Five or six days passed in a flash. The Song family searched the area for the robbers several times but found nothing. They could only report the matter to the nearby Huang family, a major foundation-building family. Unexpectedly, the Huang family did not care about the matter and only verbally appeased the Song family.
Unexpectedly, half a month later, another major incident occurred in Qinghe County. A Qi-refining cultivator from the Huang family was attacked and killed by robbers from Yingchao Ridge outside Qinghefang.
This has really stirred up a hornet's nest. The Huang family is an old foundation-building family in Qinghe County. There are still three foundation-building cultivators in the family. For hundreds of years, it has been the largest immortal cultivation family in Qinghe County.
In the following days, several major foundation-building families in Qinghe County, led by the Huang family, assembled dozens of law enforcement monks and began a large-scale investigation of foreign monks throughout Qinghe County. Seeing their plan exposed, the bandits in Eagle's Nest chose to flee.
If foreign forces kill people and rob treasures outside Qinghefang, it will seriously affect the reputation of Qinghefang. Qinghefang is the foundation of many immortal cultivation forces in Qinghe County. All the immortal cultivation families, big and small, in Qinghe County have some industries in Qinghefang.
The major immortal cultivation families showed extraordinary unity in the face of common interests. This operation not only captured and killed more than a dozen well-known bandits, but also accidentally discovered that a store in Qinghefang had been colluding with the Eagle Nest Ridge bandits for many years.
This store was originally run by a few veteran independent cultivators in Qinghe County. Driven by profit, they have been selling customer information to Eagle Nest Ridge bandits for a year.
This angered several major foundation-building families, and they once again joined forces with the Xiaoyao Sect cultivators stationed there to conduct a thorough inspection of all the major shops in the market. This caused chaos in Qinghe Market for half a month before it slowly returned to its former prosperity.
In Lingyuan Mountain, Song Qingming, who had fully recovered, was unaware of what was happening outside. He had been recuperating at home for more than ten days and did not have to go out for his daily inspections of the mines, which gave him a rare chance of free time.
At this moment, he was in the small room where he usually practiced, staring thoughtfully at a piece of gray ancient animal skin in his hand. Not far away was an exquisite green jade box.
The animal skin was only about four or five inches in diameter. There were some mountain and river patterns painted on the front, but they were very incomplete and it was impossible to make out anything. The back had some fairy clouds painted on it and some nameless spells engraved on it, which was also incomplete.
Speaking of the origin of this incomplete map, we have to go back to the cave where Song Qingming almost died a few days ago.
In order to deceive Zhu Wu that day, Song Qingming hid in the wasteland in the cave, and his body happened to fall on the jade box. After Zhu Wu left, Song Qingming climbed out of the pile of earth and dug out the little thing that had annoyed him for a long time. Seeing that the jade box outside was very exquisite, he put it into the storage bag and took it back.
It was not until more than ten days later that Song Qingming, who was too bored, remembered that he thought there might be some treasure in the jade box. Unexpectedly, it was a broken picture that he could not understand at all, which made him a little disappointed.
"This jade box is quite nice. I can use it to exchange for some Qi Refining Powder from my second sister, or I can keep it to store some things."
“As for this broken picture”
Song Qingming raised his hand and threw the map into the air, and released a fireball with his left hand.
After a burst of flames, what he didn't expect was that the remaining animal skin picture was intact, without any change.
Isn't this picture an ordinary object, but a spiritual object? Even if it is a spiritual object, it would not be unchanged when placed in this flame. Could it be a high-level magic weapon?
"Forget it, I'll ask Uncle Jiu tomorrow."
With a look of surprise on his face, Song Qingming carefully put away the incomplete map and put it back into the jade box.
The next morning, after inspecting the mine early in the morning, Song Qingming came to Song Changxin's small building.
Song Changxin looked at the gray fragment and thought for a while before speaking:
"Looks like this should be a broken fragment of a magical weapon. I saw something similar in the nearby market when I was training in Ziyun Mountain. A magical weapon is a powerful tool that can only be refined by Jindan cultivators. Even a broken fragment is much more durable than an ordinary magical weapon."
"These kinds of broken things can be exchanged for a few spirit stones, which can be used as high-level materials to refine new magical instruments. I think these patterns must have been deliberately painted on them to disguise them as the treasure hiding places of senior cultivators. People in the market often use these things to deceive young people like you who have just entered the world."
Song Qingming was still calm after leaving Song Changxin's residence. He had picked up this thing by accident. Although it was not a high-level magic weapon, it was already very good to be worth a few spirit stones.
He didn't plan to sell it in the market. After experiencing life and death, Song Qingming urgently needed to arm himself.
"Although this fragment of the map has no other use, it is very tough. Find a piece of robe and sew it on a vital part. It might save your life at a critical moment. These days, when cultivating immortality, the most important thing is to have a way to preserve your life."
Song Qingming returned to his residence and took out his somewhat worn robes. He sewed the torn picture on his chest and wore it inside his robes as an inner shirt.
At night, it was the time of another boring day of practice. Song Qingming sat cross-legged as usual and began to practice "Kun Yuan Jue".
