Chapter 90: Sparring – So You’re Lian Mu?

Lian Mu picked up the piece of fluorite. The room was a bit dark, and it was glowing faintly.

A corner had been chipped off the top of the fluorite—cut away by Xu Xianxing. Since then, its light at night had noticeably dimmed.

Lian Mu turned it over and saw a new crack from the fall earlier, making the glow even fainter.

She assumed Green Bean was just being mischievous again, shoved the stone back in place, and told it to settle down.

Wealth Bringer was already in contact with the extracted spirit armor. The flaming gold mixed with the melted golden beast spirit armor, forming a molten liquid, and thick fire-type spiritual energy radiated from the forge, carrying scorching heat.

Spirit tools involving fire always came with the risk of being injured during the forging process due to the violent nature of fire-elemental energy.

Even though Lian Mu had a fire spiritual root, she still couldn’t completely avoid injury. All she could do was endure and wait for the flaming gold and spirit armor to fuse.

She tried injecting spiritual power into the forge until the two materials fully integrated and no longer repelled each other.

Going by her instincts, she continued to add auxiliary materials. When her spiritual power was completely drained, her legs went weak, and she nearly collapsed.

A wave of dizziness hit her hard. Lian Mu braced against the wall as her vision dimmed.

But there was no time to rest. She quickly swallowed a few spirit-replenishing pills. Before they had time to take full effect, she forced herself to complete the final step—reshaping the sword.

She cut off the spiritual connection to the forge and retrieved the reforged Wealth Bringer.

Thanks to the new materials, it no longer retained its old bluish-green hue. The blade was now indigo, with a shimmer of scattered light at the tip that gave off a hint of coldness.

Lian Mu swallowed the last of her spirit-replenishing pills and tested the sword. Perhaps due to the new materials, it now felt more attuned to her than ever before.

She tried to resonate with it more deeply—and surprisingly, she faintly touched upon something.

Green Bean seized the opportunity to climb onto her and settled obediently on her shoulder.

Lian Mu examined the all-new Wealth Bringer for a while. An idea popped into her mind, and she took out the demon crystal knife to start modifying the hilt.

She carved a small pattern on the hilt—her most familiar flower, the begonia.

In her previous life, her Longevity Sword had also carried a begonia engraving. Though she wasn’t especially fond of flowers, years of swordplay had made her used to the feel of textured patterns against her palm.

Green Bean nudged her neck with its pincers.

Lian Mu guessed what it wanted. “You want to be carved on here too?”

Green Bean rubbed her with its pincers again.

“Alright then.” She thought for a moment about where to place it.

She hadn’t yet learned how to engrave onto the sword body—it’s far too easy to damage the weapon that way. As Xu Xianxing had said, only truly skilled master artisans would dare to add embellishments directly onto the body of a spirit weapon.

Instead, Lian Mu carved Green Bean’s image on another part of the hilt. She thought about it, then pulled out a few tiny red and green stones from her spatial pouch and embedded them in the carved grooves.

“You’ve stuck with me through a lot. We’ll be parting ways in a few days—this’ll be your little keepsake.”

Green Bean didn’t seem to understand. Once it saw that the engraving looked exactly like itself, it lay down and closed its eyes.

After tidying up the forge, it was already deep into the night. The streets outside were still lit, bustling with cultivators passing by.

She glanced out the window and saw a spiritual ore shop still open across the way. A large crowd had gathered, seemingly watching someone cut open a stone on the spot.

“Refined Jade of the Fifth Tier! Congratulations, young friend!!”

A wave of astonishment rippled through the crowd. The cultivators outside the shop buzzed with excited chatter.

This wasn’t the first time she’d heard someone strike it rich cutting a stone. That shop’s raw ore seemed to have a high probability of yielding refined jade—and of good quality, too.

Lian Mu also wanted refined jade to upgrade Wealth Bringer, but someone as broke as her wasn’t suited to gambling on stones. She couldn’t even afford a raw ore the size of an egg.

It was too late now. Maybe next time. She’d check another spiritual materials shop to see if they had refined jade ready for purchase.

