Qilin fish

Upon seeing this strange plant, Long Chen nearly cried out; it was undoubtedly one of the main ingredients required to condense the second star—the Yuheng Star—of the Nine Star Hegemon Body Art.

Before Long Chen left the Fengming Empire, he had long inquired at the Alchemist Guild and auction houses, but apart from some auxiliary ingredients, he hadn't seen a single main ingredient.

Although most of the ingredients for refining the Yuheng Pill were Rank 2 Medicinal Materials, those main ingredients were extremely rare; even some of the veteran alchemists at the Alchemist Guild had never heard of many of them.

At the time, it had made Long Chen's heart go cold, so seeing this Immortal Chrysanthemum now, the fact that he didn't cry out in shock was already a testament to his extremely strong composure.

"Nine leaves pointing to the sky, like an Immortal pointing the way—that's right, this is the Immortal Chrysanthemum."

Long Chen confirmed it once more; he definitely hadn't seen it wrong. It was indeed it. Long Chen jumped onto the cliff in a few strides and arrived beside the Immortal Chrysanthemum, when suddenly a warning sign arose in his heart, and he dodged backward.

"Whoosh."

A giant python's massive maw flew past Long Chen's body. If not for Long Chen's quick reaction, he would have already been bitten.

"There is actually a Demonic Beast guarding it?"

Long Chen was startled. Some rare medicinal Materials would have Demonic Beasts guarding them, but he hadn't expected to encounter one after entering the Xuantian Branch.

He took a careful look at the giant python. It appeared as thick as a water bucket, its entire body golden, with scales that looked as if they were forged from gold. After failing its first strike, it was coiling its body, flicking its tongue at Long Chen, ready to attack at any moment.

Behind it was a cave, blocked by some low bushes. From Long Chen's angle, he hadn't been able to see the cave, and he had almost been tricked.

"A Golden Scaled Python, a hegemon-level existence among Rank 2 Demonic Beasts. It's extremely rare; I didn't expect to encounter one here."

Long Chen was slightly shocked in his heart. To encounter a Demonic Beast during the assessment—did that not mean this assessment was not simple, and that failing the assessment could potentially lead to death?

Although everyone here was a Genius, their cultivation was entirely in the Blood Condensation Realm. This Golden Scaled Python had powerful combat strength; those with low combat power would likely lose their lives if they encountered it.

"Whoosh."

Just as Long Chen was pondering, the Golden Scaled Python opened its massive maw and struck at Long Chen like a bolt of lightning. Its mouth opened almost as high as Long Chen was tall, and its four long fangs were covered in translucent liquid, causing one to shudder with fear.

"Alchemy Flame."

Long Chen let out a cold snort and extended his hand. A fireball formed in his palm, and just as the Golden Scaled Python was about to bite him, he threw it directly into its mouth while retreating rapidly.

"Boom."

The fireball exploded inside the Golden Scaled Python's mouth. Flesh and blood splattered, its entire head was blown away, and the remaining half of its body writhed frantically.

Long Chen's expression suddenly changed. He stepped forward and kicked the Golden Scaled Python's corpse away. Seeing the undamaged Immortal Chrysanthemum below, he couldn't help but heave a sigh of relief; it had almost been crushed by the python's body.

The Immortal Chrysanthemum had to maintain its overall integrity; if any part was damaged, its medicinal efficacy would be greatly reduced.

In truth, the Golden Scaled Python's combat strength was very formidable, especially its scales, which possessed extremely powerful defensive capabilities that were difficult for blades and swords to injure.

Ordinary Tendon Tempering Realm experts would find it very difficult to break through its defense. Furthermore, it could spit out poisonous mist; once enveloped by the poisonous mist, even if one held their breath, they would still be poisoned. It was extremely difficult to deal with.

However, it was unlucky to have met Long Chen. Its strong defense was on the exterior, but Long Chen had thrown a fireball into its mouth; even if it had ten lives, it wouldn't be enough to survive that.

