Cultivation: I can solidify equipment attributes

Li Yuan walked back the way he came.

The checkpoints within the Wang family's territory went smoothly; the guards checked the token and let them pass. After passing the last sentry post, the road ahead returned to the wide, rammed-earth avenue they had previously traversed.

After walking about two miles, a person was squatting on the ground looking at something under a crooked tree by the roadside.

He wore a gray-blue cloth robe, and his fingers were stained with faint red cinnabar marks.

Yu Fushi.

On the ground in front of the talisman master lay a coarse cloth with several small porcelain bottles and a bundle of herbs on it, as if they had just been purchased from somewhere.

As Li Yuan approached, Master Yu looked up and recognized him.

"What are you doing here?" Master Yu stood up.

"I went to the treasure pavilion and retrieved something," Li Yuan said without going into details.

Master Yu patted the dirt off his clothes and bent down to gather the things on the coarse cloth.

Li Yuan didn't beat around the bush and went straight to the point.

"Could you teach me how to make talismans? I can pay you spirit stones."

Master Yu paused for a moment, looked up at Li Yuan, and then shook his head.

"Not now. I have many missions assigned by the Wang family, and I don't have time."

Master Yu stuffed the herbs into the cloth bag, thought for a moment, and then spoke again.

"If you really want to learn proper talisman-making techniques, there is a way."

Li Yuan glanced at him.

"The Wang Family Talisman Hall is currently recruiting and has set up an assessment." Master Yu tossed his cloth bag over his shoulder. "In the past, we not only had to conduct assessments but also select people. Now, as long as your skills are up to par, you're good to go."

He looked Li Yuan up and down.

"After you get in, you can systematically learn how to make talismans in the talisman hall. You'll have a master to guide you and materials to practice with. It's much better than you just groping around in different places outside."

Li Yuan asked, "What are the conditions?"

"It's difficult; you need to be at least proficient in talisman-making." The talisman master paused, then added, "But I don't think you'll be able to get in."

He said this not as if he were mocking someone, but as if he were making an objective assessment of a craftsman's skill level.

Li Yuan nodded without arguing.

"I see."

Master Yu nodded, picked up his cloth bag, and walked along the main road in another direction.

Li Yuan stood by the roadside, watching Yu Fushi's departing figure, then turned around and continued walking towards the market.

It was already afternoon when I got back to my lodgings.

After bolting the door shut, Li Yuan sat down by the bed and took out the Soul-Revealing Mirror from his bosom.

An oval-shaped mirror lay in the palm of the hand, its dark silver frame polished to an extremely smooth finish, and its milky white jade surface shimmering with a very faint glow.

This thing is mine now.

The moment your fingertip touches the mirror, the panel appears.

[Equipable item detected: Soul-Illuminating Mirror (Complete)]

[Entry Preview: Soul Refinement (Blue) - Enhances the strength and precision of the soul. The base enhancement is 10%, with a maximum of 50%. The enhancement increases with the strength of the soul.]

[Preview of Permanentization Conditions (Choose one): 1. Consume a second-tier or higher Divine Soul-type Demonic Beast Inner Core (0/1); 2. Accumulate one hundred years of experience (the more experience, the less time required) (0/100)]

[Current equipment slot (3/3), replace current equipment?]

Blue entries.

Soul Light Tempering - Passively strengthens the divine soul.

It's not a one-time upgrade, but a continuous enhancement; it keeps increasing as long as you equip it. The base is 10%, and the maximum is 50%, increasing with the strength of your divine soul.

There are two paths to permanentization.

The first option is to consume the inner core of a second-tier Divine Soul type demon beast. A second-tier inner core corresponds to the Foundation Establishment stage, and its price won't be low. Moreover, Divine Soul type demon beasts are already rare, and their inner cores are even more scarce and difficult to obtain. This is unrealistic in the short term.

The second point is accumulating experience over a hundred years. Even if rich experience can accelerate this process, a hundred years is still a considerable amount of time. This path is even longer.

Both conditions are far enough away.

However, the attribute itself does not need to be permanent to have an effect. As long as it is equipped, it will be passively strengthened.

Without hesitation, Li Yuan activated his Qi-Nourishing Technique.

Equip the Soul-Revealing Mirror.

The mirror transformed into a milky white light and entered the body.

The next instant, an extremely subtle change seeped down from the top of my head.

It wasn't warmth, it wasn't coolness, and it wasn't the feeling of spiritual energy flowing.

It's more like a layer of fog in your mind being gently wiped away.

My consciousness has become clearer.

