In the largest market of Lingwu City, a yellow-robed old man at the ninth level of Qi Refining, who specialized in selling spiritual elixirs, was setting up a stall on the ground. Very few items adorned his stall—only a few bottles of mid-grade medicines intended for Foundation Establishment cultivators.

A continuous stream of cultivators stopped to inquire about the prices.

"How much for this Huoyuan Pill?" a dark-skinned, burly cultivator asked loudly, approaching the stall.

"Fifty low-grade spirit stones per pill! I only have about seven or eight left. Decide quickly," the old man replied lazily, his eyes half-closed as he sat cross-legged.

"What? That's too expensive—nearly double what it was before! Damn greedy bastards." The burly man glanced into his meager pouch, which held barely over a hundred low-grade spirit stones. After a moment of hesitation, he tossed down fifty low-grade spirit stones, took one Huoyuan Pill, and walked away muttering curses.

Even when Foundation Establishment cultivators inquired, the old man maintained the same indifferent demeanor, as if daring them to buy or not.

Recently, the flames of war had swept across the Lingwu Cultivation World, causing a massive influx of cultivators seeking refuge in Lingwu City. Amidst the chaos of conflict, everyone sought to enhance their strength for self-preservation, and spiritual elixirs were the best means to achieve that. To obtain elixirs, one had to pay the price.

The greater the gathering of cultivators, the fiercer the competition for elixirs. Consequently, mid-grade spiritual elixirs were acutely scarce in the city's market, with prices inflating almost every half-month, skyrocketing from the initial thirty low-grade spirit stones to the current fifty, and still rising.

Few people in the entire market sold mid-grade spiritual elixirs, so the old man had no worries about his stock going unsold.

After the burly man left, Ye Qin approached the yellow-robed elder’s stall. Before the old man could speak, Ye Qin smiled and said, "I'm not here to buy elixirs. I actually want to sell you a small bottle of them. Name your price." He then presented a small vial.

The old man finally opened his sleepy eyes, glanced at the exquisite pill bottle, then assessed Ye Qin’s attire. His eyes brightened. A senior cultivator from the Qingdan Sect!

The old man quickly took the vial, opened it, sniffed the contents, and counted them—over forty pills in total. Surprise flashed across his face. "Exceedingly pure Huoyuan Pills, without a single flaw. Senior, I am willing to purchase these at the highest rate. Do you happen to have any more such elixirs? Give them all to me to sell; I will only take a five percent commission and guarantee their sale."

"No, that's all of it," Ye Qin shook his head.

As more cultivators flooded the city, the resulting disorder actually made it convenient for him to sell elixirs for spirit stones. No one would pay much attention to him, an ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivator, especially with his identity as a Qingdan Sect disciple, which deterred casual provocation.

As a Foundation Establishment disciple of the Qingdan Sect, and a "highly skilled Alchemist," it was perfectly normal for Ye Qin to purchase spiritual herbs in the market, refine them into mid-grade spiritual elixirs, and then sell them for spirit stones to support his cultivation. Many Qingdan Sect cultivators earned money this way.

But even though no one paid special attention to him, Ye Qin maintained an appropriate level of caution. Each time he sold mid-grade elixirs, the amount never exceeded one small bottle, and he sold them only to small vendors without any significant background.

Half of the low-grade spirit stones acquired were used, and the other half were stored away.

He would never engage in the sort of reckless behavior of dumping large quantities of elixirs to hoard spirit stones openly, advertising his wealth. Ye Qin firmly believed that with his current steady cultivation pace, he could break through to the Golden Core stage in less than ten years. He would never make a mistake born of base greed. He actively avoided anything that might draw excessive suspicion.

The yellow-robed old man was disappointed when Ye Qin said he had no more elixirs. Nevertheless, he promptly purchased Ye Qin’s small vial at a rate of forty-eight low-grade spirit stones per pill. This single transaction alone was profitable enough for him.

