Eternal Life Begins with Learning

In just a few dozen breaths, the roaring forest fell completely silent, the battle’s outcome decisively settled.

The forest was a scene of devastation, littered with splattered blood, explosive craters, and splintered trees. Amidst the wreckage, two figures stood facing each other.

The forest was silent, save for the man from the Longevity Sect, who was gasping for breath, his Magical Power seemingly exhausted.

"Fellow Daoist, sorry about just now. I thought you were their accomplice..."

The man looked up at Chu Mu, speaking with some difficulty.

"It’s nothing."

Chu Mu waved his hand dismissively. As he began to collect his spoils, a dangerous thought continued to swirl in his mind.

In the end, however, Chu Mu suppressed the dangerous thought.

’Based on my calculations, the Longevity Sect’s reinforcements should be arriving soon.’

"Fellow Daoist, you’re incredible! In all my years of Cultivation, I’ve never seen anyone hone their Magic to such a degree!"

"Is that so?"

Chu Mu raised an eyebrow, slightly puzzled. "Does the Longevity Sect not have anyone like that?"

"When a disciple is initiated, they are issued a Lower Grade Magical Artifact."

"Outer Disciples generally focus on Magical Artifacts. Very few use Magic as their primary method."

"Besides, Magic, much like the Hundred Skills of Cultivation Immortal, requires talent. It’s very difficult to advance without it."

"You might laugh, Fellow Daoist, but I also practiced Magic for a long time and never got very far with it."

"With that kind of time and energy, you’re better off just buying a few Talismans or a good Magical Artifact..."

Chu Mu nodded. That did make sense. Practicing Magic wasn’t cheap. To improve quickly, one needed a detailed understanding of their training regimen.

Achieving that level of understanding was nearly impossible just by practicing in the wild; you could only rely on intuition to figure things out.

Only with the support of detailed data like that in the Magic Experiment Hall could one achieve this.

And using the Magic Experiment Hall was far from cheap.

For the vast majority of Cultivators, spending that time and those Spirit Stones on Talismans or Magical Artifacts was clearly a much better deal.

"Oh, right, I forgot to ask your name, Fellow Daoist. I’m Sun Tao, an Outer Disciple of the Longevity Sect, and an Alchemist from Huichun Pavilion."

Chu Mu was slightly surprised but didn’t press for details. After a moment’s hesitation, he finally gave his real name: Chu Mu.

Just then, Chu Mu seemed to sense something. He glanced at several figures streaking through the distant forest before turning back to Sun Tao. "Chu dislikes trouble. As for what happened today, I hope you can cover for me a little, Fellow Daoist."

Sun Tao hastily promised, "Don’t worry, Fellow Daoist Chu..."

"Alright."

Chu Mu said no more. His Divine Wind Boots flared with Spiritual Power, and within a few steps, he vanished into the dense forest, quickly disappearing from Sun Tao’s line of sight.

Not even a few dozen breaths after Chu Mu left, several figures streaked through the air and arrived above the devastated clearing.

As for what happened next, Chu Mu would have no way of knowing.

He wasn’t too worried. After all, in Jade Emperor Valley, the identity of "Chu Mu" was that of a well-behaved, rule-abiding Cultivator.

After sprinting for dozens of miles, Chu Mu finally slowed his pace.

Perhaps the sheer scale of the battle had scared off any nearby onlookers; as he crossed mountains and ridges, he no longer felt any prying eyes.

The Jade Emperor Black Market wasn’t far from the Jade Emperor Valley Marketplace. Traveling north past the sixty-mile boundary of the valley, the market’s new location was on an unnamed mountain peak less than fifteen miles further.

Both the distance and the location made the connection between the Jade Emperor Black Market and the Jade Emperor Valley Marketplace blatantly obvious.

About twenty miles from the Jade Emperor Black Market, Chu Mu stopped and found a hidden cave to practice his Breathing exercises and recuperate.

He set down a small-scale isolation Restriction, sealing himself off from the outside world.

After a little less than an hour of Breathing and meditation to restore his Magical Power, Chu Mu could finally let his guard down.

Instead of immediately sorting through his loot, Chu Mu calmly began to analyze the fight.

The reason for the fight was sheer, undeserved misfortune.

As for the process of the fight...

’The Realm of Returning to the Essence for Magic is clearly far more powerful than I predicted. A single offensive and a single defensive Magic... those two spells practically decided the entire battle!’

As for that Binding Spell...

’At the level of Refined Skill, it’s practically useless in a life-and-death struggle where every second counts.’

’But relying on pure Magic, even at the Realm of Returning to the Essence, has its own significant limitations in a real fight.’

’The main issue is the power of the Magic itself. Even my Fireball Skill at the Realm of Returning to the Essence, while far exceeding the power of other Magic of the same tier...’

’...can only really damage undefended targets or those with weak defenses, like simple Defense Magic or some low-grade Defense Talismans.’

’My dominance this time was entirely based on that fact. None of those Evil Cultivators had any strong defensive measures, which is why my Fireball bombardment tactic was so devastatingly effective.’

’If they had been like that man from the Longevity Sect, who had even a simple Lower Grade Spiritual Artifact Shield, my Fireball bombardment would have been far less effective against its Defense.’

’Regardless, it’s undeniably a powerful trump card. The results of this battle made that perfectly clear.’

