The middle-aged steward took the waist token handed over by Yuan Ming with a complicated expression, then turned around and entered the room again. He soon brought out a rough, gray-brown animal skin-covered booklet.

After Yuan Ming took it, he immediately found a place to read it.

This time, he read it even faster, but because of the rich content, it took him more than an hour to finish reading it all.

In this booklet of the Second Cave Master’s medicinal collection, he found the descriptions of the Black Scale Fruit and Yin Marrow Liquid as he wished. The former is a black fruit that grows on some shady cliffs in the Ten Thousand Mountains.

The latter is the spinal fluid that needs to be extracted from specific poisonous insects, which are special spiritual materials used for refining pills.

The medicinal materials recorded in this booklet are even rarer and more valuable than the “Hundred Herbs Collection,” greatly enriching Yuan Ming’s knowledge in this area.

After he finished reading the booklet, he left the Storage Pavilion amidst the puzzled eyes and sighs of the middle-aged steward.

Coincidentally, on his way back to the Fire Refining Hall, Yuan Ming saw a familiar figure from afar, it was Wu Lu.

The latter also noticed him and instead of avoiding him, he actively walked towards him.

“Brother Yuan, long time no see.” Wu Lu greeted him with a fist and a smile on his face.

“Wu Lu, why are you here?” Yuan Ming looked around and didn’t see Kun Tu.

“Oh, I just came back from a mission and was about to return to the Beast Taming Hall. Shall we go together?” Wu Lu smiled and said.

Yuan Ming nodded, and the two walked side by side towards the direction of the Fire Refining Hall and the Beast Taming Hall.

“Speaking of which, I envy you, Brother Yuan. You are really lucky to be appreciated by the Third Cave Master.” Wu Lu took the initiative to speak.

“Compared to me, you are even more curious. How did you suddenly enter the Bi Luo Cave?” Yuan Ming smiled, didn’t answer, and instead changed the topic to the other person.

When he saw the other person last time, he was still following Kun Tu, and there were some topics that he couldn’t and didn’t want to talk about.

Wu Lu didn’t hide it and said frankly, “Kun Tu appreciates me. After he became an inner disciple, he used his power to make me his servant and follow him as a lackey.”

Hearing the term “lackey,” Yuan Ming couldn’t help but laugh.

“Just now you mentioned that you came back from a mission, but… servants shouldn’t be able to take on tasks from the Execution Hall, right?” Yuan Ming asked in confusion.

Upon hearing this question, Wu Lu clearly hesitated for a moment.

He looked around and found that there was no one around, so he leaned close to Yuan Ming.

Yuan Ming found his sudden action strange, but he didn’t dodge and instead leaned his ear closer.

“This is not a task from the Execution Hall, it’s a task from the Beast Slave Hall.” Wu Lu’s voice lowered as he said.

A task from the Beast Slave Hall?

Yuan Ming was puzzled at first, but soon realized.

“You mean the task of capturing wild humans?” Yuan Ming asked.

“Do you know?” Wu Lu looked surprised.

“Hehe, Wu Lu, have you forgotten? How did we become Beast Slave Handlers?” Yuan Ming laughed.

Wu Lu slapped his forehead and suddenly realized, “I almost forgot. We were captured together with the wild humans, and it seems that only the two of us are still alive.”

Hearing this, Yuan Ming vaguely felt something was off, but couldn’t remember for a moment.

“No, there is also that guy with the dual spiritual roots. If I remember correctly, his name seems to be Yi Guo?” Yuan Ming said.

“Yes, him… but his situation is different from ours. He is probably already an inner disciple by now.” Wu Lu sighed.

“Why did you take on a task from the Beast Slave Hall?” Yuan Ming asked.

He didn’t forget that the Silver Cat asked him to find out the reason for capturing wild humans in the Bi Luo Cave.

“It was arranged by Kun Tu. He said he wanted to find a way to make me a named disciple.” Wu Lu said.

“He really values you.” Yuan Ming said.

“Just raising a useful dog.” Wu Lu self-mockingly smiled and said.

“When we were captured back then, I was curious. Why did they capture these wild humans?” Yuan Ming asked tentatively.

Wu Lu looked deeply at Yuan Ming, seeming a little hesitant, and asked in return, “Isn’t it to select Beast Slave Handlers?”

“But there’s no need to kill all those wild humans without spiritual roots, right?” Yuan Ming asked.

“I don’t know about that.” Wu Lu shook his head.

After saying that, he looked at Yuan Ming with a smile and said, “If you really want to find out, you might as well go to the Beast Slave Hall and take on a task. The rewards are quite high.”

“I was just asking casually. I don’t have that much time now.” Yuan Ming smiled.

As they spoke, the two had already arrived at the foot of the mountain. They bid farewell to each other and went their separate ways towards the two peaks.

…

In the following days, Yuan Ming began to diligently practice the Wooden Prison Technique and the Wooden Concealment Technique.

He had already completed the first layer of the Death Moon method. With the blessing of his powerful soul, he only took half a month to initially master the two spells.

At night, the cold moonlight shone through the window.

Yuan Ming activated the Death Moon method, slowly stopped cultivating, and opened his eyes.

