24: Chapter 24: The Helplessness of a Waste Spiritual Root

But immediately, that thought was dismissed by themselves.

"Just relying on that kid from the Scrap Yard with the Five Elements Trash Spiritual Root and at the Qi Condensation Second Layer?" Elder Chen Mo shook his head. "Does he have this strength? Does he have this guts? And can he get so many high-grade Talismans, executing a sword technique so fast that even Sun Hao couldn't see it clearly? Impossible, absolutely impossible."

"But... if not him, then who else could it be?" Chen Yin couldn't figure it out either, only feeling his chest pain even more.

This time, he truly suffered a crushing defeat, almost getting killed, losing so many treasures, and suffering severe damage to his cultivation.

"Forget it, let this matter be suppressed for now. Focus on recovering from your injuries; the Sect will investigate on its own. As for that Xiao Yuan..." A cold light flashed in Elder Chen Mo's eyes, "Regardless of whether it is him or not, keeping this kid around will ultimately be a disaster. Once you recover from your injuries, find an opportunity to completely get rid of him!"

A perfect frame-up instigated by Xiao Yuan caused the grandfather and grandson duo, Zhao Tianlei and Chen Yin, to tear into each other like dogs biting dogs, leaving both sides suffering heavy losses and filled with grievance, while temporarily shifting the greatest suspicion away from the "Trash" they should have suspected the most.

At this moment, Xiao Yuan, the director of this play, was in the Cultivation Room, taking Medicinal Pills to Cultivate.

Inside the Cultivation Room, flawless marrow cleansing pills were tossed into his mouth like jelly beans, and their pure medicinal power dissolved, propelling his cultivation to rise step by step.

Qi Condensation Fifth Layer... Peak of the Qi Condensation Fifth Layer...

"Crack!" A soft sound came from within his body, and the Breakthrough occurred!

Qi Condensation Sixth Layer!

"Not bad! Continue!" Full of drive, Xiao Yuan grabbed more Medicinal Pills and continued consuming them.

Qi Condensation Sixth Layer Early Stage... Middle Stage... Soon, it reached the Peak of the Qi Condensation Sixth Layer!

He was on the verge of charging at the Qi Condensation Seventh Layer, stepping into the threshold of the Qi Condensation Late Stage!

Xiao Yuan suddenly felt that something was wrong.

His Cultivation speed slowed down at a rate visible to the naked eye!

It was like a speeding sports car suddenly driving into a muddy country path; even with the accelerator pressed all the way down, the speed simply refused to go up.

Even though the medicinal power of the flawless Medicinal Pill was still surging, after entering his body, the effect was greatly discounted.

"What's the situation? Has the Medicinal Pill expired? That's not right. It's of flawless quality, not to mention having no medicinal toxins, and its shelf life should be very long..." Puzzled, Xiao Yuan stopped cultivating, began to introspect his own body, and checked carefully.

Upon checking, he was instantly dumbfounded.

He discovered that when the pure Wood-attribute Spiritual Qi absorbed by his main Cultivation Technique circulated within his body, unexpectedly, more than eighty percent of it inexplicably shunted away to the other four paths of his Spiritual Root!

And this shunted Spiritual Qi was like entering a bottomless pit; it neither enhanced the four Spiritual Veins in his Spiritual Root nor fed back into the Wood-attribute Spiritual Root, but instead... directly dissipated into various parts of his body, being wasted in vain!

This... Xiao Yuan was dumbstruck.

Calming his mind, he combined the sporadic records about the "Five Elements Trash Spiritual Root" in the original owner's memories and slowly analyzed them, finally figuring out the general principle.

If his body were compared to a bucket, the Spiritual Root would be the water inlet on the bucket wall.

A single-attribute root had one water inlet, while his five attributes were five water inlets.

It seemed like the Five Elements Spiritual Root took advantage, but previously when his cultivation was low, he desperately injected water from the "Wood-attribute water inlet". Although the other four openings were also leaking slightly, they leaked slowly, barely allowing him bit by bit to pile up his cultivation.

But now, with his cultivation reaching the Peak of the Qi Condensation Sixth Layer, the leakage speed of those four "water leakage openings" had obviously accelerated!

While he worked hard here to inject ten shares of Spiritual Qi from the Wood-attribute opening, at least over eight shares leaked away over there! The efficiency was infuriatingly low!