"That comes to nine hundred and twenty low-grade spirit stones," Ye Qin said after receiving the payment, nodding contentedly. However, he didn't leave immediately, instead striking up a conversation with the old man. "You trade frequently in the market; could you do me a small favor?"

"Please, Senior," the old man replied.

"I need seeds for some spiritual herbs. If you can find them, I will pay handsomely; you won't be at a loss."

The old man agreed without hesitation; business that made money was always welcome. He was familiar with many merchants in Lingwu City, so finding seeds would not be difficult.

Ye Qin quietly made various preparations within Lingwu City.

Matters required prioritization, and the most urgent was undoubtedly improving his cultivation base, which was the foundation of all strength.

Time flew, and a year passed in a flash. In this short span, Ye Qin advanced another layer, reaching the fifth level of Foundation Establishment. With another year or two, he would become a late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator.

Such a rapid pace of cultivation, during peaceful times, would have been a momentous event causing great joy among the sect's higher-ups. But amidst the tense warfare in the cultivation world, it was entirely overshadowed.

Furthermore, Ye Qin rarely had opportunities to meet the Qingdan Sect Master, elders, or other high-ranking cultivators. The missions he was occasionally sent on by the Lingwu Alliance were usually patrols alongside cultivators from other Lingwu sects whom he barely knew. Naturally, no one paid close attention to how quickly Ye Qin's cultivation was progressing.

The second priority was accumulating spiritual herb seeds.

During this period, besides accelerating his routine cultivation and subtly accumulating spirit stones, Ye Qin was engaged in a very important task: vigorously collecting all manner of spiritual herbs and their seeds.

Whether they were spiritual flowers, spiritual woods, spiritual bamboo, or spiritual grains—whether low-grade, first-tier herbs or rare, fifth or sixth-tier spiritual materials—if it was a medicinal herb, he collected it.

He transplanted the live herbs or their seeds onto his Purple Mansion Drifting Island.

He harbored a bad premonition.

With warfare intensifying across the major cultivation worlds, no one could predict what might happen in the future. In the worst-case scenario, even the Lingwu Cultivation World could be destroyed. If he didn't store these items now, finding them later might be impossible. Moreover, the formulas for the vast majority of spiritual elixirs relied on dozens, even hundreds, of spiritual herbs; missing just one made refinement impossible. During times of strife, even very common herbs became hard to locate. By stocking up on these common herbs in the Purple Mansion now, he would only need to summon them from within the Purple Mansion when he needed to refine elixirs later.

Take the "Jinjiedan" elixir, for example: besides requiring the extremely rare, eighth-tier Five Spirit Fruit, it also needed dozens of precious fifth and sixth-tier spiritual herbs as auxiliary ingredients. Without the auxiliary herbs, the Five Spirit Fruit alone was useless for refinement.

For this reason, Ye Qin ranked stocking various herb seeds as the second most important matter after his own cultivation—even more crucial than preparing magical artifacts for combat.

To stockpile a greater variety of spiritual herbs, Ye Qin returned to the Qingdan Sect before the warfare became too intense. After all, the Qingdan Sect possessed the greatest diversity of spiritual herbs in the entire Lingwu Cultivation World, numbering several thousand species, including most exotic and obscure varieties.

He flew his sword to the Qingdan Mountain Gate, landing at the courtyard located halfway up Qingquan Peak. Everything was as usual; the courtyard and its surroundings were spotlessly clean. The siblings Peng Yuan and Peng Dan had meticulously looked after his residence and herb garden for three years. Seeing Ye Qin return, they were overjoyed and presented him with the income statements from his estate during his three years away for his review.

Ye Qin then recalled that he was still receiving a stipend from the Qingdan Sect. Reviewing the accounts, he couldn't help but chuckle. Though not substantial, three years' accumulation amounted to over thirty mid-grade spirit stones—enough to purchase two or three low-grade magical artifacts.

He accepted these dozens of mid-grade spirit stones and then gave several hundred low-grade spirit stones to Peng Yuan, instructing him to purchase various spiritual herb seeds from the Qingdan Sect.

