Chapter 19: Black Market – Competing for Longevity
Icicles hung from the glazed tile eaves of Blackwater City, and Lu Qingyang, hidden in the shadow of his cloak, gnawed on a roasted sweet potato, his hands sticky with syrup mixed with spiritual charcoal ash.
Su Li moved half a step away in disgust, as the bronze box at her waist suddenly vibrated, causing the Soul-Snatching Bells hanging from the auction house's curtain to jingle.
"The entrance fee for you two Fellow Daoists."
A scarred man stood before the stone steps, propping a wolf-tooth club, the white mist from his nostrils condensing into the words "Thirty Spirit Stones."
Lu Qingyang picked at his sweet potato skin and mumbled, "The black market is even blacker than Taiyi Pavilion, we might as well just rob them..."
Before he finished speaking, Su Li kicked his shin, and the Spirit Stone pouch she threw out arced through the air, landing precisely inside the man's collar.
The Mirage Pearl on the auction house's dome cast a colorful halo.
Lu Qingyang stared at the seven-petal lotus pattern on the robes of the Taiyi Pavilion Disciples in the front row, his palm unconsciously caressing the qingmu spirit pearl in the secret pocket of his trousers.
The marrow-cleansing grass in the pearl's medicinal field had already turned withered yellow—ever since he forcefully ripened the dragon blood vine three days ago, the pearl's time flow had dropped to 1:3, and even absorbing Spiritual Plant essence became sluggish.
"The seventh auction item, a damaged 《Qingyang Foundation Establishment Record》!"
The host Cultivator unveiled the red silk, revealing the Jade Slip's surface covered in spiderweb-like cracks.
Lu Qingyang smelled the familiar rotten bone flower scent, which was the aura of the half-scroll Cultivation Technique the Old Drunkard had clutched before his death.
He took out three Low-Grade Spirit Stones and weighed them in his hand, then suddenly shouted, "Which scoundrel is using an illusion? This is clearly Hehuan Sect's Dual Cultivation Technique!"
Amidst the uproar, the Jade Slip was enveloped in a pink mist as its true nature was revealed.
The host Cultivator's veins bulged on his forehead, but Lu Qingyang, with crossed legs, transmitted a message to Su Li: "See that? The one in the hood in the fifth row, he's holding a spirit-testing plate."
Indeed, a Taiyi Pavilion Disciple suddenly stood up, and as his Sword Qi split the pink mist, the real 《Qingyang Foundation Establishment Record》 fell from the Jade Slip's interlayer.
When the bidding soared to two hundred Spirit Stones, Lu Qingyang pulled out a moldy snakeberry fruit and flicked it at the crystal lamp.
The sour, rotten smell of the fruit pulp ignited the defensive Formation, and while the guards were extinguishing the flames, he ducked under the tables, his shoe sole's hidden spirit-absorbing talisman sticking to and taking the Jade Slip.
Su Li threw a smoke talisman at the exit, and the commotion of them knocking over a spiritual fruit stall startled Cultivators throughout the street.
"Greedy and reckless!"
Su Li dragged him onto the rooftop, as the Flying Swords of their pursuers cut off half of a flying eave behind them.
Lu Qingyang tore open the Jade Slip's Seal with his teeth as he ran, and blood-colored small script appeared on the yellowed silk—"Three Foundation Establishment tribulations, Spirit Platform Heart Questioning, Dantian Sea Transformation, Karma Dust Severing."
As the sword net of the encircling pursuers descended, he suddenly slammed the Jade Slip onto the spirit pearl, and amidst a burst of green light, the phantom of the Old Drunkard sitting in the Void Realm appeared.
"So the Spirit Platform tribulation requires severing the Heart Demon, huh?"
Lu Qingyang crashed through the back window of a Pill Furnace room, casually snatching an unformed foundation establishment pill from the table.
Flames from the Pill Furnace licked the rafters, and the pursuers were thrown back by the explosion's shockwave.
He chewed on the half-cooked Medicinal Pill and scurried into a dark alley, the surging spiritual power in his Dantian burning his Meridians hot.
Su Li threw nine ice-sealing talismans to freeze the alley entrance, then turned and grabbed his collar, pressing him against the wall: "The foundation establishment pill you ate was meant for Yao Beasts!"
Lu Qingyang bared his teeth, stained with cinnabar: "It's better than Taiyi Pavilion's Blood-Transforming Pill..."
Before he finished speaking, he suddenly hunched over like a shrimp, the qingmu spirit pearl uncontrollably floating out of his chest, and the spiritual mist in the pearl's medicinal field condensed into a funnel, pouring into his glabella.
When the pursuers' explosive talismans shattered the ice wall, Lu Qingyang was experiencing the most absurd Heart Demon tribulation of his life.
He saw himself become an apprentice in a pharmacy, marrying the blacksmith's daughter in town, and at fifty years old, coughing blood while lying in a wicker chair—that was the life where he hadn't fallen off a cliff and found the spirit pearl.