Since he reached the bottleneck in the cultivation of the Death Moon method, he completely stopped making progress these past two days. The four spiritual materials that the Silver Cat asked him to find might be the key to breaking through the bottleneck. He needed to gather them as soon as possible. He murmured to himself.

Yuan Ming didn’t get up but checked his mana situation.

Since he discovered the issue with the Nine Elements method’s attributes, he would try to find places with abundant vegetation for cultivation every day. His cultivation speed had returned to its previous state, and his mana was advancing rapidly. He was not far from reaching the sixth level of Qi Refining.

Capturing a fierce beast and killing a fierce beast were two completely different difficulties. He might even face unexpected situations. Although Yuan Ming had many means, his cultivation level at the fifth level of Qi Refining was relatively low among the named disciples. It would be better to break through to the sixth level of Qi Refining before proceeding.With the extraordinary cultivation speed of the Nine Elements Technique, Yuan Ming could reach the sixth level of Qi Refining in just one more month. However, he had already prepared for taming beasts, and waiting for another month seemed like a waste of time.

Gritting his teeth, Yuan Ming took out a juicy immortal peach, the very red peach he had picked from the Misty Island.

He had found out that this peach was called the Red Heart Spirit Peach, a rather rare fruit for strengthening the foundation and cultivating the spirit. Judging from its appearance, it was almost a hundred years old. It could be used to refine elixirs, or it could be consumed directly like the Meat Lingzhi.

Given his current status, he naturally had no means or capital to refine it into an elixir.

Yuan Ming bit into the peach and swallowed it in a few bites.

The fruit quickly turned into a stream of juice flowing into his stomach, and a surge of abundant spiritual power began to circulate throughout his body.

Yuan Ming closed his eyes and circulated the Nine Elements Technique, absorbing the spiritual power. His mana fluctuated and gradually rose.

A day and a night passed quickly.

Yuan Ming’s aura suddenly soared, his clothes fluttered without wind, and the nearby air also vibrated. It took a while for everything to return to calm.

He opened his eyes, a smile on his lips.

The nearly hundred-year-old Red Heart Spirit Peach indeed had a strong medicinal power. Even without refining it into an elixir, the abundant spiritual energy it contained surprised him greatly, allowing him to break through to the sixth level of Qi Refining as he wished.

With this, his confidence and self-protection ability for taming spiritual beasts increased a bit more.

The next day, Yuan Ming greeted Fang Ge, then applied for a leave token and left the Bi Luo Cave.

If disciples of Bi Luo Cave wanted to tame spiritual beasts on their own, they would go deep into the Hundred Thousand Mountains, where there were many fierce beasts, and they could find suitable targets.

However, the Hundred Thousand Mountains were vast, and finding a suitable spiritual beast was a matter of luck. Many people searched for several months and still couldn’t find the beast they desired. It was not only time-consuming and laborious but also involved great risks.

For this reason, most disciples bought their spiritual beasts from the Beast Taming Hall, and very few chose to find them on their own.

However, Yuan Ming was not worried about this. When he first learned beast taming from the Third Cave Master, he had already decided where to find his target: the Misty Island.

The island was full of strange and fierce beasts. Catching any one of them would make a good spiritual beast.

The only trouble was the black water monster around the island. But now he was different from before, and he had prepared some countermeasures.

Yuan Ming left the sect and quickly arrived at the shore of Thousand Reed Lake.

Instead of tying another raft, he waved his hand towards the lake, and a small boat appeared and landed on the water.

This was a boat Yuan Ming had asked a brother in the sect who was good at craftsmanship to make. Its speed on the water was much faster than the previous raft.

He jumped onto the boat, rowed the oars, and headed towards the Misty Island.

An hour later, Yuan Ming arrived at a place where the fog was particularly thick.

Relying on his memory and several times of flying up to search with the help of the incense burner, he finally found the Misty Island again.

Yuan Ming was lucky this time, he didn’t encounter the black water monster. But to be safe, he put away the boat from a distance and used the incense burner to fly directly onto the island, landing in a purple forest.

“It’s not the Black Pine Forest…” He was quite disappointed.

The Red Heart Spirit Peach had a significant effect. He originally thought he could land from the side of the Black Pine Forest and pick all the Red Heart Spirit Peaches, but it seemed impossible now.

He would look for that fruit tree after he finished his business.

Yuan Ming looked around at the environment and the nearby purple trees. The leaves of these trees were palm-shaped, similar to maple leaves, and emitted a faint fragrance.

He had crammed a lot of knowledge about the Hundred Thousand Mountains in this period, including the trees and vegetation. However, he had never seen these purple maple trees in the books, nor the black pines he had seen before.

Looking at the other plants, they were all unfamiliar to him.

“This island is quite strange. The vegetation seems to be completely detached from the Hundred Thousand Mountains. Is it because it’s surrounded by water?” He muttered to himself.

Yuan Ming didn’t immediately go into the island. Instead, he found a safe place in the maple forest to fully recover his mana before heading into the island.

There seemed to be no fierce beasts in this purple maple forest. He walked out of the forest without encountering any danger.

He continued to move forward. The fog in front became sparse, and a vast swamp appeared in front of him. With his eyesight, he could see about ten or so feet away.

The swamp was full of green-black mud. Looking around, there were lush water plants everywhere, with a few trees standing here and there. The air was filled with the smell of decay.

(End of the chapter)