A strange suction force permeated the air, and strands of spiritual energy were stripped from the heavens and earth.
Soon, a drop of pure liquid appeared at the bottom of the great cauldron.
The Samsara Divine Cauldron!
This thing was actually still inside his body.
Ling Fan was overjoyed.
He had thought he had lost this treasure after his rebirth.
"It can actually refine spiritual energy, that's great! Spiritual energy is what I lack the most at this stage."
Ling Fan swallowed the drop of liquid in one gulp. Instantly, a surge of pure spiritual energy spread throughout his body, greatly benefiting his frail physique!
"The Five Elements Meridian Opening Art requires absorbing spiritual energy of the five attributes: metal, wood, water, fire, and earth... Let's see if the Samsara Cauldron can refine attribute power."
Ling Fan found a steel longsword.
The Lan family's main industry was weapon forging, and this steel longsword was their flagship product. It was made from cyan phosphorus iron ore, which contained some metal attribute power.
As soon as the phantom image of the Samsara Divine Cauldron touched the steel longsword, he immediately saw the luster of the sword rapidly disappear, as if its essence had been stripped away.
At the same time, a small drop of green metallic liquid appeared at the bottom of the Samsara Cauldron.
"It really works!"
Ling Fan's eyes lit up.
With the Samsara Divine Cauldron refining metal attribute power, as long as he could find a large amount of metal materials, he would definitely be able to open up twelve metal meridians very quickly.
Coincidentally, the Lan family had no shortage of metal materials.
Ling Fan searched his memory. Behind the Lan family was a weapon workshop. In the past, he loved to hide there to sleep in during winter because there were many furnaces inside, and it was incredibly comfortable to sleep by the heat.
"Tsk, this useless thing wants to hide in our weapon workshop to sleep again!"
"You disgraced our Lan family yesterday, get lost, you're not welcome here."
"Go find somewhere else to lie down if you want to be a corpse!"
As soon as Ling Fan appeared, the artisans in the weapon workshop immediately put on stern faces and blocked his path.
"Who said I'm here to slack off and sleep."
Ling Fan said calmly.
The artisans taunted him mercilessly: "With your kind of ignorant and dissolute young master, what else can you do besides sneak in for warmth and sleep? Do you really think you're going in to learn weapon forging! Don't make me laugh."
Ling Fan sneered, "I, Ling, need to learn weapon forging? Ridiculous!"
In his previous life, as the strongest Heavenly Venerate of the Ten Great Heavenly Realms, he not only had extraordinary cultivation talent but also mastered all kinds of arts.
When it came to weapon forging, even Duobao Heavenly Venerate, who later became famous and was revered as the foremost artifact refiner in the Heavenly Realms, had sought his guidance.
His Heavenly Sword Qingyun, which ranked first among the Ten Great Divine Swords of the Heavenly Realms, was personally forged by him.
The so-called weapon forging masters of later generations were not even fit to carry his shoes.
Who would dare claim to be qualified to teach the Qingyun Emperor weapon forging?
However, those artisans were unaware of this and burst into laughter as if they had heard a great joke.
"This is hilarious! This waste has such a big mouth. I never knew the Lan family's useless son-in-law was also a hidden weapon forging master, hahahaha!"
"Let him in. I want to see what kind of joke he can pull!"
These artisans stared fiercely, seemingly trying to intimidate Ling Fan into showing fear and making a fool of himself.
However, to their slight disappointment, Ling Fan's expression remained calm, and he walked past them into the weapon workshop.
The weapon workshop was vast. The outermost area was the production zone for ordinary artisans.
The weapons produced here were mass-produced common goods.
The innermost area was the core zone where senior artisans forged exquisite weapons.
At this moment, the weapon workshop was filled with the clanging sounds of hammering. Burly men, with their chests bare and sweat pouring, were hammering weapons that were either nearing completion or already finished.
The ordinary weapons in the outer area used inferior materials, which Ling Fan naturally disdained.
Therefore, as soon as he entered, he headed straight for the innermost area.