When his grandchildren in the Heart Demon illusion knelt before his bed, holding inferior longevity-extending pills, he suddenly sneered, "It doesn't even have three patterns, and you dare sell it for ten Spirit Stones?"
His Spirit Platform vibrated violently, and another piece of rust flaked off the qingmu spirit pearl's surface.
When Lu Qingyang opened his eyes, he met Su Li's astonished gaze, her compass needle spinning wildly, showing the spiritual power fluctuations of the Foundation Establishment Early Stage.
The pursuers' sword tips rusted abruptly before touching his throat, and ghost-faced vines emerged from the alley's brick cracks, entangling everyone's ankles—this time, without consuming Lifespan.
"Your Foundation Establishment tribulation was... unique."
Su Li kicked away the rusted sword fragments, noticing the new Texture on the spirit pearl in his palm.
Lu Qingyang picked at the moss on the wall and chuckled foolishly: "I snatched some Blazing Sun Grass seeds from the Pill Furnace room and planted them in the spirit pearl for ten years during the Heart Demon illusion."
He opened his palm, and a Spiritual Plant entwined with lightning patterns swayed gracefully, three foundation establishment pills hanging from its pistil.
A blood-colored signal flare suddenly rose from the direction of the auction house, and Taiyi Pavilion's enforcement Flying Ship broke through the clouds.
Lu Qingyang stuffed a foundation establishment pill into Su Li's embrace and swallowed the remaining two himself: "Let's split up and meet at Burial Dragon Abyss!"
He didn't mention that the pill he gave her was mixed with a tracking talisman, nor did he mention the fragments of the future reflected in the spirit pearl—the woman on the Flying Ship's deck, whose appearance resembled Su Li's, had a golden lotus pattern embroidered on her sleeve, indicating she was a Taiyi Pavilion Elder.
As Lu Qingyang rolled into a pile of beggars, the qingmu spirit pearl under the grime felt slightly warm.
The newly Awakened "Treasure Appraisal" talent within the pearl was frantically warning him.
He reached for the old beggar's chipped pottery bowl, the "Burial Dragon" characters carved into its bottom obscured by a century of dirt.
As the Flying Ship's searchlight swept across the street corner, he shook the broken bowl and wailed, "Please, good sirs, a bowl of spiritual grain porridge!"
When the pursuers swept past the alley entrance, Lu Qingyang's spirit-testing bracelet showed Qi Refining third Realm—this was the qingmu spirit pearl's second layer of disguise ability, at the cost of having to silently recite the Qingxin Art from the 《Qingyang Foundation Establishment Record》 every quarter of an hour.
He curled up in the corner, gnawing on a cold steamed bun he had begged for, when he suddenly heard the auction house host Cultivator's secret message: "Fellow Daoist, if you are willing to share two foundation establishment pills, the black market is willing to help you change your identity."
As the Flying Ship's shadow enveloped half the city, Lu Qingyang was using the spirit pearl to age the pottery bowl.
He scratched off two strokes from the "Burial Dragon" characters at the bottom of the bowl, humming a tune as he walked towards Taiyi Pavilion's secret pawn shop.
As the appraiser used a magnifying glass to examine the forged "Burial Dragon" pattern, the hourglass in the pearl just finished its last grain of sand—his Foundation Establishment Early Stage Realm was completely stabilized.
"An ancient Cultivator's dragon-rearing vessel, valued at eighty Spirit Stones."
The appraiser flicked the rim of the bowl, and Taiyi Pavilion's treasure-appraisal talisman swept over it without any reaction.
Lu Qingyang slammed his hand on the counter: "At least two hundred! Otherwise, I'll use it to prop up a table!"
He seemed to be throwing a tantrum, but in reality, he was secretly using the spirit pearl to imprint the Eastern Wasteland map from the pawn shop's secret compartment.
When the Flying Ship landed in front of the pawn shop, he clutched his Spirit Stone pouch and flipped into the outhouse, stepping into the excrement and urine to escape into the underground dark river.
Su Li waited at the entrance of Burial Dragon Abyss for seven days, finally seeing a figure covered in stinking mud.
Lu Qingyang threw out three "Dragon Core" pills, disguised by the spirit pearl, and said with a cheeky grin, "Two hundred Spirit Stones each, plus a free Taiyi Pavilion Flying Ship deployment map."
A Treasure Seeking Rat scurried out of his trouser leg, carrying a bronze fragment that fit perfectly with Su Li's box.
The fierce wind at the bottom of the abyss ruffled his ragged clothes, and the qingmu spirit pearl reflected the mottled sword marks on the rock wall—left by a Cultivator who also possessed a spirit pearl a thousand years ago.
The moment Lu Qingyang touched the sword marks, the medicinal field within the pearl expanded dramatically, and a Nine Revolutions Soul Restoration Grass, which required Dragon blood for irrigation, broke through the soil.