Chapter 160
'I can’t just sit back and do nothing.’
Baek Cheong glared at the post stamped with karma before finally pulling herself together.
The fear that a lightning tribulation might fall twice had still not faded.
Even so, sitting there frozen in terror would not change anything.
Besides, that dao friend was still planted right there in the post.
If she dawdled, they might very well slap another point of karma on her.
Baek Cheong hurriedly backed out of the forum board post.
‘First, I have to deal with the karma.’
The problem was the karma that had already been lodged there.
In terms of her past life, it was like one downvote had been stuck on a perfectly normal post.
When a downvote bothered you, the answer was obvious.
All you had to do was get enough upvotes to bury it.
'Can’t I just fill it up with merit and cancel out the karma?’
Once her thoughts reached that point, her heart eased considerably.
The reason karma was frightening was that it blocked her path with misfortune.
If she could fill it with merit and shave it down, there would be nothing to fear.
And the Nameless Forum was full of dao Friends who could press merit for her.
‘If I lay out my pitiful circumstances, at least one kind dao friend will press it for me.’
Baek Cheong immediately crossed over to the Chat Board and put up a post.
“Dao friend(913.14): Is any dao friend willing to press Merit?”
[Some dao friend pressed Karma on me. Looking for a dao friend to save a poor Qi Condensation cultivator.]
[Merit 0 / Karma 0]
She exaggerated her pitiable situation as much as possible to stir up sympathy.
Surely at least one softhearted dao friend would press merit for her.
But the replies that began to appear were entirely different.
[Dao friend(11.23): That’s your karma. Accept it gladly.]
[Dao friend(88.4): Using Dao traces on a Qi Condensation…]
[Dao friend(55.19): I always thought you would pay for your karma someday.]
[Dao friend(553.24): I’d like to help, but I don’t have any Dao traces saved up…]
[Dao friend(417.3): If anything, there’s no need to help because you’re at Qi Condensation. Qi Condensation cultivators are everywhere.]
Far from sympathetic, every single one sounded pleased to see her suffer.
Some dao Friends told her to gladly accept her karma.
Others laughed at the named dao friend for spending Dao traces on someone in Qi Condensation.
There was only one reply, saying they wanted to help but had no Dao traces.
'No, if you don’t have any Dao traces, you can just move on.’
Baek Cheong pouted at the replies piling up one after another.
Among them, one reply was especially irritating.
The one that said there was no need to help because Qi Condensation cultivators were everywhere.
‘I’m remembering you.’
Still, it was clear that dao Friends were gathering in droves.
They seemed to regard her pitiful circumstances as a spectacle rather than something to help with.
As the replies increased, more and more dao Friends swarmed in.
Among them were some who took the discussion in a completely random direction.
[Dao friend(72.5): I heard dao friend(913.14)’s Lower Realm has nine soul transformation cultivators.]
└Dao friend(40.1): Is that for real? Are they making gu with Cultivators?
└Dao friend(66.12): Is it a Lower Realm where a True Immortal has fallen?
└Dao friend(204.6): Whatever it is, that sounds like the worst.
The trouble had started with the nine soul transformation cultivators she had thrown out on the forum board as a threat.
They had picked up the stray bait and were spinning whatever theories they liked.
‘They all have such active imaginations.’
Baek Cheong remained calm even as she watched the topic roll off in a strange direction.
From the number of soul transformation cultivators alone, no one could pinpoint where her Lower Realm was.
Unless a dao friend was exceptionally peculiar, there was no way to discover their location.
Even if they did discover it, going there was another problem altogether.
It was a realm barrier that even nine soul transformation cultivators had failed to break through, leaving them stuck beneath it.
No other dao friend would be able to easily cross such a realm barrier.
'Even if they come, they’ll be blocked by the realm barrier anyway.’
In any case, she could set aside the worry that her Lower Realm might be exposed.
The urgent matter lay elsewhere.
It was the merit she needed to shave down the karma already lodged there.
But the dao Friends still showed no sign of pressing merit for her.
[Dao friend(35.2): If anything, be grateful you received karma while still in Qi Condensation. If you’d received it at soul transformation, even your path to ascension would have become treacherous.]
└Dao friend(11.23): A dao friend who throws away Dao traces deserves Merit, lol.
Every single reply was far removed from merit.
‘Who asked you to be sarcastic…’
The replies kept swelling, but the number for merit did not budge.
[Merit 0 / Karma 0]
Apparently, this was not the kind of atmosphere where merit would come rolling in just because she begged.
Baek Cheong calmed her impatience.
If she thought it through carefully, there was no need to stamp her feet in panic.
Even if Qi Condensation grand perfection was right before her eyes, she still had time before foundation establishment.
As long as she offset the karma with merit before it was added to her heavenly tribulation, that would be enough.
'It’s not too late. I can gather it slowly.’
If you rushed anything, even things that could have worked would go wrong.
So she decided to change methods.
If begging would not work, she could win their favor instead.
She believed that if she behaved like a good forum citizen from then on, merit would follow.
