"No comment."

Hearing the richly dressed young man ask for his name, Su Xuan just shrugged.

"Very well. Just you wait, we'll meet again!"

Interpreting Su Xuan's gesture as disdain, the young man glared at him coldly before following his cousin away.

"Hahaha, I've broken through! I've broken through!"

At that moment, the person sitting on the ground suddenly leaped up and began shouting like a madman. The cultivation fluctuations rippling from his body were clearly at the Mid Heaven Severing Stage—he had indeed made a breakthrough!

The people around cast envious glances his way. This level of cultivation was considered middle-tier among the cultivators in the city. However, they only envied his new realm, not the method he used to achieve it. His breakthrough method was far too dangerous and could easily lead to cultivation deviation.

"Brother, thank you so much!"

The man suddenly faced Su Xuan and bowed deeply with respect. If Su Xuan hadn't held back the richly dressed youth, the consequences would have been dire had he been moved! In a sense, Su Xuan had saved his life!

"Don't mention it."

Su Xuan replied indifferently. He had acted mainly for his own reasons; helping the man was merely incidental.

"My name is Bai Jianyuan," the man introduced himself, then added, "Brother, may I have your name? I will surely repay this favor in the future!"

"Su Xuan."

This time, Su Xuan told him his name without hesitation.

"Brother Su, I just had my breakthrough and need to return home immediately to stabilize my cultivation. Wait for me; I'll find you for a drink!"

After saying this, the man hurried away. He no longer needed to exchange for Moon Profound Stones to boost his cultivation. He wasn't worried about being unable to find Su Xuan, as the Golden-scaled Crocodile was too conspicuous and served as a perfect marker.

"Young Master, please follow me!"

The Money Exchange Shopkeeper then led Su Xuan, who was now first in line, into the establishment. The obedient Golden-scaled Crocodile waited outside for him.

"Young Master, the person you had a disagreement with just now is from the Ge Family. His name is Ge Yuzhe." The shopkeeper led Su Xuan to a tea room and spoke gravely. "He is quite extreme in his methods and has gained some... notoriety in the city. I advise you to leave the city as soon as your business is concluded and avoid any conflict with him. His family owns many shops and is quite powerful. Moreover, they are on good terms with the Su Family."

He advised Su Xuan this way because he assumed he was also from an influential family. He feared that if Su Xuan clashed with Ge Yuzhe over the incident, the money exchange would be dragged into it, especially since it occurred right at their entrance.

"Understood."

Su Xuan didn't take the matter to heart at all. He had seen plenty of people like Ge Yuzhe in the world below the mountains, and he felt that arguing with such individuals would only lower his own character.

"Then, Young Master, how many Moon Profound Stones would you like to exchange?"

Seeing Su Xuan empty-handed, the old shopkeeper assumed he was there to exchange Moon Profound Stones for something else.

"I'm not here to exchange Moon Profound Stones," Su Xuan said. "I'm here to exchange for Profound Tickets."

"Ah?" The old shopkeeper was momentarily stunned. "Then how many Profound Tickets would you like to exchange for? Are your Moon Profound Stones... going to be delivered soon?"

"Sir, I've come to the city this time to request pills from Xie Cheng, the Third Elder of the Nine Cauldrons Sect," Su Xuan inquired. "Do you know what his usual fees are?"

The ten thousand Profound Tickets are just the fee to get an audience with Xie Cheng. Asking him to actually concoct pills will surely be another considerable expense.

"That's hard to say," the old shopkeeper pondered, stroking his beard. "It depends on the kind of pills you need. It could be as little as thirty to fifty thousand Moon Profound Stones, but for more complex ones, there's no upper limit. It could be one hundred thousand, two hundred thousand... If the pill is exceptionally rare, it might even be over a million."

"In that case, I'll exchange one million Moon Profound Stones," Su Xuan stated calmly, without a second thought.

"Ah?" The old shopkeeper was flabbergasted.

A million Moon Profound Stones is no small sum. In the entirety of Hua Shui City, you could count on one hand the number of people who could produce a million Moon Profound Stones at once. And here Su Xuan was, wanting to exchange for a million in Profound Tickets so casually?

"Then... when will your Moon Profound Stones be delivered?" the old shopkeeper asked, his tone becoming more deferential. He had to be humble, as he was now increasingly certain that Su Xuan had an extraordinary background.

"Right now," Su Xuan said mysteriously. "I must ask that you please step outside for a moment, Shopkeeper."

"Uh... of course!"

The old shopkeeper was stunned, wondering what Su Xuan had up his sleeve. Can he really conjure Moon Profound Stones out of thin air? But he dared not ask further and quickly exited the tea room.

Heh, what I learned last night is finally coming in handy.

As soon as the shopkeeper left, a smile curled at the corner of Su Xuan's mouth. His hands quickly formed a series of seals before pressing down on the floor!

HUM!

A strange sound emanated through the air as a pink ripple spread out from Su Xuan's position. The entire tea room was instantly enveloped in a pink mist, within which blossoms seemed to fall like rain and the crisp, melodious songs of birds could be heard, as if a beautiful little world had formed inside.

What is he doing?

The old shopkeeper secretly peeked in at the strange phenomenon in the tea room, growing even more bewildered.

A moment later, the pink mist in the tea room dissipated.

"You can come in now!" Su Xuan called out to the shopkeeper.

When the shopkeeper re-entered the tea room, the sight that greeted him left him utterly stupefied! Countless Moon Profound Stones were piled up inside, forming a small mountain that radiated an enchanting, fluorescent glow.

Su Xuan actually managed to conjure Moon Profound Stones out of thin air!

"Shopkeeper, you can start counting," Su Xuan said with a smile. "I just took out a rough amount, so I can't guarantee it's exactly one million."

Of course, he hadn't conjured the stones out of thin air. He had simply used an illusion to secretly retrieve a million Moon Profound Stones from his sachet. And that million was just a small fraction of what the sachet contained. The pink mist illusion was something he had learned from the two girls the previous night, and the skill had already automatically reached its max level. If those two girls had been present, they would never have recognized this as the technique they had taught him. After all, they could only conjure a few small flowers and birds; they were utterly incapable of creating such a grand spectacle!

"Young Master, was that Telekinesis? Or perhaps the Mountain Moving Technique?" the old shopkeeper asked, his voice trembling slightly after he managed to compose himself. He, too, didn't believe Su Xuan could create the stones from nothing, assuming instead that he had cleverly "transported" them from somewhere else.

"You could say that," Su Xuan answered noncommittally.

"Alright, alright, I'll count them now."

The shopkeeper hurriedly called for several assistants from the money exchange, who immediately began counting the mountain-like pile of Moon Profound Stones. A long time later, they finally finished. The total came to over one million, one hundred thousand Moon Profound Stones!

The old shopkeeper immediately exchanged the stones for an equivalent amount in Profound Tickets for Su Xuan.

"I'll be taking my leave!"

Su Xuan bid the shopkeeper farewell, then mounted the Golden-scaled Crocodile and headed for the Nine Cauldrons Sect.

The Nine Cauldrons Sect was indeed easy to find. He followed the main north-south street of Hua Shui City southward until he saw a magnificent and imposing residence. A thick, ancient plaque hung above its great gate, inscribed with three characters: Nine Cauldrons Sect. This was the famous alchemy sect of the world above the mountains.

When Su Xuan saw what was in front of the great gate of the Nine Cauldrons Sect, he couldn't help but stare, his eyes widening in surprise...

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