Chapter 5: Refining the Golden Body through Fire

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  Found out that someone was secretly watching him, Kong Fang knew without thinking that it was Zhao Yong's people. After all, now only Zhao Yong had a grudge against him and threatened to get rid of him.

  "You're staring at me so quickly, it seems like you're worried I'll sneak away ahead of time. Hmph, I won't run, and if I do, who will come to settle accounts with you?" A cold color spread across Kong Fang's face.

  Kong Fang looked at the short sword in his hand and decided it was better not to let Zhao Yong and others know for now, so he immediately turned around and went back into the house. He found a piece of torn cloth and wrapped the short sword tightly before going out again, heading straight to Huoyun Hall.

  After Kong Fang left, Qian Ziguo walked out from behind a small mound of earth.

  "You look quite like one, and you really think you're a spiritual artifact refiner. Hmph, I'd like to see how long you can keep up the act." Qian Ziguo sneered and secretly followed him from behind.

  Half an hour later, Kong Fang arrived at Huoyun Hall on another mountain peak.

  Huoyun Hall was built in the belly of a mountain, and most areas inside were made up of independent refining rooms constructed from Cold Netherstone. These refining rooms all had earth fire drawn up from underground to supply the cultivators with fire for their refinement. Apart from these refining rooms, everywhere else belonged to Huoyun Hall, and ordinary disciples were not allowed to enter.

  Kong Fangdian walked straight into the refining equipment area, walking forward along the cold and dark stone floor while observing the refining rooms on both sides of the passageway.

  It's almost time for the biennial assessment, so many people have come to Huoyun Hall to forge weapons and armor. As a result, Kong Fang found that every refining room was occupied along the way.

  But that's normal, those who are more confident in their equipment-refining abilities generally start refining weapons or armor early on. Nowadays, people who only start refining equipment at this point mostly don't have much confidence, just like Kong Fang, they won't easily come to Huoyun Hall to refine equipment until the last moment. After all, the equipment-refining materials in hand are limited, once failed, the assessment will not be passed.

  "Beginner disciples can only use the lowest-level yellow-grade furnace, it's strange to be able to refine good weapons." Kong Fang muttered in dismay, "Although I have no control over the flames, the quenching liquid in the mysterious grade furnace is much better than the quenching liquid in the yellow grade furnace. If I could go to the mysterious grade furnace, I should have a better grasp of passing this assessment."

  Quenching liquid is a device that is configured by the sect, and the levels of quenching liquid in the four-level refining room of 'Tian Di Xuan Huang' are different. The yellow level is the worst refining room, and the quenching liquid is naturally the worst.

  "This younger brother of mine, what you just said is not right." The sudden voice from behind interrupted Kong Fang's thoughts.

  Kong Fang was shocked in his heart, his spirit had just formed and his senses had become much stronger. However, someone had almost reached his back without him even noticing.

  Kong Fang immediately stopped in his tracks and turned around to look back.

  Two young men, eighteen or nineteen years old, walked towards Kong Fang. Both of their appearances were extremely ordinary, and their clothes were very simple. However, the young man walking in front had a particularly special aura about him that made it impossible for people to ignore his presence.

  "I don't know which two masters are..." Kong Fang looked at them with confusion.

  The young man with a special aura on his body hadn't spoken yet, but the young man following behind him had already spoken up, "This is Sun Hao, the senior brother of Huoyun Hall. I am Sun Hao's follower, you can call me Zhang De."

  Although Zhang De spoke extremely politely, Kong Fang found that there was a hint of arrogance in his eyes.

  Although Zhang De was just a follower, he could obtain the cultivation method and soul-refining method from the instrument sect, and thus be able to embark on the path of cultivation. His status was naturally not comparable to that of an ordinary entry-level disciple like Kong Fang. If Sun Hao hadn't suddenly spoken up, Zhang De wouldn't have even bothered to pay attention to a mere entry-level disciple like Kong Fang.

  "Could this really be the Sun Hao who refined that low-grade spiritual treasure?" Kong Fang's heart skipped a beat as he carefully sized up Sun Hao.

