The Long Journey to Immortality

As the leader of the Northern Dynasty's Taoist tradition, Xuan Yang Valley was the high and mighty judge.

They have the right to arbitrate when different families have conflicts over certain issues.

Upon hearing this, Han Lu thought to herself, "Do you think I'm stupid? My father had a conflict with Xuan Yang Valley and crippled three Nascent Soul cultivators. I am a cultivator from the Southern Dynasty's Zheng Yi Sect. If Xuan Yang Valley decides, the result will definitely be what you want."

She was caught off guard, but Han Lu's response was quite appropriate.

“How about this,” Han Lu suggested, “I have heard that Fellow Daoist Guangbo is very learned, and in addition to being knowledgeable, he is also proficient in divination.”

"Take a single hair from my head, and ask fellow Daoist Guangbo to divine this matter, what do you say?"

"I suppose you wouldn't distrust even your own family."

Hearing Han Lu's confidence and the suggestion she offered, Master Guangbo naturally understood that this poor strategy was a waste of time.

However, the play must eventually end. After exchanging a few words with the arrogant Taoist through divine sense, he replied, "Alright, since Fairy Zhenfeng trusts me, then let Fairy Zhenfeng see my divination skills."

Han Lu casually tore off two strands of hair that could be used as materials for crafting magical artifacts, and used her artifact manipulation skills to throw them at Master Guangbo.

Please make yourself at home.

Master Guangbo took the severed hair and seriously performed a divination.

Chapter 1162

Although Master Guangbo's divination skills were not as good as Han Lu's senior sister Wen Erya, he was still an outstanding figure among Golden Core cultivators.

She's probably at the same level as Han Lu, who didn't study at the Savage Star of Vermilion.

Naturally, Han Lu offered a strand of hair. With Han Lu's permission, as long as Guangbo Shangren was willing, he would surely be able to divine a rough result to verify whether his and Kuangao Daoren's guesses were correct.

In fact, when Guangbo received Han Lu's severed hair, he knew that the divination result would be exactly what Han Lu wanted.

Whether it's the truth or Han Lu has already used methods to conceal it, he absolutely cannot calculate the result that he and the arrogant Taoist imagined fairly in front of everyone.

Even so, the play must continue to the end.

Holding the hair in his hand, Master Guangbo immediately sensed that Han Lu's severed hair was quite different from that of ordinary cultivators.

“It feels even more resilient,” the knowledgeable Master Guangbo used a metaphor, “like the silk spun by a spiritual insect.”

"It might be usable as a material for weapon forging."

After muttering a sentence to himself, Master Guangbo began to use his divination skills in public, using the severed hair provided by Han Lu as a clue and material to divine part of Han Lu's background.

Although Han Lu has done many good deeds and has accumulated a lot of good karma, she is the kind of person who is not easy to predict.

However, since Master Guangbo's actions were permitted by Han Lu, fate did not help Han Lu cover up this information.

With a simple deduction, Master Guangbo easily concluded that Han Lu's mother was indeed born into the Han family.

However, after receiving the answer, Master Guangbo did not stop what he was doing.

Master Guangbo also wanted to take this opportunity to learn more about Han Lu through divination.

Seeing that Master Guangbo's actions were different, Han Lu couldn't help but raise her eyebrows.

Knowing how to divine, she naturally knew that Master Guangbo was now trying to deduce and calculate other information about her, and was using underhanded tricks and schemes.

However, she did not speak up to stop him, but quietly waited for the confident Master Guangbo to be humiliated.

As expected, thanks to the good karma she had accumulated, fate took the initiative to help Han Lu cover up this information and keep her mouth shut in front of Master Guangbo.

After fiddling with the counting rods several times, yet still unable to arrive at a clear conclusion, a few drops of sweat involuntarily appeared on the forehead of the Venerable Guangbo.

"What happened? We found absolutely nothing?"

In the end, Master Guangbo gave up spying on Han Lu and quietly put away his counting rods.

