Chapter 123: Black Sea Heavy Water Tome
Han Li continued to stare at the jade plate hovering before him in a silent, unblinking manner, and a long while later, the array plate began to emit a faint buzzing sound.
Bursts of white light then emerged from the jade plate to form a white array.
An indistinct gray shadow was standing in the array, and it was none other than the same Transient Guild envoy that had assigned Han Li his mission.
"I didn't think that you would actually be able to revive that seed, and it's even more remarkable that you managed to do it in less than a year. The elder who released this mission is quite curious about how you managed to accomplish this, and he requested me to ask about the method that you employed. He's willing to exchange for this method from you, and you can state the price," the gray figure said.
"I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint that elder. I just so happened to obtain a small vial of a special liquid by chance, and I used it to nurture the seed along with a type of five-colored spirit soil. Through some testing, I found that I was able to restore a hint of vitality within the seed, and only then did I dare to take on this mission.
“However, I only had a few drops of that liquid to begin with, and I used it all up to complete this mission. As for the method I used to create the five-colored spirit soil, I would be happy to offer that up for exchange if that elder is interested," Han Li replied with a wry smile.
"That's a pity. If you ever get your hands on this type of liquid again, you can contact me at any time. That elder has told me that he's willing to offer you an immortal treasure in exchange. Now that you've completed your trial mission, from this day forth, you will officially be an azure member of our guild. This is your new mask, make sure to keep it safe."
The gray figure didn't ask any further questions, and he swept a hand through the air as he spoke.
A streak of azure light flew out of the jade plate, then fell into Han Li's grasp, revealing itself to be an azure cow mask. Aside from the color, which had turned from blue to azure, it was no different in appearance to Han Li's current mask, and it even retained the number "15" on its glabella.
"Thank you, esteemed envoy," Han Li said as he held onto the azure mask and extended a bow toward the gray figure in the array.
The gray figure didn't say anything further, and with a wave of his hand, he vanished on the spot, following which the white array around him also disintegrated into thin air.
Thus, peace and quiet returned to the secret chamber.
Han Li gently stroked the dense patterns on the mask while sensing the peculiar fluctuations emanating from it, and a moment later, he removed his blue mask before replacing it with his new mask.
After putting on the new mask, it immediately began to ripple with a gentle watery glow, and the blue cow mask that had just been removed disintegrated into nothingness without any warning.
In the next instant, a passage of glowing golden text surfaced in Han Li's mind.
The passage of text contained the method to utilize the mask's many functions. In addition to the old features, which included disguise adoption, aura alteration, and confidential voice transmission, he had also been given access to some new features, including releasing missions and exchanging resources with other members of the same tier.
After memorizing everything, Han Li raised his middle and index fingers together, then tapped them against his own glabella as he began to chant a peculiar incantation.
As soon as his voice trailed off, a burst of gentle azure light emerged from the mask, much like a gentle breeze or a wave of rippling water, spreading throughout the entire secret chamber in a flash.
Within the area encompassed by the azure light, a projection of a massive array plate that took up virtually an entire wall of the secret chamber appeared before Han Li.
This was a square array plate that was of a glowing azure color, and it was riddled with complex array runes. At the very center of the array was a circular vortex roughly the size of a well, and it was slowly revolving while releasing bursts of spatial fluctuations.
The entire array plate was split up into two areas, one on the left and one on the right, with the circular vortex dividing the two. The top grids of the two areas contained the words "Missions" and "Exchange".
Right as Han Li was about to take a closer look, a burst of golden light emerged on the surface of the array plate, and a passage of golden text appeared on its surface, mostly comprised of some rules that had to be followed during exchanges.
Due to the fact that exchanges in the guild had to take place across realms, all of the items put up for exchange were appraised by professional personnel of the Transient Guild, and information like their quality, strengths and weaknesses, and even their places of origin, were all laid out in the descriptions attached to the items. To a certain extent, this ensured the fairness and openness of the exchanges.
Furthermore, if either side were to go back on an agreement, then the perpetrator would be dealt a severe punishment from the guild. In serious cases, they could even permanently lose their guild membership.
After Han Li was finished reading through the rules, the passage of text faded away.
Han Li took a deep breath, then continued to inspect the array plate.
On the left side of the array plate, under the heading of "Missions", there were a series of summaries of missions inscribed vertically, and listed after the descriptions of those missions were the rewards for completing them.
At a rough glance, Han Li saw a variety of missions, including requests to search for certain individuals, hiring notices for assassins, and invitations to join a group of cultivators to explore secret regions. There was a great deal of diversity in the missions on offer, and the rewards also fluctuated depending on the difficulty of the missions.
In contrast, the contents on the right-hand side "Exchanges" section were a bit more complex.
The items put up for exchange were split up into major categories like "spirit medicines", "spirit materials", "treasures", "talismans", and "scriptures", and all of the categories also had subcategories of different levels.
Han Li took a rough glance at all of the categories before focusing his attention on the "scriptures" category, where he began to take a closer look.
