Cultivation is just so scientific!

Chapter 256: Chapter 174 Profit_2

Unfortunately, Li Shiming was not at the Foundation Establishment Stage, and had not learned the Foundation Establishment Stage Techniques, so he would have to wait until he advanced to Foundation Establishment to learn this inheritance.

The rest of the storage bag contained some second-grade talisman materials, which were still somewhat valuable.

Li Shiming thought about the various buildings at the residence, and his external incarnation had already entered one of the buildings, beginning to search through it.

As he searched through one building after another, his disappointment grew; there were storehouses within the other buildings, but they all contained only Qi Refinement Realm materials, which were not very valuable.

There were no Spiritual Artifacts in the storage bags of Wei Lin and Tie Laosan, especially Tie Laosan, who, after having detonated a Super-grade Magical Artifact, no longer possessed any.

Wei Lin was not much better than Tie Laosan; the only Super-grade Magical Artifact he had was damaged by the explosion of Tie Laosan’s during combat and was considered beyond repair in Li Shiming’s eyes.

However, inside Tie Laosan’s storage bag, Li Shiming found a Secret Technique, which piqued his interest—it was the very Secret Technique Tie Laosan used to detonate his Super-grade Magical Artifact.

This Secret Technique was not overly complicated. Tie Laosan enjoyed Artifact Refining and, despite his modest skill, had a flexible mind, discovering a way to render a Magic Artifact internally unstable during the refining process.

The technique did significant harm to the Artifact’s owner, but the explosive power of the Artifact’s self-destruction was also formidable, dependent on the quality of the Artifact and the blood essence its owner sacrificed.

In a desperate act, Tie Laosan spat out three mouthfuls of blood essence, causing his Super-grade Magical Artifact to self-destruct and severely injure Wei Lin, a cultivator of the same rank.

Even Li Shiming, who had a considerable fortune, couldn’t help but twitch at the sight of this technique—it was like using Spirit Stones to strike at someone.

However, in a moment of grave danger, it could serve as an excellent lifesaving method.

What interested him was not the technique itself, but the thought process behind it. Given time to study Artifact Refining, Li Shiming might be able to perfect the technique, reducing self-harm and increasing the power of the explosion.

After turning the entire Wei family’s residence upside down, the useful Spiritual Objects he found included a huge Pill Furnace.

This Pill Furnace was fueled by a type of spirit carbon, which was stored next to the furnace in a fifty-cubic-meter storage bag, filled to the brim.

Li Shiming collected all the Spiritual Objects he could, and even gathered the gold and silver. With plenty of storage bags at his disposal, he didn’t mind the trouble.

“Fellow, go check over there!” Li Shiming, seated at the Formation’s control core, while examining a complete Formation diagram provided by IBMz15, spotted an anomaly at one location.

His external incarnation, with a handsome smile, rose and walked toward the spot.

It was not far from the cave dwelling, just thirty meters away, but the existence of a blank space within the Formation was odd.

His external incarnation’s Spiritual Thought swept over the area, detecting no abnormalities.

But the absence of any peculiarities was the greatest oddity; given that he intentionally used Spiritual Thought to search the area, this section of the wall being within the Formation should have elicited some reaction from the Formation’s energy.

The incarnation tapped lightly on the solid stone wall with his hand.

He then methodically inspected the surroundings of the stone wall with his Spiritual Thought, refusing to believe there were truly no traces left.

Having guessed the purpose of this section of the wall, he purposely searched it and, sure enough, soon discovered a stone on the ground that looked rather peculiar.

The stone bore faint wear marks, easy to overlook if not paying close attention.

He attempted to rotate the stone in the direction of the wear marks, finding it moved easily, and after a full rotation, the stone wall suddenly receded, revealing a hole.

“What ingenious thinking!” exclaimed Li Shiming.

It was a secret passage made from a type of stone that blocked Spiritual Thought and did not employ Cultivation Techniques, instead relying on mortal Mechanical Techniques.

If the Wei family’s defensive Formation were ever breached, their cultivators could escape through this passage.

Moreover, anyone entering and taking control of the residence after the Formation’s ceasing, without taking over the Formation control core, would fail to detect this special spot.

After all, even if the control core were overtaken, without repairing the Formation it couldn’t be reactivated.

By the time it took to do so, the Wei family’s cultivators would have long since fled far away.

The avatar followed the secret passage for a distance and discovered that the exit of the secret passage was at the bottom of a river outside the valley.