It has only been over half a year since Song Qingming broke through to the fourth level of Qi Refining. With his four spiritual roots, he still has a long way to go to reach the fifth level of Qi Refining through normal cultivation. He wants to take pills to save time for cultivation. Now he has only a dozen spirit stones on his body, and he still owes his uncle Thirteen and the others more than twenty spirit stones, so it is even more impossible.
Just when he was halfway through his practice, he felt a surge of spiritual energy in his body, which instantly made him feel extremely confused.
"Normally, I need to meditate and cultivate for three or four hours to fully recover my spiritual energy. Today, it's only been an hour, and the spiritual energy in my dantian is about to overflow."
Feeling the same thing, Song Qingming quickly entered into a state of meditation and used his spiritual sense to check for any abnormalities in his body.
"I haven't made any breakthroughs in my cultivation yet, so how come my spiritual energy absorption speed has increased so much? What's going on?"
“Could it be…”
Song Qingming took off his outer robes, practiced the "Kun Yuan Jue" and began to absorb the surrounding spiritual energy. Suddenly, a faint white light emanated from his chest, and the flow of spiritual energy in his body became several times faster than usual.
After repeated attempts, Song Qingming finally confirmed the reason for the abnormality in his cultivation, which was in the incomplete map he had sewn on his chest today.
"This incomplete map can actually affect the speed at which I absorb spiritual energy. This is quite astonishing."
It seems that this thing is not the fragment of the magic weapon that Uncle Jiu mentioned, and I don’t know what it is.
A month later, Song Qingming, who was staying in his room, was looking at the two complete sets of low-grade formations in his hands with satisfaction.
The speed of recovering spiritual energy was inexplicably accelerated, so that the injury that should have taken a month to heal was basically healed in less than half a month. This was beyond Song Qingming's expectations.
In particular, he suffered spiritual damage due to excessive consumption of spiritual energy. He used to feel pain in his head from time to time. Song Changxin said it would take half a year to slowly recover.
However, he felt that his spiritual consciousness had recovered to a large extent in the past few days. He tried using spells that consumed a lot of spiritual power several times, but the previous tingling sensation did not reappear.
Only at this moment did Song Qingming slowly feel a little frightened. This incomplete map might be an extraordinary treasure. Apart from several kinds of elixirs that helped to restore spiritual energy, Song Qingming had not heard of any spiritual objects that could speed up the recovery of spiritual energy.
If other cultivators discovered its use, the Song family would definitely not be able to protect themselves. I am afraid that those high-ranking foundation-building cultivators would be jealous of this thing.
Although Song Qingming stayed in his room all day, he didn't dare use the remaining diagram too much in his cultivation. Fortunately, the remaining diagram didn't make much noise when used, emitting only the faint white light typical of any magical instrument. Sewn onto his inner shirt, he could wear it over his robes while practicing without appearing unusual, and wouldn't draw the attention of ordinary people.
The spiritual energy is restored at several times the speed, allowing Song Qingming to complete a set of formations in one month instead of three months. If he has enough materials, at this rate, he will be able to pay back his uncle Thirteen and the others for the spiritual stones this year.
After more than a month of pondering, Song Qingming gradually saw a business opportunity. Although the incomplete map on his body did not greatly improve his usual practice speed, it could help him greatly save the time of practice and meditation, giving him several times more time to concentrate on making the formation.
A normal cultivator would spend four to five hours a day meditating and practicing to restore his spiritual energy, but he could now almost complete it in one hour. The spiritual energy consumed in making the formation could be recovered several times faster than usual.
The key is that he has no more materials on hand. The seven or eight spirit stones he has left are barely enough for his daily cultivation. Apart from the mid-grade flying sword he bought last time, these two formations are the only things worth money in his storage bag. He needs to find a way to go to the market again and use these two formations to exchange for spirit stones to buy new talisman making materials.
Song Qingming understood that the biggest disadvantage of a formation master was that it took too much time to create a formation. To create a low-level formation without delaying cultivation time, it usually took about three months to complete.
Excluding the cost of materials, a set of low-level formations can only earn four or five spirit stones. Fortunately, making formations generally does not waste materials, and compared to the higher-risk talisman making, alchemy, and Qi refining, the income is relatively stable.
However, after the last attack, the elders of the clan instructed that Song Qingming could not travel far alone within a year, which made his plan to make money very difficult. The materials used for the formation in Song Qingming's hand were purchased by Song Changxin on his behalf when he went to the market.
The last time he was injured, the elders of the clan were worried that his spiritual injuries had not yet fully recovered, and that something might happen if he went out alone. For a weak immortal cultivation family like the Song family, every cultivator is very important to the family, and low-level cultivators cannot be allowed to take too many risks. Only by ensuring that the young cultivators in the clan grow up as much as possible can they make more contributions to the family.
But they didn't know that Song Qingming's consciousness had almost recovered. Song Qingming didn't dare to reveal the special ability of the incomplete map, nor did he dare to explain his injuries to them. He could only wait patiently for another opportunity to go to the market.