’With the power of my Fireball Skill and a casting speed faster than an instant, it’s a guaranteed slaughter against low-defense targets or in an ambush—as long as I have enough Magical Power.’

’The only small regret is that I didn’t get a chance to use the Minghong Saber. I still haven’t been able to test the combat effectiveness of this Upper Grade Magical Artifact.’

’With my current strength... my biggest limitation is still Magical Power. Or, to put it another way... endurance?’

Chu Mu frowned. This battle had clearly exposed his weakness—or rather, the weakness inherent to the Qi Cultivation Seventh Layer.

A furious barrage lasting just a dozen breaths had consumed most of his Magical Power. Afterward, he was forced to rely on Spirit Stones and Elixirs just to keep going.

But he only had the luxury of calmly using Spirit Stones to recover his Magical Power because he held the upper hand. In a stalemate, or worse, at a disadvantage, the fight would have inevitably turned into a battle of attrition.

’Body Refining...’

Ultimately, all his thoughts converged on the manual for the Wild Bull Technique.

No matter how he looked at it, pursuing Body Refining Cultivation was imperative.

And based on his analysis of the Wild Bull Technique Cultivation Technique the other night, if he wanted to make rapid progress in his Body Refining Cultivation, the cost would be every bit as high as it was for Qi Cultivation.

As he pondered, he took out the spoils from the battle one by one and laid them on the ground before him.

There wasn’t much loot, a fact he could attribute to his own bombardment, which had been so intense it left little more than ash.

Forget Storage Talismans; even the Spirit Stones on their bodies had been blasted to smithereens.

The most valuable item was the woman’s needle-shaped Magical Artifact, which was an Upper Grade Spiritual Artifact.

The next most valuable was the hook-nosed man’s Curved Saber Spiritual Artifact, a Middle Grade Spiritual Artifact, followed by the scar-faced man’s Lower Grade Spiritual Artifact, a Flying Sword. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

Beyond that, there were only a handful of Spirit Stones, a bottle of Elixirs of unknown purpose, and four assorted Talismans.

The most valuable of these was a Tier One Upper Grade Defense Talisman called a Stone Wall Talisman, an Earth Attribute Talisman.

When used, it could form a one-meter-thick stone wall, five meters wide and five meters long, anywhere within the user’s Divine Sense range. Though called a "stone" wall, it was actually formed from a Spiritual material, making it incredibly hard—enough to withstand a full-power attack from a Cultivator at the Late Stage of Qi Cultivation.

Its defensive power was unremarkable, but it had one extremely clever feature.

The stone wall created by a Tier One Upper Grade Stone Wall Skill was permanent. However, its Spiritual nature dissipated very quickly, and after about an hour, it would degrade into an ordinary, mundane stone wall.

However, as far as he knew, this Tier One Upper Grade Stone Wall Skill was also one of the most common construction methods in the Great Chu Cultivation Immortal World.

In the Jade Emperor Valley Marketplace, many structures, from ordinary buildings to the city walls themselves, were built using the Stone Wall Skill.

By then inscribing Array Restrictions onto them to preserve their Spiritual nature, the walls became a superior building material.

After fiddling with the unique Stone Wall Talisman for a moment, Chu Mu turned his attention to the most valuable prize: the Flying Needle Spiritual Artifact.

He extended his Divine Sense into the artifact, erasing the remnant Divine Soul Seal left inside. As he did, the information inscribed within the Magical Artifact flooded his mind.

A moment later, Chu Mu opened his eyes. The Flying Needle in his hand slowly rose to hover in the air before him.

The Flying Needle was only two inches long, about the size of an ordinary sewing needle. It was a dark, burnished gold, and its surface was covered in complex, inscribed patterns that were clearly visible to the naked eye. Faintly, streams of light could be seen flowing along these markings.

It looked less like a deadly weapon that could kill without shedding a drop of blood and more like an indescribable work of art.

With a mere thought, the art-like Flying Needle’s luster dimmed, and in the blink of an eye, it vanished from where it hovered before him.

It was gone, invisible to both the naked eye and Divine Sense Perception.

But having completed the Refinement and left his own Divine Soul Seal on it, he could clearly sense that the Flying Needle Spiritual Artifact was still hovering right in front of him, completely unmoved.

Then, with a faint flash of dark gold, two minuscule, almost unnoticeable holes appeared on the cave wall opposite him.

In that single instant, the Flying Needle had already flown through the mountain rock and returned.

’So close, yet not quite perfect!’

Chu Mu felt a pang of regret. The Flying Needle had its own built-in Concealing Breath Restriction, and its raw materials seemed to be some kind of substance that existed on the border between the tangible and intangible.

As a result, when stationary, the Flying Needle could remain completely invisible—hidden from both the naked eye and Divine Sense.

Unfortunately, the material was slightly flawed; the moment it moved from a stationary position, it would reveal the faintest of traces.

The traces were minuscule, but to a Cultivator’s Divine Sense Perception, even the slightest disturbance was perfectly clear.

Without those traces, this Flying Needle Spiritual Artifact, named the Formless Needle, would be a truly invisible and untouchable weapon of death.

As his thoughts churned, Chu Mu let out an unexpected smile. It was a good thing those traces existed. If the needle had been truly formless and without a shadow, he would have likely been the one to fall to it today.

He certainly wouldn’t be sitting here now, admiring the Flying Needle as his prize...

...