Chapter 481: Golden Breath Flower
Chapter 481: Golden Breath Flower!
Jiang Chen was no stranger to Yellow Earth Essence; he had witnessed it more than once.
A single wisp of Yellow Earth Essence weighed ten thousand jin, a profoundly rare material suited for refining Spiritual Tools.
Yang Zhenyue had previously warned him of these occasional subterranean anomalies; they could not be halted, only allowed to drift undisturbed.
Now standing before one, Jiang Chen fell into deep thought. With my current cultivation, subduing a single wisp of Yellow Earth Essence poses no challenge at all.
I can use it to forge my first Magical Artifact and test its profound effects.
Deciding this, he pushed off the ground and soared straight toward the drifting Yellow Earth Essence.
As he drew near, an oppressive aura descended upon him-a crushing weight a hundred times denser than the ambient energy of the Earth Vein.
It felt as if he were facing an entire mountain peak, not a mere wisp of qi.
No wonder the sect rumors claimed that any formal disciple who captured a wisp of Yellow Earth Essence would instantly be elevated to a core disciple.In truth, those at the Foundation Establishment realm possessing an Earth Spirit Root were practically incapable of withstanding such terrifying, crushing force.
Anyone capable of bearing this weight would have distinguished themselves even without the Yellow Earth Essence; they would never be relegated to toil in the mines day after day, covered in ash and dirt.
Yellow Earth Essence was the absolute purest distillation of the Earth Vein’s energy-vastly thicker and infinitely heavier.
Jiang Chen decisively circulated the Great Earth Heaven Bearing Art. Facing the wisp of Yellow Earth Essence, he raised a hand and swept it forward.
The Golden Core within his Qi Sea instantly began to spin with a hum.
A surging tide of Spiritual Power erupted outwards, instantly ensnaring the Yellow Earth Essence before him.
Crack!
Screech-!
Sounds resembling the violent twisting of solid metal echoed out, grating harshly on the ears.
Yet, against the boundless Spiritual Power unleashed by a Heavenly-Grade Golden Core, the essence simply could not break free.
Jiang Chen had no intention of wasting time wrestling with it. He swiftly channeled his Spiritual Power, directing it into a relentless clockwise vortex to forcibly churn the essence.
At first, the Yellow Earth Essence viciously resisted, accustomed to rampaging unchecked through the subterranean depths.
But as time wore on, it was ultimately forced to abandon its struggle, obediently following the flow of his power.
Seeing the rotation smooth out, Jiang Chen circulated his Spiritual Power once more, slowly compressing the spatial bounds around it bit by bit.
Before long, the three-chi-long wisp of Yellow Earth Essence condensed into a yellow sphere the size of an infant’s fist, its density rendering it even more unimaginably heavy than before.
Jiang Chen gave a faint nod. It seems subduing Yellow Earth Essence at the Golden Core stage isn’t too difficult after all.
With a mere thought, he drew the floating yellow sphere into his Square Inch Ring to store it securely.
Once he returned, he would carefully deliberate on what type of Magical Artifact to forge from it.
One thing was certain: with the infusion of the Yellow Earth Essence, the artifact’s quality would be undeniably peerless.
Seeing that this subterranean expedition had yielded an abundant harvest, Jiang Chen saw no reason to linger.
Thus, he decisively turned and retraced his steps along his original path.
With the map Yang Zhenyue had provided, he harbored no fear of losing his way in the dark.
A full shichen later, just as he neared the exit of the tunnels.
Suddenly, the Treasure Hunting Chisel in his grasp trembled wildly, resonating with a hidden presence.
Jiang Chen paused, caught off guard. “I’m already at the periphery. Could there still be an undiscovered rare mineral hiding here?”
Because he was so close to the Earth Vein’s entrance, Formation Masters and disciples with Earth Spirit Roots regularly traversed this area.
Though their numbers were sparse, he would occasionally catch sight of a passing cultivator.
Still, everyone kept their distance, maintaining a mutual, unspoken silence without any intent to socialize.
Forget it, let’s go take a look!
No matter what it is, checking won’t cost me anything.
Even if I didn’t find any spirit insects this time, harvesting these rare minerals has already made this trip a massive windfall!
Jiang Chen firmly believed that hesitating now would be a profound disrespect to the Treasure Hunting Chisel.
Decisively opening his palm, he allowed the artifact to take flight on its own.
