Chapter 291: Thunder Fruit
As expected, the universe gourd could hold the lightning water.
In the blink of an eye, all the lightning water was emptied and a thunder essence crystal was exposed at the bottom of the pool.
The crystal was translucent and was covered with purplish lightning which flickered continuously.
Looking at the crystal, Yu Nianzhen felt a pain in his eyes and a terrible pain flashed in his head.
Without meaning to, Yu Nianzhen groaned and subconsciously closed his eyes to block out the sight of the crystal.
"What’s wrong?" Jiang Yue asked when he heard his husband’s groan.
"It’s okay." Yu Nianzhen answered and opened his eyes.
"I didn’t expect the thunder essence crystal to be so domineering." He continued and sighed.
Fortunately, he didn’t look at the crystal for too long or he would have endured worse pain.
After putting away the universe gourd, Yu Nianzhen took a deep breath and thought about the current problem.
No matter what, he wanted to refine the thunder essence crystal but couldn’t think of how to take it away for a moment.
"Transfer it into the ancient palace." Jiang Yue suggested and Yu Nianzhen nodded.
He also thought this plan was feasible since he couldn’t momentarily think of a better way of handling the thunder essence crystal.
Anyway, as long as he refined the crystal within a hundred years, it didn’t matter where he kept it.
With that thought, Yu Nianzhen wrapped his hands with sword qi and sword intent before he extended his right hand towards the thunder essence crystal.
Almost immediately, the purple lightning on the thunder essence crystal began to flash vigorously.
Bolts of lightning emanated from the crystal and struck his hand’s protection but Yu Nianzhen didn’t panic.
He endured the numbness of being struck by lightning and firmly held the thunder essence crystal before transferring it into a room in the ancient palace.
’As expected, lightning is the most violent element.’ He thought and sighed.
Although he held the crystal for less than a breath, his hand was still injured and dark scorch marks covered his palm.
Without a doubt, his hand would have been scrapped if he held the thunder essence crystal for longer.
"How are you?" Jiang Yue asked and took his hand to look.
"It’s better than it looks." Yu Nianzhen said but his husband rolled his eyes.
"Take a pill to recover."
"Good."
Soon after, Yu Nianzhen sat cross-legged to refine a pill while Jiang Yue protected him.
An hour later, he finished refining the rejuvenation pill and his hand was back to normal.
"Handling the lightning treasures is a little more difficult than we expected." Yu Nianzhen said and frowned.
"It will be easier after we break through to the fourth level of body refining."
"I also think so."
After that, the two didn’t immediately leave the area.
Instead, they sat down and decided to have a meal before continuing with their search of the core area.
"The lightning liquid should be useful to lightning cultivators." Jiang Yue suddenly said and looked at Yu Nianzhen.
"Mmmm. Let’s trade it with Xuan Ke."
Since they couldn’t use the liquid for themselves, it was best to exchange it for something they needed.
This was the most practical outcome and it prevented the brothers from owing each other too much.
"The lightning liquid is enough to help him break through several levels." Jiang Yue said with a little envy in his voice.
In the origin tempering realm, the qi accumulation needed at each level was tremendous.
Ordinarily, cultivators used spirit stones to reach the peak of a level before they refined an origin treasure to break through.
However, with an appropriate treasure, they could gain twice the result with half the effort.
For lightning origin cultivators, the lightning liquid was such an appropriate treasure.
It contained a lot of lightning qi and absorbing it was faster than absorbing the lightning qi from the surroundings.
More importantly, the lightning qi in the lightning liquid was extremely pure and only needed to be absorbed without further refining.
"We will also have our chances." Yu Nianzhen consoled and rubbed his husband’s hair.
"I know."
With that, the two talked while resting before continuing with their search.
In this way, another two days passed.
In that time, they didn’t find another core treasure but they found several pools of lightning liquid.
The quantity and quality of these pools were lower than the first but the two collected them all.
Although they didn’t need them, Yu Nianzhen and Jiang Yue didn’t plan on ignoring any resources.
