Qing Jun told him, “I know what you want to say: it’s said that the Fourth Grand Master had entered the Pure Land, how come there are any skeleton left? Nonetheless, what I know is that, for tens of thousands of years, none of the cultivators had been transformed to deity, not a single one of them. You were born with great wisdom and had cleared five of the six sense bases. If you can get over the one and only tribulation in your life, perhaps you will have the chance to be the first Buddhist Cultivator who enters the Pure Land over the past thousands of years.”
Fo Zi bowed with gratitude, “Thank you for informing me.”
Qing Jun waved his hand and took a seat, serving himself a cup of tea.
Fo Zi didn’t ask Luo Jianqing where he got such an intimidating Item Soul, instead, he was sunk into his own thoughts. When there were only several items left for bidding, the auction almost came to an end. Luo Jianqing asked his friend, “Fo Zi, Qing Jun mentioned that you need to overcome a tribulation…?”
“That’s true. Nine years ago, my destiny has changed abruptly overnight. I once cleared all my six roots of sense bases, but, the day after that night, my Master foresaw a tribulation befalling me. However, I don’t really consider it a bad thing. I won’t be able to ferry myself through the vast sea of mortal vanity without getting over the tribulation. There is no way to ferry over the ocean when your boat is not even touching the sea. Therefore, I’m not taking it as a big deal.”
Luo Jianqing frowned subtly, “Nine years ago…”
Luo Jianqing was sensitive to this number. Nine years ago, Li Xiuchen came to Tai Hua Mountain and became an inner-door disciple; nine years ago, he woke up and found that he was reincarnated. Besides, he never heard anything about the tribulation of Fo Zi in his last life. Could it be another triggered change?
It was hard to tell.
The last item of today’s auction was finally revealed – a broken sword. When the mutilated sword was presented, Luo Jianqing suddenly shivered and sensed a colossal amount of willpower from his Interspatial Ring.
So, this is it, he thought, the other half of the broken sword which he reaped from Wan Shou Mountain.
Several Months ago when Luo Jianiqng followed Li Xiuchen to the battle field of Qing Jun and the Demon Beast, he plundered every valuable items left on the field before Li Xiuchen even woke up. That was how he got a half of the sword. Even though the sword was broken, it still contained coercion as powerful as a Heaven-level magic item. Therefore, there was no doubt that the sword would be a high-grade Heaven-level magic item after the re-forging!
Luo Jianqing’s own sword, Floating Frost Sword, was only a Superior-grade Earth-level item, while this broken sword was three grades higher than it.
Among all the magic items that Luo Jianqign saw in his life, except Xuan Lingzi’s sword, none of the item could match with this broken sword. Xuan Ling Sword was a Superior-grade Heaven-level item which was cultivated by Xuan Lingzi’s Primordial Life for three hundred years. Undoubtedly, Xuan Ling Sword could strengthen the sword-holder’s power, endowing the holder with the ability to kill a cultivator even if the cultivator achieved higher cultivation base than the sword-holder.
For instance, it enabled a late-stage Foundation Establishment Period cultivator to pierce through a late-stage Gold Core Period cultivator’s heart.
When the memory was recalled, Luo Jianqing could now face it with calmness. His internal demon had been conquered.
On the platform, the auctioneer was advertising the item, “Though there is only half of the sword, this broken piece is still a Heaven-level magic item! As you all know, the Heaven-level item would be imprinted with its previous owner’s insight towards the records. The original owner of this broken sword was probably a Deity Transformation Period cultivator. The reserve price is five hundred thousand with an increment of fifty thousand by each bid!”
As a Heaven-level item, five hundred thousand was nothing. If the sword wasn’t broken, there wouldn’t be any issue to raise the reserve price to five million. Soon, many bidders raised their bid card, “Five hundred and fifty thousand”, “Six hundred thousand”, “Seven hundred thousand”.
However, some doubting voice could be heard over the babble of voices, “A broken Heaven-level sword might influence our insight of record. Sounds so easy to get Qi Deviation.”
“You are right. After all, this is a broken sword. What should we do if we lose the rein while cultivating with it?”
The auction for this Heaven-level item was far less popular than the auctioneer thought it would be, but before he decided to put in all his efforts to catch the bidders’ attention on this sword, Li Xiuchen raised his bidder card, “Nine hundred thousand!”
He added two hundred thousand more than the last highest price!
Many were shocked by his bid and gave up bidding. Seeing the auction house was silenced, Luo Jianqing smiled subtly, about to call out the price. However, an unexpected voice came out of the box next to Luo Jianqing’s, “One million!”
Shocked, Li Xiuchen clenched his teeth, “One point one million!”
He didn’t have that much in his pocket right now, but Li Xiuchen decided to sell some of his belongings. Although he didn’t get the other half of the broken sword at the Wan Shou Mountain, he still believed that it wouldn’t be destroyed accidentally – it must have been dropped somewhere on the mountain range. He deemed that as long as he got this half from the auction, there was a great chance for him to find the other half using the interaction between the two pieces of the sword!
The bidder sitting in the box let out a pleasant laughter, “One point two million.”
Li Xiuchen insisted, “One… one point two five million.”
Compared to his trembling voice, the laughing of the other bidder sounded much more confident, “One point five million, then.”
This bidding set the auction on fire.
A piece of the broken sword was offered a bidding of one point five million! This was totally unheard of!
Li Xiuchen could do nothing but give up the bidding. He clenched his teeth and kept glaring at two boxes located on the second floor – one was Luo Jianqing and Fo Zi’s box, because Luo Jianqing almost snatched away everything that Li Xiuchen tried to bid for. The other one was the box set next to theirs, given that the owner of the box eliminated every bit of hope for Li Xiuchen to get the broken sword.
Hearing the offer, the auctioneer was super excited, he chanted for the bidding to close, “One point five million going once, one point five million going twice, one…”
Luo Jianqing called out the bid, “Two million.”
The whole crowd became quiet. The auction house was now tranquil enough even to hear the sound of a needle dropping on the ground.
The next moment, an enraged voice came out of the next box, “Two point five million!”
“Three million.”
“Four million!”
Luo Jianqing smiled, “Five million.”
Bang!
Suddenly, from the next box came the sound of breaking furniture, as if something had been overthrown. The bidder called out fiercely, “Six million!”, then added a threat, “Who the hell are you?! How dare you bid the item against a woman like me? Are you out of your mind?!”
Luo Jianqing was surprised to hear these words. He turned back to look at Fo Zi.
The monk was looking at him in astonishment as well. Eyes meeting in the air, they both smiled.
And then Luo Jianqing raised the bid again, “Eight million.”
Yun Xiang who was sitting in the box next to theirs was shocked, “How dare you!”. After struggling a while, she called out, “Ten million!”
Fo Zi lowered his voice to persuade Luo Jianqing, “Amitabha, Cultivator Luo, why are you bullying a girl?”
Luo Jianqing looked at Fo Zi innocently, “Fo Zi, actually eight million is the highest bid I can offer. I only have nine million Spiritual Stones left in my pocket.” He didn’t tell Fo Zi the other half of the sentence: half of the nine million Spiritual Stones were his Master’s.
Since both of them had confessed their love to each other, Xuan Lingzi gave Luo Jianqing his Interspatial Ring when Luo Jianqing was about to leave. Luo Jianqing found it a little bit weird to take away his lover’s whole possessions with him, so he only took five million Spiritual Stones. A fair amount, right? But Xuan Lingzi didn’t think so, obviously. He was worried that Luo Jianqing wouldn’t have enough money to spend.