Xiuxian: I use magnetic fields to prove my truth

Chapter 97 Just One Small Step
When Fang Yuhe and others arrived at the Yongshou Hall of Zichen Palace, Elder Mao Liang of the Chuangong Hall was in charge of receiving Elder Tiejian of the Tianjian Sect.

Thirty years ago, when Elder Tiejian was promoted to the elder of Tianjian Sect, Mao Liang went to congratulate him on his behalf of Qingyun Sect, so this time Mao Liang was responsible for receiving Elder Tiejian.

The two elders were reminiscing about what happened after they parted when Fang Yuhe and others walked into the hall and bowed to the two elders.

Mao Liang pointed at the three disciples who came with Elder Tiejian and said with a smile, "Why don't you hurry up and greet the senior brothers from the Tianjian Sect?"

The Tianjian Sect is a sword-cultivating sect, and most of its disciples are very talented. These three disciples also have some arrogant attitude.

When Fang Yuhe and the others came to meet him, the disciple headed by the Heavenly Sword Sect glanced at him and said, "Are you Zhou Qing?"

Fang Yuhe was startled and shook his head, "I'm not Zhou Qing."

The Tianjian Sect disciple looked at Fang Yu and the other disciples behind him and said, "Who among you is Zhou Qing?"

None of the Qingyun Sect disciples agreed.

The Tianjian Sect disciple asked unhappily, "Where is Zhou Qing? Why isn't he here to greet us? Is he looking down on us?"

Judging from his tone, it was clear that he didn't take them seriously at all. All the disciples of Qingyun Sect were indignant.

Liu Bingxuan said, "We, the little guys, are enough to receive all the senior brothers from the Tianjian Sect. There is no need for Zhou Qing to show up."

The Tianjian Sect disciple's eyes were full of sharpness as he asked, "Are you provoking us?"

Having said that, his hand was already on the sword.

"Liang Feng, stop!"

Elder Tiejian stopped him, then turned to Mao Liang and said, "Don't be offended, Elder Mao Liang. We met a fellow Daoist from the Yinghua Sect on the road. He spoke highly of a disciple of your sect named Zhou Qing. After hearing this, the three of us, useless fellows, all wanted to see Zhou Qing's demeanor."

"So when they saw Zhou Qing wasn't here, they thought your sect was looking down on them and refused to receive them with the same standards as the Yinghua Sect."

Mao Liang laughed and said, "That's not difficult, Yuhe, just go find Zhou Qing."

Fang Yuhe agreed and bowed as he left Yongshou Hall.

……

After parting with Fang Yuhe and the others, Zhou Qing went straight up to Tianji Peak. While thinking, Fang Daoyi's funeral had not yet ended. The concept of time in the world of immortal cultivation was indeed different from that in the mortal world.

When a mortal dies, the funeral is only three to five days long, but in the world of immortal cultivation, it takes a whole year to allow relatives and friends scattered over hundreds of thousands of miles to have the opportunity to come and pay their respects.

Only the lifespan of immortal cultivators can adapt to this time scale.

Although they are of the same race and there is no reproductive isolation, in fact, cultivators and mortals have become different species. Both sides have completely different perceptions of time, even in the most basic aspects.

Arriving at the Zhen Court, Zhou Qing found Cheng Feipeng and made a request.

Cheng Feipeng did not refuse at all and easily handed the last two thousand runes to Zhou Qing.

He just specifically reminded him that the sect had not yet fully researched these runes, so the records in the classics were not the final answers, and there were still many points worth discussing. He asked Zhou Qing to pay more attention when using them.

Zhou Qing thanked him and went straight back to his home. Just as he was about to start experimenting to see if there were any runes that suited his needs, he suddenly heard a knock on the door.

He walked over and opened the door. Seeing that it was Fang Yuhe, he couldn't help but asked in surprise: "Brother Fang, what do you want to talk to me about?"

Fang Yuhe said, "Elder Mao Liang wants you to go to Zichen Palace."

After that, he narrated what happened in Zichen Palace.

Zhou Qing said, "Brother Fang, please tell the elders that I'm busy."

He had heard rumors that Elder Lin would enter the Cave of the Living Dead in two months and would appoint a new elder at that time.

Time was tight, so he had no time to do any trivial work like receiving guests.

Fang Yuhe said in embarrassment: "I'm afraid the elders will blame me."

Zhou Qing said: "Elder, what reason do you have to blame me?"

"The duty of the elders in the Transmission Hall is to pay attention to the disciples' cultivation. Now that the disciples are at a critical juncture in their cultivation, the elders should create conditions for the disciples to cultivate with peace of mind. However, he asked the disciples to receive guests. I am afraid that he is failing in his duty as an elder."

"Besides, how to arrange for disciples to receive guests is Qingyun Sect's own business. Why should fellow Taoists from Tianjian Sect interfere?"

"The elder immediately asked his disciples to go after hearing what others said. He is a bit too weak..."

"Okay, Brother Zhou!"

Fang Yuhe interrupted him hastily, and said with a wry smile, "You'd better say less. Anyway, even if you say it, I wouldn't dare to convey it on your behalf."

Zhou Qing smiled and said, "Brother Fang, you've made a wasted trip."

Fang Yuhe shook his head helplessly and went back to Qingyun Mountain to report.

……

"What, he won't come?"

Mao Liang said with hidden anger.

Fang Yuhe said with a stiff upper lip, "Zhou Qing is currently at a critical juncture in his cultivation and cannot be free. I ask for your understanding, Elder."

