Chapter 391
Zheng Fa replied, "Huo Xing Zi Fu."
He paused for a moment and added, "Only Huo Xing Zi Fu."
Both of their eyes sparkled with a silvery light as they activated their Dong Xu Ling Yan (洞虚灵眼, "Void Spirit Eye"), ensuring they weren't mistaken. Yet, confusion clouded their faces, as if they doubted their own sight.
They had long suspected that the spiritual materials should contain spiritual energy or, in other words, some kind of talismanic diagram. But to find only Huo Xing Zi Fu... left them puzzled—after all, they had never encountered a standalone Huo Xing Zi Fu before.
Five Elements Zi Fu were quite common, but they never appeared in isolation.
"There are no other Zi Fu diagrams," Sister Zhang confirmed after several checks. "Only Huo Xing Zi Fu."
Zheng Fa fell silent for a moment. His golden core shot out from the top of his head, and a burst of red metal erupted from it, landing before everyone.
"What is this?"
"Let's give this a try," Zheng Fa said to Sister Zhang and the others.
This was the "oxygen metal" he had discovered in the modern world. The recent collision experiment had sparked a hypothesis in Zheng Fa's mind:
Spiritual energy, in the form of Five Elements Zi Fu, could combine with particles.
He wanted to verify this further.
Sure enough, after the collision, what appeared in the Dong Xu Ling Yan was the Jin Xing Zi Fu (金行子符, "Metal Element Talisman").
Sister Zhang and the others exchanged glances, unsure of what this meant.
But Zheng Fa seemed to have an epiphany.
He suddenly walked to the table and drew a diagram.
"This is... the Five Elements Ring?"
Sister Zhang immediately recognized it.
This was the Yuan Fu Dao Ji (元符道基, "Foundation of the Original Talisman") that Zheng Fa had previously condensed, a ring formed by the Five Elements Zi Fu.
"Sister Zhang, how many types of spiritual materials do you think there are?" Zheng Fa suddenly asked.
Madam Xuanhua, hearing this question, seemed to find it a bit silly and replied, "Countless."
Zheng Fa slapped his forehead, feeling he had asked the wrong question.
He rephrased, "Sister Zhang, how many types of particles can form spiritual materials in the Xuanwei Realm?"
"…"
Now, everyone understood, but it still seemed unclear.
"You know?" Madam Xuanhua asked, her eyes wide.
"I think... I might know," Zheng Fa said, looking at the Five Elements diagram on the paper. He suddenly drew a table filled with square boxes, each with a number in one corner.
If anyone here had attended middle school...
They would immediately recognize this as a periodic table of elements.
"This table contains over a hundred types of non-spiritual particles. If I'm not mistaken... each type of particle here can form five types of spiritual particles. I’ll tentatively call these basic elements of spiritual materials 'Ling Su' (灵素, "Spiritual Essence")."
Discovering the Huo Xing Zi Fu in the Tai Chu Gang Qi (太初罡气, "Primordial Gang Qi") had led him to this hypothesis.
Zheng Fa categorized the basic particles that make up spiritual materials into two parts: one being the elemental particles similar to those in modern science—like hydrogen and oxygen...
The other being the spiritual energy existing in the form of Five Elements Zi Fu.
In other words, Ling Su—the elements of spiritual materials follow the Five Elements periodic law!
"Is that so?"
Madam Xuanhua and the others exchanged glances, seemingly struggling to grasp the concept, yet unable to pinpoint any questions.
The biggest question was...
"What’s the use of this?"
The elder asked.
Before Zheng Fa could respond, Madam Xuanhua suddenly spoke up:
"This is the essence of spiritual materials, no... the essence of artifact refining!" Her eyes sparkled with excitement.
As a master of artifact refining, she instantly understood the significance of the Five Elements periodic law.
"Our understanding of spiritual materials has never been this clear before. From fundamentally not knowing how many types of spiritual materials exist to only a few hundred basic Ling Su."
"We can now search for previously unseen spiritual materials!"
"We might even be able to produce some spiritual materials ourselves..."
"From today onward, spiritual materials... will no longer be something we can only seek from the Xuanwei Realm; we can create them ourselves!"
Zheng Fa nodded gently, agreeing wholeheartedly with Madam Xuanhua:
Only by recognizing the essence of Ling Su could the simulation of spiritual materials become possible.
To him, the most intuitive benefit of the Five Elements periodic law lay in its periodicity.
In the periodic table, elements of the same group share similar properties.
Thus, it was reasonable to deduce that each row of elements in the Five Elements periodic law should also exhibit similar properties.
This paved the way for Zheng Fa to simulate the Ling Yu (灵玉, "Spirit Jade") using the spiritual particles in his dantian.