  Kong Fang didn't say a word, just staring at Sun Hao, which made Zhang De somewhat dissatisfied in his heart. "A novice disciple with no status sees an inner disciple and doesn't pay respects, but instead keeps staring, really not understanding any rules." Zhang De couldn't help but hum heavily.

  Kong Fang only reacted after hearing Zhang De's humming, but he didn't behave as Zhang De had expected and instead changed the subject, saying: "Brother Sun Hao said I was wrong earlier, I'm stupid, please enlighten me, Brother Sun."

  Kong Fang came from Earth, and his ideas were still somewhat different from those of the people in this world. If it was another entry-level disciple who saw this inner disciple who could refine spiritual treasures, even if they didn't immediately fawn over him, they would still appear extremely respectful.

  Sun Hao didn't mind Kong Fang's rudeness, and instead smiled to explain: "Although the quenching agent in the Xuan-level refining room is better than that in the Huang-level refining room, it's not just about the quenching agent when it comes to refining equipment. Removing impurities, combining various refining materials according to different requirements to form a blank, and finally awakening, these three steps are also extremely important for refining equipment. Relying solely on quenching is not enough to refine spiritual treasures."

  Zhang De sneered inwardly, extremely disdainful. "Even among the inner disciples, not many can refine spiritual treasures, let alone this tattered and poorly trained outer disciple. I'm worried he won't even understand what I'm saying about spiritual treasures." Zhang De thought with malice in his heart.

  "Quenching agent is a bit better, it can improve the quality of the weapon somewhat, right?" Kong Fang asked in surprise.

  Sun Hao chuckled and shook his head, "What you said is both right and wrong. If the removal of impurities and the creation of the furnace body are not done well, the quenching agent cannot bring out all the properties of the various materials in the weapon. At this time, ordinary quenching agents may only be able to bring out a small part of the material's properties, while high-grade quenching agents can bring out slightly more properties. But you must understand, brother, that the properties of the various materials in a spiritual treasure should complement each other and be in a state of balance."

  "If it can't achieve this balance, then the weapon is actually already ruined. Ordinary quenching agents have a smaller effect on the material's properties, so they also cause less damage to this balance. In this case, high-level quenching agents are actually not as good as low-level ones, do you understand, young brother?" Sun Hao asked with a smile.

  Kong Fang's heart suddenly cleared up, "Thank you, brother, for pointing that out." Kong Fang's heartfelt thanks.

  Although Sun Hao said little to him, his help was great.

  Sun Hao smiled and didn't say anything else, leading Zhang De to continue walking forward. More than 20 meters away, the refining room was empty, Sun Hao led Zhang De to choose a refining room and walked in.

  Kong Fang pondered over Sun Hao's words as he walked into a refining room next to Sun Hao.

  "It's no wonder that he can refine spiritual treasures. This principle seems simple, but if no one teaches it, ordinary people really can't figure it out." Sun Haokong couldn't help but express his admiration for Kong Fang.

  In the Alchemy Room where Sun Hao was located,

  Zhang De stood at the door and saw Kong Fang enter a nearby refining room. Only then did Zhang De close the heavy, cold, and dark stone gate.

  "Senior brother, you're too kind-hearted. He's just an ordinary novice disciple, yet you spend your precious time guiding him." Zhang De said with a smirk.

  Sun Hao glanced at Zhang De and smiled, shaking his head. "My time isn't as precious as you said, let alone just saying a couple of words, how much time would that take?"

  Zhang De was dissatisfied in his heart, but he didn't dare to say it directly. Zhang De hoped that Sun Hao would use all his free time to guide him in refining equipment, rather than spending time on an entry-level disciple with no future prospects.

  "Alright, let's not talk about anything else. I'll just give you some pointers on how to refine your equipment." Sun Hao said with a faint smile.

  ……

  Next to the refining room, Kong Fangguan quickly came to the stone pond filled with quenching liquid after closing the cold and mysterious stone gate behind him. He untied the broken cloth on his short sword, and with an excited mood, he stabbed the short sword into the stone pond.