In her past life, too, useful posts had been showered with upvotes, had they not?
If she shared one solid piece of information, some grateful dao friend would press merit for her.
‘Leave nice comments and post information. Then someone will press the button for me.’
Conveniently, she had material worth sharing.
None other than puppetry pill refining.
She had bragged about it on the Nameless Forum before, but she had never shared the details.
Most importantly, it was something difficult to combine in the first place, so it probably had never been released on the Nameless Forum.
Baek Cheong crossed over to the information board and began writing a post.
“Dao friend(913.14): Sharing a secret puppetry Pill Refining Method.”
[If a dao friend has a full set of five Five Elements Golems, they can put them to work in pill refining. Dao Friends who keep missing fire control because they don’t have enough hands, take note.
First, match each golem’s attribute and divide the work. The fire(fire) golem guards the pill furnace flame; the wood(wood) golem adds the medicinal ingredients; the water(water) golem cools the steam and condenses it; the earth(earth) golem steadies the pill furnace; and the metal(metal) golem skims off the rising turbid qi.
For power, just slot one spirit stone into each golem. Don’t skimp. If they run short on power, their movements get sluggish and you miss all your fire control.
The key is splitting your Divine Sense into five strands and controlling all five at once. Assign one golem to each strand, and it’s like you’ve grown ten hands. Your main Divine Sense only needs to watch how the pill is cooking.
This way, the alchemist only has to handle fire control and medicinal properties, while the golems do all the grunt work. It greatly reduces the chance of ruining the pill compared to struggling alone over a pill furnace.
Using five strands of Divine Sense at the same time is confusing at first, so practice with an empty pill furnace until you get the hang of it.]
[Merit 0 / Karma 0]
It was an information post she had put real effort into.
At this rate, she thought someone would thank her and at least press one merit.
But the only response she got was a single mocking reply.
[Dao friend(202.5): Look at you trying, lol.]
There was a reason the post got buried.
The entire Nameless Forum was boiling over with the Upper Realm war topic.
All the dao Friends were drawn to the story of a war breaking out in the Spirit Realm.
There was no room to squeeze in something like a puppetry pill refining Secret Method.
‘Of all times, a war had to break out now.’
Baek Cheong clicked her tongue and left the post.
Getting impatient for no reason would only waste her strength.
It would be better to wait leisurely until the topic cooled and the dao Friends returned.
She decided to take the long view on collecting merit.
‘No need to hurry. The road is long anyway.’
Then a different move suddenly crossed her mind.
‘Should I just delay foundation establishment?’
If she did not reach foundation establishment, the heavenly tribulation would not fall either.
If there were no heavenly tribulation, then there would be nowhere for the karma to attach itself.
It was a method of sitting tight until she had filled up all the merit in Qi Condensation.
But as soon as she considered that far, a chill ran down her spine.
She had remembered what dao friend(3.9), who had been passing by, had said.
They had said karma took a different form for each Cultivator.
Just because she delayed foundation establishment did not mean karma would quietly wait.
Even if she avoided heavenly tribulation, the karma might arrive in some other form.
‘What if I delay it for no reason and end up suffering something even nastier?’
Once her thoughts reached that point, she could not bring herself to delay foundation establishment.
Delaying it was a problem, and not delaying it was a problem too.
It was nothing short of a dilemma.
If there were no way out either way, then there was only one path.
She had to make even more airtight preparations to face the heavenly tribulation with karma layered onto it.
That would be enough, as long as she prepared so thoroughly that she would be fine even if lightning tribulation fell twice.
‘I’d rather take heavenly tribulation a hundred or a thousand times.’
Fortunately, among the methods she had, there was at least one way to prepare for heavenly tribulation.
There was the Five Elements Tribulation Formation she had devised long ago.
It was a formation that created fake tribulation clouds to receive and disperse the lightning of heavenly tribulation.
If she intended to take the lightning tribulation split in two, the more tightly she refined the formation, the better.
In the end, to refine a formation, she had to return to formation glyphs.
“Phew…”
Baek Cheong took the Jinmun Formation Diagram out of the Storage Platform.
It was a diagram densely packed with formation glyphs, the bones of formations.
She had already learned most ordinary formation glyphs.
The ones she had left untouched and put off were all difficult formation glyphs.
It was a hurdle she had set aside until now because there had been no urgency.
‘If I learn even these, the tribulation formation should become that much sturdier.’
She studied, chewing over the formation glyphs she had put off one by one.
They were so tricky that merely looking at them made her head cramp, but she had no other choice.
At the same time, she did not neglect training.
She had no idea what form the karma might take when it arrived.
She needed to block even variables that might seep in as something other than heavenly tribulation.
‘Now that I think about it, this really is unfair.’
A little knot of grievance settled in Baek Cheong’s small heart.
Who would have thought one measly downvote would make her keep up such diligent cultivation?
Even so, she could not stop.
Until the day the heavenly tribulation carrying karma fell, she felt she would only be at ease if she did everything she possibly could.