The chisel hovered in the air, seeking the spiritual resonance. After two breaths of time, it violently shot off toward the left at astonishing speed.
Jiang Chen immediately gave chase, his curiosity rapidly burning brighter.
Moments later, the chisel halted before a jagged fissure in the cavern wall, from which a faint, eerie draft bled out.
Amidst a flurry of crisp ringing strikes, the artifact rapidly chiseled through the stone, exposing a remarkably narrow hollow within.
However, upon clearly making out the contents of the hollow, Jiang Chen was genuinely startled. Good heavens. I expected a rare mineral, not a corpse.
Yet, this skeleton was strikingly unusual.
A mortal’s bones would have weathered into a dull grayish-white.
However, this entire skeletal frame gleamed as though meticulously plated in a layer of gold.
It was not a brilliant, radiant luster, but rather a profound, heavy dark gold.
Judging from the deep spiderweb cracks fracturing the stone beneath it, the skeleton possessed an immense, crushing density.
The Treasure Hunting Chisel darted frantically around the remains, frantically probing for something, yet an invisible force barred it from drawing too close.
Jiang Chen raised an eyebrow. “It wasn’t drawn here by the skeleton itself?”
Narrowing his eyes, he cast a vigilant glance over his shoulder.
Though the tunnels were empty, he was still at a depth where Formation Masters and formidable Earth Spirit Root cultivators occasionally roamed.
With a sweeping gesture, he manipulated the ambient earth energy, commanding the surrounding soil and shattered stone to fuse into a thick, sturdy wall that perfectly sealed the entrance.
Stepping up to the remains, he extended his right hand and formed a grasping gesture, effortlessly levitating the heavy skeleton into the air.
Just as he suspected, the chisel instantly dove into the spot where the skeleton had been resting and began to frantically dig into the stone.
It swiftly carved out a deep hollow. First, a plume of golden mist billowed outward; once the haze dissipated, a radiant golden flower revealed itself.
Jiang Chen stared in sheer astonishment. “It is actually a Golden Breath Flower.”
In a flash of insight, the entire macabre history of this cavern became clear to him.
The nature of the Golden Breath Flower was to impart a metallic tempering upon whatever it touched.
This cultivator had likely stumbled upon it by pure chance while alive, choosing to secretly nurture it here in the dark.
Their ambition was to borrow the flower’s power to temper their mortal frame into golden bones. Such a transformation would bestow a qualitative leap in defense, physical might, and an unparalleled resilience against the crushing weight of the earth.
With such a physique, capturing a wisp of Yellow Earth Essence would be effortless, guaranteeing an immediate ascension to core disciple status.
Looking at the result, their bodily tempering had ultimately succeeded, but their life had been extinguished in the process.
Unsurprisingly, the cultivator’s flesh and blood had been entirely siphoned away, serving as the ultimate nourishment for this Golden Breath Flower.
Jiang Chen let out a wistful sigh. “In the end, I am the one who reaps the harvest.”
The current market value of a Golden Breath Flower hovered around three thousand Mid-grade Spirit Stones.
Naturally, only a fully mature specimen could command such a staggering price.
The cycle to nurture one was arduously long; it would take no less than ten years just for the seed to take root and sprout.
More crucially, this spiritual plant could only grow within veins of metallic ore. The rarer the host metal, the higher the resulting quality of the flower.
Legends claimed that if planted within a mountain of pure gold or silver, it would devour the entirety of its essence, evolving into the mythic Mountain-Suppressing Golden Breath Flower-a supreme treasure with a price but no market.
Faced with such fortune, Jiang Chen certainly would not stand on ceremony. Be it the Golden Skeleton or the Golden Breath Flower blooming beneath it, he swept them all into his Square Inch Ring, leaving absolutely nothing behind.
Whatever tragic fate had transpired here before, the spoils now solely belonged to him.
Once everything was securely stowed away within the Square Inch Ring, he turned to leave, instantly dissolving the earthen wall that had masked his presence.
The Treasure Hunting Chisel fell completely dormant in his hand, devoid of any light or tremor.
Half a shichen later, Jiang Chen finally stepped out from the oppressive depths of the Earth Vein. Yet almost immediately, a subtle vibration emanated from his Jade Green Gourd.
Drawing it out, he found that it was actually a Communication Talisman from his Senior Sister!