Time flew by, and thirteen years passed.
Li Mu's life on Yue Qiong Peak was uneventful, with no major changes.
Every day, besides tending to the spiritual plants, he would refine artifacts, craft talismans, or create Puppets, occasionally researching brewing or preparing spiritual meals. Roughly every half month, he would take Xiaojin and Xiaowa out to hunt Yao Beasts for food. Occasionally, Li Mu would personally take action, battling Yao Beasts to test his combat prowess.
As time flowed, spiritual plants matured and were harvested batch after batch. Li Mu gained a massive amount of free proficiency points, successively raising high-grade Cultivation Techniques like Nebula Meditation - Gathering Spirit Chapter, Mystic Iron Sword Formation - Basic Chapter, Spirit Devouring Body Nourishing Art, Spirit Control Contract, and others to max level.
Although his cultivation had not yet achieved a Breakthrough to Golden Core, his strength had undergone earth-shattering improvements.
Li Mu's Divine Sense became incredibly powerful, making it extremely easy to simultaneously control multiple Fourth Rank Spiritual Artifact swords and set up sword Formations. His combat power increased by tens, even hundreds of times.
If he went all out, dealing with Fourth Rank Yao Beasts was no problem, and even against a Late Stage Golden Core Cultivator, Li Mu was confident he could fight him.
With the Perfection of Nebula Meditation - Gathering Spirit Chapter, Li Mu comprehended a new Divine Sense Divine Ability - Star Soul Domain Transformation. At the same time, a new chapter appeared for the Star Cloud Contemplation Method: Star Cloud Visualization Art-Star God Chapter.
The Star Cloud Visualization Art-Star God Chapter, like the Yin Yang Five Elements Scripture, requires other spiritual items for supplementary cultivation to raise its Rank. It needs a spiritual item called star source to continue improving the Cultivation Technique's Rank.
Li Mu searched for a long time but found nothing regarding which spiritual plant could provide this star source attribute, so he could only put it aside for now.
The Perfection of Nebula Meditation - Gathering Spirit Chapter had already brought the qualitative change and enhancement of his Divine Soul to an extremely high level, and Li Mu was already very content.
Similar to the Star Cloud Contemplation Method, after the Profound Heaven Sword Formation - Basic Chapter was raised to max level, a new chapter also appeared: Profound Heaven Sword Formation - Grand Profound Sword Formation Chapter. After being raised to max level, three new sword Formations successively appeared: Profound Heaven Sword Formation, Heaven Suppressing Sword Formation, and Grand Profound Myriad Sword Formation.
The Spiritual Artifact swords required for setting up these sword Formations are: one thousand, three thousand, and ten thousand, respectively.
Relying on his powerful Divine Sense, Li Mu could barely use the first Profound Heaven Sword Formation. As for the latter two sword Formations, he would likely need to advance to Golden Core cultivation or raise Star Cloud Visualization Art-Star God Chapter to max level to make it possible.
Yue Qiong Peak was enveloped in dense Spiritual Qi. In the mountains, in the pools, in the golden Superior Spiritual Fields... various birds, spiritual fish, and mountain beasts all appeared incredibly vibrant and unreal, for they were all Spiritual Artifacts capable of forming spirits.
Over thirteen years, although Li Mu had always kept a low profile, with his powerful Artifact Refining skills, he had refined at least eight hundred, if not a thousand, Fourth Rank Spiritual Artifact swords for the Qingxuan Sect, in addition to the Spiritual Artifacts refined for the Wanbao Pavilion.
Over time, Li Mu easily gathered the one thousand Spiritual Artifact swords needed to set up the Profound Heaven Sword Formation. Moreover, a portion of them, over three hundred, were Fourth Rank Spiritual Artifact swords with artifact spirits, accumulating a vast fortune.
More importantly, as time passed, a batch of High Grade spiritual plants that Li Mu had focused on nurturing was about to enter their harvest season.
First, in the ten mu of Superior Spiritual Field where the Gold Essence Formation was set up, Three-Tier Golden Sword Grass stood like long swords in the field, radiating golden light and exuding agile Sword Qi.
In the spiritual water pool where mountain springs gathered, white lotuses bloomed on the surface, and at the clear bottom of the pool, Three-Tier Jade Pure Green Lotus was also about to mature.
Li Mu waved his hand, recalling the seven or eight Fourth Rank Gold-element Spiritual Artifact swords patrolling within the Gold Essence Formation.
He then sent out a surge of Origin Qi, which entered the Gold Essence Formation, stopping the Formation that had been maintained for nearly fifteen years.
The Gold Essence Formation flashed and disappeared. The ten mu of gold sword grass simultaneously revealed their 'sword glows,' sensing the environmental anomaly and releasing an aura of 'danger.'
Li Mu chuckled, "They're quite spirited. However, I've nurtured them for fifteen years; now it's time for them to repay me."
golden origin gathered in Li Mu's hand, and streams of Gold Blade Technique flew out, striking the ten mu of gold sword grass.
"Puff, puff..." A series of heavy collision sounds rang out as more than a dozen Gold Blade Technique strikes entered the gold sword grass spiritual field one by one, barely harvesting less than half a mu of gold sword grass before losing their momentum.