He carefully brushed away the soil and dug out the Immortal Chrysanthemum with extreme caution, leaving some soil on the roots.

He gently placed it into a jade bottle over a foot tall and put it into his spatial ring. He took one last look at the Golden Scaled Python's corpse, but ultimately decided to abandon it.

The strength of the Golden Scaled Python lay in its body, not its toxicity, so its poison was not as potent as that of a Desert Giant Scorpion.

And for pythons without potent poison, their gallbladders often didn't have much value, so Long Chen didn't intend to take the corpse.

He walked around the area and, in a patch of grass, saw a large piece of rotting flesh. From within that rotting flesh, Long Chen extracted a palm-sized crystal.

That was the Golden Scaled Python's beast core. This beast core gathered all the essence of the Golden Scaled Python and was extremely precious.

Whether for medicinal use, Alchemy, or forging weapons, it could be used. Especially for forging weapons, one could use unique techniques to embed the beast core into a weapon, thereby greatly increasing the weapon's power. Such weapons were known as Spiritual Artifacts.

Spiritual Artifacts required a powerful weapon smith to use the power of runes to activate the Demonic Beast's beast core in order to increase the weapon's power.

However, such weapons were rare and few. In any case, up until now, Long Chen had never seen such a weapon.

This beast core was of too low a Rank to be used for forging weapons, but it should be worth some money. After putting away the Demonic Beast's beast core, Long Chen continued on his way, this time following a small stream between two mountains.

Long Chen knew that such places with abundant water vapor were most likely to produce rare treasures of Heaven and Earth. After discovering the Immortal Chrysanthemum, Long Chen's heart became much more active; he saw hope.

After walking for over ten miles along the stream, the stream gradually became wider, and the water flow became increasingly gentle, forming a small river.

"Rumble."

After walking for another hour or so, a loud noise came from ahead. Walking closer to take a look, Long Chen couldn't help but cheer.

A waterfall like a white ribbon hung upon the cliff. The spring water struck the rocks, bursting into billions of water droplets that glittered in the sunlight, like pearls scattered from the clouds—a truly beautiful sight.

Below the waterfall was a deep pool, about ten miles in circumference. The surface of the water was clear, and one could clearly see the scene underwater within ten zhang.

The waterfall was like a ribbon, the pool water like a mirror, reflecting the surrounding green mountains, making one feel intoxicated. It took a while for Long Chen to collect his thoughts.

"Eh, are there fish underwater?"

Long Chen suddenly discovered shadows moving deep underwater, as if a school of fish were swimming by, but he couldn't clearly see what kind of fish they were.

Suddenly, the water surface moved slightly, creating a ripple. A fish swam secretly to the surface and swallowed a small fruit floating on the water.

"Qi Ling Fish?"

Long Chen saw clearly this time; it was a palm-sized fish, its whole body covered in four-colored scales. After swallowing the small fruit, it quickly dived into the depths.

The Qi Ling Fish was not a Demonic Beast, but a delicacy of the human world. It tasted delicious; it was said that when eating it, one had to tie their tongue with a string to avoid accidentally swallowing their own tongue.

Although this was an exaggerated, joking saying, the deliciousness of the Qi Ling Fish had become a legendary existence, hailed as food for Immortals.

What Long Chen valued was not its deliciousness, but its value. Below the gills of the Qi Ling Fish, there was a piece of soft flesh, and hidden there was a spherical object like a small stone.

Almost everyone thought that the sphere was some kind of calcified stone and threw it away as waste.

However, Long Chen had the memories of the Pill Emperor in his mind, and he knew that it was the essence of the Qi Ling Fish, a treasure for nourishing the Divine Soul.

Whether a person's Soul was powerful was often innate. Things that could nourish the Divine Soul Acquired later in life were extremely rare, and most were unknown to anyone.

