Chapter 262: A Helping Hand

Ever since he was a boy, Nie Tian had learned that a suitable spiritual tool could greatly enhance a Qi warrior’s battle prowess.

Later, the appearance of the Flame Dragon Armor had further proved this point.

However, other than the Flame Dragon Armor, he hadn’t come across another spiritual tool that truly agreed with him.

He had won every battle by only relying on the secret magics he had learned from the mysterious land and his shockingly sturdy physique.

He was convinced that if he could find a spiritual tool that completely agreed with him, his battle prowess would rise to a whole other level.

Even though the Flame Dragon Armor was a Spirit Channeling grade spiritual tool that had unparalleled power, he currently didn’t have the ability to wear it.

More importantly, the Flame Dragon Armor was too eye-catching. If he used it in battle but failed to kill his opponents, its whereabouts would be exposed, along with Nie Tian’s identity.

If it came down to that, powerful experts from both the Flame God Sect and the Heaven Palace Sect would flood the Realm of Split Void, and strip him of his Flame Dragon Armor and two fragmentary star marks.

Therefore, he currently didn’t have a single suitable spiritual tool that he could use.

It was hard to say if Pei Qiqi had meant to taunt him or remind him. Nonetheless, Nie Tian felt suddenly enlightened. “A Premium grade spiritual tool…”

In the next moment, Nie Tian looked at Pei Qiqi, his eyes filled with confusion, as he asked, “Is Li Ye capable of forging Premium grade spiritual tools?”

Pei Qiqi nodded. “Yeah. He successfully forged a Premium grade spiritual tool right before I came here. He’s joined the ranks of Premium grade equipment forgers.”

“Premium grade equipment forger!” Nie Tian was shocked by her words.

All the best equipment forgers in the Realm of Flame Heaven who were able to forge Premium grade spiritual tools were in the Spiritual Treasure sect.

Gan Kang’s identity as a Premium grade equipment forger was why he had dared to do whatever he wanted and press An Shiyi to marry him.

It was also why, after the Spiritual Treasure sect’s incident, the Flame God Sect from the Realm of Dark Underworld made a very generous offer to him.

For any sect or force, Premium grade equipment forgers were extremely important resources.

It was hard to believe that Li Ye could rise to such a high level at such a young age. His equipment forging talent was utterly amazing.

Pei Qiqi continued, “If you want to have a Premium grade spiritual tool custom-made for you, you’ll have to pay a very high price, much higher than the price of the Premium grade spiritual tools you can purchase from the Blood Skull’s headquarters.”

Then, Pei Qiqi glanced at Nie Tian, and realized that he might not be familiar with the spiritual tool market. Thus, she explained, “There are many shops in Shatter City that sell spiritual tools, and quite a few of them have Premium grade spiritual tools for sale.

“Most of them go for ten thousand spirit stones, give or take.

“However, with those kind of Premium grade spiritual tools, even if they match the buyers’ cultivation attributes, they won’t be able to display their ultimate might.

“More often than not, those Premium grade spiritual tools were originally custom-made for someone else, and after that person died, they drifted to Shatter City after several transactions.

“Therefore, a Premium grade spiritual tool of that kind is usually worth around ten thousand spirit stones.”

After a pause, she added, “On the other hand, if you want a Premium grade equipment forger to customize a Premium grade spiritual tool that matches your cultivation attribute, as well as your physical and psychic traits, it would, at the very least, be triple that price.

“So if you want Li Ye to customize one for you, you’d have to pay him with everything you’ve obtained in the Void Illusion Mountain Range, and that’s already a discounted price, since you’re his friend.

“Not to mention that it won’t be a guaranteed success.

“It’s just funny to see how complacent you are with yourself after acquiring such a puny amount of wealth.” Pei Qiqi said with a cold smile.

After hearing her words, Nie Tian forced a smile and stuffed all the bracelets of holding back into his leather pouch, saying, “I seems that I need to kill more powerful Dark Moon experts.”

Pei Qiqi snorted disdainfully and didn’t say a word. She took out a few Space Spirit Jades and started working on a delicate spell formation.

She held one Space Spirit Jade in her hand, and wisps of spiritual power began to flow out of her fingertips and seep into the Space Spirit Jade. They swam inside of the jade as if they were engraving tiny but detailed spell formations.

Off to the side, Cai Yuan was still recuperating with his eyes clenched. There were no signs of him awakening.

“She consumed more strength than Cai Yuan, but somehow recovered much faster than him.” Nie Tian watched Pei Qiqi with a measuring gaze, as he felt that she was a girl veiled by numerous mysteries.

