Chapter 42
Baek-Cheong roamed the Marketplace, filled with fierce determination.
After she had feasted her eyes on the Platinum Pavilion, her discerning eye had improved quite a bit.
While she was at it, she resolved to fish out at least one fortuitous encounter.
However, cold reality differed from her romantic expectations.
‘This is trash, and that’s junk. Where the hell is the fortuitous encounter?’
She scoured hundreds of street stalls and stared intently at the energy of the displayed items using the Qi Observation Technique.
Most were just lumps of scrap metal that hadn’t even properly gathered spiritual energy, or common 1st-Grade Low-Tier materials.
She deeply felt the truth of the saying that finding a fortuitous encounter was like finding a needle in a desert.
On the other hand, the situation for Law Enforcer Ga, who was silently following behind her, was quite different.
“Why is this dropped here?”
Law Enforcer Ga stopped walking and casually kicked the dirt floor before picking something up.
It was covered in dirt and dust, but it was a Mid-Grade Spirit Stone exuding a faint spiritual energy.
In the middle of a Marketplace bustling with countless cultivators, accidentally picking up a Mid-Grade Spirit Stone dropped by someone else was as rare as getting struck by lightning while walking down the street.
“Law Enforcer Ga, did you just pick that up?”
“Yes, Young Lady. I was quite lucky. I don’t know who lost it, but it will be put to good use.”
Law Enforcer Ga smiled good-naturedly and tucked the spirit stone into his robes.
It was as if a glowing title reading [Person of Fortuitous Encounters] was visible above his head.
“Does this make any sense?”
Seeing this, Baek-Cheong felt a deep sense of disillusionment.
An insane amount of luck, where fortuitous encounters just rolled in even when simply walking down the street.
In front of such a genuine Person of Fortuitous Encounters, she realized the bitter truth that for an ordinary and unlucky Cultivator like herself, living a life of diligent Training was what suited her station.
“I just want to go back to the Mansion.”
In the end, Baek-Cheong folded her dreams of a fortuitous encounter and trudged back to the Mansion.
As soon as she returned to her Abode, she laid her exhausted body on the bed and connected to the Nameless Forum out of habit.
She fiddled with the comments from her Dao Friends to soothe her hollow heart, and before she knew it, she fell into a deep sleep.
* * *
The next morning, true to her resolution from the day before, Baek-Cheong decided to stop her vain search for fortuitous encounters and devote herself to Training.
Her goal was to learn the Water Element 1st-Grade High-Tier Spell, Ice Dragon Shatter, which she had won at the Myriad Phenomena Pavilion’s Auction House.
Normally, a 1st-Grade High-Tier Spell has complex Meridian Manipulation and consumes a massive Amount of Spiritual Energy, making it easier to initiate only when one reaches at least the Late Qi Condensation Stage.
However, Baek-Cheong knew her own situation better than anyone else.
Despite being at the 4th-Stage Qi Condensation, she had a spiritual root that had grown through the Five Elements Mutual Generation, a vastly expanded Dantian, and a massive Divine Sense that had astonished the Dao Friends of the Nameless Forum.
She had a well-founded confidence that she could learn a 1st-Grade High-Tier Spell without much difficulty, with this.
“Let’s see.”
Baek-Cheong went out to the garden and took the jade slip from her Storage Platform.
When she infused her Divine Sense into the jade slip, the Incantation and Meridian Manipulation Method for Ice Dragon Shatter poured into her mind.
“It’s definitely on a different level from a Basic Technique. The way the meridians twist is practically art.”
Baek-Cheong closed her eyes and drew up the Water-attribute Qi from her Dantian.
Following the Incantation, she rotated the energy, followed the complex meridian pathways, and pushed it out through her fingertips.
The process of compressing the energy and shaping it was quite tricky, but her energy control, honed through Pill Refining, shone through.
When barely One Shichen had passed,
Cold air spewed from her fingertips, and a shape began to form.
Crackle - As Ice Dragon Shatter fired from her hand, the moisture in the air froze as if leaving a trail, and sparkling crystals fell.
However, it was not the massive and majestic form of an Ice Dragon as its name suggested.
Because she was still at the beginner stage, the cohesion of her energy was lacking.
As a result, the shape flying through the air was an unsightly form, closer to an ice earthworm barely the size of her forearm.
“What is this? It’s an earthworm, not a dragon.”
Baek-Cheong grumbled, unable to hide her disappointment.
However, the true value of Ice Dragon Shatter lay not in its form, but in its Control Art.
She realized that a thread of her Divine Sense was connected to the fired ice earthworm.
“I can move this however I want?”
When she controlled Ice Dragon Shatter with her Divine Sense, the ice earthworm flying through the air changed direction flexibly and charged toward a large boulder in the corner of the garden.
CRASH!
With a loud collision, the boulder froze over and shattered into pieces.
Even though it was an unsightly form at the beginner level, it possessed a destructive power befitting a 1st-Grade High-Tier Spell.
“If I do this right…”
Baek-Cheong’s interest surged as she realized the true value of Ice Dragon Shatter.
It seemed that if she deployed Ice Dragon Shatter in multiples, it could exert considerable power.
“Let’s give it a try.”
