Chapter 369 (1): Farewells

Chapter 369 (1): Farewells

First and Fifteenth continued to whittle away at the piece of Dragon Slaying Platform, and by the time that had almost "consumed" the entire piece of Dragon Slaying Platform, it was already the twenty-ninth day of the last month of the year.

Pei Qian, Wei Xian, and Sui Youbian had gone out five or six times to purchase a ton of things for the Dust Medicinal Shop in anticipation of the new year. Each time, Pei Qian had begged Sui Youbian to accompany them, and that turned out to be for good reason. All Sui Youbian had to do was stand near the shops that they visited, and the shopkeepers would voluntarily drop their prices without requiring any bartering from Pei Qian and Wei Xian.

They always went out early in the morning and returned late at night, and upon their return, the old man would still be reading under the locust tree at the intersection between the street and the alley. Initially, he was a bit more subdued, but after familiarizing himself with everyone from the medicinal shop, he began to greet them whenever they returned.

For the last two trips, Wei Xian didn't accompany them. Instead, it was just Sui Youbian and Pei Qian, and the latter was carrying Chen Ping'an's bamboo bookcase on her back to store all of their purchases. As they returned to the alley, the old man greeted them again. Pei Qian eagerly responded in a sweet and exuberant manner, while Sui Youbian remained silent.

As they stepped into the medicinal shop, Chen Ping'an was still seated behind the counter as usual, and Pei Qian immdiately began giving him a detailed account of all of the shops that they had visited at what time, as well as the original prices and the final prices of all of the items that they purchased, while Chen Ping'an made calculations on his abacus.

As soon as Pei Qian's account concluded, the sound of the clacking abacus beads also instantly subsided, and Chen Ping'an gave Sui Youbian a thumbs-up as he said, "We've saved roughly a hundred taels of silver on stationery alone."

Pei Qian lifted the bamboo curtain for Sui Youbian, while the latter made her way to the back of the shop to unload their purchases.

Pei Qian snuck back over to the counter, then got up onto the tips of her toes and rested her chin on the table with an expectant smile on her face, clearly asking for a reward.

Chen Ping'an took a glance over at the bamboo curtain, then sneakily handed seven or eight copper coins to Pei Qian as he said, "Make sure to keep this safe, and don't let anyone else see it. If Sui Youbian sees this, both of us will be in trouble."

Pei Qian carefully stowed the copper coins away, then rushed into the backyard and into her room to place the coins into her little treasure trove.

"Make sure to help Sui Youbian unload everything. Don't just make her do it all on her own, and thank her for her hard work at the end," Chen Ping'an called out.

"Got it!" Pei Qian yelled in response, and a faint smile appeared on Chen Ping'an's face.

The next day was going to be the final day of the year, the gateway from one year to the next.

Never had Chen Ping'an imagined that there would be so many people celebrating the turn of the year together in the Dust Medicinal Shop.

For the first few shopping trips, Sui Youbian was very reluctant to go. After that, Wei Xian no longer wanted to go, but Sui Youbian had really developed a taste for shopping, and she dragged Pei Qian around everywhere on their epic shopping sprees.

Initially, it was Zhu Lian who had approached Pei Qian in secret, promising to gift her a set of four treasures of the study and some pocket money if she could convince Sui Youbian to go out shopping with her. Pei Qian told him that she would consider his offer, then went to Chen Ping'an. Chen Ping'an felt like it would be a good thing for Sui Youbian to go out more.

At the very least, it would help her get in better touch with the world around her instead of being so cold and detached all the time, so he instructed Pei Qian to agree to Zhu Lian's offer. Hence, Pei Qian began nagging her insistently like an annoying little fly, constantly disrupting her cultivation, so in the end, she could only cave and go out shopping with her and Wei Xian.

After that, Sui Youbian grabbed the bamboo bookcase in the corner of her shared room with Pei Qian, then took the initiative to drag Pei Qian out for a shopping spree. Chen Ping'an made an agreement with Pei Qian in secret, promising to give her a copper coin for each time Sui Youbian bartered with a shopkeeper.

All of a sudden, Chen Ping'an cast his gaze out of the medicinal shop.

The light outside the alley had suddenly become very dim, as if a heavy, dark cloud had suddenly descended upon the alley, but there was no cloud to be seen.

Immediately thereafter, the green-robed Fan Junmao descended out of the sky.

Chen Ping'an made his way around the counter, then emerged from the shop.

"Have you made up your mind?" Fan Junmao asked.

Chen Ping'an nodded in response.

"Hopefully, this year can have a good conclusion."

Fan Junmao turned to the Zhao Clan yin soul as she warned, "Don't try to use your powers to see what's happening above the sea of clouds. Otherwise, Chen Ping'an will be the one who suffers the consequences."

The yin soul nodded in response. By using the formation in the medicinal shop to attain Unpolished Jade Tier powers, he would indeed be able to observe what was taking place above the sea of clouds. However, the spiritual energy of the sea of clouds was very pristine and pure, while his energy as a yin soul was the complete opposite.

The two conflicting types of energy could easily cause the sea of clouds to descend into a state of disarray, thereby ruining Chen Ping'an's bonded item refinement and harming the foundation of his Great Dao.

Chen Ping'an smiled as he said, "I'll take that as a yes to my question then. It seems like this is a superior piece of water essence to this Old Dragon Rainbringer."

