Chapter 874 - 124: The Terrifying Consumption Even Yin Yue Can’t Withstand
Chapter 874: Chapter 124: The Terrifying Consumption Even Yin Yue Can’t Withstand
In Hundred Refinements City, Lin Chen spent five thousand Flame Coins to rent a courtyard in the eastern district.
Five thousand Flame Coins, just to live for half a year, is quite extravagant.
However, if it’s a place that can defend against Divine Thought from anyone below the Myriad Phenomena Realm and has array protection, making it impossible even for an Innate Sixth Realm powerhouse to break in instantly, then these five thousand Flame Coins are well worth it.
This is also the most premium area in the entire Hundred Refinements City, where no commoners frequent, and all conversations involve the Innate.
In the courtyard.
Lin Chen activated the array, and a blue light shield quickly made the entire courtyard disappear. After a few breaths, the light shield was concealed in the air.
"Truly miraculous, even our Canglan Sect’s Sect Protection Array can’t achieve this."
"The Canglan Sect has a vast territory. To protect the whole sect, the array requires a very high standard. Additionally, the reason this array can resist Divine Thought is because it’s constantly consuming energy. Just the energy required for this half-year costs at least three thousand Flame Coins."
With a rental fee of five thousand, a cost of three thousand, it essentially makes a profit of two thousand Flame Coins.
"Business isn’t calculated this way. A business needs to support a group of artifact refining experts. Sometimes, even if they don’t make money, these firms are willing to rent them out. This is called maintaining operation. Also, if no one rents such houses, the energy these arrays require would be wasted, causing prices to drop."
Lin Chen smiled. As the princess of the Moon Soul Tribe, Yin Yue had no lack of intelligence and knowledge, but she definitely hadn’t studied the ways of commerce. Owning a factory sometimes means running it at a small loss just to keep it going, to pay workers and maintain equipment.
First, it ensures their scale; second, it maintains prices. This kind of array that shuts out Divine Thought requires Soul-devouring Pearls for energy. Due to current demand, if that vanishes, the price will surely plummet, leading to a drop in income for the artifact refiners who create Soul-devouring Pearls...
"Can I start using Quenching Crystal Sand now?"
Lin Chen didn’t delve deeply into explaining the commercial principles to Yin Yue. This is the Martial Path world; martial artists don’t need to worry about such matters but must continue elevating their Martial Arts Realm.
"Yes."
Yin Yue nodded and once again took out a pile of Innate Stones and some crescent-shaped herbs from the Storage Box.
"This is Moon Melting Grass. Mix it with the Innate Stones and Quenching Crystal Sand, then add the Moon Melting Grass. The energy from the Innate Stones will liquefy and can be directly absorbed through the skin."
Moon Melting Grass?
"Why haven’t I heard of it?"
"It’s exclusive to my Moon Soul Tribe, and few in the outside world know it."
Soon, Lin Chen moved a Copper Tripod from the utility room of the courtyard. The refining arts are prevalent in the Thousand Mechanism Domain, and many martial artists encounter artifact refining from a young age. Almost every household has some refining tools.
This courtyard likewise had many refining items, including a fire stove and a Pill Furnace, aside from the Copper Tripod...
Yin Yue first threw a hundred Innate Stones into the Copper Tripod, then poured in Quenching Crystal Sand, stirring it evenly with an iron rod, and finally tossed a Moon Melting Grass into the Copper Tripod.
When Moon Melting Grass entered the tripod and came into contact with the Innate Stones and Quenching Crystal Sand, it auto-dissolved into droplets of green liquid flowing in.
As the green liquid circulated, the Innate Stones and Quenching Crystal Sand reacted within the tripod. Lin Chen kept his gaze fixed on the tripod’s contents, which resembled the process of mixing sand and stone into cement slurry at construction sites in his past life.
A quarter-hour later, the Innate Stones and Quenching Crystal Sand within the entire Copper Tripod had fully fused, transforming into a pool of silver liquid.
"You can go in now."
Hearing Yin Yue’s words, Lin Chen didn’t hesitate and stepped into the Copper Tripod.
The moment Lin Chen entered, the silver liquid, like lava, instantly enveloped his whole body, permeating his pores and entering his body. The terrifying flood of energy immediately tore through the meridian barriers, crazily flushing all his body’s hidden acupoints.
Simultaneously, the liquid in the tripod began to drop visibly—
In ten breaths, the liquid’s level inside the tripod dropped by one-tenth.
Witnessing the speed at which the tripod’s liquid was consumed, Yin Yue’s pupils slightly constricted. Lin Chen’s consumption rate was even faster than she had anticipated.
"Is it because Lin Chen’s body has been tempered by Innate Fire?"
Yin Yue pondered while holding her chin. When the liquid inside the tripod began to run low, she once again added Innate Stones and Quenching Crystal Sand.
At this moment, within the tripod, Lin Chen, with the Canglan Technique in operation, saw his chest’s hidden acupoint first madly absorbing the incoming energy like a vortex.
After three hundred breaths, an Innate Crystal formed and crystallized within one of the hidden acupoints.
A martial artist’s opening involves only twenty-four main acupoints, the rest are hidden acupoints.
Once entering the grade, the number of main acupoints becomes seventy-two.
Upon entering the Innate, the number of main acupoints reaches three hundred sixty-five, while hidden acupoints number over a thousand.
Lin Chen did not feel elated for having condensed an Innate Crystal in one hidden acupoint. Compared to all the hidden acupoints on his body, this was just one-thousandth.
What he had to do was to fully absorb energy and open more hidden acupoints to cultivate Innate Crystals.
...
...
One day, two days, three days...
Ten days...
Half a month...
When a month passed, Yin Yue, seeing the emptied section on the left where Innate Stones were stacked, instinctively reached into the Storage Box. However, this time, she was able to extract barely five thousand Innate Stones.
Innate Stones... were exhausted.
Usually reserved, Yin Yue’s expression cracked for the first time. She looked at Lin Chen with a bit of grievance, knowing that when she left the clan due to a traitor, she took away all the treasures from her father’s Treasure Vault in the imperial palace.
In the Treasure Vault, there were nearly a million Innate Stones alone, yet now they were all used up by Lin Chen.
A million Innate Stones are enough for more than ten Innate Second Realm martial artists to step into the Innate Third Realm.
But now, merely opening hidden acupoints for Lin Chen was not sufficient.
Just how many hidden acupoints had this guy opened?
Unlike the main acupoints, which show an aura when condensing Innate Crystals, hidden acupoints are called such because one reason is they don’t show on the surface.
Yin Yue’s small face rarely showed conflict. She had promised to provide Lin Chen with the Innate Stones needed for cultivation this year, applying to normal cultivation needs.
With a million Innate Stones exhausted, she hadn’t violated the agreement.
Yet seeing Lin Chen in such a state of oblivion, she knew that he must be in some breakthrough state. To cut off resources now would mean interrupting his breakthrough.
Considering what she needed to do in a year, Yin Yue pondered for a moment before finally retrieving a pure white stone from the Storage Box.
Ultimately, she threw this stone into the tripod.
"A million Innate Stones, plus my tribe’s Moonlight Stone. Even the most outstanding Celestial Pride throughout our tribe’s history hasn’t been this extravagant. It’s your gain."