“Ye Feng, do not scare me.”
Zhu Lan’s voice carried a hint of a sob again.
Hearing the faint sound of sobbing from the person in his arms, Ye Feng ultimately could not bring himself to be cruel and released her.
“Fine. Go back. You are not allowed to soak here at night anymore. It is too dangerous.”
Zhu Lan scrambled ashore and dressed herself quickly.
Without even daring to look at Ye Feng, she hurried back to her cultivation room and locked the door.
She leaned against the door and slid down weakly.
Even though a single door was practically nonexistent to someone like Ye Feng, its presence still provided a small sense of inner security.
Zhu Lan patted her head, trying to force her brain to think clearly.
‘Ye Feng is getting bolder and bolder. I can’t handle this.’
‘I must get the male and female leads together as soon as possible so I can escape.’
From that night onward, Zhu Lan’s dedication to her cultivation surprised even Ye Feng.
Every day, she did nothing but eat and cultivate.
She stopped sleeping entirely, using all that time for her practice.
After training with Ye Feng in the evenings, she proactively soaked in the Ancestor Dragon’s Blood.
Even when Ye Feng got carried away, Zhu Lan remained silent.
Once he left, she would immediately resume her cultivation.
After a few days, her hard work left even Ye Feng feeling stunned.
Finally, the day of her Foundation Establishment arrived.
Ye Feng arrived early, and Bai Xue also came to act as a protector.
The Foundation Establishment went smoothly.
There was no world-shaking commotion; instead, it happened as naturally as water flowing into a channel.
“Congratulations, Junior Sister.”
A smile hung on Bai Xue’s face as she felt genuinely happy for Zhu Lan.
“Thank you, Senior Sister,” Zhu Lan replied sweetly.
Feeling the spiritual energy rushing through her body like a river, Zhu Lan felt a sense of fulfillment she had never experienced before.
“Congratulations, Junior Sister,” Ye Feng said coldly.
“Thank… thank you, Senior Brother.”
Zhu Lan was somewhat speechless.
She did not know what was wrong with Ye Feng today.
He put on a cold and lofty act whenever others were around, but when they were alone, he acted like a shameless flirt, taking liberties with her whenever the thought struck him.
“Junior Sister, Master is unable to get away because of some business. She wants you to consolidate your cultivation after your breakthrough and then go to the Great Hall to find her.”
“Mm-hmm!”
Consolidating one’s cultivation was a very important task.
This was especially true for cultivators whose foundations were not solid enough, as they could easily attract evil energy or sprout heart demons.
Once she reached the Great Hall, Fairy Xue Li gave Zhu Lan a storage ring.
Zhu Lan was curious, but she knew it was not the time to open it.
She bowed sincerely and said, “Thank you, Master!”
“Yes. Cultivators say that one only truly enters the path of immortality after reaching the Foundation Establishment realm. Your future path is still very long. A cultivator must remain calm to accumulate strength for later growth. On this long road, the geniuses you meet will be as numerous as carp in a river. You do not need to feel anxious because of others’ progress. I have seen too many geniuses fall, and among those who eventually achieve the Dao, there is no shortage of late bloomers.”
“Your disciple will keep your teachings in mind, Master.”
Zhu Lan felt a little moved.
Although Fairy Xue Li was too busy with affairs to look after her disciples personally, she never missed these important moments.
“Go now. If you have any confusion regarding your cultivation, you may ask your senior brother or sister, or you may ask me.”
“Yes!”
…
On the way back to her cultivation room, Zhu Lan could not suppress her curiosity and checked the storage ring.
The sight nearly gave her a heart attack!
Inside were rows upon rows of top-grade spirit stones!
They were piled up like a small mountain.
Zhu Lan was almost blinded by the shimmer.
“Senior Sister, inside this…”
Bai Xue laughed, seemingly having expected this.
“Junior Sister, do not be surprised. Our Master is actually very wealthy.”
Zhu Lan was so shocked her mouth hung open.
“This… this is way too much. Senior Sister, why does Master have so many top-grade spirit stones?”
Bai Xue said with a beaming smile, “Junior Sister, you are new and do not understand. Do you know about Pozhen Peak next door?”
Zhu Lan nodded.
“Of course.”
Come to think of it, she had not seen Senior Sister Qing Yi in a long time.
She had been so annoyed by the male lead that she had not even been in the mood to read her stories.
“The Peak Master of Pozhen Peak is interested in our Master.”
Bai Xue dropped a massive piece of gossip.
Zhu Lan’s interest was instantly piqued.
“Senior Sister, tell me, tell me!”
Bai Xue explained, “Junior Sister, the disciples of Pozhen Peak are incredibly rare. When other disciples enter secret realms to hunt for treasure, they inevitably encounter formations — whether they are dangerous traps or illusions.”
“They are dangerous and leave people helpless. However, the legacy of formations requires disciples to have extremely high comprehension. One can only become a qualified formation master if their perception of formations is much stronger than that of an average person. It is rare for someone to meet even one of those conditions; meeting both makes them as rare as phoenix feathers or unicorn horns.”
Zhu Lan roughly understood.
“So, to be safe, disciples entering secret realms will pay a high price to hire a formation master to accompany them?”
Bai Xue shook her head with a smile.
“You are half right. That situation does happen, but only mediocre formation masters take those kinds of jobs. Skilled formation masters use special materials to create formation plates. The higher the level of the formation master, the more powerful the plates they create. When encountering illusions or killing formations, these plates allow an ordinary person to find the formation eye and destroy it, thereby breaking the array.”
“Junior Sister, guess why formation masters are so wealthy?”
Zhu Lan tried to guess.
“Are the formation plates for one-time use?”
Bai Xue nodded with a smile.
“Exactly. All formation plates are for one-time use. Therefore, if you want to break a formation, you must purchase a plate from a formation master.”
This time, Zhu Lan was genuinely stunned.
She understood now. It was a monopoly.
You could choose whether to buy or not, but if you wanted one, you had to buy it from them at a high price.
For slightly larger sects, they would purchase a massive stockpile of formation plates every time they entered a secret realm to ensure the safety of their disciples.
“The Peak Master of our Pozhen Peak was even poached by us from another sect.”
Zhu Lan was shocked again.
Just how rare were formation masters?
She asked in confusion, “Senior Sister, do the other three major sects not have formation masters?”
Bai Xue explained, “Except for the Wanjian Sect, all the major sects have them. Originally, the Wanjian Sect had one too. However, the disciples of the Wanjian Sect take whatever little money they have and use it all to forge swords, and sword forging is a money-burning bottomless pit.”
“The Wanjian Sect’s formation master originally had a massive amount of orders to process every day, but he couldn’t take it anymore and ran away to join our sect. That formation master is also the number one person in the field of formations in the current cultivation world. Without a formation master, the Wanjian Sect is publicly recognized as being dirt poor, hahahaha!”
Zhu Lan could not hold back her laughter either.
She finally understood why the male lead in the original novel, who was in the Wanjian Sect, chose to attack the Tianyan Sect first.
The formation master had been poached, and the sword forging could not stop, so the entire sect had become a bunch of paupers.