Baek-Cheong drastically drew up the energy from her Dantian and performed Divine Sense Division.
However, Ice Dragon Shatter was on a different level from basic techniques.
Maintaining even a single Ice Dragon consumed considerable concentration, and even though it used the same Water-attribute Qi, the burden placed on her meridians was immense.
“Ah, five is the limit.”
Baek-Cheong stretched out both hands and simultaneously floated five ice earthworms into the air.
Her meridians expanded, causing a stiff ache that indicated she had reached her limit, but it wasn’t enough to make her lose control.
“Go!”
As she snapped her fingers, the five ice earthworms swam through the air in unison.
Through her divided Divine Sense, she controlled the ice earthworms with different movements.
One soared into the sky, two made wide detours to the left and right, and the remaining two charged straight ahead.
“These are just controlled projectiles, aren’t they?”
Baek-Cheong excitedly whipped the ice earthworms around, turning the garden into a mess.
At that moment, a Hollow Laugh echoed from the direction of the garden entrance.
“Haha…”
Baek Mu-Yeong had dismissed his guards and stood alone at the garden entrance, staring blankly at the bizarre sight.
As the Guild Master of the Baek Clan Merchant Guild, he had seen countless Cultivators, but the sight of a young child at the 4th-Stage Qi Condensation freely wielding a 1st-Grade High-Tier Spell - even splitting it into five streams - was an astonishing spectacle.
Even the modifier Peerless Prodigy seemed woefully inadequate to describe his Niece’s Talent.
He clearly felt that what the Pacheon Sword Saint had seen through the day before was chillingly true.
“Gasp! Uncle!”
Belatedly noticing Baek Mu-Yeong’s presence, Baek-Cheong was startled and hastily dispersed the deployed Ice Dragon Shatter.
She painstakingly straightened her Attire and feigned the expression of the most modest and demure Young Lady of a noble Clan in the world.
However, it was a meaningless act of feigning ignorance in front of her uncle, who had already seen everything.
“Haha, you rascal. You’ve been showing nothing but extraordinary sights ever since you arrived at the Immortal City, and now you try to act demure? If my elder brother knew your true tomboyish nature, he would faint in shock.”
Baek Mu-Yeong chuckled heartily and walked into the garden.
“No, I wasn’t! I was just quietly Training by myself…”
When Baek-Cheong blushed and made excuses, Baek Mu-Yeong waved his hand.
“It’s a joke, a joke. Anyway, that’s some excellent skill. To initiate a 1st-Grade High-Tier Spell overnight. My elder brother’s shoulders will rise with pride so high they’ll be visible from ten li away.”
Baek-Cheong didn’t know what to do with herself at the embarrassing praise.
Then, she perked up her ears at her uncle’s following words.
“It’s just that a few quite rare items have just come in, so we’re planning to hold a small auction at our Platinum Pavilion tomorrow. It won’t be as diverse as the Myriad Phenomena Pavilion, but there will be some fairly good items. Are you interested?”
Her ears perked up at the word 'auction,' but her interest quickly cooled.
It was because the auction she had experienced at the Myriad Phenomena Pavilion had been full of boredom.
“I think it’s still too much for me to covet rare items…”
Baek-Cheong was about to answer unenthusiastically.
Suddenly, a good idea came to mind.
What if she tried selling the Inscribed Spirit Gathering Pill she had?
She wanted to find out the value of the Inscribed Spirit Gathering Pill, which both Yak-seon and the Dao Friends of the Nameless Forum had found so incomprehensible.
“By any chance, can I also put an item up at the Auction House?”
“Hmm? You want to put an item up for auction?”
Baek Mu-Yeong made a puzzled expression.
“It might be different for a large-scale auction like the Myriad Phenomena Pavilion, but the items that go up for auction at our Platinum Pavilion have limited slots, so we don’t accept them unless they are of a certain grade. It would be difficult to put mediocre 1st or 2nd-Grade Low-Tier miscellaneous items up for auction…”
What could a young child at the Qi Condensation Stage possibly have other than some common spirit herbs or a few talismans?
Baek Mu-Yeong tried to politely decline his Niece’s proposal.
However, Baek-Cheong smiled triumphantly and carefully took out a jade bottle from her Storage Platform.
“Would something like this not work either?”
Baek-Cheong opened the lid of the jade bottle and held it right under her uncle’s nose.
A clear and pure medicinal fragrance flowed out from inside the jade bottle, purifying even the air.
And on the surface of the pill resting neatly at the bottom of the jade bottle, a Silver Cloud Pattern that looked like living, moving clouds was clearly engraved.
“Th-This is…!”
Baek Mu-Yeong’s eyes widened like saucers, unable to hide his surprise.
He immediately recognized the true nature of the energy exuding from the pill before his eyes and could not contain his shock.
“A Spirit Gathering Pill, a 1st-Grade Low-Tier Pill… has a pill pattern engraved on it? How can such a Heaven-Defying Pill exist in this world!”
Baek Mu-Yeong took the jade bottle with trembling hands and stared intently at the pill, as if witnessing an unbelievable miracle.
And Baek-Cheong, watching her uncle’s intense reaction, smiled like a victor.