  Kong Fang then waited aside. The quenching liquid needed some time to activate the properties of various materials in the short sword.

  "After quenching and tempering, I suppose the quality of this short sword will be improved somewhat." Kong Fang had some expectations in his heart; after all, this was his first time refining a weapon.

  After a while, Kong Fang took out the short sword from the quenching liquid.

  Kong Fang's eyes were filled with anticipation as he carefully observed the short sword in his hand. Suddenly, Kong Fang's face changed drastically.

  "How can there be no change at all? It shouldn't be like this. Even if the grade hasn't improved much, there should be some slight improvement." Looking at the short sword in his hand that hadn't changed in the slightest, Kong Fang suddenly felt a bit anxious. He had never been very confident about passing this assessment to begin with, and now the quenching process hadn't had any effect, making his hopes of passing even more remote.

  "It shouldn't be like this." Kong Fang muttered to himself, "Due to my own innate talent, I am unable to control the flames, so in the first two steps of removing impurities and forging the blank, I had to use other methods. As for the effect, I was already uncertain about it in my heart. Now if tempering can't improve the quality of this short sword, then this attempt at crafting will end in failure."

  Kong Fang's anxious mind caused him to speak incoherently, but suddenly a flash of insight struck his brain, leaving him stunned.

  "The problem... may lie in the two steps of removing impurities and creating the furnace mold. Others refine their instruments using earth fire, but I mistakenly used the power of the earth element instead. Perhaps, that's where the problem lies." Kong Fang's eyes narrowed, a glimmer of hope rising in his heart.

  No matter what, try it now, after all, trying is the most likely to fail, but if you don't try, you will definitely fail.

  Kong Fang walked aside and opened the formation. The earth fire suddenly emerged from the ground, with fierce flames surging up and occupying an area of about six or seven meters in size.

  The destructive power of the earth fire is extremely strong, but under the restraint of the formation, it becomes very gentle.

  Kong Fang stretched out his hand and threw it, the short sword drew an arc and fell into the ground fire in front of him. Although Kong Fang couldn't control the flames, the formation had a certain controlling effect on the ground fire, which allowed Kong Fang to use the formation to do some simple things.

  Like the yellow-level refining room, it is generally used by entry disciples. Entry disciples who do not have access to soul-refining techniques naturally cannot embark on the path of cultivation. As a result, all entry disciples, regardless of their high or low innate talent in fire manipulation, are unable to directly control the earth's fire. At most, they can only rely on their innate talent in fire manipulation to guide the earth's fire, and thus have a very limited effect on refining equipment.

  Therefore, the array method set up by Qierong in the yellow-level refining room has some auxiliary effects on refining.

  The short sword was thrown into the earth fire, and Kong Fang used the array method to simply control the earth fire, preparing to redo this step of making the furnace.

  Suddenly, the surging flames stopped abruptly, as if a flame sculpture had solidified in an instant. The sudden change left Kong Fang's heart racing with shock, unsure of what had happened.

  However, the earth fire soon churned up again. But that's not all, the earth fire churned rapidly, with a power several times more terrifying than before. Moreover, these earth fires actually surged towards the short sword, and for a moment, the short sword was like a bottomless pit, quickly devouring many of the earth fires.

  Kong Fang stared at this scene in shock, even forgetting to control his formation.

  At the same time, in the dozen or so refining rooms around Kong Fang, those who were refining equipment suddenly let out a heart-wrenching scream. These people were originally carefully refining weapons, but the earth fire controlled by the formation suddenly became extremely unstable, and its power surged instantly, turning all their refining materials into ashes.

  "The earth fire has an array method to control, how can it suddenly become unstable? I've never heard of such a thing." Next to the alchemy room, Sun Hao looked at the materials that had turned into ashes, his expression full of shock and uncertainty.

  But Zhang De's face turned green in an instant as he watched from the side, these refining materials were all his hard-earned accumulation. At this moment, his heart was bleeding.