She had to go back.

Lian Mu packed her spatial pouch, took out the bamboo token, pricked her finger, and activated the teleportation rune.

…

…

Azure Profound Sect, late night.

Disciples were still at the sparring grounds, not yet resting. They were still choosing opponents to duel. Students from different sects, dressed in various robes, mingled—giving the air a strange, tense edge.

Those with grudges between sects seized the chance to go after each other. No one held back.

Unsurprisingly, the Returning Immortal Sect disciples were the ones getting swarmed—from the front by Crimson Sky Sect and the rear by Clear Thought Sect. They’d been challenged all day.

Still, most of the targets were sword cultivators or body cultivators—both of whom loved to fight anyway—so they treated it as a kind of disguised training.

Wen Yun had a blast fighting all day. Most challengers were body cultivators from Crimson Sky Sect—not particularly talented and easy to beat. One move per fight was all he needed.

He knew the Crimson Sky disciples were doing it on purpose—trying to study his technique. But Wen Yun didn’t care. He wasn’t hiding anything and just grew more efficient with each duel.

Meanwhile, Baili Que had finally emerged. He was watching the sword and body cultivators spar but showed no interest in joining.

By contrast, the artifact refiners and alchemists had a much more peaceful vibe. They sipped tea and chatted, only arguing occasionally over refining techniques. Most of the time, it was tranquil.

Lian Mu, now in her new sect robes, headed for the sparring grounds just for fun. Her spiritual energy hadn’t fully recovered, so she didn’t plan to fight—just to pass the time and maybe enjoy the chaos.

During this period, none of the sect elders interfered with inter-disciple sparring. With Murong Yi not hovering over her, Lian Mu had no motivation to fight others. It wasted pills, earned no money, and didn’t teach her nearly as much as sparring with an elder.

But she had underestimated how much attention she was getting from the other sects. The moment she arrived at the sparring grounds, disciples from all four major sects turned to look at her, their expressions complex.

Lian Mu: “…”

A bad feeling crept in, though she kept a calm exterior. “Such diligent and hardworking fellow cultivators.”

By now, disciples from all the major sects knew who Lian Mu was. No one could’ve imagined that a triple-root cultivator would outperform geniuses with heavenly roots—becoming the first to gain fame both among peers and elders.

No one knew why, but whenever Lian Mu showed up, people couldn’t help watching her. Maybe it was her bizarre luck, or the fact that she liked flying around on a broom, or because she was a robe-snatching hooligan.

In short, she was just too weird.

Lian Mu was aware of her image in others’ eyes but had no intention of changing. She shamelessly embraced it, ignoring all the stares.

Baili Que walked up to her and said, “You don’t look so good—been holed up indoors too long?”

Lian Mu didn’t know how pale she looked. Her room had no mirror. She’d just returned from Feihai Pavilion, changed clothes, and rushed over.

She made up an excuse: “It’s nothing. Just a bit of acclimation issues. I’ll be fine in a couple days.”

Baili Que noticed how completely bloodless her face was and grew concerned.

“It’s really just acclimation,” Lian Mu said, then shifted topics: “Where’s Xu Xianxing? I have something to ask him.”

Baili Que replied lazily, “Probably loitering by the Pearl-Seeking Device again. He really likes that thing. But he might show up later.”

“Then I’ll wait here for him.”

Lian Mu sat down beside Baili Que. Another round of sparring had started in the arena. She glanced around—aside from the chief disciple of the Returning Immortal Sect, the chief disciples of the other three major sects were nowhere to be seen.

Wen Yun had already maxed out his sparring matches for the month. Bored, he ditched the crowd still lining up to challenge him and headed straight toward Lian Mu and Baili Que.

As soon as he left, the people from the Crimson Sky Sect looked displeased, and the Clear Thought Sect disciples were even more annoyed at the sight of those three. But since they couldn’t vent their frustration on the chief disciple group, they turned their attention to Lian Mu instead.

“So you’re Lian Mu? Come here, let’s have a match!”