Just like the Night Demon skull Long Chen had auctioned at the Huayun Pavilion, inside the Night Demon skull, besides the beast core, there was also the Night Demon essence.

Long Chen had used the Night Demon essence as the main ingredient to refine a Soul Nourishing Pill, which he later entrusted to Lu Fang'er to give to Meng Qi.

What he did not know was that after Meng Qi consumed the Soul Nourishing Pill, her Soul power underwent a tremendous change—a change that was earth-shattering.

Meng Qi's Soul power was already special, in a strange state, and Long Chen's Soul Nourishing Pill was like a fuse that ignited Meng Qi's Soul energy, shaking the entire Feng Hun Pavilion.

However, Meng Qi and Lu Fang'er both kept tight-lipped about this matter, stubbornly insisting that they didn't know what had happened, fearing that this matter would implicate Long Chen.

Long Chen did not know of these things. Looking at the shadows in the water, his heart couldn't help but be filled with wild joy.

The Qi Ling Fish was different from the Night Demon skull. The Night Demon belonged to lewd and evil things, with a violent and fierce nature. The Soul Nourishing Pill refined from Night Demon essence required removing most of the negative energy, preserving only that small portion of essence, which was too wasteful.

But the Qi Ling Fish lived in pure water, itself absorbing Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi, containing no Impurities. The Qi Ling Fish essence could be absorbed directly, and it had no negative effects.

"I'm rich, I'm rich!"

Long Chen couldn't help but feel wild joy in his heart. This Xuantian Branch was truly a good place, with treasures everywhere; this trip was truly worth it.

Looking at the water pool about ten miles in circumference, Long Chen pondered for a moment. He needed to test the depth of the water before deciding how to catch the fish.

He took out a strand of black silkworm silk, tied it to a stone, and threw it into the pool; the stone slowly sank.

"No way, how could it be this deep?"

The over one hundred zhang of black silkworm silk in Long Chen's hand was clearly reaching its end, but it still hadn't touched the bottom.

"With water this deep, even if I made a fishing net, it would be very difficult to catch the fish. Moreover, the Qi Ling Fish is famously fast at swimming in water; it's simply not feasible."

"Fishing would be a good choice, but the efficiency of fishing is too low. I can't stay here forever; it's more practical to make a few fish traps."

Long Chen thought about it and decided to make a fish trap cage. Making a fish trap cage was very simple; one only needed some vines, and the Materials were readily available.

Long Chen had made this thing when he was young and was very familiar with it. He tied some straight sticks into a long barrel shape, and made both ends into inverted funnels.

This way, the outer opening was large and the inner opening was small. Once the fish entered the inside of the cage, it would be very difficult to find the original entrance, and they would be trapped inside the cage just like that.

In less than half an hour, Long Chen had finished making two fish trap cages. After thinking for a moment, he took out the Pill Furnace from his spatial ring and lit a fire to start Alchemy.

A quarter of an hour later, a batch of pills was easily refined. They were not real Medicinal Pills; without a Pill Formula, Long Chen had combined some fragrant medicinal herbs, flowers, and fruits together to refine a scented Medicinal Pill. It had no efficacy itself and was specifically used as fish bait.

He found two ropes, cut off a length of about thirty-plus zhang, tied them to the cages, placed the bait in the cages, selected two locations, threw the cages into the water, and tied the other ends to trees.

After setting up the two cages, Long Chen found a clean rock to rest. Now he just needed to wait and see if his bait would be to the liking of these Qi Ling Fish.

Half an hour later, Long Chen gently pulled on one of the ropes and slowly lifted the cage up. Just as the cage was about to emerge from the water, a rustling sound came from inside the cage.

"Haha, there's fish!"

Long Chen lifted the cage out of the water; inside were three palm-sized colorful little fish—they were exactly the Qi Ling Fish.

"Hand over the Qi Ling Fish!"

Just as Long Chen was lifting the cage out of the water and was full of joy, a voice suddenly came, also filled with surprise.