Chapter 44: The Three Great Magic Arts

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  What made Li Wenjun feel that this time he hadn't suffered in vain was that after completing a full cycle of the Heavenly Circuit, the circulating Tour Silk in his meridians had increased by a tiny bit, an extremely weak increment that was almost imperceptible, but it was growth nonetheless, and that was undeniable.

  With this thread of growth, it means that Li Wenjun can make progress in his cultivation even without relying on external objects like dan medicine and crystal stones. Of course, this is just a luxury, and solely relying on the method of circulating the heavenly cycle, there is an external condition that cannot be lacking, which is that the place of cultivation must have abundant spiritual energy. In a place like San Shan County with such poor spiritual energy, Li Wenjun can circulate his heavenly cycle for a lifetime but will never be able to cultivate to the second layer of the Qi Refining stage.

  Li Wenjun persisted in doing two laps of the Heavenly Cycle, and the turbid energy that had been pent up inside him was finally exhausted. The energy dissipated gradually, disappearing without a trace. His spirit relaxed, and he could no longer control his fatigue and drowsiness. He fell onto the bed with a thud, fainting dead away.

  After an unknown period of time, Li Wenjun slowly woke up. The first thing he did was to check his meridians immediately. He operated the Long Spring Skill and spent an hour before completing another cycle of the Heavenly Circulation.

  The vital energy flows very smoothly and gently, just like the water flowing in a small stream without any drop or turbulence, calm and peaceful.

  Li Wenjun opened his eyes, excitedly jumped down from the bed, and bounced up and down, beaming with joy. He could finally call himself a cultivator, and after months of diligent pursuit, he had achieved a pretty good result.

  Before Li Wenjun could enjoy the thrill for long, he suddenly felt a chill run down his spine. He looked down and found himself stark naked. The little bird was also frozen into a ball, like a chick huddled in its nest to avoid the cold.

  Li Wenjun hastily put on his clothes and warmed up. He rushed out of the house, found a wine shop, ordered a table of sumptuous dishes, and treated himself well.

  Li Wenjun left the wine house with a full stomach and returned home. He threw all the leftover food he brought back into the dog's bowl, which still had a lot of meat in it. The big dog also got lucky and ate until its mouth was oily.

  Li Wenjun moved a chair and sat in the middle of the yard. The warm sunshine shone on his body, feeling very comfortable. A full dog ran over, lay at his feet, drooping its ears, accompanying its master to lazily bask in the sun.

  Li Wenjun scratched the big dog's fur, closed his eyes, seemingly cultivating his spirit, but in fact he was thinking about what to do next.

  Cultivation must not be stopped, he is only in the first layer of Qi refining period, among the cultivators, without thinking, it is also the lowest level of existence, he must work hard and persistently cultivate to make progress, to catch up with other cultivators' pace, so as not to be eliminated by them.

  But wanting to persist in cultivation isn't that simple. The spiritual energy of the Three Mountains County is scarce, and cultivating here while also wanting to make progress necessarily requires relying on external objects.

  The so-called external objects, for Li Wenjun, are just the scattered Qi. The medicinal herbs left to refine the Qi are not many, and if he continues to configure the bath soup twice a year like last month, he can only hold on for about ten more days. After ten days, he will be out of food.

  What to do after running out of food? Li Wenjun hasn't figured it out yet. The trading conference only happens once a year, and he can't make large purchases of herbs again. Wufeng Mountain is also closed due to heavy snow, making it unrealistic to enter the mountain to pick herbs. He can only think of another way now.

  Apart from cultivation, Li Wenjun's greatest desire was to cultivate the immortal family techniques recorded in Changchun Gong, which were also known as spells among cultivators.

  The spells on "Changchun Gong" are very few, only three, one is fireball technique, one is unmoving diamond technique, and the other is light body technique.

  Among the three spells, Fireball is an offensive spell. The heaven and earth spiritual energy enters the body, after the cultivator's hard work, it is transformed into magical power, the principle of fireball is to force out the magical power obtained by the cultivator's hard work from the body, then use a special method to ignite it, and throw it at people, thereby achieving the purpose of hurting people.

  The Immovable Diamond Technique is a defensive technique that forms a transparent protective shield around the cultivator's body when activated, blocking attacks from others. Whether it's physical attacks like swords and guns or magical attacks like fireballs, the Immovable Diamond Technique is effective against them all.

  However, the Unmoving Golden Body Technique has a very obvious drawback. Once a cultivator activates this technique, they cannot leave the range of the protective shield that envelops them; otherwise, the protective shield will not move with them.

  As for the Lightweight Technique, it is similar to the Qigong of a high-ranking martial artist, but of course, it is much more brilliant. The Lightweight Technique lasts longer, moves faster, and its movements are even more agile. It can't be compared to ordinary Qigong.

  According to the records of "Xiu Xian Za Lun", there are countless methods for cultivating immortality, and the three techniques of fireball technique are just the most inconspicuous ones. However, for Li Wenjun, this is his means of survival in the future, and he must master it proficiently.