After all, one was injecting water, but four were leaking water!

No wonder everyone said that for a Five Elements Trash Spiritual Root wanting to achieve Foundation Establishment, it was as hard as ascending to heaven...

Xiao Yuan came to a sudden realization, and his heart turned icy cold.

The water needed during the Qi Condensation Stage was small, so he could rely on the 'water injection speed' to barely exceed the 'water leakage speed' and pile up his cultivation.

But upon reaching the Foundation Establishment Stage, the amount of water needed grew geometrically! With this water leakage speed, how many resources would it take to fill it? It simply couldn't be filled!

Even if he had the creation cauldron, it would probably still be tough!

Theoretically, there were two ways to solve this:

1. Block off the other four "water leakage openings" — Cultivate only a single attribute and abandon the other four attributes.

But this was nearly impossible. The Five Elements Spiritual Root is symbiotic as a whole. Relying just on his current self, he simply didn't have the ability to plug the leaks; even a Nascent Soul Cultivator wouldn't have this capability.

2. Turn the other four openings into "water inlets" as well — Cultivate the Five Elements simultaneously!

Cultivate all five Spiritual Roots together, injecting water into the "bucket" from five directions at the same time! Only in this way could the total injection volume far exceed the leakage volume, allowing his cultivation to grow continuously.

If resources were sufficient, the enhancement of his cultivation and the solidity of his Foundation would even far surpass other Spiritual Root Cultivators.

It's just that... cultivating the Five Elements simultaneously...?

Xiao Yuan's mouth twitched.

Wouldn't that mean he had to gather five main Cultivation Techniques of different attributes and practice all of them?

The cultivation difficulty and resource consumption would be directly multiplied by five?!

He seemed to see the future: others consumed one Medicinal Pill to advance a rank, but he had to consume five; others practiced one Cultivation Technique to Major Achievement, but he had to practice five... What kind of cultivation efficiency was this!

Truly worthy of being an epic-level Trash template, I yield...

Xiao Yuan sat on the ground listlessly, looking at the several hundred flawless marrow cleansing pills remaining before him, for the first time generating the thought of "how about I just lie flat and give up".

As for resources, with the creation cauldron, he didn't have to worry too much.

But this time cost was simply too terrifying! Others cultivated for one year, but he had to Cultivate for five years? How could this game even be played?

Feeling depressed for a good while, Xiao Yuan shook his head and cast aside his negative emotions.

No! He couldn't give up! At least... charge to the Qi Condensation Seventh Layer first and talk later!

If push came to shove, he would Cultivate all five attributes. Of course, if he could find a Cultivation Technique for cultivating the Five Elements simultaneously and unifying them into one, that would be perfect!

His gaze turned firm once again.

Between the Qi Condensation Late Stage and Middle Stage, there was a qualitative gap in strength!

First acquire the power to protect oneself, and then figure out a way to solve the problem of cultivating the Five Elements simultaneously!

There's always a way when things come to a head; with the creation cauldron around, maybe one day he could find a solution!

No sooner said than done! He once again transformed into a "pill-popping maniac"!

Flawless Medicinal Pills were stuffed into his mouth handful by handful, and a massive amount of medicinal power poured in. Although most of it was "stolen" and wasted by the other four attribute Spiritual Roots, the sheer quantity was large enough to make up for it!

Constant dropping wears away the stone, and an iron pestle can be ground into a needle!

Not knowing how many more Medicinal Pills were consumed, finally——

"Boom!"

A roar louder than before came from within his body. His Meridians seemed to have been widened by a circle, and both the total amount and purity of his Spiritual Qi leaped up a major step!

Qi Condensation Seventh Layer Early Stage! Officially stepping into the Qi Condensation Late Stage!

"Hoo... It's finally done!" Xiao Yuan let out a long breath, feeling his whole body filled with power, and his strength was more than a notch stronger than when he was at the Qi Condensation Sixth Layer!

He checked the remaining Medicinal Pills and instantly felt a pang of heartache.

The over eight hundred flawless marrow cleansing pills exchanged from the market had actually been consumed by more than half! Only over three hundred pieces were left!

"Several hundred flawless Medicinal Pills..." Xiao Yuan felt like crying without tears,