Seeking Immortality

In the days that followed, in addition to daily meditation and practicing Taoism, Xu Qingfan also added one more activity, which was to collect seeds of various plants and refine them into his body.

Ever since Xu Qingfan accidentally learned about the wonderful uses of "Withering and Flourishing Art" that day, he has developed a strong interest in various plants, especially those exotic flowers and plants with special functions. For others, they are just curiosity, but for him, they are likely to evolve into his own magical powers. In order to have a more comprehensive understanding of these plants, he also borrowed a book called "Shanhai Yitan - Plants and Trees" from Yue Qingru.

"Shanhai Yitan" is considered to be a great wonder in the world of immortal cultivation. It is widely circulated. Almost everyone who likes to collect in the world of immortal cultivation has a copy, and it is even circulated among the laymen in the mortal world.

This book is said to be written by a casual cultivator called "Yunyouzi" three thousand years ago. Yunyouzi's cultivation level has just reached the virtual pill stage, which is not the top in the world of immortal cultivation. But this old man likes to travel. After he felt that his skills could not go any further, he gave up the illusory theory of immortality and began to travel around the world. In this respect, he is very similar to Xu Qingfan.

It took him more than three hundred years to visit the barren and dead southern wilderness where monsters were rampant, to go deep into the wild desert and sandstorms in the west, to explore the mysterious and vast East China Sea with many storms, and to leave footprints on the continuous glaciers in the Arctic.

After going to all the places that humans can reach now, he returned to the Middle Earth and was already very old. His many years of exploration career caused him to suffer many internal and external injuries that could never be healed. So he died soon after. After his death, he left behind eleven volumes of his travel notes "Shan Hai Yi Tan". Later, a good friend of his was found when he was packing up his belongings. The great value of these notes was immediately recognized by everyone in the cultivation world. From then on, the name Yunyouzi began to be famous throughout the cultivation world with "Shan Hai Yi Tan".

And this "Strange Talks of Mountains and Seas - Plants and Trees" is one of the eleven volumes of notes. The others are "Mountains and Waters", "Birds and Insects", "Spirits and Monsters", "Monsters", "Magic Arts", "Strange People", "Spiritual Treasures", "Human Feelings", "Strange News", and "Miscellaneous Essays". These eleven chapters contain almost all the knowledge that a cultivator should know and many strange and bizarre descriptions.

The various strange flowers and plants described in "Strange Talks of Mountains and Seas - Plants and Trees" opened Xu Qingfan's eyes. Although he only had a partial understanding of some knowledge about strange flowers and plants from books, it was enough for Xu Qingfan to sigh. The vast land of China is endless, and there are countless strange flowers and plants. Plants like the explosive flame flower, blade grass, and iron vine that Xu Qingfan refined are only unique plants near Jiuhua Mountain. Compared with the entire vast land of China, they can only be said to be a drop in the ocean.

So Xu Qingfan was more confident than ever. Although his talent was still not good and his skills were still low, at least he had a way to go.

Unknowingly, another ten years had passed.

In these ten years, Xu Qingfan collected all the seeds of plants that he could collect within his ability. But although there were many seeds, there were not many that were useful to him.

So far, he could only use a few of them, such as the explosive flower that exploded when touched, the blade grass that was as sharp as a sword, the iron vine that could entangle people and had a tough body, the iron cattail that was invulnerable to swords and guns and fire, and the floating catkins that could be used for detection.

Because he often went to the "Hundred Herb Garden" with many flowers, plants and trees to collect seeds, Xu Qingfan was now very familiar with Uncle Liu who was in charge of the Hundred Herb Garden. Uncle Liu was a skinny old man who knew the characteristics of various plants very well, which benefited Xu Qingfan a lot. Uncle Liu also felt that since Xu Qingfan liked plants very much, especially the exotic flowers and plants he liked like himself, it meant that he was a teachable person, so he never kept his knowledge to himself and felt that he had found a soulmate.

Moreover, over the years, as Xu Qingfan absorbed more and more seeds of various plants, he was surprised to find that not only his skills were growing faster and faster, but also his control over the spiritual energy in his body was getting stronger and stronger. Xu Qingfan has now started to practice the "Withering and Flourishing Finger" again.

In just ten years, Xu Qingfan went from the early stage of fasting to the late stage of fasting. Although the fasting stage was originally a realm where the progress of cultivation was extremely fast, and the bottle of "Wood Spirit Pill" given to him by Lu Huayan was also very effective, Xu Qingfan still felt that the subtle changes in the spiritual energy in his body after absorbing the seeds were also very important reasons.

In the past ten years, in addition to practicing, Xu Qingfan spent most of his time after practicing reading with Yue Qingru. Of course, Yue Qingru often nagged Xu Qingfan to read more, but more of it was because Xu Qingfan liked reading. Xu Qingfan has loved reading since he was a child, and now he has been in Jiuhua Mountain for twenty years. He can only rely on the knowledge in books to imagine the outside world. "Shanhai Yitan", "Turtle Treasure", and "Shenzhou Haotu Zhi" are all familiar to him.

After Xu Qingfan's ten years of continuous reading and learning, his calm eyes have added more tranquility and bookishness. The indifference is determined by his personality, and the tranquility is the precipitation of his thoughts after years of reading.

That night, Xu Qingfan came to the place where he usually practiced with Jin Qinghan again, and closed his eyes and meditated as usual. Although Xu Qingfan's cultivation in the fasting period no longer needs to deliberately meditate to improve the spiritual energy in his body, Xu Qingfan still likes to meditate for a period of time at a fixed time every day to cultivate his body and mind.