Even common spiritual herbs often required decades or a century to cultivate, making them extremely expensive. However, their seeds were far cheaper and easily acquired, drawing no special attention.

Ye Qin collected a set of every herb seed he could obtain. He even managed to acquire many seeds belonging to the spiritual herbs cultivated in the Qingdan Sect's grand medicinal garden, but only those of herbs ranked sixth tier or below. Spiritual herbs of the seventh or eighth tier and above were exceptionally rare within the Qingdan Sect, grown only in the private medicinal gardens of the various Golden Core Ancestors and protected by powerful formations, inaccessible even to Foundation Establishment disciples.

Ye Qin pondered this difficulty for a long time, realizing he couldn't obtain them, and had to give up.

After a half-year of dedicated effort gathering resources in Lingwu City and the Qingdan Sect, Ye Qin could not claim to have obtained every seed, but he possessed over ninety percent of the seeds for all common spiritual herbs available on the market, now stored within his Purple Mansion. For refining common elixirs such as healing pills, detoxification pills, or sustenance pills, Ye Qin had no worries about finding the necessary ingredients.

At this time, within the Niwan point between Ye Qin's eyebrows, on the gray rock spanning a mile across the endless Drifting Islands of the Purple Mansion, nearly every inch was planted with various spirit flowers and exotic grasses suitable for medicinal use. It resembled a misty, ethereal fairyland island floating in the clouds.

If this place were not in the endless void, where no other cultivator could see it, they would likely be rendered speechless by the spectacle.

This was because different spirit flowers and exotic grasses required distinct environments to survive. Water-elemental spiritual flowers needed areas rich in moisture, while fire-elemental spiritual grasses could only thrive where fire spiritual energy was abundant; they fundamentally could not exist in the same environment. Yet, on this single Purple Mansion Drifting Island, they all flourished perfectly. Ye Qin only needed to sprinkle spirit stones corresponding to the required elemental energy, and they would grow rapidly.

Amidst Ye Qin's intense preparations, the war finally began to spread near Lingwu City.

The military forces of dozens of cultivation sects from Tianqiong Plain and Wan Yue Lake, along with several sects from the Chaotic Lands, had already attacked the territory of the Nanliang Kingdom, which was extremely close to Lingwu City. The Nanliang Kingdom was heavily fortifying its positions, stockpiling various war materials in preparation for assaulting Lingwu City.

The Nanliang Kingdom was just on their doorstep, and the enemy cultivators had already forced their way to the city gates. The cultivators of the Lingwu Alliance were no longer silent. The major sects of the Lingwu Cultivation World were also heavily garrisoning Lingwu City, creating a standoff with the allied forces from Tianqiong Plain, Wan Yue Lake, and the Chaotic Lands.

Within Lingwu City, the seven major cultivation sects had each sent two Golden Core cultivators, adding three Golden Core cultivators from the Rogue Cultivator Alliance, and several others from smaller sects, bringing the total number of Golden Core cultivators in the city to nearly twenty. The Foundation Establishment cultivators numbered between seven and eight hundred, and Qi Refining cultivators exceeded a hundred thousand, pooling nearly half of the entire Lingwu Cultivation World’s strength.

However, the military force garrisoned in Lingwu City was still no match for the combined armies of the three major cultivation worlds: Tianqiong Plain, Wan Yue Lake, and the Chaotic Lands. Tianqiong Plain had mobilized over thirty Golden Core cultivators, Wan Yue Lake had brought over thirty, and the Chaotic Lands had sent the Golden Core-level Cult Master Wu Wei. The sheer number of Golden Core cultivators alone outnumbered those in Lingwu City by several times. The number of Foundation Establishment cultivators from the rogue factions also surpassed those in Lingwu City.

If not for the city's protective formation left by an ancient Nascent Soul cultivator—which was incredibly powerful—the cultivators from the allied forces would have already launched a massive assault into the city.