After Long Xuan swallowed the Heaven-Mending Pill, he split his soul to multitask.
While refining the medicinal power of the Heaven-Mending Pill, he also began researching the formula for the Soul Restoration Pill.
He had tested it before—his split soul couldn't track progress effectively. Therefore, he had to set aside his research on the ship temporarily and focus on the Soul Restoration Pill, as repairing his soul was the highest priority, far more important than building a large ship.
With intense concentration, time flew by quickly. In the blink of an eye, two months had passed.
His efforts were not in vain. After two months of hard work in the Soul Library, he finally completed the recipe for the Soul Restoration Pill.
The main ingredient for the Soul Restoration Pill was not a concern. Although the Soul-Nourishing Wood was left in his herb garden and not with him, he still had some leaves of the Soul-Nourishing Wood, as they were the food for the Heavenly Dream Silkworm, and he always kept some on hand.
However, while the main ingredient was easy to solve, the other ingredients were a problem. He didn't have any of the supplementary materials listed in the pill recipe apart from the main one.
The Soul Restoration Pill required as many as 7,000 spiritual herbs, many of which were extremely rare and valuable, including some that were over a thousand years old, making them exceedingly difficult to collect.
This time, he couldn’t rely on shortcuts like he had with the Third Young Master; he would have to spend a tremendous amount of time slowly collecting them. It was unclear how long it would take to gather all the ingredients.
In the following days, Long Xuan sent his clones out to collect the materials for the Soul Restoration Pill, while he began researching the technology for building a large ship.
Once a ship reached a certain size, it was no longer just a spiritual tool; it became a combination of a spiritual tool and a formation array, essentially a different type of treasure.
The combination of inscription patterns and formation patterns was no easy task, and not just any faction could build a large ship.
Mastering the technology of large shipbuilding was a specialized skill, and very few forces were capable of doing so.
Long Xuan named his not-yet-completed large ship the "Shenlong"- (Divine Dragon).
He had learned the technique of harnessing solar energy from the Empress's Tomb and definitely planned to incorporate it into the Shenlong.
He had also gathered the materials for the Five Elements Reversal Grand Formation, which would further strengthen the defense of the Shenlong once installed.
Long Xuan was confident in solving the defense issue of the Shenlong. The only challenge that troubled him was the ship's propulsion system. After all, propulsion was the most critical aspect of a ship.
In this world, there were many ways to enhance a ship's propulsion. For instance, one could hang sails on the ship and use formation arrays to generate powerful winds, allowing the ship to travel at unimaginable speeds.
Additionally, inscription formation could be carved at the bottom of the ship to reduce its weight, or arrays could be used to control the movement of seawater, pushing the ship forward at lightning speed.
Some spiritual ships even had automatically rotating oars, enabling fast travel without the need for manpower.
In this mystical world, there were indeed countless ways to provide power for ships.
However, the main difficulty lay in the limited surface area of the ship's body. Only one or two propulsion formation could be used at most.
If too many speed-enhancing formation were inscribed, there wouldn't be enough space for defensive formations, which would reduce the ship's defensive capability.
Given the limited surface area, the shipbuilder had to choose between building a sturdy ship or a fast one—or they could strike a balance, but the ship's overall performance would end up being mediocre.
Moreover, the formation needed on a ship were not limited to just these two types. This meant that a shipbuilder had to carefully plan the layout of the arrays on the ship, as they couldn’t just inscribe whatever they wanted.
However, Long Xuan made an immediate decision: his Shenlong would have all the propulsion formation possible. The Shenlong had to become the fastest ship in its class.
As for the problem of insufficient space for too many formation, Long Xuan wasn’t worried at all. With the Heavenly Eye, he could inscribe as many formation as he wanted. His Shenlong could hold them all.
Thus, Long Xuan didn’t have to rack his brain like other shipbuilders over how to lay out the formation. Without any hesitation, he soon completed the blueprint for the Shenlong.
