txolops Chapter 140: Early Stage of Foundation Establishment
Chapter 140: Early Stage of Foundation Establishment
The auction has ended.
After obtaining the Foundation Establishment Pill, Gu Musheng and Cheng Yao both returned to their respective places to diligently cultivate.
The same applies to Li Ping.
While he was diligently practicing his spiritual cultivation, nothing happened, and before he knew it, a year had passed.
On this day at the end of the year, it's time for the Tongzhou Club's year-end gathering again.
Zhang Tie, Gu Musheng, and two others gathered at Xiantao Mountain.
Li Ping's divine sense swept over the four people, and he quickly gained a complete understanding of their situation.
Needless to say, Zhang Tie's aura was basically unchanged compared to last year, which clearly shows that his focus in the past year was not on cultivation.
Or rather, after he established his foundation, he had already given up.
After winning the Foundation Establishment Pill at the previous auction, Gu Musheng was eager to establish his foundation.
Therefore, he cultivated with exceptional diligence and has now reached the peak of the ninth level of Qi Refining. Perhaps after a month or two of further refinement, he can attempt to break through to the Foundation Establishment stage.
Cheng Yao broke through to the ninth level of Qi Refining last year. Li Ping saw that her aura was significantly stronger than at last year's gathering. In another year or two, she would probably reach the peak of the ninth level of Qi Refining.
Bai Qing broke through to the seventh level of Qi Refining two years ago. After two years of arduous training, he has reached the peak of the seventh level of Qi Refining and is expected to break through to the eighth level of Qi Refining after the new year.
After assessing the cultivation levels of the four individuals, the next step was to pay the Foundation Establishment Fund for the year.
Li Ping contributed 300 spirit stones, Zhang Tie contributed 100, Gu Musheng contributed 100, and Cheng Yao and Bai Qing contributed 60. The Foundation Building Fund, which had been empty and returned to zero, has now reached 560 spirit stones.
Since Gu Musheng had already used the Foundation Building Fund once, it was Cheng Yao's turn next.
Li Ping put away the storage bag containing the spirit stones, then smiled and looked at the four people, asking them to take turns talking about their experiences over the past year, and also mention the troubles they had encountered.
The first character to be told is Zhang Tie. He is no longer the simple and honest young man he once was, but a dignified logistics officer of the Immortal City, whose voice is now powerful and resonant.
He had been busy learning administrative management over the past year, but at least he had time to learn weapon crafting techniques.
In addition, his twin concubines each gave birth to a child for him this year, while his wife became pregnant again after giving birth to their first child.
At this point, a hint of anticipation appeared on Zhang Tie's face.
Li Ping was speechless. If Zhang Tie had a "Many Children, Many Blessings" system, it would be a perfect match for him, given Zhang Tie's rate of having children.
Unfortunately, he didn't have one; he was just waiting to gamble on whether a genius with a unique spiritual root or higher would emerge from his descendants.
After reaching the Core Formation stage, he can mentor the Ancestor.
After Zhang Tie came Gu Musheng.
His experience was unremarkable. In order to break through to the Foundation Establishment stage as soon as possible, he had closed his shop and devoted himself to cultivation.
Whether the grocery store will reopen for him depends on the outcome of his Foundation Establishment.
If he successfully establishes his foundation, he will be a highly respected Foundation Establishment cultivator, able to become a disciple of True Person Fenglan, and naturally will have no need to care about a general store.
If he fails to establish his foundation, he may have no choice but to continue running his general store to make a living.
Next up is Cheng Yao.
She told Li Ping and the others that she had resigned from her position at the Spirit Medicine Garden to focus on cultivation.
After Cheng Yao finished speaking, Zhang Tie smiled without saying a word.
Li Ping couldn't help but ask her curiously whether she had enough resources for cultivation after resigning from her position.
Cheng Yao openly discussed her relationship with Wang Xingwei and how she decisively helped the Wang family recover their financial losses.
