The Eternal Saint of Alchemy

Behind him stood a slender clerk and a composed deputy, both at the peak of the ninth rank.

The bald, burly man stood at the entrance of the wall, glanced at the three large characters "Shuangjietai" on the wall, and with a slight smile, shouted loudly, "I, Leng Tiefeng, the lord of Tiefeng Fortress, have come to pay my respects to the lord of Shuangjietai. May I ask what brings you here? I heard that a new territory has recently been established, and everyone is talking about it. My Tiefeng Fortress is nearby, so I have come to take a look."

Xiao Fan walked out of the main building and headed towards the outside of the wall.

Leng Tiefeng glanced at Xiao Fan, knowing that Xiao Fan only had the first level of the Transformation Realm. However, Leng Tiefeng was at the early stage of the Transformation Realm, and his cultivation was higher than Xiao Fan's, so he was naturally confident.

"The Twin Realms Platform has just been established. Lord Iron Peak Fortress has come from afar. Please come in," Xiao Fan said calmly, stepping aside as he did so.

Leng Tiefeng walked into the courtyard and scanned it with his eyes. There was a main house, a formation room, a warehouse, and a spiritual material testing area. The area was not large, but it was arranged in an orderly manner.

Finally, he glanced at the complex spiritual energy seeping through the crack in the door, then at the short staff at Xiao Fan's waist, and said politely but tentatively, "I've heard that Twin Realms Platform holds the mining rights to several new veins in the northern part of Aurora Plains, and Iron Peak Fortress is also interested in participating in the development north of Aurora Plains. Since we're all in the same boat, why don't we sit down and divide the spoils?"

Xiao Fan sat in the main seat, not answering Leng Tiefeng's question, but instead poured Leng Tiefeng a cup of tea before slowly saying, "The mining of the veins north of Aurora Plains is not open to everyone. If Iron Peak Fortress wants to join, then we should discuss it first, as previously agreed, and then divide the territory."

Leng Tiefeng picked up his teacup but didn't drink it. Instead, he placed it on the table and said in a low voice, "What right do you, the Two Realms Platform, have to set the rules? You are not on the official jurisdiction list of Xingluo Plain."

The atmosphere in the hall became heavy.

Xiao Fan leaned back in his chair, calmly looking at Leng Tiefeng.

Bai Ye, who had been silent all along, walked in through the side door of the central hall. The Silver Frost Sword in her hand hung down naturally, its silver patterns emitting a faint glow under the hall's lights.

She leaned against the doorway, her aura and sword intent spreading out silently. Just as Cheng Xiushi and Ning Yao were about to answer, they suddenly stopped talking, allowing the figure leaning against the sword to give the most direct response.

Leng Tiefeng glanced at the white figure, then at Xiao Fan, his voice carrying a hint of solemnity.

He stopped talking, stood up, and walked towards the exit of the hall. When he reached the door, he stopped, turned back, and said, "North of Aurora Plains, Iron Peak Fortress will participate in their own way. It would be best if they kept to themselves."

After saying this, he strode out of the wall and left with fifty soldiers.

Master Cheng looked at Xiao Fan and said, "Iron Peak Fortress's territory is much larger than our Crimson Iron Gang's. He came here this time to gather information."

Xiao Fan picked up the cup of tea that Leng Tiefeng hadn't drunk from, drank it all in one gulp, and said, "He has already investigated and found out that the Twin Realms Platform is not easy to deal with. He won't make any rash moves in the short term."

Bai Ye stood up from the doorway, walked past Xiao Fan, and said softly, "Iron Peak Fortress is nearby. They've set up camp on a small hill about five miles to the east."

Xiao Fan paused in his teacup-picking motion, put it down, stood up, and followed her out of the wall.

Five miles to the east, on a small hill, the silhouettes of some tents can be vaguely seen.

Three days later, the men of Tiefengbao set up camp on this low hillside.

They did not approach the walls of Shuangjietai, nor did they block the road leading to the Rust Rift Valley; they simply stood there quietly, as if guarding something.

Over the past three days, the mane on the Earth Core Golden Mane Beast has become much shinier, and its amber eyes gaze at the hillside every night.

On the fourth night, Bai Ye, who was tidying up the spiritual material experimental base, suddenly looked up, listened for a moment, and then said, "The people on the low slope have retreated. Only seven or eight people are left to guard a large tent."

Xiao Fan put down the documents in his hand and walked to the wall to take a look.

The number of tents on the low slope was indeed half that of before, with only the dark gray main tent in the middle still standing. A faint light emanated from the top of the tent, steady and stable, suggesting that it was not unattended.

That night, Xiao Fan left the city wall alone and headed east.

The Earth Core Golden Mane Beast followed Xiao Fan silently, its dark golden scales almost blending into the shadows under the starlight.

He crouched about a hundred paces from the camp, using his spirit core to probe the spiritual energy structure within the camp. Inside was a magical artifact with stable spiritual energy fluctuations, ranging from the peak of the ninth rank to the Transcendent Realm, continuously outputting spiritual energy.

Seven or eight people take turns on duty outside the tent, with a new group changing shifts every half hour.

After nearly two hours of observation, he determined that this magical artifact was the core of a large detection array, covering the entire area between the northern part of Aurora Plain and the Twin Realms Platform, and it was still expanding.

Clearly, Leng Tiefeng was not used for offense, but rather to monitor the spiritual energy fluctuations around the Twin Realms Platform and the people entering and leaving.

Xiao Fan returned to his base and did not tell anyone about the incident.

The next day, Master Cheng adjusted the routes in and out of the base, taking a different route from the direction of the Iron Rust Rift Valley, avoiding the low slope, and adding a thin layer of spiritual energy barrier to the walls of the Twin Realms Platform to isolate the detection array from the array's sensing.

The main tent remained on the hillside for another five days, then quietly left early the next morning.

On the monitoring network in the northern part of Aurora Plains, all the spiritual energy fluctuations of the detection arrays disappeared.

When Bai Ye recounted this incident, his tone was calm: "Leng Tiefeng's detector was heavily used; he persisted for nearly ten days. Next time, he will appear in a different way, not the same way."

Xiao Fan closed his laptop and looked at the clear sky outside: "Next time, the defenses of the Dual Realm Platform should be even thicker."

In the afternoon, he discussed with Ning Yao and finalized the arrangement of the second layer of shielding runes, and also developed an emergency plan for unforeseen circumstances.

This time, Leng Tiefeng did not bring fifty men, but only four.

His attitude had changed drastically. He didn't sit down immediately after entering, but stood in the hall and said bluntly, "I want to make a deal with you."

Xiao Fan sat down opposite him and gestured for him to sit down.

Leng Tiefeng took out a piece of parchment from his pocket and spread it on the table. It showed the distribution of mineral veins north-northwest of Aurora Plains, and marked an area that had not yet been explored by the Twin Realms Platform.