Zhang Ruochen had traded the Demonic Blood Ax Engraving for three one-hundred-thousand-year-old ancient sacred herbs with Xie Canghai.
This was only a small part of them. He had also taken eight of these herbs from the saint-level cultivators like Tian Chen, King Daxi, Jueyan Hu.
For Supreme Saints, the one-hundred-thousand-years-old sacred herb was a precious medicine.
It was in the Kunlun Realm during its recovery period that produced such an amount of sacred herbs.
It was also an attraction for the elites from the Celestial Court and Infernal Court and the reason behind the chaotic situation.
With Zhang Ruochen alone possessing eleven sacred herbs, it would surely arouse jealousy among the Supreme Saints.
The one-hundred-thousand-year-old sacred herbs that Zhang Ruochen possessed was called Hundred-Root Fern. It was feather-light and cold in nature, easily drifting in the air.
Hundred-Root Fern appeared lush-green and full of vitality.
As if the plant knew what Zhang Ruochen was going to eat it, a fearful voice came from within the Hundred-root Fern. “Your Honorable Saint King, please spare my life and I will repay the debt of gratitude.”
Unlike Awesome, the Little Taoist, not every one-hundred-thousand-year-old sacred herb possessed cultivation methods and saint techniques.
In fact, the one-hundred-thousand-year-old ancient sacred herbs born in the Kunlun Realm were catalyzed to the level of one hundred thousand years along the revival of the macroworlds. It did not mean that they had lived for one hundred thousand years. So few of them possessed intelligence.
Not that there were not any ancient sacred herbs that had lived for one hundred thousand years. It was just that they were rare.
The demonic tulip that Zhang Ruochen encountered in Luoshui was one such an ancient herb. It could perform a spiritual power attack.
“Don’t worry. I will not eat you,” said Zhang Ruochen.
Devouring a one-hundred-thousand-year ancient sacred herb was a wasteful behavior.
A more sustainable way was to culture it, and plucked its leaves, fruits, petals, roots, and even the dewdrops on the leaves as medicine when needed.
Each ancient sacred herb could be an important heirloom of a sect or an empire.
Zhang Ruochen planted the Hundred-Root Fern in the herb garden. He then plucked a leaf from it, put it in his mouth and started to consume and refine it.
The battle of Eastern Region Holy City had let Zhang Ruochen get not only eleven ancient sacred herbs but also a vast amount of thousand-year-old sacred medicine and various grades of sacred pills and treasures of merit that could enhance one’s cultivation base.
With the Canon of Truth in hands, Zhang Ruochen could deepen his insight of the Precept.
On top of that, he also had various sacred pills and herbs to speed up his cultivation.
Five years into the closed-door cultivation, the amount of Precepts in Zhang Ruochen’s Sea of Qi had surpassed 2 million, entering the peak of Seven-Step Saint Kinghood. He was on his way to attaining Eight-Step realm.
He spent another two years and successfully made a breakthrough.
2 million Precepts gushed inside the Heavenly Stream of his.
The saint qi in his Sea of Qi started to compress and undergo changes.
In a short period of a day, the increase in quality of the saint qi in Zhang Ruochen’s body became unprecedented, as if it had undergone an intensive distillation process.
At the same time, he had also inhaled a vast amount of saint qi and exhausted a few million Godstones.
It came to a point where his saint qi was out of control and started to leak out of his body. The leaked saint qi turned into white saint clouds and floated above the palace of Eastern Region.
Jiang Yunchong stood inside the Tower of Flames and looked at the saint clouds in the distance. “He is truly the Scion of Time and Space. Seven days! Just seven days and he achieved the ascension. At Eight-Step Saint Kinghood, how powerful is Zhang Ruochen now?”
“With his current level of cultivation, he is still not an unbeatable figure in the Kunlun Realm. But I am sure few saint-level cultivators in the Kunlun Realm could pose a lethal threat to him,” said Yin Ruo.
It was another year of cultivation.
Zhang Ruochen had completely strengthened his cultivation base. The number of Precept in his Sea of Qi had each a staggering 2.8 million, more than doubling his previous number.
Yet he was still considered in the beginning stage of the Eight-Step Saint Kinghood.
If he wanted to attain the Nine-Step Saint Kinghood, even just of the Lesser Precept World, he would need to increase the number of Precept in his body to at least 7 million before he could even try.
During the eight years of cultivation, he had not only achieved ascension but also made improvement in the Sword Path, Path of Truth, Path of Dimension, and Path of Time.
With only a level away, his insight of Ninth Sword almost made it to the ultimate stage.
That realm was called the Seamless Return of the Soul.
Wheel of the Law’s Rebirth, the fourth dimension of Sword of Time, was complete. This had boosted Zhang Ruochen’s combat strength to another level.
Path of Dimension had gained even bigger improvement. This was a confidence boost for him, and he decided to refine the Dimensional Scroll, in case he needed it later.
There were many categories of Dimension scroll such as Dimensional Teleportation Scroll, Dimensional Storm Scroll, Dimensional Chaos Scroll, Multi-Dimensional Scroll, and Dimensional Collapse Scroll.
There were differences in difficulty, too. For example, the refining process of Dimensional Collapse Scroll was relatively easier, and Multi-Dimensional Scroll was the most difficult.
