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Inevitably, every cultivator had to come into contact with the Divine Trade Association once they embarked on the journey of cultivation.
Take Lu Ye as an example. Not long after he arrived at the Spirit Creek Battlefield, he started buying and selling things in the Divine Trade Association. Although he could transact with the other cultivators, it wasn’t as convenient and secure as doing it in the Association.
Things would become troublesome when one couldn’t do business with the Divine Trade Association.
Weaker cultivators relied heavily on the Association. As such, their decision would cause tremendous trouble to the two Sects of Thousand Demon Ridge.
It had been a long time since anyone last caused a scene in the Association. To the cultivators of the current generation, the Association only seemed like a place where transactions happened. It wasn’t until this moment that the cultivators realized, in a way, it was a juggernaut that could rival Grand Sky Coalition or Thousand Demon Ridge.
Under normal circumstances, this juggernaut remained neutral, refraining from interfering in the battle between the two sides. However, if anyone broke the rules in its territory, it wouldn’t hesitate to reveal its fangs.
Moreover, compared to Grand Sky Coalition or Thousand Demon Ridge, this juggernaut had its unique advantages.
All sorts of rumors sprang into the cultivators’ minds, making them realize that those interesting rumors were not only hearsay. Those were things that had happened in the past.
Perhaps the incident that had happened this time would end up becoming another rumor to the next-generation cultivators in dozens of years’ time. Only the cultivators who had witnessed the incident knew it wasn’t just a rumor.
The resolution and ruthlessness of the Divine Trade Association when dealing with this matter surprised Lu Ye. He initially only intended to stall for time so that the strong cultivators of the Association would appear and save him from trouble.
After giving it some thought, he realized they might have felt it was a good chance to strengthen their authority. In that case, only ruthlessness would yield meaningful results.
Following this incident, no one would dare to make a fuss in the Association for a very long time.
As for getting their revenge, as long as the cultivators of the two Sects were not out of their minds, they wouldn’t want to retaliate against the Association.
After the storm was resolved, several servants of the Association came over and lugged the corpses away, then cleaned up the blood stains on the floor. Soon, the Sanctum of Providence became spotless again as if nothing had happened.
Only the metallic tang in the air reminded everyone that it wasn’t an illusion.
A moment later, the middle-aged cultivator said, “I’m sorry for the commotion, little friends.”
He was a Real Lake Realm Master, so he was definitely older and more powerful than all of them. It was reasonable for him to call these Cloud River Realm Masters ‘little friends’.
Then, he turned around and took a brief glance at Lu Ye before making to leave.
Following a moment of silence, the Sanctum was soon bustling with noise again.
Suddenly, Lu Ye recalled being hunted down by Dong Shu Ye on the Spirit Creek Battlefield. At that time, he was significantly weaker than the other party, so he had no choice but to seek refuge in the Divine Trade Association, where an old man from the Association helped him settle the issue.
His fluctuations of Spiritual Power showed that he was in the Ninth-Order Spirit Creek Realm, and a Ninth-Order Master was undoubtedly a formidable presence in the periphery of the Spirit Creek Battlefield.
However, as Lu Ye thought about it now, he wondered if the old man was indeed merely a Ninth-Order Master. Perhaps the old man was a Cloud River Realm Master or even a Real Lake Realm Master who disguised himself as a weaker cultivator. ʀ𝔞ℕ𝐨฿Εs
Lu Ye secretly told himself to be more careful when dealing with those of the Association in the future. Those people were blessed by the Heavens, so they might be more powerful than what they appeared in most circumstances.
He pushed these thoughts to the back of his mind and pressed his hand against the Divine Opportunity Column before connecting himself to the Vault of Providence.
He was lucky this time as there were more than ten Flames of Earthen Spirits, which were previously sold out.
A Flame of Earthen Spirits cost 200 Contribution Points. The item was expensive to Lu Ye in the past. After all, Contribution Points didn’t come easily. However, he found the price acceptable now. If not for the fact that there were no more in stock in the Vault of Providence, he would’ve bought more.
It required a lot of Mystic Flames like the Flames of Earthen Spirits to activate the Tree of Glyphs. Sometimes, Lu Ye couldn’t help but wonder what it would look like if all the leaves of the Tree of Glyphs were set ablaze.
Nonetheless, it was a goal that was extremely hard to achieve. Although he had ignited a lot of leaves so far, they accounted for only half of the total.
Having said that, he believed he would make the entire tree burn one day.
After he was done purchasing Flames of Earthen Spirits, he went on to buy some things that could be absorbed by the Tree of Glyphs but were not expensive, like Core Flames.
In the end, he spent around 10,000 Contribution Points.
The auction of Amulets was about to begin.
Just like the previous time, Lu Ye acquired an item that looked like a piece of jade that would allow him to take part in the auction. Wherever one was in the Divine Trade Association, he could sink his soul into a special space and participate in the auction.
Several minutes later, the cultivators, who attended the auction from different parts of the Association, opened their eyes with gloomy expressions.