“No problem. It seems the Han family is quite fortunate. True Phoenix Fairy is indeed a descendant of the Han family.” Master Guangbo did not play any tricks or distort the results of divination.

Han Lu nodded slightly, expressing her approval of Master Guangbo's honesty. "In that case, please return this lock of my hair, so that it may not be lost and picked up by some scoundrel."

Upon hearing this, Master Guangbo knew that Han Lu also knew divination and had already seen through his little scheme.

His expression froze for a moment, but he feigned composure and said, "That makes sense. Zhenfeng Fairy, please accept this."

He intended to use some tricks to leave a trace when returning the hair, but Master Guangbo discovered that he was simply not capable of tearing Han Lu's hair off without making a sound, relying solely on his weak external martial arts skills.

Helpless, he could only return the hair intact and completely suppress his ulterior motives.

Both small-scale contests ended in Han Lu's victory, which inevitably disappointed the well-prepared Master Guangbo and the arrogant Taoist.

"Could it be that my Qian family will once again rank second?" Guangbo Shangren thought pessimistically.

The arrogant Taoist seemed to sense his elder's troubles and comforted him with a telepathic message, "Great-grandfather, it's alright, we still have a better plan."

Slightly relieved, Master Guangbo said, "We'll see how you perform later."

This kind of shameful thing is not suitable for Master Guangbo, the leader of the Qian family.

The arrogant Taoist, in both personality and appearance, is perfectly suited to be the warrior charging ahead with a spear.

After Han Lu's identity was confirmed by the Qian family, Xuanfeng Daoist continued to advance the meeting between the three families according to the ritual agenda that had been passed down for thousands of years.

Because it was just a division of spoils.

The entire process of the meeting consisted of determining the total amount of resources to be divided, their current status, and dividing them according to the strength of the three parties.

Because a new spirit stone deposit has been discovered in recent years, Xuanfeng Daoist added a "reporting process" before each party reported on the current status of their resource points.

He took out the report from the resource exploration team that the three organizations had jointly organized, and read it aloud slowly and deliberately, word by word, so that the cultivators from the three organizations present could understand the specific details of the new mineral deposit.

Han Lu sat to the side listening, and after Xuanfeng Daoist finished reporting the situation, she summarized several key points.

"The new deposit does not contain many spirit stones, and the quality is only average. It is not a rich deposit, but it is not barren either."

"In terms of quality and quantity alone, it ranks after the three existing spirit mines, and can produce eight hundred to one thousand spirit stones a year for the family that controls it."

"The location is good; it's not far from any of the three companies."

"Regardless of which company ultimately wins the mining rights to this spirit stone mine, they will need to pay fifty spirit stones to the exploration team to cover the costs of preliminary exploration and preparation."

"In addition, the spirit stones mined in the first ten years also need to be divided into four parts according to the old rules, with the owner receiving two parts and the other two families each receiving one part."

All three parties understand the principles of sustainable development and the methods of increasing revenue and reducing expenditure. Therefore, by clearly explaining the rules, they can expand the pie and benefit each other while maintaining a friendly relationship.

Han Lu wholeheartedly approved of this approach, and gained a deeper understanding of how the Northern Dynasty's cultivation families were able to grow and become an important part of the cultivation world.

"If Xuan Yang Valley were to inexplicably split or weaken one day, perhaps the cultivation families of the Northern Dynasty could still stand on their own and carry the banner of the Northern Dynasty's cultivation world."

After the first procedure was completed, Xuanfeng Daoist began to speak on behalf of the Han family about the status of several resources controlled by the Han family over the past century.

The situation was normal; nothing unusual happened.

The Han family did not exploit these resources, which had long been under their control, but instead carefully protected them, fearing that their own interests might be harmed.

After Master Xuanfeng, Layman Kongkong spoke.

The situation was roughly the same, except that the matter of reduced spiritual ore production was brought up by Layman Kongkong.

