Chapter 16 – Immortal Art, Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique!
by spirapira【The dungeon was brimming with spiritual energy. You took a deep breath and felt every cell in your body singing with pleasure.】
【You and Jin Congxue walked toward a thatched cottage in the distance. After knocking on the door, an elderly man with a youthful face and crane-white hair appeared.】
【The elder praised you both as people blessed with great fortune, and assigned you the task of cultivating spirit fields.】
【You and Jin Congxue each received a plot of spirit field and prepared to farm it.】
【Because your cultivation had broken through to the fifth layer of Qi Refinement, the spiritual energy within you was more abundant, and your spirit field grew exceptionally well.】
【In your spare time, you taught Jin Congxue farming knowledge and helped her accelerate the ripening of spirit grain.】
【You and Jin Congxue gradually became good friends.】
【On the day the task was due, the elder rewarded Jin Congxue with twenty spirit stones and twenty jin of spirit rice.】
【After Jin Congxue left the dungeon, the elder called you aside privately.】
【The elder produced an aptitude testing stone and asked you to place your hand on it.】
【You placed your hand on the stone, and two streams of light—one green, one red—flickered across its surface.】
【The elder smiled and nodded approvingly, praising your exceptional aptitude and saying you had the potential to walk the path of immortality.】
【The elder took out a jade slip and a bag of seeds, handing them to you. He said your wood-attribute spiritual energy was well-suited for cultivating spirit fields, and that if you learned a fire-attribute technique, you might have a chance of embarking on the path of pill refinement.】
【You did not accept the elder’s rewards, and instead asked to become his disciple.】
【The elder shook his head slightly upon hearing this. He said you had not completed his task, and that you had begun cultivating too late in life, having missed the optimal age for immortal cultivation.】
【Left with no choice, you could only accept the jade slip and spirit seeds before leaving the dungeon.】
【You stayed in Jinling City for a few days and became close friends with Jin Congxue.】
【After several days, you returned to Capital Vocational Academy and began studying the jade slip and the seeds the elder had given you.】
【You channeled spiritual energy into the jade slip and discovered that it contained an immortal art called the 《Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique》. The technique documented the cultivation methods and wondrous uses of thousands of spirit plants, and contained thirteen minor sub-techniques used for nurturing spirit plants.】
【You studied for several months but still could not grasp even the basics. You came to appreciate more and more just how extraordinary the 《Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique》 truly was.】
【In the days that followed, you split your time between studying this immortal art and cultivating.】
【A year passed, and your Qi Refinement cultivation broke through to the first level of Foundation Establishment.】
【You gained some insight into the 《Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique》 and learned how to grow spirit grain.】
【In the second year, you voluntarily dropped out of school, left Capital City, and returned to your rural hometown.】
【You used your meager savings to lease a hillside in the countryside. You believed the air deep in the mountains was fresher and more suitable for growing spirit plants.】
【You cleared two mu of wasteland and began planting spirit grain.】
【You attempted to learn the Minor Spirit-Gathering Formation from the thirteen sub-techniques of the 《Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique》, hoping to transform these two mu of farmland into spirit fields.】
【You failed. You were unable to learn the Minor Spirit-Gathering Formation.】
【Left with no choice, you settled for the next best thing—burying spirit stones in the farmland to gradually improve the soil.】
【Three years passed in the blink of an eye.】
【In the fifth year, through your diligent farming, the mountain soil had slowly been cultivated into spirit fields. However, maintaining them cost ten spirit stones per month, which pained you greatly.】
【The quality of the spirit fields was poor, so the spirit grain produced was of inconsistent quality. Nevertheless, the grain still yielded a considerable amount of spirit rice.】
【In the sixth year, you harvested two mu worth of spirit grain. You processed it into spirit rice and obtained one thousand jin of low-grade spirit rice.】
【Though this spirit rice was only low-grade, it was still enough to help you break through in cultivation.】
