Using entries to cultivate immortality in chaotic times

The auction hammer in his hand tapped the square table on the stage like a gavel, and soon five women in cheongsam with veils covering their faces filed out from behind the stage, each holding a mahogany tray.

Covered with a layer of red cloth on top.

The elder walked up to the first woman, whipped off the red cloth, and with a casual wave of his right hand, spiritual energy in the air strikingly formed several lines of large characters.

"The first auction item."

"Spiritual Treasure, Mid-grade Foundation Establishment Stage Alchemy Furnace \'Eight Trigrams Pill Furnace,\' using this furnace to refine pills will result in a higher success rate."

"Starting bid 20 Spirit Stones, each increase must be no less than 10 Spirit Stones."

Just the casual display of skill had already proven his strength. Such control of spiritual energy, practiced to this fine degree, must be at least at the seventh level of the Foundation Establishment Stage.

Barely short of the existence at the Great Perfection of Foundation Establishment.

As long as one had sufficient lifespan, it was almost a certainty to break through to the Great Realm and become a Golden Core Great Power.

A Mid-grade Foundation Establishment Stage Alchemy Furnace, according to Jianghu slang, is actually a Yellow Level Mid-grade Spiritual Treasure. A Yellow Level Mid-grade Spiritual Treasure isn\'t worth much, worth only about 50 Spirit Stones, and doesn\'t even qualify for the auction.

But this Spiritual Treasure is an Alchemy Furnace, so its price is a different story.

An Alchemy Furnace of this sort of Spiritual Treasure is extremely difficult to craft and its price is several times higher than that of another Spiritual Treasure of the same level.

Very quickly—

many people started to call out their bids.

"50 Spirit Stones!"

"60 Spirit Stones!"

"100 Spirit Stones!"

In the end, a middle-aged man in the hall stood up, held up his number board and called out a high bid of 200 Spirit Stones, securing this first auction item. This price was about right; after all, an Alchemist is a money tree, and the Alchemy Furnace is the Alchemist\'s bread and butter, so naturally, the price wouldn\'t be low.

However, not a single person in the private rooms made a bid. Those who could sit in the private rooms generally had their own backing, and training an Alchemist was something they were already doing. Thus, a Mid-grade Foundation Establishment Alchemy Furnace was a bit beneath their notice.

They weren\'t here for these initial auction items. The real highlights were yet to come.

...

Chen Qiu, too, gazed somewhat listlessly down at the auction stage, showing little interest in the several items that had come up, whether they were for alchemy or talisman making, as he had no thoughts about either of these two arts.

Until—

When the fifth auction item was unveiled, Chen Qiu sat up straight, finally finding something he wanted.

"The fifth auction item."

"Entry Jade Slip, green entry \'Self-Extinguishing Root,\' sacrifice one organ to receive a random white or green entry. The more sacrificed, the more entries received."

"Starting bid 50 Spirit Stones, each bid must increase by 10 Spirit Stones."

"500 Spirit Stones!"

Chen Qiu picked up the Sound Transmission Talisman from the table next to him, channeled spiritual energy into it, and whispered his bid, and as his voice reached the expanse of the hall, it was automatically disguised to sound like an old man.

This entry had the same meaning to him as a full-strength strike from someone at the first level of the Golden Core Stage; 500 Spirit Stones was absolutely appropriate.

The power of a talisman equivalent to a full-strength strike of a ninth level Foundation Establishment Stage Cultivator was 300 Spirit Stones. As for the price of one equivalent to a full-strength strike of someone at the first level of the Golden Core Stage, he wasn\'t sure, but it was definitely not less than 1000 Spirit Stones.

After all, the gap between the Golden Core Stage and the ninth level of the Foundation Establishment Stage was too vast; they were not on the same level.

...

The elder looked up at the second floor, and after seeing the flash of red light from the jade embedded outside the Heavenly Number 7 private room, picked up the auction hammer and lightly tapped it on the square table, "Heavenly Number 7 bids 500 Spirit Stones."

He then swept his gaze over the audience, and seeing no one raise their number board, he continued.

"500 Spirit Stones for the first time!"

...

The crowd in the hall also discussed with odd expressions on their faces. It wasn\'t surprising that someone would spend 500 Spirit Stones on a green entry as entry jade slips were extremely rare in the market. Any that made it to the market, if not utterly worthless, could easily sell for over two thousand Spirit Stones.

But...

Would someone qualified to sit in the Heavenly Number 7 private room use this entry?

Or was it intended for use by someone below them? In that case, it would make sense.

...

In the crowd of the hall, a young man was looking at the middle-aged man beside him with an urgent expression and anxiously said, "Master, what are you hesitating for? Bid! BID!!!"

"I\'m telling you, this entry is absolutely priceless to you, let alone 500 spirit stones, even if it\'s 2000 spirit stones, you must buy it!"

After pondering for a moment, the middle-aged man still didn\'t raise his bidding placard. Meanwhile, the auctioneer had already started the first call for 500 spirit stones, and the middle-aged man looked worriedly at the young man beside him.