He likes the tranquil and distant feeling when meditating. Combined with the beautiful mountain scenery, bright moon and fresh breeze, Xu Qingfan really feels like a fairy.

When Xu Qingfan opened his eyes again, he found that Jin Qinghan did not leave after practicing as usual, but was standing quietly in front of him, as if he had something to say.

Looking at Jin Qinghan in front of him, Xu Qingfan was filled with emotion. His progress in the past ten years has been fast enough, but he didn't expect this guy to progress even faster. He had reached the late stage of Bigu four and a half years ago, and now he is only a hair's breadth away from the spiritual silence period. Maybe fate always favors geniuses more.

And Jin Qinghan is undoubtedly a genius among geniuses.

"What's the matter?" Xu Qingfan smiled faintly and asked.

"Yes." Jin Qinghan is still so frugal with words. Except for those two chats, Xu Qingfan has never seen this guy talk too much.

"What's the matter?" Xu Qingfan asked with some curiosity.

"Will you participate in this year's internal competition?"

"Internal competition? What is that?" Xu Qingfan asked.

"Every sixty years, the six major holy places of cultivation will jointly hold a newcomer competition. Only disciples who have been in the sect for less than a hundred years are allowed to participate. This is to deepen the exchanges among the six major holy places and to promote the common progress of the newcomers in the six major holy places. And ten years later, it will be the time for the newcomer competition. In order to achieve good results in the newcomer competition, our sect has decided to hold an internal competition every ten years before the newcomer competition. Only newcomers are allowed to participate. The top five disciples will receive certain prizes and represent our sect in the newcomer competition jointly held by the six major holy places ten years later." Jin Qinghan knew that Xu Qingfan had never heard of the outside world in the twenty years since he joined Jiuhua Sect, so he patiently explained.

"Oh? There is such a thing? I have never heard of it." Xu Qingfan said in surprise. Indeed, since he started cultivating immortals, he had been under the protection of Lu Huayan for the first ten years. Because he was busy practicing "Withering and Flourishing Art" and Lu Huayan was a loner by nature, Xu Qingfan basically had no contact with other people in Jiuhua Mountain. As for after Lu Huayan's death, Xu Qingfan moved to the back mountain to live, almost isolated from the world. Until now, he is only familiar with his senior brother Yue Qingru, Jin Qinghan and Uncle Liu from Baicao Garden.

In a way, Xu Qingfan, who likes quietness and does not like to move, is indeed a bit lonely.

Looking at Jin Qinghan who was quietly waiting for his answer, Xu Qingfan asked back: "Do you want to participate?"

"Well, Feng Qingtian participated." Jin Qinghan said lightly.

"I won't participate." Xu Qingfan thought for a while and said.

"Why?"

"You know me, I don't like excitement, and I don't like fighting even more." Xu Qingfan explained.

Hearing Xu Qingfan say this, Jin Qinghan nodded, but turned and left without saying anything else.

Looking at Jin Qinghan's figure going away, Xu Qingfan shook his head. In his opinion, Jin Qinghan was good in everything except that he was too competitive. He still had a defeat ten years ago in his mind.

When Xu Qingfan returned to his residence, he found that his senior brother Yue Qingru was sitting in his room waiting for him with a strange expression.

"Senior brother, is there anything?" Xu Qingfan asked.

"Junior brother, do you know about the upcoming internal competition?" Yue Qingru asked.

"Yes, Jin Qinghan told me just now. What's the matter?" Xu Qingfan said.

"Junior brother, do you want to participate?" Yue Qingru asked again.

"Senior brother, you know, I don't like these very much." Xu Qingfan shook his head slightly and said with a chuckle.

After hearing what Xu Qingfan said, Yue Qingru hesitated for a while and said, "Junior brother, you probably don't know what the rewards for the top five this time are?"

"Well, I don't know. Probably some magic tools and spiritual medicines. But I don't care much about this kind of things." Xu Qingfan said. At the same time, he was a little curious. Could it be that the reward this time was so good that even the usually elegant senior brother had the desire to compete for it?

Yue Qingru took a deep breath, and then slowly said: "You should be very familiar with the prize that the third place will get in this competition."

"What is it?" Xu Qingfan couldn't help but ask curiously after hearing what Yue Qingru said.

"It is the magic weapon that Master often used in the past - 'Three-foot Green Silk'." Yue Qingru said word by word.

"What?" Xu Qingfan said in surprise.

In a trance, Xu Qingfan seemed to have returned to more than 20 years ago, when a white-haired, majestic and ancient old man brought a delicate-looking boy, flying quickly in the air on the clouds.

"Master, how can this green silk scarf turn into clouds? And can it carry people flying?"

"This is one of my magic tools, called 'Three Zhang Qingling'. It is the first magic tool your master's wife has ever made. After hundreds of years of sacrifice and refinement, it has many magical uses and has been with me for hundreds of years."

When Lu Huayan said this, his face was sad and nostalgic. Xu Qingfan still remembers it clearly.

This "Three Zhang Qingling" is definitely not one of Lu Huayan's best magic tools, but it is definitely his most commonly used magic tool, because this magic tool represents the memories of him and his master's wife.

"Brother, are you participating?" Xu Qingfan came back to his senses and asked.

"Yes, what about you, brother?"

"I will participate too." Xu Qingfan said firmly.