  Li Wenjun decided to first master the three spells to a proficient level, no matter what, he had to thoroughly understand the characteristics of the three spells, otherwise, when facing others, if he wanted to use fireball technique but couldn't, wouldn't that be putting himself in danger?

  Another thing that made Li Wenjun worried was the safety of his parents. Logically, he should have set out to find them immediately after completing his training, but Li Wenjun thought about it and gave up on the idea.

  It's not that he didn't want to find his parents, but rather that his current cultivation level was too low and his methods were not strong enough. If he dove headfirst into the vast sea of people to search for his parents and siblings, not only would his hopes be slim, but he'd also have to pray that he wouldn't encounter other cultivators. With his current abilities, if he were to meet other cultivators, he'd just be a dish on someone else's plate, waiting to be devoured.

  Before, Li Wenjun might not have had such worries, but after encountering other cultivators one after another, he would rather think of things in a bad light than recklessly go find his parents without sufficient means of self-protection.

  After basking in the sun for a while, Li Wenjun gradually formed a plan in his mind. He decided to cultivate and familiarize himself with fireball techniques and other spells, and wait until next spring to decide on further action based on the actual situation.

  In addition, he also figured out that with money, ghosts can push mills. He didn't have to go find it himself, he could hire some people in Sanshan County to replace him to search for it. Not to mention, many people searching together would be much stronger than him going alone, and the efficiency would only be higher.

  Li Wenjun went to find Sun Baicao with this in mind.

  Half a month ago, Sun Baicao set up a Chinese herbal medicine store in the county town and purchased medicinal materials from local medicinal farmers and collectors. For most of the day, Sun Baicao stayed in the store.

  Li Wenjun found Sun Baicao and told him his idea, Sun Baicao nodded repeatedly, he also thought that through the way of reward, asking for help to find Li Wenjun's parents was a good idea.

  Sun Baicao gave Li Wenjun a lot of ideas, for example, when looking for someone, there must be a goal. What are the names of Li Wenjun's parents, brothers and sisters? What are their physical characteristics? All these are things that people need to know. Also, what kind of person to ask to find is also a matter of course. The height of the reward should also be appropriate. If the reward is too high, it will not only be useless but also harmful, and if it's not good, it will lead to greed. If the reward is too low, it may not have the effect of motivation.

  Li Wenjun and Sun Baicao discussed for a long time and finally came up with a plan.

  Sun Baicao asked Sun Jianing to take care of the shop, and he took Li Wenjun to find a painter in the county town. He asked the painter to draw portraits of Li Wenjun's parents, brothers and other relatives according to Li Wenjun's description. Then, he took the portraits to the book pavilion and asked someone to engrave them into woodcuts, printing out several thousand copies of missing person notices.

  After that, Sun Baicao took Li Wenjun to visit more than 100 people in the county who often ran east and west, asking them to post a wanted notice wherever they went.

  Of course, doing these things costs money. Even if someone is willing to help for free, Li Wenjun would not be comfortable without paying a single penny. Moreover, if the other party really doesn't charge a single penny, he worries that they won't genuinely help him with his affairs.

  After all these things were busy, half a month passed again.

  During this time, Li Wenjun used up all the remaining herbs. By the end, although there were still some herbs left, the types of herbs were no longer complete and it was impossible to configure a bath soup.

  Every day, apart from practicing, Sun Bairen took him to busy with the affairs of searching for people and starting things. The rest of the time, Li Wenjun was familiar with fireball techniques and three other spells.

  After this period of exploration, Li Wenjun had a certain understanding of the three spells. He didn't know what situation other cultivators used these three spells in, but personally speaking, there were still many problems.

  First, let's talk about Fireball Technique.

  After this period of hard practice, Li Wenjun was able to proficiently cast fireballs, but before casting a fireball, he needed ten breaths of preparation time. These ten breaths were not only necessary before casting the first fireball, but also between casting the first and second fireballs, he similarly needed the same amount of time to prepare.

  That's not all, there is another point. In the past, Li Wenjun could only use the fireball technique three times, which means that after casting three fireballs, his magic would be difficult to sustain and he would have to re-cultivate and recover his magic. The recovery time is roughly equivalent to cultivating the Long Spring Skill for a day and a night, that is, continuously circulating the twelve cycles of the heavenly cycle without interruption.

  As a result, Li Wenjun was very dissatisfied. If he were to fight with others and wanted to use the fireball technique to defeat his opponents, he would be restricted in many ways, which is easy to imagine.

  Don't mention the Golden Rooster Award again.

  The most obvious feature of Diamond Skill is already mentioned in Changchun Gong. After getting familiar with it, Li Wenjun found two more flaws.

  One is that once he starts using the Immovable Golden Body Technique, he can no longer use the Fireball Technique. He must concentrate his mind and recite incantations to support the protective shield released by the Immovable Golden Body Technique. Another drawback is that even if he uses all his magical powers to support the Immovable Golden Body Technique, in the absence of attacks, he can only last for half a stick of incense time.

  Three incense sticks burn for an hour, half a stick can only last how long? It's really pitifully short.