Nearly 80% of the mineral veins controlled by the Lu family have already been mined. One can imagine that at the "division conference" two or three hundred years from now, several families will start to worry about the lack of a spirit stone mine.

Since the loss was not caused by human error, neither of the other two families criticized the Lu family.

The Qian family was the last to report the situation.

Their situation was almost identical to that of the Han family, and they even had some good news.

Chapter 1163

“Starting three years ago, that sacred place for cultivation located on Weiyang Lake has undergone new changes.”

"After a brief investigation, it turned out that the long-dormant volcano at the bottom of the lake had awakened and become restless."

"This makes the fire-attribute spiritual energy at the bottom of Weiyang Lake more concentrated and active."

"If arranged properly, many cultivators who have reached the Foundation Establishment stage and practice fire-attribute techniques can also enter the bottom of Weiyang Lake to breathe in spiritual energy and accelerate their cultivation."

As he said this, Master Guangbo smiled, clearly indicating that some of the Qian family's cultivators had already benefited from it over the years.

Upon hearing this news, the cultivators from both the Han and Lu families were quite pleased.

“It seems there has been quite a bit of good news over the past century,” Xuanfeng Daoist continued, “Then let’s talk about the distribution.”

"This time, my Han family has the True Phoenix Fairy in charge. Are you convinced?" Xuanfeng Daoist didn't waste any time and directly brought up Han Lu. "If you are convinced, then my Han family will still be in first place. If you are not convinced, then let's fight according to the rules."

With Han Lu's help, Xuanfeng Daoist was quite confident. He only hoped that the other two families would say "I'm not convinced," so that Han Lu could show her power, win a great victory, and boost the morale of the Han family.

Eager to challenge Han Lu, the Hermit of Emptiness was in no hurry to express his opinion, waiting for the Qian family to ignite the conflict.

"However you look at it, the Qian family is no match for the Han family," Kongkong Jushi noticed the two Qian family cultivators were calm and composed. "Could it be that after failing in one move, Guangbo Shangren and Kuangao Daoren have given up the struggle and accepted their fate?"

"If that's the case, then I shouldn't be selfish. I can only seek out Fairy Zhenfeng for a duel in private."

While the Hermit of Emptiness was pondering, the Arrogant Taoist spoke up, "I am convinced of the strength of Fairy Zhenfeng and Fellow Daoist Xuanfeng; they are both far superior to me."

"However, in my opinion, so many years have passed, shouldn't the rules of the duel be changed?"

Xuanfeng Daoist knew that the Qian family was up to their old tricks again.

"Why change it?" Xuanfeng Daoist said emphatically, "This rule has been in place for a thousand years, operating stably for a thousand years. It has long been verified by countless facts and is correct and effective."

“Making changes arbitrarily will only create loopholes and give those with ill intentions an opportunity to exploit them.”

“Fellow Daoist Xuanfeng, don’t rush to refute me. Let me explain which rule I want to change first,” the arrogant Daoist said, equally justified. “I think it’s unfair that the three cultivators representing their families take the stage in order of their cultivation levels from highest to lowest.”

"If we could change it to deploying troops and assigning orders before the battle begins, wouldn't that be... more interesting, with more suspense?"

The arrogant Taoist used frivolous language, deliberately targeting Xuanfeng Taoist's tactic of "the ancestral laws cannot be changed".

Xuanfeng Daoist chuckled and said righteously, "The purpose of the contest is to showcase the strength of each family in order to achieve a fair final distribution, not for entertainment."

"The duel is not open to the public; there are no spectators."

The arrogant Taoist was confident of success.

Before speaking again, he first gave a look to the lay Buddhist Kongkong beside him.

"What?" Master Kongkong asked, puzzled. He had not made any agreement or colluded with the Qian family at this meeting.

The arrogant Taoist ignored the bewildered look in the eyes of the hermit of emptiness and continued to explain the benefits of doing things this way, saying, "No one can guarantee that a family will prosper in the long run."

"Such a change could give families that have long been ranked third the possibility of moving from third to second, and only in this way can they achieve revival."