Black Phoenix took the wooden vial and opened it.
Suddenly, a potent breath of life escaped from the vial.
The restaurant was a wooden structure, and at this moment, the yellowed tables, chairs, beams, and pillars were all sprouting branches and leaves. In an instant, the entire restaurant became a lush land of green teeming with vitality.
The aura flowed around the beam, and the dead wood got a second lease of life.
A gleam of light appeared in Black Phoenix eyes, as she realized that the spring water in the wooden vial must be quite rare.
Zhang Ruochen said. "It's a bit of the fountain of life I had gotten by chance. No matter how badly injured you are, just by drinking it, your wounds will heal quickly, and help you return to your peak.
The fountain of life is created from the new seedlings of the Divine Sky-connecting Tree.
As the tree grows, the fountain of life under the tree had become a big pool.
Giving a small bottle as a gift to someone was a trivial matter.
Black Phoenix however did not think so. One should know, the aura of the fountain of life alone was enough to give life to dead wood. It could be seen that even a small vial was enough to be comparable to a sacred healing pill, and was worth at least tens of millions of sacred stones.
Black Phoenix was a little embarrassed to take it and said solemnly. "The fountain of life is just too precious, and it's like having one more life, I cannot take it. The Maleficent Records of the Ten Clans of the Infernal Court indeed only needs one saint stone to purchase."
Zhang Ruochen smiled. "Don't have to be so reserved. Take it as a sign of friendship."
Black Phoenix wanted to continue to decline, but the Fool sitting by the side was ready to make a move as he lunged at the wooden vial, yelling. "I want it, I want it."
Black Phoenix flicked her sleeves aside, and put the small wooden vial away as she glared at the Fool again.
Immediately, she put away the small wooden vial like a treasured item, her beautiful eyes flickered as she said. "Then I shall oblige you and take it! Cripple, you are not weak, and are also trained in the way of the dimensions. Surely you are no common folk, what is your real name?"
Zhang Ruochen smiled and said. "A drifting duckweed has no roots, thus ask not a wanderer of that. A Butcher was just called the Butcher, a fool being called the Fool, the White Zhuque is being called thus, and the Black Phoenix is also the same, why do you need to ask that much? Call me the Crippled, it's a pretty good name."
"Hehe."
Without warning, Black Phoenix approached Zhang Ruochen with her five fingers like lightning, revealing thousands of phantoms of her fingers.
A trace of lightning flowed along her fingers.
Black Phoenix withdrew her hand and looked somewhat discouraged as she said, "We are at the very least friends in adversity, why are you still so cautious against us? This saintly maiden just wanted to take your mask off and see how you look like, that's all."
Zhang Ruochen said. "If I was not cautious, I'm afraid I'd be long dead already, and how could I live until today? Weren't you two lacked caution that you fell for Shi Kai's ambush?"
Both Black Phoenix and White Zhuque fell silent.
While their cultivation level was far beyond Zhang Ruochen, but if it was a real combat situation, it was very likely they would have perished in Zhang Ruochen's hands.
With just this test alone, Black Phoenix had already noticed that the crippled was not as simple as he looked.
What Zhang Ruochen said earlier was undoubtedly a shock to them.
Black Phoenix and White Zhuque escorted Tianmingzi and left Luocheng.
When they left, Black Phoenix told Zhang Ruochen that they will come back as the deep waters of Luoshui was definitely an awakened sacred soil with great opportunities hidden in it.
At the same time, she also told Zhang Ruochen that the sacred medicines in Luoshui had the same characteristics as the medicines growing at the Divinity Bestowment Altar, and could increase the Saint Path precepts in a cultivator's body, and improve their cultivation level.
The Butcher and the Fool also bade farewell to Zhang Ruochen and said that they were going to meet Her Highness.
As for the Her Highness they were talking about, Zhang Ruochen did not ask too much about her. After all, there were many ancient civilizations that cooperated with the Celestial Court, and the number of Celestial Maidens numbered in the hundreds.
Zhang Ruochen then moved the civilians of Luocheng into the Qiankun Realm and then spent another day and night to get to the various major fishing villages and small towns at the edge of Luoshui and picking up the surviving fisherfolks before rushing back to Yunwu Commandery.
...
Luoshui was a borderland.
The western shore of Luoshui had fisherfolks living there, close to Qianshui and Yunwu Commanderies.
The eastern shore of Luoshui was a desolate and uninhabited primal jungle. Legends say that all sorts of powerful wild beasts, with dense miasma covering the swamp, with mortal dangers lying within. The people of Yunwu Commandery called the place, the Xuanhuang Wasteland.
The Xuanhuang Wasteland stretched all the way east, and the end of the continent was after who knows how many tens of thousands of miles later, entering the vast Eastern Sea.
The eastern shore of Luoshui, at the borderlands of the Xuanhuang Wastelands, a large mountain that was shrouded in white mist all year round stood tall.
The insides of the mountain had long been hollowed out, with more than a dozen large formation arrays deployed within it. Even if an ordinary Saint King cultivator was to come here, they would be hardpressed to notice the weirdness inside the mountain.
Below the mountain was an underground cavern.
Qi Xiaotian sat on the dragon stone chair at the top, with silver wings on his back and his face pale.
