Cultivation is just so scientific! Chapter 1537 - 815: Discovery

As Grandmaster Hu departed, his face bore an expression too intricate to put into words. The Ten Thousand Beast Sect had just acquired five late-stage Golden Corpses, whose power greatly exceeded that of typical Great Cultivators—a development that surely brought elation.

Yet, the effortless downfall of his mightiest Spiritual Pet, the Red Gold Phoenix, left him utterly unable to feel any delight.

The tangled emotions swirling within his master, Grandmaster Hu, eluded Li Shiming's grasp. Once Grandmaster Hu had gone, Li Shiming turned his thoughts toward Artifact Refining concerns.

He intended to employ the superior fourth-grade materials gathered earlier by himself and his avatar Li Yuanba. Truth be told, bolstering those five late-stage Golden Corpses would likewise amplify his personal fighting strength.

For his initial refinements, Li Shiming crafted five hammer-like magic treasures. These consisted merely of the prior high-quality fourth-grade mountain peak treasures fitted with hammer handles. The sole enhancements involved etching three billion 'power runes,' three billion 'gravity runes,' and three billion 'fortification runes' onto the hammer magic treasures.

Selecting exactly three billion runes served to rein in the hammer magic treasures, ensuring they failed to ascend to Spirit Treasure status following the Artifact Tribulation.

In the Cultivation World, this approach likely stood as the oddest way to limit magic treasure potency, since fellow cultivators always sought to elevate their artifacts' caliber to the utmost.

Were Li Shiming at the Mahayana Realm's might, he could effortlessly forge Spirit Treasures without a second thought.

At present, confined to the Great Cultivator Realm, he held the capacity to challenge superpowers and eliminate several Great Cultivators. Still, should he openly display his skill in crafting Spirit Treasures from top-grade fourth-grade materials, it might incite a mighty expert to confront him directly.

To those formidable powers, a Great Cultivator's demise formed part of life's inevitable cycle. Having witnessed countless births and deaths, they refrained from meddling unless a sect's very existence hung in the balance.

Scenarios capable of stirring a mighty expert into motion proved exceedingly scarce; beyond sect-internal affairs, they touched upon personal stakes or a sect's endurance.

Spirit Treasures tied straight into the pursuits of these mighty experts; for even them, producing a Spirit Treasure demanded considerable effort.

Most fifth-grade materials stemmed from Grotto Heavens, and a single mighty figure's Grotto Heaven yielded only a scant supply of such materials—barely sufficient for forging one Spirit Treasure.

Spirit Treasures enabled mighty beings to unleash their full battle might, and acquiring an extra one meant a notable boost in fighting ability for the majority.

Moreover, an additional Spirit Treasure hastened one's cultivation progress, a factor of immense importance to mighty experts as well.

During the time Li Yuanba unveiled the Spirit Treasure Xingyi Sword, fortune smiled upon him by crossing paths with Sword Elder—one of the uncommon mighty beings indifferent to gaining a second Spirit Treasure.

As a devoted Sword Cultivator, Sword Elder poured his efforts into cultivating his Lifebound Flying Sword, embracing the creed of "one sword breaking all laws," and thus required no further Spirit Treasures.

Because of this, Li Yuanba managed to retain the Spirit Treasure Xingyi Sword. Nevertheless, he refrained from revealing the 'Ten Thousand Sword Peak' Spirit Treasure enhancement to Sword Elder.

The Great Cultivator Realm's boon lay in its dramatically accelerated refining pace; altering the five hammer-shaped magic treasures required roughly thirty days and occurred all at once.

Drawing upon the bulk of his mental faculties, with precision down to 0.05 nanometers, he etched runes within the refinement room's domain, securing this impressive swiftness in refinement.

Navigating the Artifact Tribulation for the five hammer-shaped magic treasures proved remarkably straightforward, as the five late-stage Golden Corpses wielded them. To fortify the five late-stage Golden Corpses against thunder, Li Shiming armed them with the Spirit Treasure 'Heavenly Strike Thunder Hammer' and the 'Shenxiao Thunder Pearl' for layered protection.

All three Heavenly Thunders got completely repelled by the five hammer-shaped magic treasures, denied any opportunity to strike the late-stage Golden Corpses.

In the end, this yielded five fourth-grade magic treasures that had endured the Artifact Tribulation. In truth, such refining marked merely the initial and most basic phase in uplifting the battle strength of the five late-stage Golden Corpses.

That said, intelligence from Master Liu Ziyun indicated that Peak Great Cultivator Yan Gao of the White Emperor Sect could very well have reached the Dongqi Continent by now.

This report's vagueness arose from Yan Gao's secretive travels, kept hidden even within the White Emperor Sect itself.

Only when the Central State Commerce's spy network noted Yan Gao's month-long absence from the West Yan Continent did fragments of intel surface.

In light of these developments, Li Shiming found it impossible to press on with refining enhancements for the five late-stage Golden Corpses.

Yan Gao wielded terrifyingly immense combat strength. The key issue lay in how, differing from the prior Peak Great Cultivator Ren Mu of the Central State Commerce, Li Shiming shared an unbridgeable grudge with the White Emperor Sect.

It might have started over prized treasures, yet with the White Emperor Sect enduring heavy blows—including the loss of three Great Cultivators and close to a hundred Nascent Soul Middle Stage Cultivators—the hatred had deepened beyond mending.

Yan Gao's journey to the Dongqi Continent undoubtedly aimed at slaying Li Shiming.

These days, the Central State Commerce had widely disseminated Li Shiming's fame. For instance, while his avatar Li Yuanba secluded himself for cultivation on the Central State Continent, he would from time to time spot reports in the regular intel updates via the Sword Intent Chongxiao Pavilion’s Identity Jade Disc about Li Shizhen's triumph over Master Ren Mu.

In the past, superpowers referred to Li Shizhen as Master Li, signaling his role as an Alchemy Master.

Today, however, superpowers simply used Li Shizhen's name alone. Far from a sign of disrespect, this shift placed Li Shiming's martial prowess above his Alchemy Master status, honoring him for his fighting skills.