CHAPTER 107: GOLDEN CORE STAGE

Chapter 107: Golden Core Stage

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He began with his first core, immediately triggering the crystallization process of the condensed Qi, and with meticulous attention, he guided it until little by little it formed an initial layer within the fire core.

He spent almost five whole hours doing this, and during that time he didn’t allow himself even the slightest distraction. If someone had seen him from the outside, they would have thought a statue was sitting there, not him.

It was a delicate process that required extreme attention, especially in the initial phase of forming the first layer.

And so, after five hours, he finally let out a sigh of relief when he saw that the first layer of the golden core inside the fire core was completed.

The crystallization process was delicate and troublesome; it would only take a small mistake for everything to shatter into pieces.

Now that he had created the first layer, the following ones would be faster and a bit easier. The only issue was that it would probably take an entire day just to complete the fire core, and he still had five more to work on.

Time flew by, and as he continued creating the initial layers of golden cores in each of his elemental cores, the week passed, and soon the day came when the renovation of their shop was completed.

Everything was already prepared, from the tools to the materials they would work with. All was set and ready to be used.

It was also the day Zhu Rong completed the last initial layer, the one covering the inner walls of his dantian, and by evening he had finished creating the spiritual link between the various golden cores inside the elemental cores.

With this, he had successfully stepped into the fourth stage with all of his cores, and the increase in power was immediately noticeable.

Not only had his ability to unleash much stronger spiritual energy attacks grown, but due to the more solid control over his Qi granted by the formation of these initial golden cores, his spiritual sense had also received an enormous boost.

If before he could envelop the entire inn and perceive even the tiniest detail within it, now he could easily expand it to almost five miles in radius.

Normally, a cultivator who had just stepped into the fourth stage could only expand their spiritual sense to no more than half a mile, with the most talented and skilled in Qi control barely reaching a full mile.

But Zhu Rong, who already had perfect control over his Qi and now the support of five elemental cores, all at the fourth stage, which amplified his abilities, could go far beyond that, covering almost five miles in radius.

Basically, he could cover half of Qiyan with his spiritual sense, and considering that Qiyan was the capital city of one of the three main provinces, and one of the largest in the empire, that was no small thing.

Only cultivators at the fifth stage could possess the mental strength and spiritual power necessary to sustain such a wide range.

Even then, the number of things they could clearly perceive within that radius was far inferior to what Zhu Rong could see, thanks to his flawless Qi control, which allowed him to monitor almost everything in detail.

Essentially, within the reach of his spiritual sense, he had an almost omniscient vision.

But even so, he wouldn’t use it to its full extent all the time, since releasing such a vast amount of spiritual power to stretch the range of his sense could easily alert many people powerful enough to perceive fluctuations of spiritual energy in the environment.

Not to mention the fact that many places were often protected by artifacts or formations that concealed them from prying eyes, no matter how powerful one’s spiritual sense might be.

Of course, someone truly strong could still penetrate those defenses, but that was not something he was currently capable of doing.

With the shop’s renovation complete, his three departments moved there, and their activity resumed on the very same day they relocated.

He could already see an improvement in productivity now that they had a space entirely of their own, equipped with everything they needed to work.

Working at the pavilion had been useful, but only to a certain extent. Once a certain level was reached, all sorts of problems began to appear: small things like the lack of tools, materials, having to adapt to the pavilion’s schedule, and many other little inconveniences.

Alone they weren’t too serious, but together they became a real headache.

Now, most of those issues were gone, and the benefits of this would show very soon.

Zhu Rong had already noticed that the skill level of some among the departments was rising very quickly, and if they kept going at this pace, it was very likely that within just a few months they would reach the rank of Three Star Experts.

The speed was shocking, to say the least, but considering they were constantly guided by a master level expert like Zhu Rong, and refined their skills every single day, it was only natural that they would progress fast.

Even the less talented among them were advancing faster than the average person.

Zhu Rong already had plans to expand the business of all his departments in the future, and for now he was simply waiting for these seedlings to grow strong enough before pushing them to bear even greater fruit.

With their activity now fully underway, only the academy competition remained, and there were just two days left until it began.

Zhu Rong had decided to dedicate some time to training Ye Ning and the other elves during this period.

They all had very good talent in cultivation, and with the resources that had become abundant in the past two months, their progress was anything but slow.

While Ye Ning had successfully broken through to the second stage and kept advancing, all the other elves who had reached the first stage had already stepped into the second, and were not far from reaching its peak.

With the personalized cultivation techniques Zhu Rong had created for them, the early stages of cultivation were quite fast.

But the closer they got to the third stage, the more their progress would slow down. At that point Zhu Rong would have to upgrade the underground cultivation area beneath the inn.

It had been designed to handle a large amount of Qi, which allowed many people to cultivate there at the same time without too many issues.

But now that they were advancing further and further, their Qi requirements had increased, and the formation within the underground area was already struggling to keep up with them.

Zhu Rong had already noticed this, and so he had decided to start designing a new one for them, in preparation for their future cultivation stages.