Li Shiming couldn’t help but feel relieved; he now had a retreat route, and there was no need to worry about the troubles after the formation might be broken.

In the valley, two Foundation Establishment Cultivators from the Tie Clan and more than thirty Qi Refining Cultivators had been attacking for a long time, but there wasn’t the slightest sign of the formation breaking.

Tie Laoda’s expression was as dark as water, not only had they failed to take down the Wei family’s residence, they had also lost Tie Laosan.

He felt reluctant to leave just like this, but what could he do if he didn’t leave? Just keep standing guard here?

“Go contact the Hu family, and tell them that my Tie Clan is willing to offer half of the shares to invite them to break the formation together!” Tie Laoda quickly thought of a plan and ordered a Qi Refining Cultivator of his clan in a deep voice.

The Qi Refining Cultivator of his clan bowed respectfully and went to carry out the order, while the rest of the Cultivators stopped attacking and retreated to the side to rest.

Li Shiming left his avatar in the main hall of the cave residence and his original body went to the entrance of the residence.

He took out the Shu Mountain Seal, and then, separated by the defensive layer of the formation, he activated the Shu Mountain Seal and sent it flying out.

The advantage of the formation was that the outside couldn’t observe the inside; attacks and Spiritual Thoughts were unable to penetrate the formation unless it could be broken.

Originally, the Wei family’s Cultivators also couldn’t attack the outside from within the formation, due to their lack of knowledge on formations.

Li Shiming didn’t have this trouble; he activated the Shu Mountain Seal, which had been replenished with Spiritual Power since its last use.

He still didn’t choose to attack the Foundation Establishment Cultivators, as that would have been useless. Instead, he targeted the group of Qi Refining Cultivators who were sitting together.

Suddenly appearing, the Shu Mountain Seal transformed into a mountain and heavily smashed down towards the group of Qi Refining Cultivators who were resting.

The resting group of Qi Refining Cultivators hadn’t anticipated being attacked at all, as there were two Foundation Establishment Cultivators from their clan not far away; they were almost in a completely relaxed state.

As the Shu Mountain Seal transformed into a mountain, a binding force restrained the Qi Refining Cultivators within its range.

With a “boom,” twelve Qi Refining Cultivators from the Tie Clan were crushed by the mountain, turning into meat patties.

The Shu Mountain Seal that smashed down quickly shrank and turned into a beam of spiritual light that flew back into the formation.

Everything happened so quickly. The longest preparatory period for the Shu Mountain Seal took place inside the formation, and the actual attack and the Seal’s return took less than a moment.

By the time Tie Laoda and Tie Laoer thought to rescue their junior clansmen, they were already a step too late.

“Quick, move back further!” Tie Laoda shouted angrily.

The loss of the twelve Qi Refining Cultivators from the Tie Clan cut him like a knife.

Although Cultivation Families searched for children with spirit root seeds not only from their own lineage but also from everywhere to bring back and raise in the clan, to truly raise them into Qi Refining Cultivators with substantial combat power in the mid to late stages requires a tremendous amount of resources and effort.

This strike reduced the Tie Clan’s upcoming talents by a third.

He stared hatefully towards the formation, unable to see who the attacking Cultivator was, but his hatred for the Wei family reached its peak.

Li Shiming smiled as he put away the Shu Mountain Seal; indeed, the Shu Mountain Seal was very useful, giving its best performance both times he used it.

Regrettably, recharging the Shu Mountain Seal was quite troublesome; an uncharged Seal would be much weaker.

Needless to say, among those killed by his attack were four late-stage Qi Refining Cultivators; he had chosen the spot where the largest number of late-stage Qi Refining Cultivators were gathered.

He didn’t use Sword Intent, nor did he use any unconventional methods; it was purely the Spiritual Power of a Qi Refining Ninth Level combined with the power of the Shu Mountain Seal.

If he had used other super-grade Magical Artifacts, he would have been able to kill at most one or two late-stage Qi Refining Cultivators instantly, which would have been an excellent feat.

“Another group of Cultivators is coming!” His soul-sharing clone, who was monitoring from the top of the mountain, sent a warning, and he saw a group of Cultivators flying towards them through the clone’s vision.

Li Shiming paid close attention for a while and didn’t find anyone with strength exceeding that of a Mid-stage Foundation Establishment Cultivator, let alone the Golden Core Cultivator he was most worried about.