There were quite a few sub-categories under the "scriptures" category, and most of them contained cultivation methods of different attributes.
However, there weren't many cultivation methods for Ancestral Gods. In fact, there weren't even as many cultivation arts of this nature as what was available for sale in the Black Wind Sea. As for high-grade Earthly Immortal cultivation arts, those were even rarer.
After searching for close to six hours, Han Li's eyes suddenly lit up, and he spotted an earth-attribute Earthly Immortal cultivation art by the name of the "Origin Earth Refining Arts".
According to the brief description provided, this was quite an advanced cultivation art, and upon attaining full mastery of the cultivation art, one would be able to at least reach the Golden Immortal Stage.
However, after seeing the asking price for this cultivation art, Han Li was immediately left feeling deflated. The owner of the cultivation art was asking for a mature Fire Origin Dragon Tooth Fruit in exchange.
According to the description, this was a type of spirit fruit that contained the power of laws of fire. Not only was it extremely difficult to find trees that this fruit that bore this fruit, the fruit itself also required tens of thousands of years to reach full maturity, just like a Profound Heavenly Fruit.
Furthermore, as soon as the fruit emerged, it would immediately begin to release a strong fragrant aroma, and it was often the case that the fruit would be eaten by spirit beasts before reaching full maturity. Hence, mature specimens of this fruit were extremely rare, and there was very little supply to meet the demand.
Hence, he had no choice but to give up on this cultivation art and search for another one.
Around an hour later, he found another Earthly Immortal cultivation art by the name of the "Heavenly Glacial Ice Arts". This was a cultivation art of an inferior caliber to the Origin Earth Refining Arts, but it was a water-attribute cultivation art, so it was very suited to the environment in the Black Wind Sea.
However, the asking price was just as steep. In exchange for the cultivation art, Han Li would have to go and search for an item in the Northern Glacial Immortal Region.
The mission duration was 100 years, and regardless of whether the requested item was secured or not, one would be able to obtain the cultivation art as long as they didn't perish in the Northern Glacial Immortal Realm.
Han Li naturally immediately gave up on this cultivation art as well.
Over the course of a day and a night, he scanned through virtually all of the cultivation arts up for exchange, and aside from those previous high-grade Earthly Immortal cultivation arts, he only managed to find one more, a cultivation art by the name of the Black Sea Heavy Water Tome.
This was a rather intriguing cultivation art in that not only could it allow one to attain the power of water laws through harnessing the power of faith, one could also use the cultivation art to derive heavy water from seawater. This derivation process was also the process through which users of this cultivation art could attain more immortal spiritual power, so it was truly killing two birds with one stone.
According to the summary of the cultivation art, there were nine tiers of heavy water that could be derived using this cultivation art, and theoretically, it could help a cultivator progress beyond the True Immortal Stage to reach the Golden Immortal Stage.
The reason why it was stated that this was only achievable in theory was because no one had successfully accomplished this in practice. This wasn't because this cultivation art was too profound and difficult to cultivate. On the contrary, it was far easier to cultivate than the previous two cultivation arts, but the process of deriving heavy water was quite difficult, and it required an extremely long time.
Furthermore, the further one advanced in this cultivation art, the longer the time it would take.
The Earthly Immortal who invented this cultivation art was only able to derive three levels of heavy water, which roughly equated to the amount of water in a small creek, and even that had taken him close to 500,000 years. In the end, he was only just barely able to reach the mid-True Immortal Stage, and for a time, he was the laughingstock of all of his fellow daoists.
After that, he was also unable to bear the snail-like progress in this cultivation art, and he switched to a different one. By his estimates, it would've most likely taken him tens of millions of years for him to complete the cultivation of the subsequent six levels.
However, Han Li wasn't too bothered by this. After all, his objective was never to pursue the path of the Earthly Immortal, and he was only using an Earthly Immortal cultivation art as a temporary means for him to recover his magic power.
Furthermore, it was exactly due to this fatal flaw that the asking price for this cultivation art was far cheaper than for the other two. All that was being requested in exchange was any type of material that contained the power of laws.
After making up his mind, Han Li joined his middle and index fingers before tapping them against his own glabella, and a wisp of azure light flew out from within, then landed on the spot where the "Black Sea Heavy Water Tome" was situated on the array plate, where it vanished out of sight.
Around 15 minutes later, a beam of azure light was projected down into the secret chamber from the array plate.
A projection of a male figure wearing an azure raccoon mask, and his build was remarkably tall and muscular. He was dressed in a set of rather strange tribal attire, and he didn't seem to be human.
"I take it that my Black Sea Heavy Water Tome has caught your eye, Fellow Daoist?" the man asked as he cupped his fist in a salute toward Han Li.
His voice was very loud and clear, but he spoke in a rather warm tone.
Han Li returned the man's salute, then replied, "Indeed. I can see that you've requested any type of material that contains the power of laws in exchange for the cultivation art, but you haven't offered any further information. Would you be able to elaborate, Fellow Daoist?"
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