Chapter 626: We're Just on Good Terms with Lingbao
“Next up, the Qi Refining Stage competition.”
Jiang Li called a young cultivator to the stage.
The young cultivator carried a long spear as he stepped onto the platform, his face beaming with excitement when Jiang Li called his name.
Win—he absolutely had to win no matter what.
The long spear trembled slightly too, understanding the significance of this competition.
Getting noticed before Human Sovereign Jiang—this was a blessing that wouldn’t come even in several lifetimes.
Perhaps even the Yin-Yang Heaven Seal ancestor might take him under its wing.
“This is a young cultivator from the Dao Sect, nothing particularly special about him, just that he has a particularly good relationship with his weapons,” Jiang Li casually introduced.
Qian Desolation Lord also called out a Qi Refining Stage cultivator, confidently introducing: “I observe that your young cultivator is only at Qi Refining Stage 9, while the one we’re sending out this time is at Qi Refining Stage 10.”
“Oh, Qi Refining Stage 10?” Jiang Li became interested. After he awakened his Heavenly Spirit Root during Foundation Establishment, his realm had dropped from Foundation Establishment to Qi Refining Stage 10 due to compressed cultivation.
“Achieving Foundation Establishment is extremely difficult for ordinary cultivators—both solid foundation and Foundation Establishment Pills are indispensable. Therefore, some Qi Refining Stage cultivators researched the possibility of advancing further within the Qi Refining Stage, becoming Qi Refining Stage 10. We also like to call such cultivators ‘False Foundation Establishment’.”
“Although the cost is never being able to reach Foundation Establishment Stage in this lifetime, becoming Qi Refining Stage 10 still counts as being above ordinary Qi Refining Stage cultivators, so one should be content.”
Jiang Li frowned. He noticed that the young cultivator from the Eight Desolations had exceptionally good talent—dual spiritual roots—so how could he be unable to break through to Foundation Establishment?
Could it be that Qian Desolation Lord had forcibly raised this promising seedling to Qi Refining Stage 10 just for this competition?
As soon as the match began, the Eight Desolations Qi Refining cultivator attacked first, directly bringing out three Spiritual Treasures.
The cultivation technique he practiced was called “Three Minds as One,” allowing him to flexibly control three Spiritual Treasures. It was precisely because Qian Desolation Lord valued this point that he had fed this promising seedling to Qi Refining Stage 10.
A Qi Refining Stage 10 cultivator controlling three Spiritual Treasures—even early Foundation Establishment cultivators would have to avoid confronting him.
Qi Refining Stage was merely the beginning of cultivation—no matter how powerful one was, they couldn’t possibly defeat someone wielding three Spiritual Treasures.
“Controlling three Spiritual Treasures?” Jiang Li raised an eyebrow.
Qian Desolation Lord chuckled: “Brother Jiang, the competition rules don’t specify that only one Spiritual Treasure is allowed. You’re not thinking of adding rules last minute, are you?”
“Of course not.”
“Good then.”
The young cultivator from the Nine Provinces faced the three Spiritual Treasures without panic. Holding his long spear, ten Spiritual Treasures appeared behind him as he charged forward to fight.
Ten Spiritual Treasures including axes, dagger-axes, hooks, forks, clubs, and rods all emerged together, frightening the cultivators from the Eight Desolations side.
How could anyone use ten Spiritual Treasures? Was this even human?
The Eight Desolations Qi Refining cultivator panicked briefly but quickly stabilized his mindset. He knew better than anyone how difficult it was to control multiple Spiritual Treasures. Qi Refining Stage cultivators had limited energy—even with Three Heads and Six Arms, one could only control three Spiritual Treasures at most.
Controlling ten Spiritual Treasures might look terrifying, but it was actually just bluf… thud—
The ten Spiritual Treasures didn’t care what the opponent was thinking. Coordinating with each other, they delivered a fierce beating, directly knocking away the three Spiritual Treasures the opponent controlled.
The Eight Desolations Qi Refining cultivator was completely stunned, unable to believe it even after experiencing it firsthand.
Ten Spiritual Treasures, controlled more flexibly than his three Spiritual Treasures.
This was impossible!
But reality harshly slapped his face—the ten Spiritual Treasures had developed sentience and could fight without needing control.
This young cultivator from the Dao Sect came from a wealthy and noble family, having been accompanied by Spiritual Treasures since childhood. He also loved Spiritual Treasures very much, and after the Spiritual Treasures developed sentience, they treated this young cultivator very well too. If not for the Dao Sect’s internal competition rule that each person could only use one Spiritual Treasure, this young cultivator would have long been the number one Qi Refining cultivator in the Dao Sect.