She now effectively manages the Wang family's finances, and since she has no shortage of cultivation resources, there's naturally no need for her to waste precious time working in the spirit herb garden.
Of course, due to the strict restrictions on the identity of the auctioneers for Foundation Establishment Pills at the Immortal City Auction, the auction is conducted in a very specific manner.
Therefore, she was still nominally a rogue cultivator. Apart from eating and using the Wang family's food and supplies, and living in the Wang family's spiritual land for cultivation, she had no other relationship with the Wang family.
Upon hearing her say that she wanted to return to the Wang family to compensate the rogue cultivators for the spirit stones, Li Ping was dumbfounded.
I can only be thankful that I didn't expose my identity and ask the Wang family for the spirit stones back, otherwise this fourth sister would have come to my door to collect the debt.
Finally, there's Bai Qing. He's a calm and collected person, and he didn't cause as much trouble as Cheng Yao.
Aside from earning resources through his pharmacist skills, he focused solely on cultivation, which is why his cultivation progressed so quickly.
He's not even thirty yet, but he's almost at the eighth level of Qi Refining.
……
The next morning, as the four were leaving, Li Ping called out to Gu Musheng and handed him the Foundation Establishment Pill that he had obtained from Yan Liming with a smile.
Before leaving, he encouraged him to prepare well and strive for success in establishing his foundation.
After Gu Musheng left, Li Ping stood in the courtyard, lost in thought.
After a long silence, he sighed softly, "Unbeknownst to me, ten years have already passed since I reached the Foundation Establishment stage!"
When Li Ping established his foundation, he was forty years old, and ten years later, he is now over fifty.
At this age, most people would be considered to be in their fifties, with half their bodies buried in the earth.
However, compared to the long lifespan of 240 years for Foundation Establishment cultivators, 50 years is only about one-fifth of that.
Li Ping, a Foundation Establishment cultivator at the age of fifty, is still a young man.
During these ten years, due to cultivating the "Ze Shui Nourishing Life Technique," you received a new chapter update: "Chapter 139: Early Foundation Establishment Success?", reading link. He could hardly sense the existence of cultivation bottlenecks, and every day he simply accumulated mana. Compared to when he first established his foundation, his mana was now at least 30% stronger.
Li Ping silently estimated: "If the Foundation Establishment stage also has nine levels like the Qi Refining stage, after ten years of hard training, my current level is about the second level of Foundation Establishment."
"However, the Foundation Establishment stage only has three realms, so I should be at the early stage of Foundation Establishment, minor completion?"
"At this rate of cultivation, I might be able to break through to the mid-Foundation Establishment stage around the age of seventy, and reach the peak of Foundation Establishment around the age of one hundred and fifty, before attempting to form the Core Formation."
Li Ping was quite satisfied with this cultivation speed.
Dai Sangyu possessed a unique spiritual root, yet she only reached the peak of Foundation Establishment at over 170 years old.
As a cultivator with three spiritual roots, his cultivation speed surpasses that of cultivators with different spiritual roots. What could he possibly be dissatisfied with?
Ultimately, although he couldn't take pills to enhance his cultivation, his normal cultivation speed was still slower than that of someone with a different spiritual root.
However, the fact that he has no bottlenecks in his cultivation allows him to leave his opponent far behind.
Do you even understand the value of overtaking on a curve?
"Continue your training!"
……
Luoyang, the capital of the Great Zhou Dynasty.
In a cave dwelling specifically for visiting monks to rent.
Above one of the second-tier cave dwellings, the spiritual energy suddenly fluctuated violently, then rapidly converged, eventually forming a vortex with a diameter of several tens of feet above the cave dwelling.
Any cultivator could tell what had happened with just one glance.
This phenomenon was clearly caused by a cultivator rapidly absorbing the spiritual energy of heaven and earth during their foundation-building phase.
However, when cultivators occasionally looked up and saw this scene, they would only glance at it before looking away without paying any attention.
The Great Zhou is not a remote place like the Western Wilderness. The number and quality of cultivators in the Great Zhou far exceed those in the Western Wilderness.
