Chapter 34: Cultivating Spells

Unknowingly, night descended upon the city.

Neon lights emerged everywhere in the city, like scattered stars appearing in the night sky. Human industrialization had made the stars in the sky nearly invisible, yet the vast city resembled an inverted starry night—something that had to be said to carry a touch of irony.

Lights, sounds, and crowds surged through the massive metropolis. The early hours of the night seemed even more bustling than the daytime.

Listening to the faint noise coming from outside the window, Su Xiaoyu opened her eyes.

She had consumed the two Spirit Enhancing Pills she exchanged for earlier, but after taking them, the spiritual power provided still didn’t feel sufficient—not enough to help her break through to Qi Refining Third Layer. So she had gone and exchanged for another Spirit Enhancing Pill, which finally allowed her to reach the Qi Refining Third Layer.

When ordinary cultivators trained, having enough spiritual power wasn’t the only requirement. They also needed contemplation and insight to break through each bottleneck.

But for Su Xiaoyu, such bottlenecks seemed practically non-existent.

As long as there was sufficient spiritual power provided, she could make her cultivation progress skyrocket, reaching an astonishing pace.

“Is this what the Qi Refining Third Layer feels like?”

Su Xiaoyu stretched her hands, feeling they had become much stronger.

The Qi Refining stage was a gradual, subtle process that progressively strengthened the body. Now, at the Qi Refining Third Layer, she could easily win an arm-wrestling match against a strong man.

Of course, the improvement at the Qi Refining Third Layer wasn’t limited to just that. After all, the strength of cultivators didn’t depend solely on their physical fitness, but on a variety of spells, as well as Magical Artifacts, elixirs, talismans, and the like.

At the Qi Refining 2nd Layer, Su Xiaoyu could have already begun trying to cultivate spells. Now that she had reached the Qi Refining Third Layer, this was a matter she couldn’t afford to neglect.

“Let me order some takeout first. I’ll just have a rice bowl.”

Su Xiaoyu used her phone to order takeout, then clambered into her wheelchair, pushed herself over to the Diorama Box, and took a look.

Her Faith Value was just over 300 now.

This was also why she hadn’t continued exchanging for Spirit Enhancing Pills to cultivate. She could still manage to exchange for one more pill, but it wouldn’t be of much help to her right now. Better to save the value.

How to acquire Faith Value faster was something she needed to think about.

Inside the Diorama Box, Qixi Festival Sect was exceptionally lively at night. Many disciples were gathered together chatting, their faces brimming with joy. They had also prepared a lot of lavish food to celebrate.

Su Xiaoyu watched for a while before understanding what everyone was celebrating.

Li Yidan had broken through.

Li Yidan, who had been at Qi Refining Tenth Layer, had, not long after returning today, naturally achieved a breakthrough, becoming a Foundation Establishment cultivator.

This was probably what they meant by ‘accumulating deeply before bursting forth.’ She had reached the Qi Refining Tenth Layer long ago, only held back from Foundation Establishment by her limited aptitude. But after winning the previous Sect Grand Competition and consuming quite a bit of Immortal Rice, her aptitude had clearly improved considerably.

Su Xiaoyu knew that now, within Qixi Festival Sect, many people’s Spiritual Root Compatibility had exceeded twenty percent. Even the Sect Master, Tong Shishi, had a Spiritual Root Compatibility surpassing thirty percent!

“Everyone is growing.”

Su Xiaoyu sighed with emotion.

Everyone was improving; she naturally couldn’t afford to fall behind.

She pondered which spell she should cultivate next.

Cultivating spells didn’t require any external items, so she didn’t need to exchange anything from the Diorama Box. She could just start directly.

The spells she knew were all spells the members of Qixi Festival Sect had demonstrated, and there were quite a few wood-attribute ones among them.

For example, the Rattan Spell, which could control surrounding plants for one’s own use—entangling, lashing, all were possible. This was a spell learnable at the Qi Refining Third Layer.

There was also Plant Growth, which could be grasped at the Qi Refining 2nd Layer. It simply allowed control over plants for a certain degree of growth. Spiritual Plant Masters frequently used this spell to help Spirit Plants grow, but it couldn’t be overused, otherwise the Spirit Plants would grow poorly.

Beyond nurturing Spirit Plants, this spell could also be used in combat. In areas with few plants, it could turn a small amount of plant life into a large amount. At that point, there was no need to worry about the consequences of overuse. With a large quantity of plants, one could then use the Rattan Spell to fight enemies—an excellent combination.

Different spells had different personal requirements for the cultivator. There were many spells Su Xiaoyu couldn’t yet grasp at her current cultivation level; she needed to master them step by step.

As for spells of other attributes, even though Su Xiaoyu cultivated the Greenwood Heart Method, she could still learn them. However, because she cultivated the Greenwood Heart Method, the spiritual power in her body had become attuned to the wood attribute. Therefore, cultivating wood-attribute spells would yield twice the result with half the effort, while cultivating spells of other attributes would be noticeably slower.

Of course, this slowness varied from person to person. With sufficient talent, mastering some spells would still be quite easy.

Su Xiaoyu quickly determined a sequence for cultivating the different spells in her mind.

By the time she had made her decision, her takeout finally arrived.

After getting her takeout, Su Xiaoyu solved her dinner problem first, then began cultivating spells.

The first spell to cultivate was, naturally, the wood-attribute Plant Growth.

Sitting in her wheelchair, Su Xiaoyu pushed herself out of the bedroom, passed through the living room, and arrived at the balcony.

On the balcony sat several pots of plants whose names Su Xiaoyu couldn’t recall. She usually didn’t need to care for them; they grew naturally just sitting there, remaining quite lush and green.

“Feel the breath of the plants, understand the plants, and finally, stimulate the plants…”

Su Xiaoyu murmured to herself.

She placed her hand on a long leaf of one plant. Her own spiritual power spread out, following her fingers to the plant, using her spiritual power to analyze the plant’s various conditions, deepening her understanding.

Under the perception of her spiritual power, the plant that had seemed unfamiliar before rapidly became clear in Su Xiaoyu’s mind.

After sensing it for a while, Su Xiaoyu withdrew her hand and began touching the other plants, continuing to deepen her understanding of them.

Based on information revealed during the interactions of Qixi Festival Sect disciples, for a cultivator to master the Plant Growth spell from scratch required at least ten days. This was because one first needed to understand a variety of plants. Although it wasn’t necessary to understand all plants, one had to understand a certain number of them before mastering the spell.

Su Xiaoyu had mentally prepared herself to spend a lot of time mastering this spell. But an hour later, a strange expression crossed her face.

Looking at the numerous plants in the pots, Su Xiaoyu thought for a moment, then pointed a finger toward them.

Immediately afterward, every plant before her eyes showed a tiny visible amount of growth.

Plant Growth. She had already mastered it!