The Eight Desolations Qi Refining cultivator fought desperately despite injuries, wielding his Spiritual Treasure to battle the Dao Sect’s young cultivator. He stabbed at the young cultivator’s chest but was blocked by the opponent’s heart-protecting mirror. He then stabbed at the abdomen, but the heart-protecting mirror moved to block this strike too.
No matter how the Eight Desolations Qi Refining cultivator attacked, the heart-protecting mirror could quickly move to block the strikes.
Just as he didn’t know where to attack next, ten Spiritual Treasures appeared behind him, directly knocking him out of the competition.
Qian Desolation Lord couldn’t believe it and couldn’t understand what he had just witnessed: “Spiritual Treasures developing sentience? And on such low-level Spiritual Treasures at that?”
Shouldn’t only immortal artifacts be able to develop sentience?
“We just have a relatively harmonious relationship with Spiritual Treasures,” Jiang Li casually explained without saying more, pursing his lips to signal continuing the competition.
The Eight Desolations had only sent two people to gather intelligence in advance. During five days, they spent three days just collecting legends about Jiang Li, with the remaining two days investigating other matters—they hadn’t had time to investigate the Spiritual Treasures situation yet.
The Nine Provinces had too many miscellaneous pieces of information, making it difficult to distinguish truth from falsehood—this was partly due to the methods used by the three Rulers.
Because of this, even after five days of secret investigation, the Eight Desolations hadn’t obtained much useful intelligence.
The competition continued, with the Eight Desolations side continuing to send out Stage 10 Qi Refining cultivators. These Stage 10 Qi Refining cultivators had unique specialties in certain aspects—some could control fire, some had immense strength, some used illusions…
But no matter what, they couldn’t withstand attacks from several sentient Spiritual Treasures working together.
Actually, excluding the help from Spiritual Treasures, the Nine Provinces’ Qi Refining Stage competition was at a disadvantage. The “Five Elements Qi Refinement Art (Upper Volume)” was useful not only for mortals but also for Qi Refining cultivators.
After the technique became widespread, most cultivators stuck at Qi Refining Stage 9 advanced to Foundation Establishment Stage. Now, the remaining Qi Refining Stage 9 cultivators were either newly promoted or those wanting to accumulate more foundation, resulting in the quality of Qi Refining Stage 9 cultivators being inferior to before.
When cultivators’ cultivation levels collectively improved, there would always be some drawbacks, such as too few low-level cultivators.
After the Nine Provinces won the Qi Refining group, they proceeded to the Foundation Establishment Stage competition.
What shocked the Eight Desolation Lords was that the Nine Provinces’ Foundation Establishment cultivators not only used sentient Spiritual Treasures in battle but also cultivated their spiritual platforms, enabling spiritual sense attacks.
Cultivators who cultivated spiritual sense fighting against those who hadn’t cultivated spiritual sense could only result in complete domination.
One of the Desolation Lords abruptly stood up, loudly questioning: “Shouldn’t spiritual sense cultivation only be possible at the Nascent Soul Stage? Why can your Foundation Establishment cultivators do it!”
Qian Desolation Lord sternly commanded: “Kun Desolation Lord, sit down! Do you think the Nine Provinces are cheating?”
Kun Desolation Lord was unwilling but, constrained by Qian Desolation Lord’s authority, could only sit down.
Jiang Li, Yu Yin, and Bai Hongtu had once conducted deductions in the clouds, combining them with the Five Elements Creation Method to research how using spiritual plants and herbs containing Five Elements attributes could enable early cultivation of the spiritual platform.
Moreover, Five Elements spiritual plants and herbs were inexpensive, affordable for any Foundation Establishment cultivator.
Now, all Foundation Establishment cultivators cultivated spiritual sense, greatly enhancing their learning abilities. Correspondingly, their cultivation levels were also improving.
The Eight Desolations sent Foundation Establishment cultivators who had been carefully selected and underwent strict internal screening, ultimately choosing eleven outstanding cultivators.
Whereas the Nine Provinces side merely casually selected eleven late Foundation Establishment cultivators.
Jiang Li’s thinking was simple—whoever they sent would win anyway, so there was no need to carefully select people. That would be purely wasting time.
Qian Desolation Lord realized that the Nine Provinces had directly surpassed their side in cultivation progress.
How could they possibly fight like this!