So Zhang Ruochen chose to first refine Dimensional Collapse Scroll.
It was a two-step process. One, Refining the scroll; two, engraving the dimensional inscription.
To refine the Dimensional Scroll, special materials such as void silk, Taiyi Primordial Stone powder, and Wood of Origin were needed.
These materials were not indispensable, however. There were substitute materials.
For example, Wood of Origin could be substituted with the wood of Divine Sky-connecting Tree, which would not impact the quality much.
On the other hand, the Void Silk was the most difficult-to-find material.
The so-called Void Silk was silk produced by the Void Silkworm.
The Void Silkworm only lived in the void that only formed when a macroworld was born or destroyed, providing a conducive environment for Void Silkworms.
Besides, only Haishi Star Bastion was the only place where Void Silkworm could be found.
Zhang Ruochen took out a dimensional storage container. After a careful search, he finally found some Void Silk inside.
The Void Silk was stored inside a ring, about two pounds in weight, thinner than hair, shimmering and appearing to be in solid and sometimes gaseous form.
He remembered he got this ring from a dimensional cultivator during the attack of the Xumi Dojo.
With the Void Silk, Taiyi Primordial Stone powder and the wood of the Divine Sky-connecting Tree in hands, Zhang Ruochen had quickly gathered all the materials he needed as the other materials were not that difficult to find.
He invited Lu Huaiyu over and together; they refined the Dimensional Scroll.
Lu Huaiyu had studied The Record of Heavenly Work before. He might not be the top alchemist in the Kunlun Realm, but his skill was top-notch.
With the help of Lu Huaiyu, it only took Zhang Ruochen ten days to make his first Dimensional Scroll.
As the alchemical process got better and better, Zhang Ruochen had made dozens of Dimensional Scrolls in the following one month, completely exhausting the stock of the Void Silk.
Next, he would write the Dimensional Inscriptions on the blank scroll.
With Zhang Ruochen’s current level of dimensional cultivation, inscribing the simple Dimensional Collapse was just a five-finger exercise. Before long, he had finished writing the first scroll.
Following that, he had finished inscribing another ten Dimensional-Collapse Scrolls, eight of which were successful and the other two were spoiled. The success rate was considered high.
The Dimensional Teleportation Scroll is more useful. It is a lifesaving method. More of it is better.
The so-called Dimensional-Teleportation Scroll was the inscription of a teleporting array on a scroll. The difficulty in achieving this was several times higher than setting up a physical one.
It was not a small challenge for Zhang Ruochen.
“With this Dimensional-Teleportation Scroll, I can evacuate easily, even if I encounter a Supreme Saint. And I can go anywhere I want and poke anyone I like in the Kunlun Realm. I have to get this done!”
Zhang Ruochen took a deep breath, opened a blank scroll, and concentrated on the inscription. He could not afford to make any mistake.
But halfway during the process, he started to lose control.
Boom!
The Dimensional Teleporting inscription shattered the scroll, turning it into streaks of light before dissipating in the air. What was left of the scroll were some fragments.
Zhang Ruochen did not give up, however. He took out a second blank scroll and continued the inscription.
Boom!
This time, the scroll went up in flames and was burned to ashes only after he had done two fifths of the work.
After a while of silence, he decided to stop the inscription. Taking out the Secret Tome of Time and Space, he carefully studied the chapters that detailed the setup of a Dimensional Teleportation Array.
Next, he flipped to the chapter containing the information about the refinement of the Dimensional Scroll.
Two days later, Zhang Ruochen picked up the inscription pen again, and started to inscribe the Dimensional Teleportation Scroll.
As the inscription slowly took shape, Zhang Ruochen became nervous. He forced his mind and stabilized his fingers until he finished inscribing the last bit of it, only then he breathed a sigh of relief.
Looking at the Dimensional Teleportation Scroll, a smile finally spread across his face.
Until now that he realized beards of sweat had popped up on his forehead.
It could be because of my spiritual power; I couldn’t focus enough. If I could enhance my spiritual power, I could increase the success rate.
With his success on the first scroll, the following inscription process became much easier.
Zhang Ruochen used up twenty scrolls and successfully produced six Dimensional Teleportation Scrolls at one go.
He then used the remaining sixteen blank scrolls to make the Dimensional Chaotic Scroll, and seven were successful.
Zhang Ruochen was excited after completing the refining process. He was ready to find someone to experiment with these three types of scrolls
The bull-sized Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit ran up to him. “Could you please give me more one-hundred-thousand-year ancient sacred herbs? I have finished those that you gave me last month.”
Surprisingly, Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit had elevated his cultivation base the quickest for the past eight years. He was now in the Nine-Step Saint Kinghood.
It was mainly because he was gluttonous, and could digest anything. He ate Godstones as if he was eating candies. He had even swallowed a few divine bones.
That was not all; he had helped himself to the sacred herbs from the Royal Mountain, collecting a vast amount of it as if all that belonged to him.
Such ravenous appetite could have bankrupted Zhang Ruochen in no time.
Zhang Ruochen carefully examined him, then nodded with a smile. “Sure. But first, you have got to do me a little favor.”
“Really?”
Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit’s eyes lit up instantly, surprised by how generous Zhang Ruochen was. But he ignored the last part of the sentence.