Lang Ya Earth Spirit was exceedingly candid and completely missed the subtext in Mo Ren Wang's words. Instead, he replied with smug satisfaction: "Hmph! That brat is cunning and crafty — he dares to treat an old man like me with such disrespect! I'm doing this on purpose! I'll teach him a proper lesson and make him understand what it means to respect his elders. Hahaha — what Gu Recipe could he possibly figure out? What foundation does he have? He's clearly a Strength Path Immortal Zombie — does he think this old man can't see through him? Hmph, Little Tai Bai is trusting him blindly. If he can deduce an Immortal Gu Recipe, I'll smash my own medicine mortar to pieces and eat the fragments!"
Tai Bai Yun Sheng watched the boastfully laughing Lang Ya Earth Spirit with an expression of compassion, saying nothing. He actually wanted to say: it wasn't that he had confidence in Fang Yuan — it was that he had confidence in Zhi Hui Gu.
……
Fang Yuan stood quietly within the luminous halo of the Zhi Hui Gu.
After a brief moment, he opened his eyes, which flickered with joy.
"Success." He sighed with emotion. That short span of time had been enough for him to deduce and perfect the first damaged recipe to one hundred percent.
The perfected recipe was the one that had previously stood at ninety-nine percent.
Looking at it again, Fang Yuan marveled: "This final step is nothing short of miraculous — the recipe was perfected by my own hand."
Even he found it hard to believe.
Deducing Gu Recipes required two things: first, foundation; second, inspiration. A Gu Master lacking in Refinement Path foundation would find the process exceedingly difficult. But even those with deep foundation often hit bottlenecks while deducing recipes — stuck at a single step, unable to advance even slightly. Cases of being trapped for years, decades, or even centuries were not uncommon.
At such moments, breaking through required inspiration.
But inspiration was exceedingly rare. It might arrive in rapid succession, or it might not appear for many years on end.
Even when inspiration came, it was merely a method that still needed verification.
If the method succeeded, it was true inspiration. If it failed, it was merely an idea — a failed attempt.
"The power of Zhi Hui Gu lies in granting the Gu Master limitless inspiration. I myself am already a Refinement Path Grandmaster, so my foundation is sufficient — all I lack is inspiration." Fang Yuan once again felt the full might of a Ninth Transformation Gu.
And this was merely him borrowing the Zhi Hui Gu's luminous halo. If one day he were to truly and fully activate the Zhi Hui Gu, he couldn't imagine what that spectacle would be like.
Fang Yuan reined in his cascading thoughts and turned his focus inward.
Within his consciousness, a large amount of Joy Essence still remained.
The previous recipe had an extremely high completion rate, needing only the final push. As such, Fang Yuan had consumed barely any Joy Essence.
He calmed his heart and began deducing once more.
The second recipe was an Immortal Gu Recipe standing at ninety-seven percent completion.
This time too, Fang Yuan consumed only a modest amount of Joy Essence — a mere third. Once the bottleneck of the Immortal Gu Recipe was cleared, the rest was smooth sailing. His reasoning became clear, every aspect laid bare. Even relying solely on his own ability, Fang Yuan could have completed the deduction.
But the third Immortal Gu Recipe proved more troublesome.
He consumed three Green Grape Immortal Essences in succession before finally perfecting it.
This Immortal Gu Recipe was riddled with difficulties. He solved one problem only for another to arise. Therefore, although its completion rate was also impressively high at ninety-six percent, the Green Grape Immortal Essences consumed in the process were a full two to three times more than before.
But even so, by the terms of their agreement, Fang Yuan was making a massive profit!
Since he was in a hurry, Fang Yuan connected to Treasure Yellow Heaven and, through the Shen Nian Gu, reached out to Lang Ya Earth Spirit.
Lang Ya Earth Spirit burst into hearty laughter, assuming Fang Yuan had come to admit defeat. But when Fang Yuan handed him a perfected one-hundred-percent Immortal Gu Recipe, he was struck speechless on the spot, unable to process what he was seeing.
After several breaths, his entire attention had been consumed by the contents of the recipe.
"Brilliant! Simply brilliant! So this is the method to break through the bottleneck! Why didn't I think of that? Why didn't I think of it?!" he shouted. If not for his hands being bound by Qi Path seals, he would surely have been slapping his thighs in excitement.
His exclamations abruptly halted, and a look of embarrassment crept across Lang Ya Earth Spirit's face.
He hadn't forgotten that only a short while ago, he had been thoroughly dismissive of Fang Yuan's abilities. Yet before long, Fang Yuan had successfully deduced one of the Immortal Gu Recipes and handed it over.
Unable to save face, Lang Ya Earth Spirit mumbled: "Brat, who would've thought that your bizarre way of thinking could actually stumble onto the answer like a blind cat catching a dead rat, managing to figure out this Immortal Gu Recipe. Fine, I'll chalk it up to your luck. According to our previous agreement, perfecting one damaged Sixth Transformation Immortal Gu Recipe above ninety percent — the reward is ten Immortal Yuan Stones! Shall I send them through Treasure Yellow Heaven, or will you come collect them in person?"
Treasure Yellow Heaven transactions naturally required handling fees. But if Fang Yuan went to collect them in person, he would need to use Ding Xian You.