The Three-Tier Golden Sword Grass plants had grown in the Gold Essence Formation for a long time, making their root systems as hard as red gold and Mystic Iron. The quantity harvested by the Gold Blade Technique was extremely limited.
Instead of being surprised, Li Mu was delighted. As the Gold Blade Technique harvested, clusters of golden spiritual plant light groups emerged from the half mu of gold sword grass, incredibly dazzling.
Li Mu's Divine Sense swept over, and clusters of golden Plant Spirit light groups flew into his body.
"Heavenly Talent - Plant Spirit Absorption takes effect. You absorbed a cluster of Plant Spirit. Innate golden origin Qi +23, Sword Qi Power +7."
"Heavenly Talent - Plant Spirit Absorption takes effect. You absorbed a cluster of Plant Spirit. Innate golden origin Qi +18, Sword Qi Power +5."
...
Thousands of golden light clusters entered his body, and Li Mu immediately felt a significant increase in the Gold-element portion of his Five Elements Spiritual Power. Subsequently, as gold generates water, water generates wood, and so on, the purity of all Five Elements Spiritual Power underwent a transformation. The overall increase in Five Elements Spiritual Power decreased as a result, but his cultivation, which had not seen a Breakthrough for a long time, now subtly seemed on the verge of breaking through to the next layer.
Li Mu was overjoyed and immediately thought about how to verify the Sword Qi Power.
Li Mu brought his two fingers together, skillfully employing Finger Flicking Force to unleash a golden Sword Qi.
With a "ding" sound, a stream of Sword Qi shot out, sharply piercing a blue rock and creating a small hole over a foot deep.
Li Mu was overjoyed. The Sword Qi Power had truly increased, and the extent of the power boost was not small.
Looking at the remaining nine and a half mu of gold sword grass, Li Mu's eyes glowed, and he continued to gather spiritual origin and cast the Gold Blade Technique.
"Puff puff puff..." Streams of Gold Blade Technique, as if they cost nothing, flew towards the ten mu of Three-Tier Golden Sword Grass, furiously harvesting the gold sword grass.
Soon, clusters of golden spiritual plant light groups swarmed towards Li Mu.
"Heavenly Talent - Plant Spirit Absorption takes effect. You absorbed a cluster of Plant Spirit. Innate golden origin Qi +19, Sword Qi Power +7."
...
"Ding, the quality of your Five Elements Spiritual Power has improved. Your cultivation has increased to: Foundation Establishment Third Layer."
"Heavenly Talent - Plant Spirit Absorption takes effect. You absorbed a cluster of Plant Spirit. Innate golden origin Qi +23, Sword Qi Power +5."
...
"Ding, the quality of your Five Elements Spiritual Power has improved. Your cultivation has increased to: Foundation Establishment Fourth Layer."
...
Soon, the harvesting of the ten mu of gold sword grass was complete. Li Mu's cultivation had risen to Foundation Establishment Sixth Layer, his Five Elements Spiritual Power Origin Qi had become four to five times denser, and the strength of his Five Elements Spiritual Power and Sword Qi Power had received a significant boost.
"Excellent! As expected of Three-Tier spiritual plants, this enhancement effect is outstanding!" Li Mu was overjoyed, somewhat regretting not planting more.
Although the growth period for gold sword grass was a bit long, the enhancement effect was outstanding. The Plant Spirit light groups could directly improve the quality of Gold-element Spiritual Power, thereby driving the Five Elements Spiritual Power and indirectly increasing cultivation.
Feeling the abundant and dense Five Elements Spiritual Power within him, Li Mu was incredibly invigorated. He then realized he had fallen into a misconception: Yin and Yang Qi were used to raise the Rank of the Yin Yang Five Elements Scripture, which did not mean he couldn't continue to improve his cultivation using other attributes of spiritual plants.
However, while cultivation could indeed be improved with spiritual plants, forming a Golden Core was still most suitable by relying on the Rank advancement of the Yin Yang Five Elements Scripture.
The attributes enhanced by gold sword grass were far more useful than those from other Three-Tier spiritual plants.
During this period, several other Three-Tier spiritual plants matured successively.
After harvesting them, Li Mu gained some attributes that he wasn't sure were useful or not. For example, Three-Tier Heavenly Vein Fruit's Plant Spirit light groups increased Meridian strength; Three-Tier Illusionary Spirit Grass's Plant Spirit light groups increased Divine Soul will; and Three-Tier Qingxu Spirit Tea's Plant Spirit light groups increased a portion of Divine Soul strength and a portion of Divine Soul resistance.
In short, comparatively, Li Mu still preferred gold sword grass, a spiritual plant that could improve the quality of Spiritual Power and increase cultivation.
After harvesting the gold sword grass, Li Mu gathered them. Three-Tier Golden Sword Grass is one of the main ingredients for refining Gold Vein Pill and could sell for a good amount of Spirit Stones. However, Li Mu was too lazy to sell them. Instead, Xiaojin would probably like them; he could give them to him as a snack to grind his teeth.