Chapter 4670 — The Division

There was no helping it—the Mystic Ascension stage and the Nascent Soul stage, together with all the realms before them, were separated by a gulf as vast as heaven from earth.

Nascent Soul or any realm below it: though the great majority of cultivators had formed the habit of breaking through by swallowing pills—a notion so deeply entrenched it had taken root in every heart—the truth was that with sufficient talent and sufficient willpower, every one of those realms could be crossed by natural means. In principle, no elixir was required at all.

The Mystic Ascension stage was another matter. As already noted, advancing to Mystic Ascension demanded two or more spiritual root attributes; only by fusing two kinds of attribute qi could one climb to the next level. That step, to be sure, was guarded by a towering threshold and monstrous difficulty, but in itself it was like every realm before it—no elixir was needed. The problem lay in what came after.

Once the two spiritual root attributes were woven together, they could draw down a lightning tribulation!

The lightning tribulation was a heavenly punishment—heaven's merciless erasure of those who defied the natural order. Which is to say that before the Mystic Ascension stage, even at a level as lofty as the Nascent Soul stage, one could only be called powerful, never heaven-defying. After all, a cultivator who had never weathered heavenly punishment had no business claiming to defy heaven.

And since it was a heavenly punishment, it was naturally no trifling thing; a master at the peak of Nascent Soul could not withstand it at all. Even the most monstrous of prodigies, if they wished to pass through the lightning tribulation alive, had no choice but to take a life-preserving pill—the Thunder Mystic Pill!

One might say that possessing a Thunder Mystic Pill was the same as holding a ticket through the gates of Mystic Ascension. It did not mean the gates would swing open before you, but at least it guaranteed that when you went to try pushing them, the gatekeeper would not kill you.

At this, Wei Zhao's heart stirred. Had the other party offered anything else, he might not have been interested, but the Thunder Mystic Vine happened to be exactly what he needed. Indeed, even without this expedition, he would soon have had to find a way to obtain it; better, then, to seize the chance and let the current carry the boat.

After all, the Thunder Mystic Vine was no less rare than the Infant Ginseng. Relying on himself alone, Wei Zhao would have struggled to dig up even a scrap of useful information, let alone actually lay hands on one.

"Fine, then. Once we find it, how do we split it?" Wei Zhao asked bluntly. Settling the division of spoils was the crucial precondition of any partnership; if they could not even agree on that, there was no point talking further—it would be a sheer waste of time.

"Three-seven," Huo Yudie blurted out without the slightest hesitation. Clearly she had already thought it through.

"You take three, I take seven?" Wei Zhao raised both eyebrows.

"How could it be!" Huo Yudie choked on her words. Faced with that matter-of-fact expression of his, she could only shake her head in exasperation. "You know perfectly well what I meant."

"Then we're done here." Without another word Wei Zhao turned to leave, as though the Thunder Mystic Vine were entirely dispensable to him—if it was not to be had, so be it. To think such a temptation could lure him into losing his footing was pure wishful thinking.

"Brother Wei Zhao..." Huo Yudie pouted, gazing at him with wide, liquid eyes. Her tone and manner were the very image of Han Jingyi's—plainly she had studied and copied them beforehand. After all, for a beauty like her, no man could possibly withstand the assault of her coquetry, unless he was no man at all.

At such a moment any other man would have been utterly bewitched; forget a three-seven split—he would have nodded without hesitation even at the prospect of doing her hard labor for nothing. Unfortunately, Wei Zhao was the exception.

"Save your breath. That doesn't work on me." Wei Zhao gave her a cold glance, his gaze carrying a distinct trace of impatience, even a hint of warning, which made Huo Yudie start in alarm and unconsciously clap a hand over her mouth. Hadn't her master said this trick worked a hundred times out of a hundred on men? How could it have failed?!

Huo Yudie could not help feeling uneasy, never suspecting that Wei Zhao was merely severe in appearance; in truth, something small and inexplicable had stirred in his heart, only he had masked it so well that no one could tell.

In the end, Huo Yudie's master had not been wrong: a beauty's coquetry worked on any man, especially when deployed by a peerless beauty like her. Even now, behind her veil, with nothing but a pair of bright, delicate eyes, she had plainly made Wei Zhao feel a stirring charm—only that his will was firm, and he had long since grown accustomed to beauties such as Han Jingyi.

This woman was absolutely a femme fatale of the highest order! Wei Zhao quietly put up his guard. If she were to remove her veil at this moment, he truly could not swear he would hold out; he might not lose his mind entirely, but once pity and tenderness took root, he might well yield to her without even realizing it.

"All right, then. To show my sincerity, I'll back down—four-six!" Seeing that Wei Zhao remained utterly unmoved, Huo Yudie had no choice but to concede. Inwardly she was speechless. Could what that Kang Jingming had said be true? Was this thing really a eunuch? Otherwise, why had her coquetry had not the slightest effect?

"Bye-bye." Wei Zhao's mouth curled, as though his patience were completely spent, and he at once quickened his pace to shake her off.

"What does that mean?" Huo Yudie was startled and hurried after him for several steps to ask.

"It means goodbye. If that's what you call sincerity, then there's nothing left for us to discuss." Wei Zhao spoke without turning his head.

At those words Huo Yudie stopped in her tracks, her expression shifting as she watched his receding back. A sense of helplessness welled up in her heart. How could this thing be so impervious to persuasion?

"Fifty-fifty! This is already an astronomical price, and my bottom line—not a penny more!" Huo Yudie said through gritted teeth, though her eyes held the resolve of a small vendor haggling over prices.

She was currently stuck at a bottleneck and urgently needed the Thunder Mystic Pill. If she let this chance slip, who knew where she would have to go, or how long she would have to wait, for the next Thunder Mystic Vine. Lingering too long at a bottleneck could drag a prodigy down into a waste; she could not afford the delay.

"Let's go with the three-seven you proposed earlier. Otherwise, no deal." Wei Zhao halted his steps, the corner of his mouth curving up ever so slightly. The three-seven he meant was of course to be turned around—she would take three, and he would take seven!

Though his impression of this girl had improved considerably, business was business. On a matter like this Wei Zhao would not be so foolish as to give ground. After all, the other party was nothing but a stranger he had never met. Wei Zhao's generosity was ever reserved for friends and his own people—he would never dole out charity to strangers, not even to a peerless beauty.

"What?!" Huo Yudie stared at Wei Zhao in disbelief. Had she not been veiled, her mouth could have fit a whole egg. How was this thing's brain put together? Clearly it was she who had proposed the partnership, and all the intelligence was known to her alone—and yet he still wanted the lion's share? And wanted it as though it were the most natural thing in the world? R1152