"Can't get away?"

Mao Liang sneered, "He was just at Qingyun Mountain. The Formation Court is only a hundred feet away from here. Did he think this elder couldn't hear him?"

"I think he is disrespecting this elder. Yuhe, go there again and make sure he comes over." "Fellow Daoist!"

Old Man Tiejian stopped him and said, "Since he doesn't want to come, why force him? Forget it."

Liang Feng, speaking with the other disciples of the Heavenly Sword Sect below, said disdainfully, "I guess he's afraid of the reputation of our Heavenly Sword Sect and doesn't dare to come. I thought he was some kind of genius, but it turns out he's just a rat with a name but no substance."

Mao Liang listened to his words. He was angry that Liang Feng didn't know the rules and had no respect for his elders. He was also dissatisfied with Zhou Qing for not having a sense of the overall situation.

Liang Feng was from the Heavenly Sword Sect, so he couldn't teach him a lesson directly. He took his anger out on Zhou Qing and said, "Yuhe, go to the Transmission Hall and inform Chen Qingxuan to bring Zhou Qing here personally. I want to see if Zhou Qing is really at a critical juncture in his cultivation and can't get away."

Fang Yuhe didn't dare to say more and had to go find Chen Qingxuan.

After listening to Fang Yuhe's account of what happened, Chen Qingxuan couldn't help but shake his head and said, "Since he said it was a critical moment, why force him to do anything? As cultivators of my generation, cultivation is naturally the most important thing. How can we force others to entertain guests while we are cultivating?"

"Go back and report to the elders, and tell them that I've given Zhou Qing leave, and that you don't need to look for him for this kind of thing in the future."

Fang Yuhe had no choice but to go back and report.

At noon, Chen Qingxuan was experimenting with the method of silent meditation and clearing the mind taught by the headmaster indoors. Suddenly, a figure flashed at the door and Elder Mao Liang rushed in.

Seeing the elder's face turn pale, Chen Qingxuan guessed it was still because of Zhou Qing's incident. He pretended not to know and asked, "Why are you here, elder?"

Mao Liang said, "Chen Qingxuan, stop pretending. Do you think you can be promoted to elder and therefore don't take me, an elder, seriously?"

Chen Qingxuan frowned and said, "Elder, you are too kind. I am just following the rules."

Mao Liang asked, "Are you the only one in the world who is right, and no one else is right?"

"In this social gathering between our two factions, the other party simply wanted to meet our disciples, yet you refused, citing your personal cultivation as an excuse. You prioritize personal matters over official ones. Is this how you think?"

Chen Qingxuan said calmly, "As a disciple of the Immortal Sect, my personal cultivation is the most important public matter of the sect."

Mao Liang looked at him coldly for a while and said, "Only outsiders like you would consider personal cultivation as important as sect affairs. You are like useless youngsters. The important responsibilities of the sect can never be entrusted to you."

"Chen Qingxuan, you can give up on this idea. The responsibility of being an elder will never be yours."

After saying that, he turned around and left Chen Qingxuan's residence.

……

Zhou Qing once again devoted himself to intensive research work.

His daily work has been adjusted again.

During the afternoon meditation time, he would spend half a day every four days to hone his spiritual heart through eternal suffering.

The evening is the time for qi circulation.

The rest of the time was almost all spent studying formations. Only during the morning and lunch breaks would he pay attention to the Soul Realm. If there was a task issued, he would take it on behalf of his fellow junior brothers and sisters, and then send a notification via paper crane.

Half a month passed, and he had tested all the two thousand runes he had obtained from Cheng Feipeng.

So far, he has tested all the more than 6,000 runes mastered by Qingyun Sect, and in the end he could only find 22 reverse runes out of the 27 runes.

What Zhou Qing worried about finally happened.

He was unable to find all twenty-seven reverse runes from the runes controlled by Qingyun Sect.

This means that he may not be able to construct the reverse formation of eternal damnation by relying solely on the rune resources of Qingyun Sect.

But where can he find new rune resources?

Can I seek help from other sects?

Zhou Qing immediately thought of the friendly sects of Qingyun Sect who came to pay tribute to Fang Daoyi.

But then he shook his head.

Runes are the strategic resource of every sect.

Every seven years, the Qingyun Sect has to spend hundreds of high-grade spirit stones to get some new runes by chance.

When you are lucky, you can get seven or eight new runes. When you are unlucky, the runes produced by the collision of the Five Elements Annihilation Formation are all runes that the sect has already mastered, and hundreds of spirit stones are wasted.

No sect would easily give away such a huge amount of strategic resources.

Maybe one or two would be exchanged occasionally, but no more than a dozen at most.

However, Zhou Qing's research work required him to conduct haphazard experiments. He needed to get all the rune books from other sects and then test them one by one.

Don't even think about such a thing.

Zhou Qing felt a little confused after suddenly losing his research direction.

Actually, if you think about it, it doesn’t seem to be anything serious.

It's just that he can no longer rely on Mu Zhuosha, and Uncle Chen's position as an elder is also gone. Lu Qingzhu, the guy who he always feels is gloomy and seems to have a lot on his mind, which makes him feel uncomfortable, is going to be the elder.

He failed to successfully establish an external defense line in the sect that would make him feel safe.

Apart from this, there seems to be no other adverse consequences. At most, you will have to be more careful in your life in the future.

However, after all, I have worked so hard for so long, and when I was just one small step away from success, it came to an abrupt end. I just don’t feel happy.

(End of this chapter)