At this moment, Qi Xiaotian was furious, and he roared, "Investigate, investigate immediately, who were the people that fought against us last night? That idiotic looking fatty is actually stronger than me, he must be one of the top-level masters of the Celestial Court."
Shi Kai sat to the bottom right of Qi Xiaotian and was feeling dejected as he snorted coldly. "If not for the Six Scions of Tianyuan being utter garbage, and cannot even deal with a crippled man, I could have at the very least take Black Phoenix and White Zhuque last night. But... the identity of that cripple is probably not simple. For him to actually use the power of dimensions. The cultivators of dimensions are a rare bunch."
"Power of dimensions?" Yinghuo asked softly.
Qi Xiaotian stared at her and asked, "What's the matter? You know the identity of that cripple?"
Yinghuo stared back at Qi Sheng who was sitting opposite her.
Qi Sheng was once of the strongest among the younger generation of Immortal Vampires in Kunlun Realm, and was the prince of Qitian tribe, and was one of the rare few legendary sons of heaven who could challenge Zhang Ruochen.
But the Qitian tribe in Kunlun Realm was just a tiny branch of the tribe.
Even if Qi Sheng was once a prince, he was now under someone else. Not only was Qi Xiaotian's cultivation level far beyond him, but he was also one of the imperial princes of the Infernal Court's Immortal Vampires, and had the backing of a Supreme Saint.
Qi Sheng was no longer as high-spirited as before, and now gained a taste of keeping a low profile as he stood up and bowed respectfully at Qi Xiaotian, and said. "It is said that the scion of time and space, Zhang Ruochen had recently returned to Yunwu Commandery, and Luoshui is close to Yunwu. Now that a cultivator of dimensions had appeared at Luoshui, it is no coincidence!"
Qi Xiaotian laughed and said. "As far as I know, the so-called scion of time and space is just a junior who had barely even matured."
Qi Sheng had fought Zhang Ruochen more than once and knew how powerful Zhang Ruochen was. "However, the information I got was that Zhang Ruochen had taken care of many of his powerful foes in the Celestial Court, including Gong Ziyan of the Fane of Dimensions, the Fane of Bloody War..."
Qi Xiaotian waved his hand and said. "I know you have suffered a great defeat at Zhang Ruochen's hands, and it is inevitable that you are afraid of him. But within the lands of Luoshui, I, Qi Xiaotian is king. He better not provoke me or else he will die a horrible death."
Qi Sheng felt that Qi Xiaotian was underestimating his foe a little too much and frowned as he wanted to speak again.
Qi Xiaotian interrupted and said. "Qi Sheng, I feel that you should immediately collect more human blood, and gather the sacred medicines in Luoshui, and help me refine the Blood Pill of Thousand Ages as soon as possible. This is your top priority."
"All right."
Qi Sheng did not say more as he turned and left the underground cavern.
Qi Xiaotian stared at Qi Sheng's back as his eyes shrank deeply, and said to himself, "I don't know what's so good about this coward that Yinghuo had been resisting me for him. If it weren't for you having some useable value, I'd long refine you into a pot of blood and swallowed it whole."
"My lord, I will also help you collect human blood."
Yinghuo stood up and bowed before Qi Xiaotian, then she turned around to chase after Qi Sheng.
Qi Xiaotian smiled and said, "Yinghuo, a beauty like you is rare even among the Immortal Vampires, you don't have to do this sort of menial work. Stay in the underground cavern tonight, I will teach you a Tongxuan-level intermediate saint technique of the Immortal Vampires."
"Thank you, my lord, but Yinghuo still wants to collect more human blood as soon as possible to help you refine the Blood Pill of Thousand Ages."
As she said that, Yinghuo transformed into a thin shadow and flew out of the underground cavern.
Bam!!
Qi Xiaotian's hand slammed heavily onto the table, his gaze chilly.
Shi Kai burst out laughing as he said, "Brother Qi, you are a Nine-step Saint King regardless, why can't you even take a woman for yourself?"
"That woman is not that simple. She already has a supreme artifact that recognizes her as its master, so I can only subdue her. Even so, I cannot do so by force." Qi Xiaotian's gaze was solemn.
Shi Kai said, "You told me that there is an ore vein left over from ancient times; you are not hoodwinking me, right?"
The mist in Qi Xiaotian's eyes dissipated as he laughed. "How can I lie to you, with our bond as brothers. Plus, I hope that you will break through to the realm of Nine-step Saint King as soon as possible, and we will join hands to take control of the Eastern Region. By then, won't every treasure and resources in the Eastern Region all be ours?"
The cultivators of the Stone-clan are different from the other cultivators in that they needed to absorb special energy from the mineral veins of the earth to quicken their cultivation.
The higher the quality of the minerals within the veins, the faster their cultivation speed gets.
Ancient mineral veins would undoubtedly be a fatal temptation for Shi Kai, not only it would help it break through the realm of a Nine-step Saint King, but also possibly gain the opportunity to break into the realm of a Supreme Saint.
Shi Kai looked rather excited as it asked, "Where is that vein located?"
"In the Xuanhuang Wastelands, come with me," Qi Xiaotian said.