Several rows of large display cabinets immediately caught Ling Fan's attention. They were piled with various rare metal ores that shimmered with metallic luster.
Ling Fan immediately walked over.
In his eyes, these raw metal materials were all spiritual liquids of the metal attribute.
"Son-in-law, what brings you here?"
A sturdy, honest middle-aged artisan with a square face glanced at Ling Fan and came forward to greet him.
This man was the supervisor of this Lan family weapon workshop and one of the most outstanding artisans in the Lan family, named Li Shan.
He came from a very poor background, but thanks to his considerable talent in weapon forging, he gradually rose from a laborer to the position of supervisor of the Lan family weapon workshop, thus changing his fate.
What was commendable was that despite his success, he had not picked up any bad habits and remained kind and courteous in his interactions with others.
Even towards Ling Fan, the useless son-in-law whom everyone looked down upon, he maintained the most basic respect.
This was also why Ling Fan used to like coming to the weapon workshop.
"I'm just here to look around,"
Ling Fan said with a slight smile.
Of course, he couldn't say that he was here to pilfer Li Shan's precious metal materials, or Li Shan would surely kick him out.
Li Shan assumed that Ling Fan was here to sleep as usual and said with a warm smile, "Then please, make yourself at home. I have some things to attend to. Just be careful not to hurt yourself, or it will be difficult for me to explain to the master and young lady."
After speaking, Li Shan left, leaving Ling Fan alone.
Ling Fan couldn't have asked for anything better. He walked quickly to the large shelves.
Taking a deep breath, the Samsara Divine Cauldron, now the size of a palm, landed in his hand. He touched the rare metal raw materials on the first row of shelves one by one.
A large piece of high-quality Xuan magnetic iron yielded dozens of drops of metallic spiritual liquid.
A piece of superior blood aluminum stone yielded another fifty or so drops.
Brass.
Water Cloud Gold.
...
After being refined by the Samsara Divine Cauldron, these raw ores immediately lost all their essence and turned into loose, stone-like substances.
"No, this is too obvious. Since there are plenty of materials here, I'll refine a portion of each."
Ling Fan consciously controlled himself from then on. Even so, the first row of shelves provided him with over a thousand drops of extremely pure metallic spiritual liquid.
With the spiritual liquid in hand, Ling Fan immediately found a secluded, deserted corner to begin cultivating.
He swallowed the spiritual liquid drop by drop, and it flowed along the meridians for opening the metal meridians...
...
Half a day passed in a flash.
After consuming these thousand-odd drops of golden spiritual liquid, Ling Fan had only managed to open five metal meridians.
This was mainly because the aptitude and root bone of this body were too poor, leading to significant waste of spiritual liquid.
But it didn't matter. If aptitude was lacking, resources would make up for it!
Ling Fan set his sights on the second row of cabinets...
Thus, three days passed.
During this time, Li Shan did not disturb Ling Fan, as Ling Fan used to be like this, capable of sleeping for three to five days without moving!
He slept more than a pig.
Li Shan himself was a workaholic. Once he started forging weapons, he would forget to eat and sleep, and had no time to bother with him.
...
While Ling Fan was secretly accomplishing great things in the weapon workshop.
Lan Tianxiong and his daughter Lan Xueyi had been quite troubled for the past two days.
In Jiangnan City, there was not only their weapon workshop but also the Jin family, their formidable rival.
Recently, the Jin family had invited a master craftsman from somewhere – Master Zheng, who was said to be the foremost person in forging mortal weapons below the Yellow Rank forging master!
After Master Zheng arrived, the quality of weapons produced by the Jin family had significantly improved.
Moreover, to monopolize the weapon market in Jiangnan City, the Jin family not only improved quality but also launched a big promotion. With this dual approach, the sales of the Jin family's weapon shop immediately surged.
As one declined and the other rose, the business of the Lan family weapon workshop naturally became sluggish.
If this continued, the Lan family would likely be completely squeezed out by the Jin family.