

Chen Ping stopped.

He looked around and spread out his spiritual sense at the same time.

Then his expression changed:

"The main material of the Cultivation Pill, the second-order Golden Leaf Tree!"

"Judging from its annual rings, it must be three hundred years old..."

He did not go forward immediately, but observed carefully.

"The leaves above are one hundred years old, two hundred years old..."

"Some leaves are newly born."

There was no joy in his eyes, but some gloom: "There is no powerful second-order monster guarding it... This Golden Leaf Tree, could it be artificially planted?"

Growing with the help of the third-order Dongyue Mountain spiritual veins...

"How could it be such a coincidence?"

Chen Ping didn't believe it was a coincidence, so there was only one possibility: this was planted by the local four major families.

Or he guessed wrong.

In any case, Chen Ping did not act rashly, nor did he rush to pick the golden leaves above.

Although he really wanted to refine high-quality Cultivation Pills, he couldn't do it with only golden leaves without other materials.

"I have to get the Guo family and Senior Sister Luo Fei to take action as soon as possible..."

Chen Ping did not leave immediately, but stood not far away to observe whether there were any monsters guarding this second-order Golden Leaf Tree.

If there were monsters guarding it, then it was not done by the four major families, and Chen Ping would rightfully take this second-order Golden Leaf Tree as his own.

But if it belonged to the four major families, he couldn't alert the enemy and lose big because of small things.

One day... two days... three days...

……

In the Floating Light Market.

Meng Huang'er opened the door as usual and hung up a sign: "Limited sales of fifty bottles of Essence Qi Pill, Grain Avoiding Pill, Qi Recovery Pill, and one bottle of Body Tempering Pill every day."

Unlike in the past, customers did not swarm in as soon as the door opened.

"Bang—"

A pill bottle smashed into the shop, and a sad and angry roar sounded:

"Your pills killed someone!"

Meng Huang'er's face turned pale.