Raising the sketch of the large ship, Long Xuan smiled in satisfaction.
Now, as long as he had the materials, he could start building the ship.
Long Xuan was excited and eager to get started, wanting to begin the construction of this ship, which would be far ahead of anything in this world.
At the same time, during this half-year period, he had also fully restored his qualifications, making it a double blessing.
However, not everything was perfect. The issue arose when he had his clones sell pills everywhere to quickly collect materials for the Soul Restoration Pill and shipbuilding.
Since the Gu cultivators in this area were mostly concentrated in Xinghai City, the Fire Clone simply rented a small shop in the city and started selling pills.
But the shop hadn't been open long before it became incredibly popular, with a constant stream of customers, almost overwhelming the door.
At the same price, the pills refined by Long Xuan had far greater medicinal power than those from other alchemists. Naturally, those who bought his pills became loyal customers, returning only to his shop.
Good wine needs no bush. Even though Long Xuan didn't do any advertising when he opened the shop, word of mouth alone caused his reputation to soar.
Now, the entire city knew that a highly skilled alchemist had arrived in Xinghai City, hailed as the best alchemist in the city. His alchemy skills were unrivaled, with no one in the city able to compare.
This was overpraise! They were praising me to death! Long Xuan was stunned when he heard that he had somehow become Xinghai City's top alchemist.
He hadn't expected that, as a mere second-grade alchemist, he would end up with the title of Xinghai City's best alchemist.
This title would easily make him the target of jealousy from his peers, and it attracted far too much attention. He truly didn’t want it!
"I told you to keep a low profile when refining pills! How did you manage to cause such a mess in just a few months while I was in seclusion?!"
Inside the World Tree Seed, Long Xuan frowned and kicked the Fire Clone.
The Fire Clone scratched his head, puzzled. "I did hold back! I only used 30% of my strength. Any less and there would have been a failure rate, wasting a lot of materials!"
Long Xuan was speechless...
"Forget it! If we're going to be high-profile, so be it. It’s not like it's a life-threatening issue. How is the material collection for the Soul Restoration Pill going? How much more do we need?" Long Xuan sighed helplessly and changed the subject, asking about the important matter at hand.
"I've posted a full list of the materials we need in the pill shop, so the Gu cultivators who want to buy pills can only exchange the materials listed on the wall."
"This method is quite fast for gathering materials. I've already collected about 70 to 80% of the materials needed for the Soul Restoration Pill."
"However, without offering higher-value pills, it’s unlikely we'll be able to gather the rarest materials."
"Especially the Thousand-Year-old spiritual herbs. Very few are willing to trade them unless we offer something that truly excites them."
"Right now, we're still short of about 100 materials. These 100 are the most valuable ingredients in the Soul Restoration Pill recipe, mostly consisting of thousand-year-old spiritual herbs, which are extremely difficult to collect."
"To gather these 100 materials, we'll likely need to attend a high-level trade fair."
"I've heard that in half a month, Xinghai City will be hosting a trade fair for Gu cultivators at the Marrow Cleansing stage. This trade fair is of the highest caliber."
"As I understand it, Xinghai City is the largest port in the Xuanyue Empire, attracting Gu cultivators from all regions. The city’s commerce is highly prosperous, and supplies are very abundant."
"As long as we offer something attractive enough, we’ll certainly be able to collect all the materials for the Revival Soul Pill in this city."
"Moreover, we should also be able to gather all the rare materials needed for the Shenlong Ship here, since it is the largest shipyard in the Xuanyue Empire. It all depends on whether you're willing to spend enough."
"The trade fair in half a month will bring together a massive number of Gu cultivators from different regions. Only the extremely wealthy and powerful can participate, so it’s a golden opportunity for us."
"However, we need to prepare a large amount of valuable trade items. Ideally, these items should be universally appealing and irresistible to all Marrow Cleansing stage Gu cultivators."