"Are you saying that as long as we determine which Ling Su is contained in the Ling Yu, we can use the simulation of similar Ling Su to create our own innate treasures?"
Zheng Fa nodded, "Similar elements might also require the same quantity of Five Elements Zi Fu and particle numbers..."
Whether it could be simulated, Zheng Fa didn't know for sure.
But this could be easily verified—what was lacking was merely the understanding of the Five Elements periodic law itself. Only by grasping this could they develop ideas for creating spiritual materials.
Madam Xuanhua nodded lightly, then suddenly sighed:
"Ugh, Xie Qingxue is from your generation..." She looked at Zheng Fa with a strange expression. "What bad luck."
...
Yan Wushuang felt he was truly unlucky.
"Senior Sister! Don't be in such a hurry!"
Wrapped in a red silk, Yan Wushuang was being whisked through the air like a kite.
He looked at the figure ahead, helplessly shouting.
In front of him, the owner of the red silk, dressed in black, didn’t look back, seemingly unwilling to acknowledge him.
Yan Wushuang felt speechless.
He glanced beneath his senior sister, where a tiger, wide enough to be seven or eight of his shoulders, was beneath her. This tiger was pure white, with not a single strand of messy fur, and the woman sat atop it like she was lounging on a soft, expansive white cloud, looking extremely comfortable.
Yan Wushuang couldn't help but feel both aggrieved and envious.
He wanted to sit too!
But this white tiger was too noble; it was said to possess the bloodline of the Four Symbols, the Bai Hu (白虎, "White Tiger")—a very pure one at that.
More importantly, it was a Yuan Ying (元婴, "Nascent Soul")!
It simply refused to let Yan Wushuang sit on its back!
Thinking of this, Yan Wushuang's tone brimmed with resentment. The white tiger seemed to sense this grudge and glanced back at him, its eyes filled with mockery.
"…Senior Sister, could you let me go?"
Yan Wushuang squirmed like a caterpillar and added.
His senior sister, Xie Qingxue, finally spoke, though her tone seemed a bit disdainful:
"If I don't tie you up, you’ll just run away, won't you?"
"…Where would I run to?"
"To the Nine Mountains Realm."
Yan Wushuang awkwardly replied, "…I just wanted to go to the Nine Mountains Realm to gather intelligence on the Da Zizai Demon Sect."
"Gather intelligence? More like passing information, right?"
Xie Qingxue scoffed coldly.
"You're leaking information from within the sect to outsiders. If you weren't the master’s son, you would have been punished long ago!"
"…But I haven't leaked any confidential information, have I?"
Yan Wushuang muttered.
"That's because your father is keeping an eye on you!"
"I'm his son... what’s there to keep an eye on?"
Xie Qingxue shot him a glance but didn’t respond, and Yan Wushuang promptly shut his mouth.
To be fair, he should be watched.
Otherwise, he might have spilled everything.
"Fortunately, you haven't caused any major incidents... But I still need to seek an explanation from the Nine Mountains Sect Leader. You may be foolish, but you are still the son of the Tianhe Sect Leader."
"I volunteered!"
"That’s why you’re foolish!"
"Old Han said Zheng Fa is exceptionally talented, even stronger than our founder! Building a good relationship with him will be beneficial!" Yan Wushuang argued, "I’m just placing a bet in advance!"
"Old Han... is a bit obsessive."
Xie Qingxue's voice suddenly dropped, as if she recalled something, her mood turning slightly irritable. Yan Wushuang didn’t catch what she said next.
He continued to defend Zheng Fa: "Senior Sister, it’s really not Zheng Fa who’s pushing me."
"My father looks down on me; you know me well enough, right? I’m not that foolish!"
His words had their reasons. He and Xie Qingxue were not far apart in age, belonging to the same generation of disciples—when he first started cultivating, due to a poor relationship with his father, it was Xie Qingxue who guided him.
Xie Qingxue might understand Yan Wushuang better than the Tianhe Sect Leader.
"I don’t understand you; how could I bring you out?"
"…Senior Sister?"
"If you stay in the sect, will the master spare you?"
Yan Wushuang's expression changed, finally realizing why Xie Qingxue wanted him to act as a guide...
"Senior Sister!" His tone turned a bit emotional, "You have to believe me, I’m really not leaking information! Zheng Fa will definitely..."
"Don’t mention Zheng Fa again..." Xie Qingxue shot him a disdainful look, her eyes filled with contempt. "This time, when dealing with the Da Zizai Demon Sect, you’d better make amends. Only then will you avoid punishment when you return."
"…Understood."
"I trust you, but I don’t trust Zheng Fa." Xie Qingxue's tone turned cold as she spoke, "If you mention him again, I will truly go to the Nine Mountains Realm to seek justice."
"…."
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