This was the second time since hearing about the twelfth demon core in Chen Ping'an's possession that she had been struck by the urge to take something from him by force.

However, on this occasion, she quickly suppressed that impulsive urge. After learning about Chen Ping'an's relationship with the sword spirit, she didn't dare to consider making any moves on Chen Ping'an. All she could do was scoot a little closer to Chen Ping'an so that she could take a longing glance at the jade tablet.

Chen Ping'an didn't know the true value of this jade tablet, but she did, and she could tell that this was definitely an item manifested from the water fortune essence of a certain large water vein from dragon palace in a major river. Compared with this Old Dragon Rainbringer... Well, there really was no comparison between the two. It was like night and day.

The reason why Fan Junmao desired this jade slip so intensely was that she could tell that refining this jade slip would be sufficient to replenish the sea of clouds to its original condition, and it would also be more than enough to restore her cultivation base to the Nascent Tier.

From there, she would be able to easily reach the Upper Five Tiers in just three or four more decades, and once she reached the Upper Five Tiers, it would be a simple matter of revisiting places that she had already explored, breaking open different small world secret areas in search of fated opportunities.

The process would be much safer and make for far more bountiful returns compared with the average cultivator that had to venture into secret areas that were fraught with peril.

"I can use this as the water essence to refine the water seal into my water-attribute bonded item, right?" Chen Ping'an asked.

"Of course you can!" Fan Junmao spat through gritted teeth. "You are the luckiest bastard I've ever met! Do you know how rare this thing is? This is an innate immortal treasure! If this thing were to appear in a small world that's not presided over by a sage, a bunch of Golden Core and Nascent Tier earth immortals would fight to the death over something like this!

“In fact, there's a very good chance that even some Unpolished Jade Tier cultivators would throw their hats into the ring!"

"Fate has different things in store for everyone," Chen Ping'an said with a smile. "If I had grown up my entire life in Old Dragon City, I could perhaps stay here for a thousand years without earning a single opportunity to stand atop this sea of clouds. Just the same, had you gone and explored that water god temple for ten thousand years, there's still no guarantee that you would've been able to secure this jade slip."

"That is true," Fan Junmao admitted with a nod. "Alright, cut the chit-chat and hurry up! You've already wasted more than enough time!"

She then took a deep breath before making a series of hand seals, and the outermost parts of the giant sea of clouds looming over the entirety of Old Dragon City began to rapidly curl up, presenting a sight much like a lotus flower in full bloom reverting back to a flower bud.

The sea of clouds encompassed Chen Ping'an, Fan Junmao, and the cloud table from all directions, and countless rays of white light began to cascade down from above like water from a flowing creek.

Spiritual energy rose up from all directions, making it rather difficult for Chen Ping'an to breathe. Upon noticing the mocking look in Fan Junmao's eyes, he pulled out the golden jade tablet that carried the inscription of "nurturing the noble spirit" and hung it at his waist.

The surrounding spiritual energy instantly began to surge into the jade tablet in a frenzy, and Fan Junmao hurriedly swept a sleeve through to scatter the surrounding water essence from the sea of clouds that was exerting pressure upon Chen Ping'an. Otherwise, all of it would be sucked into the jade tablet, thereby further whittling down the sea of clouds.

After that, Fan Junmao flew out of the giant flower bud formed by the sea of clouds, then communicated to Chen Ping'an through voice transmission, "If you encounter any trouble, then stop the refinement process right away.

“You run the risk of sustaining injuries and losing all of your materials if you do that, but the alternative could quite possibly cost you your life. Also, you can adjust the height of that cloud table as you please with just a single thought."

Chen Ping'an sat down with his legs crossed, and the cloud table indeed descended in front of him until it resembled a white mat draped over the ground.

On the cloud table were the water seal, the Five-Colored Golden Box Cauldron, the water essence jade slip from the unknown dragon palace, and the Old Dragon Rainbringer, which was currently looking rather redundant.

There were also over forty natural treasures, which included twelve types of sand of different colors, all of which were supposed to become more and more profound the longer that they were refined. There was the dense and heavy Infernal Water Sand, the Great Dipper Sand that glowed with radiant starlight... All of these priceless types of sand were stored in transparent glass containers of different sizes.

Chen Ping'an was seated atop the sea of clouds, inspecting his surroundings. Even though he was situated in the giant flower bud formed by the sea of clouds, his vision wasn't impeded at all, and he was still able to see the ocean on three sides.

Ideally, he would be able to successfully carry out the refinement process on his first try and refine the water seal into his bonded item using the jade slip as water essence.

If he were to fail, then jade slip would disintegrate, releasing all of the water essence that it contained. However, the water essence would not go to waste as it would be drawn into the golden jade slip that he was wearing as spiritual energy. Even if some of the water essence were to escape, it would fuse into the sea of clouds, and that would serve as compensation for the assistance that Fan Junmao had provided.

In this case, he could still use the Old Dragon Rainbringer as his backup water essence to attempt the process again.

Chen Ping'an practiced his standing meditation momentarily to calm himself down, and in his mind, he was visualizing the process of pottery firing that he had frequently carried out as a child.

After tossing a large handful of lesser heat coins into the Five-Colored Golden Box Cauldron on the cloud table, five-colored clouds began to billow out of the mouths of the five beasts on the edge of the cauldron.

Chen Ping'an drew upon the True Qi in his own body, then gently exhaled into the cauldron to "start the fire."