Seeing that both Pei Qiqi and Cai Yuan were busy with their own business, Nie Tian took out more spirit stones and concentrated on another session of cultivation.

After all, now that he had entered the Heaven stage, he could conduct new rounds of expansion and refinement to his spiritual sea.

His original plan had been to devote all his time and efforts to studying the profound knowledge recorded within the first part of the Fragmentary Star Incantation after ascending to the Heaven stage.

However, considering that Pei Qiqi and Cai Yuan were in the same stone room as him, he was afraid that they would pick up some clues if he studied it now. Thus, he could only postpone it.

Thump! Thump! Thump!

After an unknown period of time, gentle knocking sounds rang out from the gate of the stone room.

Cai Yuan immediately sprang to his feet and spoke, while his eyes shone with the light of excitement, “Our reinforcements are here!”

Before Pei Qiqi and Nie Tian could react, he had already rushed to the entrance, raised the spiritual power ward, and opened the gate.

“Young Lord!”

“Little Lord!”

“Lord Cai!”

“Brother!”

The moment the gate was opened, numerous calls echoed into the originally silent stone room, among which Nie Tian recognized Zhao Feng and Wang Zhuo’s voice.

The last call that entered Nie Tian’s ears sounded familiar too. After a brief search in his mind, he realized that it was Cai Yue’s voice, whom he had met at the Blood Skull’s headquarters.

Just as both Pei Qiqi and Nie Tian cast wondering gazes towards the entrance to the stone room, Cai Yuan reached out with one hand and stopped the Blood Skull members from entering, saying, “We’re coming out. Wait for us at the foot of the mountain.”

With those words, he turned to look at Nie Tian and Pei Qiqi.

After receiving his beckon, the two of them stepped out of the secret stone room and followed Cai Yuan to the foot of the mountain, where approximately ten Blood Skull members were waiting.

Aside from Wang Zhuo and Zhao Feng, Nie Tian also identified Shi Qing in the crowd, who was standing next to Cai Yue, as it seemed that he was here to protect her.

Amongst the crowd of Blood Skull members, there was only one late Greater Heaven stage expert, whose name was Gu Yu, the commander of the Blood Skull’s branch in the Void Illusion Mountain Range. All the others were at the Heaven stage.

“Greetings, Miss Pei.” Upon seeing Pei Qiqi, many Blood Skull members cast respectful gazes towards her.

Only Cai Yuan’s sister, Cai Yue, looked rather sullen, as if she was very displeased to see Pei Qiqi.

“I knew it!” Cai Yue thought. “It’s all because of this woman. Otherwise, my brother wouldn’t have risked his own life and acted so rashly!” Anger filled Cai Yue’s face as she stared at Pei Qiqi without saying a word, as if she was going to march over and denounce her in front of everyone in the next moment.

She knew that her brother had always admired and liked Pei Qiqi, and repeatedly put himself in danger to protect her.

If it weren’t for the fact that Cai Yuan was resourceful and lucky, he would have been killed years ago.

For that reason, Cai Yue had sought out Pei Qiqi to reason with her more than once. Every time, it would escalate into a squabble, and would only come to an end after elders from the Blood Skull showed up to intermediate.

Seeing that Cai Yuan was unscathed, Gu Yu assumed that it was thanks to Pei Qiqi and her expertise in spatial magics. “Thank you, Miss Pei,” he said.

“The Dark Moon has been quite active recently.” Shi Qing said with a frown. “It appears they didn’t learn their lesson from our last confrontation. I’ve already arranged for our brothers to search for Ma Jiu in this region. They’ll inform me the moment they find their trail.”

“Exactly, we have to strike back even though you’re fine!” Gu Yu said with great determination in his tone.

Since they all knew Pei Qiqi was a master of spatial magics and how powerful she could be in the Void Illusion Mountain Range, they naturally assumed it was Pei Qiqi who had killed a number of Dark Moon members and kept Cai Yuan safe.

Not a single one of them paid much attention to Nie Tian, including Shi Qing and Cai Yue, who had met him before.

Shi Qing was the only one who greeted Nie Tian by nodding briefly toward him, before he rapidly joined everyone else as they gathered around Pei Qiqi and Cai Yuan, asking about what had happened.

Surrounded by people, Pei Qiqi, who had remained silent the whole time, said with a plain tone, “Actually, it was thanks to Hua Tian that we escaped from those Dark Moon people.”

Cai Yuan nodded. “She’s right.”

Only after hearing those words did everyone turn to look Nie Tian up and down with confused gazes.