【You devoted yourself to cultivation for a year, consuming over a hundred jin of spirit rice, and your Body Tempering cultivation successfully broke through to Bone Forging.】
【In the seventh year, you attended your younger sister Su Nian’an’s funeral.】
【Not long after the funeral, you returned to the mountain and continued cultivating your spirit fields, living like an old farmer in the hills.】
【Every day you shouldered your hoe, working from sunrise to sunset, often studying the immortal art until you forgot to eat and sleep.】
【In the eighth year, the number of spirit stones in your possession dwindled to just over a dozen.】
【You tried burying the husks of spirit grain in the spirit fields to maintain the spiritual energy within the soil, but the results were minimal.】
【You reduced your two mu of fields down to half a mu, and only occasionally spent a spirit stone to replenish the field’s spiritual energy.】
【Your spirit plant cultivation skills improved rapidly, and you gained some insight into the Minor Spirit-Gathering Formation.】
【In the tenth year, you attended Yu Yan’s funeral.】
【After the funeral, you didn’t rush back. Instead, you went to find Jin Congxue.】
【You traded one hundred jin of low-grade spirit rice for twenty spirit stones from her.】
【Jin Congxue wanted you to stay, but you were singularly devoted to farming. After lingering together for a few days, you still returned to your hometown.】
【Five more years passed in the blink of an eye, bringing you to the fifteenth year.】
【Over these five years, you learned the cultivation methods for spirit grain and several types of spirit herbs. Through your tireless efforts, you finally achieved a basic mastery of the Minor Spirit-Gathering Formation.】
【Because you had been consuming spirit rice day and night over these years, tempering your body, your Qi Refinement cultivation broke through to the third level of Foundation Establishment, and your Body Tempering cultivation broke through to the seventh level of Bone Forging.】
【One day, while planting in the fields, you noticed the sky growing dark.】
【You looked up and saw that colossal beast blotting out the sun.】
【You raised your middle finger at the giant beast. The light of hope in your eyes had not yet been extinguished.】
【You died!】
【You activated the talent Die With Eyes Open…】
【Ding! This simulation has ended!】
【You may select one of the following rewards: Wood-Fire Dual Spiritual Root (talent), Foundation Establishment Level 3 (cultivation), Bone Forging Level 7 (cultivation), 《Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique》 (immortal art), fifty jin of low-grade spirit rice (item), farming insights from the simulation (insight)】
【Wood-Fire Dual Spiritual Root】: Green talent. Price: 10,000 energy points.
【Foundation Establishment Level 3】: Cultivation. Price: 2,700 energy points.
【Bone Forging Level 7】: Cultivation. Price: 7,500 energy points.
【Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique】: Immortal art. Price: 10,000,000,000 energy points.
【Fifty jin of low-grade spirit rice】: Item. Price: 25,000 energy points.
【farming insights from the simulation】: Insight. Price: 10,000 energy points.
After a long silence, Su Xing finally came back to his senses from the simulation and murmured:
“This simulation… was truly a bountiful harvest!”
It could be said that in this simulation, Su Xing had walked down a completely different path from the money-making ventures of previous runs.
His simulated self had transformed entirely into a farming fanatic, obsessively cultivating spirit plants. This had opened up an entirely new path for Su Xing to explore.
What shocked Su Xing even more was that in this dungeon, he had actually obtained an immortal art—the Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique!
Though it wasn’t a combat technique or supernatural ability that could directly boost his strength, this spirit cultivation art was extraordinarily precious to Su Xing.
In the past, Su Xing had possessed spiritual energy and mana, but no spells or supernatural abilities to speak of.
And this Shennong Spirit Cultivation Technique was clearly something exceptionally valuable—its extraction price alone was a staggering one billion energy points.
“This spirit cultivation technique is way too expensive… but the more expensive it is, the more it proves just how powerful this art must be!”
So Su Xing thought to himself.
What surprised Su Xing even more was the appearance of an entirely new type of reward in this simulation—insights!
This meant Su Xing could spend a great deal of time learning a particular technique within the simulation, then extract the insights afterward. This would save him an enormous amount of time that would otherwise be spent comprehending techniques on his own.
“When it comes down to it, this simulation’s choice has to be that one!”
The corners of Su Xing’s mouth curled upward slightly.