For most people, it wasn’t their first time making bids in an auction. As such, they had a rough evaluation of the prices of the Amulets that came in different colors. An item wouldn’t be worth it if it exceeded ten per cent of its estimated price. After all, they didn’t get their Contribution Points for free. They had to get into life-and-death battles to get the Contribution Points, so every point was the result of their blood and sweat.
Apart from someone like Lu Ye, who was wealthy enough to squander his Contribution Points like they were worth nothing, the others were careful with their spending.
However, something had seemed off since the beginning of the auction.
An unscrupulous person directly raised the prices to a point where all other participants were unable to make a bid.
As such, this was probably the shortest auction of Amulets in history as it only took several minutes to conclude everything.
Meanwhile, Lu Ye returned the piece of jade to the Association and headed to his room.
Given his wealth now, it wasn’t challenging to partake in an auction with a group of Cloud River Realm Masters. He had acquired all the Amulets, from white to purple.
Unfortunately for him, there were not a lot of Amulets on auction this time. Only one Purple Amulet, two Blue Amulets, four Green Amulets, and nine White Amulets.
He thought that it was better than nothing.
Ever since his ascension to the Fifth Order in Fox Immortal Valley, he had been busy battling against those of Thousand Demon Ridge. Although he had never stopped cultivating, there wasn’t much progress.
The Amulets he had acquired this time were not enough to help him ascend to the Sixth Order, but they could save him some time.
Not long after he arrived at the Cloud River Battlefield, he came to the realization that the Cloud River Realm was a Realm where the cultivators could increase their powers quickly.
That was indeed the case. As long as a cultivator had enough Amulets, it wouldn’t take him a long time to go beyond the Cloud River Realm.
When he was on the Spirit Creek Battlefield back then, it would take him one to three months to move to the next Minor Realm. It was especially slow during the transition from the Eighth Order to the Ninth Order as it had taken him four months. Although he had been held up by many surprising events, his cultivation still wouldn’t progress rapidly even without those incidents. After all, he had to open up the Spiritual Points one by one.
On the other hand, even though it had only been six months since he arrived at the Cloud River Battlefield, he had made it to the Fifth Order.
Gui Yingzi’s cultivation speed could be considered fast, and he had arrived at the Cloud River Battlefield a few months earlier than Lu Ye, but he was only in the Third Order.
In comparison, Lu Ye’s progress was unimaginably rapid.
Certainly, he had gone through a lot of hardship during this period, so he supposed his hard work had paid off, after all.
Upon returning to his room, he saw Amber sound asleep and Yi Yi cultivating, so he didn’t disturb her.
He sat down somewhere and whipped out the Flames of Earthen Spirits and Core Flames he had just purchased before activating the Tree of Glyphs to devour them. At the same time, he observed the tree’s reaction closely.
He had been observing the Tree of Glyphs ever since he acquired it, so he had summarized some regular patterns.
During the process of devouring Mystic Flames, if there was only a leaf that lit up on the Tree of Glyphs, there probably wouldn’t be any surprises. The leaf likely bore the technique of weaving a Glyph. Certainly, there might be exceptions.
For example, a Glyph like Sharp Edge or Protection was borne by a single leaf.
If many leaves lit up at the same time, it would be an incredible Glyph.
Glyphs like Fire Phoenix, Wings, Aerial Lock, and Charm were found on more than one leaf because the process of building such Glyphs was complicated, so a single leaf couldn’t bear such complexity. As such, more leaves would be needed.
Furthermore, some Glyphs could only be activated after special Flames were consumed.
Back then, only after he made the Tree of Glyphs devour True Phoenix Flame did Fire Phoenix Glyph appear on the tree.
After he killed the Fox Mutant and let the tree consume her Core Flame, Charm Divine Glyph was activated.
Even though most of the Glyphs borne on the leaves were not complete, the techniques of weaving them were immensely useful to Lu Ye.
It was thanks to the techniques he had found on the Tree of Glyphs that his mastery of the Way of Glyphs surpassed that of the cultivators in the same Realm, and even Lady Yun was willing to give him some guidance.
More importantly, whenever he built a ward, he would need such techniques as well.
The Flames of Earthen Spirits and Core Flames he had spent 10,000 Contribution Points to purchase were soon fully consumed. Several leaves on the Tree of Glyphs were burning. Lu Ye inspected them and realized there were no new Glyphs.
He wasn’t disappointed, though. After all, he had mastered a sufficient amount of Glyphs, which were good enough for him to deal with most situations.
The only thing he could never get over was Void Glyph.
He was certain that there was a Void Glyph on the tree, but he couldn’t proactively activate it since he didn’t know where it was.
The more he came into contact with Void Glyph, the more he felt it had amazing uses. Unfortunately, it wasn’t activated on the Tree of Glyphs, so he was unable to put his ideas into action.
His speed and efficiency in building Void Glyph couldn’t help him verify his very creative ideas.
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