"Venerable Liu, it\'s not that I don\'t trust you, but you know my Initial Entry is \'Nine Ox Power.\'"

"Indeed, this entry could grant me eight random entries, but they would only be random white or green entries at best. Whether their effects are beneficial to me is still unknown, and even if they are, it\'s very difficult for me to break through to the Golden Core Stage. If I can\'t make the breakthrough, earning back so many spirit stones will be difficult."

His name was Wang Tiedan, fifty-six years of skeletal age, a third-layer Foundation Establishment stage cultivator. He started from scratch and formed his own small family, a small Foundation Establishment family in a place hundreds of miles away from Fufeng City. Although they didn\'t have many big businesses, they managed to earn a profit of more than two hundred spirit stones each year.

Life was also considered comfortable.

Until a year ago, when he met this young man who was said to have fled from a village ransacked by mountain bandits. Out of kindness, he took him in and gradually discovered that this man named Liu Zide had a very clever mind.

He often spoke of new ideas which Wang had never heard of before.

Terms like market operations, industry barriers, omnichannels, endorsement harvesting, and the like.

He gave Wang quite a few suggestions, and with the young man\'s help, his business grew steadily larger. Winter was approaching this year, and it was estimated that the net profit would amount to 500 spirit stones—an amount equating to double the annual earnings.

He officially employed the young man as a family retainer, serving as a strategist, and providing counsel and strategies on a daily basis.

He had hardly ever been wrong.

This time, after Venerable Liu saw the list of auction items for the annual Wentiang Fang Market auction, he insisted that Wang bring all the spirit stones that the family could mobilize. They traveled for five days just to reach Wentiang Fang Market in time for the auction, all for the sake of the green entry \'Self-Extinguishing Root.\'

"Master, you\'re being foolish!!!"

Seeing the second call at 500 spirit stones was about to end, the young man urged with an anxious tone, "Master, can\'t you change your way of thinking? Who told you that buying this entry was just to enhance your strength?"

"Let me ask you, if someone stood in the Wentiang Fang Market now saying they possessed both \'Nine Ox Power\' and \'Self-Extinguishing Root\' and were about to perform a live carv, with everyone watching what random entries they might get, do you think people would want to see that?"

"Of course, they\'d want to see it!"

"That\'s human nature! What\'s at the deepest part of human nature? It\'s the gambling urge. Rationality restrains most people as much as possible, but watching others gamble also provides a thrilling sense of excitement."

"Wouldn\'t it be fair to charge 1 spirit stone for a ticket to see such an exciting show?"

"We\'re just setting up such a spectacle. Now, with the annual Wentiang Fang Market auction and the Heavenly Dao Secret Realm in Fufeng City, there will surely be a large number of cultivators gathering in Fufeng City in the coming days. The timing and conditions are perfect. For those sect family descendants, paying 1 spirit stone for such a rare spectacle is a bargain!"

"1 spirit stone isn\'t much for them, but they won\'t have another chance to see such a show again."

"As long as we can advertise and attract 3000 spectators, that would be 3000 spirit stones. If there are 5000 spectators, that would directly net us 5000 spirit stones!"

"Leave the operation to me; I\'m confident we\'re going to make a killing!"

"We\'re going to start a groundbreaking live broadcast of Bull Cutting in Fufeng City!"

"Those with less money can watch real-time through the \'Mother-child Realm\' from the outside, paying 1 tael of silver, while those slightly wealthier can watch from the rooftops around for a better view, costing them 10 taels of silver. For those sect family descendants, we\'ll arrange the closest seats for real-time viewing, charging 1 spirit stone!"

"In Da Xia Country, there\'s really no entertainment. With the natural inclination to watch lively scenes, the number of people coming will certainly not be small."

"Master, trust me, just win this entry, and I can promise you a brand-new tomorrow!"

"And you don\'t have to worry about losing face, Master. We\'re 800 miles from our main base, and after we make a profit here, we\'ll head home. Once we\'re back at our main base, no one will know about this!"

Perhaps it was the young man\'s excited fervor that touched the middle-aged man, or maybe it was his past achievements that made the middle-aged man quite trusting in him. In the end, just before the third call for 500 spirit stones was concluded,

the middle-aged man stood up, raised his bidding placard, and shouted with a trembling voice, "1000 spirit stones!!!"

"1200."

Chen Qiu in the private room glanced down at the middle-aged man in the hall below and, after a moment of contemplation, raised the bid again. This was his bottom line; any higher would be unjustifiable. Buying an entry for self-destruction at such a price was a poor value for money.

"1500 spirit stones!!!"

Almost immediately after Chen Qiu finished speaking, the middle-aged man raised his bidding placard again, and with almost all his might, roared, "I bid 1500 spirit stones!!!"

This was almost all his family had accumulated over the years, and for him, it was a high-stakes gamble.

He could indeed become rich overnight, as Venerable Liu had said, but he might also lose everything in the blink of an eye.

...

"..."

Sitting in the private room, Chen Qiu shook his head slightly in disbelief; the price was getting absurd. He wasn\'t going to bid any higher. 1500 spirit stones for such a green entry? Had they gone mad?

The person bidding below couldn\'t possibly have the \'Nine Ox Power\' entry as well, could they?

Still, he was quite curious to see which entries this person could acquire with both \'Nine Ox Power\' and \'Self-Extinguishing Root\', although each cultivator\'s entries were private and not easily revealed to others under normal circumstances.