When Ding Yun left, she had captured a wisp of aura from the culprit. Upon returning, she immediately began performing rituals, using her mental power to cast a curse.
However, considering that she couldn't kill him instantly without attracting the attention of the Public Security Bureau, Ding Yun devised a very complex curse this time, with a considerable duration. In essence, it could be described as being plagued by a hundred illnesses, with no cure.
Specifically, the curse stipulated that starting from that day, every month, the target would contract a new illness, beginning with milder ailments and gradually progressing to chronic and severe conditions. One new illness per month, until the day of his eventual death.
Most importantly, during his periods of illness, no medicine could cure him. Even the most targeted remedies would be ineffective, acting like placebos.
Ding Yun felt that letting someone who sold fake medicine experience the torment of a hundred illnesses was the most fitting retribution.
To cast this curse, Ding Yun specifically chose an immortal artifact as its source. Theoretically, as long as no immortal-level cultivator assisted the fake medicine vendor in breaking the curse, he was destined to die of a hundred illnesses, with no one able to save him.
Given the current state of spiritual energy recovery, even cultivators at the Nascent Soul stage struggled, so where would they find immortals to help?
Therefore, this matter was considered settled, definitively.
Unrecoverable, that's how settled it was.
However, to prevent the news from leaking, Ding Yun did not inform her relatives about the details. She simply told them that the culprit had been apprehended and the money would be recovered soon, thus concluding the matter. She then continued to improve her cultivation and assist her family members in doing the same.
For those with poor aptitude, she improved their innate potential; for those with weak foundations, she provided elixirs; and for those with shallow cultivation, she expounded on the Dao, patching up any shortcomings.
She easily helped them raise their cultivation levels.
Furthermore, Ding Yun arranged for the cultivation of the four arts.
She insisted that each of them choose one to specialize in.
Alchemy, artifact forging, talisman crafting, and array formations were the primary means by which cultivators earned money. Their family could not remain low-key forever. While they could afford to be discreet at the Foundation Establishment stage, it would be impossible to do so at the Golden Core or Nascent Soul stages.
Therefore, having each of them learn a craft would provide them with several overt means of income in the future. It was common knowledge that alchemy, artifact forging, talisman crafting, and array formations were lucrative trades. Once they mastered these skills, displaying some wealth and a slightly improved cultivation would make everything seem much more natural.
However, compared to the improvement of cultivation, these pure technical skills required time for slow learning and accumulation of experience.
Thus, their learning and mastery speed was slow, especially for the two who still had to work their regular jobs, their progress even slower due to limited free time.
But there was nothing Ding Yun could do to accelerate this.
She could only let them improve at their own pace.
Compared to the difficulty of teaching disciples, Ding Yun's own cultivation progressed much more smoothly. After all, it wasn't her first time cultivating; improving her cultivation was a familiar process. The only troublesome aspect was the tribulation required for breaking through to the Golden Core and Nascent Soul stages.
It wasn't that Ding Yun feared failing the tribulation, but rather she was concerned about the immense commotion it would cause, potentially revealing her presence to others.
To mitigate this, she meticulously chose the time and place. It was only after considerable effort that she managed to cross the Golden Core tribulation on a stormy day in a deserted canyon. Later, on another stormy day, she crossed the Nascent Soul tribulation on a remote, uninhabited island. After each tribulation, she quickly departed.
This barely managed to ensure her secrecy.
She was not discovered by the authorities.
With Ding Yun successfully breaking through to the Nascent Soul stage and stabilizing her cultivation, she undoubtedly possessed the ability to survive in space for short periods. This also meant she could enter space and activate her mecha.
Therefore, the day after stabilizing her cultivation, Ding Yun informed her family that her cultivation had recovered significantly and she was going to retrieve another part of her inheritance. She mentioned she might be away for the next three days and asked them to cover for her. With that, she left the residential area in a hurry.
Finding a secluded spot, she quickly erected numerous talismans and formations on herself to conceal satellite signals and the like, before breaking free of gravity and ascending into space.
She left the stratosphere and broke through the atmosphere.
However, she didn't travel too far. She only went as far as the shadowed side of the moon, an area not covered by satellite signals, and stopped. After all, the Nascent Soul stage wasn't exceptionally powerful. Traveling too far could result in her being unable to fly back. Besides, she only needed a secluded place to retrieve and activate her mecha.
The shadowed side of the moon was vast enough for her needs.
Why travel far and exert herself needlessly?
Upon arriving, Ding Yun quickly retrieved her super divine antimatter mecha, which stood tens of thousands of meters tall, and initiated the activation sequence. She imprinted her mental power to claim ownership and, concurrently, began to understand the specific functions and capabilities of this super divine mecha.
As for the final results, they were exceptionally optimistic.
This mecha truly lived up to its name. When its energy reserves were sufficient, it could perform spatial jumps and teleportation at will. The mecha also came with a storage space of tens of millions of cubic meters. These were merely the most basic applications for daily life. The true power of this mecha lay in its offensive capabilities.
Again, with ample energy, as long as the user's combat consciousness wasn't exceptionally poor, it could easily destroy interstellar weapons at the star-destroyer level.
Furthermore, the mecha was equipped with an antimatter energy cannon.
A single shot from it could obliterate an ordinary planet.
In short, with this mecha, Ding Yun could, in minutes, hold the entire human race hostage or threaten them.
Gaining influence would be effortless.
However, Ding Yun wasn't that cruel. She felt that possessing this mecha was overkill for her current needs. She didn't need to destroy planets or engage in interstellar warfare. But since she had come this far and obtained the item, it would be a shame not to use it.
Thus, Ding Yun eventually entered the mecha.
And then she began mining everywhere.
That's right, mining. She had told her family she was going to retrieve another part of her inheritance from her past life. How could she return without a gift? Moreover, her soul space couldn't only receive and not give. Using the super divine mecha to mine some high-grade minerals to bring back was definitely a good option.
So, for the following few days.
Ding Yun traversed the entire galaxy.
At one moment, she appeared near two merging neutron stars, taking the opportunity to collect millions of tons of heavy metals ejected during their collision.
For example, gold, platinum, and primordial gold.
At another moment, she appeared near a white dwarf, excavating celestial crystals comparable to top-grade spirit stones from it.
With the ability of spatial jumps, the resources in the universe were truly abundant. Whether it was the core of a dead planet, extreme ice crystals within an ice planet comparable to eternal cold jade, Taiyi gold, Ziji profound iron, or even solar gold, finding a single piece would weigh at least several hundred to a thousand catties.
Scraping a fingernail-sized patch of earth from a neutron star.
Its weight would exceed hundreds of thousands of tons.
Such material could easily be used to forge a magic artifact comparable to, or even superior to, the Heaven-Turning Seal.
Truly, Ding Yun found it difficult to tear herself away.