While Foundation Establishment cultivators aren't everywhere, they're certainly not extremely rare either.
Especially in Luoyang, the premier immortal city of the Great Zhou Dynasty.
It's just Foundation Establishment, nothing special. Every day, cultivators attempt to break through to Foundation Establishment.
Several days passed, and after absorbing enough spiritual energy, the spiritual energy vortex, which was dozens of feet long, dissipated on its own, with faint glimmers of light within.
Clearly, this cultivator has successfully broken through to the Foundation Establishment stage.
Inside the cave, Teng Feng opened his eyes, and a spiritual pressure of the Foundation Establishment stage emanated from his body.
His eyes shone with barely suppressed elation: "I have successfully established my foundation!"
When Teng Feng fled the Western Wilderness, he was twenty-seven years old and his cultivation was only at the fifth level of Qi Refining. He originally thought that he would be lucky if he could successfully establish his foundation around the age of forty, just like his elder brother.
Unexpectedly, they encountered the Nether Bone and were inexplicably transported to the Great Zhou Dynasty.
In just six years, he went directly from the fifth level of Qi Refining to the Foundation Establishment stage, almost one level per year!
To achieve Foundation Establishment at the young age of thirty-three was simply unbelievable for him.
"It's just Foundation Establishment, what's there to be happy about? Without reaching the Nascent Soul stage, we're just ants!" Just as Teng Feng was overjoyed, Ming Gu's cold voice rang in his mind.
Upon hearing Minggu's voice, Teng Feng immediately expressed his gratitude in his mind: "Senior, I am able to establish my foundation thanks to the many resources you have given me."
Although he had always been wary of the Nether Bone, to be fair, he wouldn't have been able to achieve Foundation Establishment so quickly if it weren't for the Nether Bone.
After all, the Foundation Establishment Pills needed for Foundation Establishment, as well as the pills and spirit stones required for cultivation, were all given to him by the Nether Bone.
"Alright, there's no need for words of gratitude. I've been training you only in the hope that you'll do a few things for me after you've achieved some success in your cultivation." The cold voice echoed in my mind once more.
Teng Feng tentatively inquired, "I wonder what you wish me to do, senior?"
Minggu didn't respond to him, but instead brought up another matter: "I left two sets of resources at the Immortal Offering Hall back then. What you took before was only the Qi Refining stage resource. Now that you've reached the Foundation Establishment stage, you're also qualified to take the Foundation Establishment stage resource. Hehe... the value of Foundation Establishment stage resources is more than ten times that of Qi Refining stage resources."
"More than ten times?" Teng Feng was greatly surprised upon hearing this.
Following Ming Gu's instructions, the resources he received from the Immortal Salary were worth at least tens of thousands of spirit stones, a sum most Foundation Establishment cultivators probably didn't have.
If the value of resources in the Foundation Establishment stage is more than ten times that of resources in the Qi Refining stage, wouldn't it be worth more than 100,000 spirit stones?
After figuring it out, he couldn't help but click his tongue in amazement, secretly guessing Ming Gu's identity: "I originally thought Senior Ming Gu was a Core Formation cultivator, but now it seems that he is not only that, but at least not an ordinary Core Formation cultivator."
Walking on the wide streets of Luojing, Teng Feng couldn't help but think of his brothers far away in the Western Wilderness: "So much time has passed, my second brother should have already tried to break through to the Foundation Establishment stage, I wonder if he succeeded! I wonder how my eldest brother and the others are doing."
In the years he's been in the Great Zhou, he's already inquired about the location of the Western Wilderness.
From Anzhou, the westernmost state of the Great Zhou Dynasty, one can cross the boundless sea to reach the Western Wilderness.
However, such a long distance was beyond the capabilities of a Foundation Establishment cultivator like him.
Only when he successfully forms his core in the future can he return to the Western Wilderness.
"Big brother, second brother... I hope you'll all still be alive by then," he thought to himself.