Li Yuan closed his eyes and felt it for a moment.

In the past, when I closed my eyes, my senses were like being separated by a thin veil. I could feel the flow of spiritual energy, blood and qi, and the pulsation of meridians in my body, but all of these senses had a slightly blurry edge.

The blur has thinned now.

The information about where spiritual energy reaches in the meridians, where blood and qi slow down slightly, and the density distribution of spiritual energy at the edge of the dantian is a little clearer than before. It's not much, but you can feel it.

A 10% increase may not have a significant effect, but it is continuous.

Li Yuan opened his eyes and flexed his fingers.

That night, Li Yuan continued making talismans.

Spread out the talisman paper, dip it in ink, and begin to write.

It's still a fireball symbol.

As he began to write, the first few fire patterns unfolded—and when he reached the middle section where the fire patterns overlapped, he pressed spiritual energy into the paper.

The feeling is different this time compared to before.

It's not that my control over spiritual energy has improved much, but rather that I have a clearer perception of how spiritual energy flows through the tip of my pen.

It's not that my control over spiritual energy has improved much, but rather that I have a clearer perception of how spiritual energy flows through the tip of my pen.

In the past, when I put pen to paper, the spiritual energy was transmitted from my fingertips to the tip of the pen, but there was a part of the transmission that I relied on my sense of touch. The spiritual energy was sent out, and it probably reached the tip of the pen and was probably poured into the talisman paper. Whether it was successful or not could only be known after I finished writing.

That number has probably decreased now.

When spiritual energy reaches the tip of the pen, Li Yuan can perceive more clearly how it spreads on the paper, how wide it spreads, and whether the concentration is sufficient.

It's not a significant improvement; the blurry edges are just a little sharper.

However, in practice, the success rate is higher in those areas where mistakes are easily made—such as the overlapping of fire patterns and the convergence of talisman cores.

Throughout the night, fourteen fireball talismans were drawn, and seven were successfully completed, achieving a success rate of 50%.

It's nearly 10% higher than before I equipped the Soul-Illuminating Mirror.

The effects are similarly enhanced when practicing the Spirit Guiding Technique and the Hundred Meridians Returning to Origin Technique.

With more precise control over spiritual energy, the time for each cycle of energy circulation has been shortened slightly. Little by little, the cultivation efficiency over an hour has increased considerably compared to before.

The Micro-Element Pulse Guiding Technique is the most beneficial.

This technique inherently requires an extremely high degree of mental focus. The spiritual threads must be compressed to an extremely fine thickness to probe into those hair-thin micro-veins, relying entirely on perception to find the way. After the soul was strengthened, the perception at the tip of the spiritual threads became more acute, and the judgment when encountering the entrance of a micro-vein became faster.

Over the next few days, Li Yuan maintained a fixed rhythm.

Making talismans and cultivating oneself.

On the afternoon of the fourth day, Li Yuan was drawing talismans at his table when he heard footsteps outside the door.

Instead of knocking, several people walked past from the residential area, their steps hurried and their voices much louder than usual.

Li Yuan put down the talisman brush, walked to the door, and pushed open half of the door.

Several patrolmen and minor officials walked briskly towards East Street.

As an inspector passed by, he saw Li Yuan at the door and stopped.

"What's going on? Why are you in such a hurry?"

"Something's happened, Vice Captain, haven't you heard?"

"What is it?"

"The Wang family and the Li family have started fighting."

The inspector lowered his voice, but the tension in his eyes was unmistakable.

"This wasn't a small skirmish. I heard that a group from the Wang family ran into the Li family at the border between the two families' territories, and the two sides immediately started fighting. Several people died, on both sides."

Li Yuan's gaze narrowed slightly.

"When did this happen?"

"The news came back this morning; the fighting must have started last night or the day before." The inspector glanced towards East Street.

Li Yuan hummed in agreement and did not ask any further questions.

The inspector didn't linger and left in a hurry.

Li Yuan stood at the door watching his departing figure, then glanced at the flow of people coming and going in the direction of East Street.

The atmosphere in the market was even more tense than before. The vendors' shouts were lower, the pedestrians walked faster, and occasionally you could see two or three scattered monks gathered under the wall talking in hushed tones, their faces not looking too good.

Li Yuan closed the door and sat down at the table.

On the table lay a half-finished fireball talisman, with a small dot of spiritual ink condensing on its surface.

Li Yuan peeled off the discarded talisman and set it aside, then laid out a new blank talisman paper.

He picked up the brush, dipped it in ink, and wrote.