After all, these resources could be exchanged for resources they needed.
Using that mentality, they took advantage of everything that could be taken advantage of.
On the evening of the second day, the two came across a thunder fruit tree and they couldn’t help but be excited when they saw it.
"We have only seen purple bamboo trees in the thunder forest. I didn’t expect we would come across a thunder fruit tree." Jiang Yue said excitedly.
"Mmmm." Yu Nianzhen nodded in agreement.
The thunder fruit produced by the tree was the main ingredient for the lightning-swallowing pill.
This pill was a special pill that could swallow tribulation lightning thus reducing the risk for a cultivator.
Most importantly, the lightning-swallowing pill could then be refined to cultivate the body.
"I wonder if Hongzhu can refine the lightning-swallowing pill."
"Her alchemy is not bad. She probably can."
After spending more than a year with Hongzhu, Yu Nianzhen had a good understanding of her skills.
For a pill like the lightning swallowing pill, he didn’t think she would have any difficulties.
However, ...
"XiaoYue, the lightning-swallowing pill can only swallow ordinary tribulation." He reminded.
No matter how heaven-defying the pill was, it couldn’t swallow white lightning.
White lightning was only experienced by those cultivators envied by the heavens and the two belonged to that category.
In that case, the lightning-swallowing pill was absolutely useless to them.
"I forgot about that." Jiang Yue said and sighed in resignation.
Unless they encountered a thunder beast, they were destined to continue enduring terrible thunder calamities.
"It doesn’t matter." He continued and Yu Nianzhen agreed.
Even without the lightning-swallowing pill or thunder beast, they had ways to survive their thunder calamities.
In that case, they didn’t need to dwell on what they couldn’t have.
"Let’s take some fruits and continue our search." Yu Nianzhen said.
"Good."
Soon after, they two worked hard to harvest ten fruits before leaving the area.
"Ten fruits are enough to refine one hundred lightning-swallowing pills." Jiang Yue said in a happy voice.
Yu Nianzhen was also happy because he managed to transplant a branch of the thunder fruit tree into the jade box.
"Let’s find a chance to give them to Hongzhu for refining." He said.
"I wonder if we have the auxiliary ingredients." Jiang Yue worried.
If all the fruits were not refined within one hundred years, they would definitely be taken back by the secret realm when they left.
"We can trade some fruits with lightning origin cultivators." Yu Nianzhen suggested.
Like the lightning liquid, the thunder fruit had a humongous amount of lightning qi.
Refining a fruit would allow a lightning cultivator to immediately break through to the next level.
However, a cultivator could only take one thunder fruit in their life.
As such, most would wait until the core formation realm or the nascent soul realm.
"It’s a waste to eat the fruit in the origin tempering realm but it’s their choice to make." Jiang Yue agreed and the two continued walking.
In the following day, they found another pool of lightning liquid but nothing else.
However, the two were neither impatient nor disappointed.
They originally accompanied Xuan Ke into the thunder forest and didn’t expect to have any gains.
Fortunately, things went beyond their expectations.
Not only were they enlightened, but they also managed to get a lot of benefits in the thunder forest.
If they could only cultivate in the thunder pool and get the heavenly thunder stone, they would be satisfied with their foray into the thunder forest.
"Azhen, we found the thunder essence crystal but I didn’t see anything that could be polar to it in the vicinity." Jiang Yue suddenly said and looked at his husband.
"I know." Yu Nianzhen answered and frowned.
While walking in the thunder forest, something seemed to be nagging at the back of his mind.
This something was related to the polarity between violence and non-violence.
However, the idea was too vague and Yu Nianzhen couldn’t grasp it.
For the time being, he didn’t try to force it and hoped the idea would develop on its own and eventually manifest when he was ready.
After speaking to Jiang Yue about it, his husband went silent and fell into deep thought.
"I also have the feeling that the answer is right in front of us. Unfortunately, I can’t seem to get it." He eventually said.
