Becoming a Saint From the Iron Armor Skill

Chapter 427: Chapter 216: Tian Can Makes a Move

After checking his panel, Chen Cheng slowly rose to his feet. He walked to the edge of the flower bed, plucked an autumn chrysanthemum, and thoughtfully sniffed its faint fragrance.

The Iron Armor Dragon Elephant Skill was his greatest asset, and his progress with it had been steady.

’If it weren’t for this Inner Breath Technique, my cultivation progress wouldn’t have been this fast, even with the bonus from my panel allowing for unimpeded cultivation.’

His Body Tempering Technique cultivation, on the other hand, had always been a case of a skilled housewife unable to cook without rice.

Back then, his status was low; he had no money or power, and even the medicinal materials for the Skin Grinding Technique’s herbal decoction were extremely hard to come by.

Later, after advancing to the Muscle Strengthening Realm, his cultivation had once stagnated due to a lack of Low Grade Muscle Strengthening Pills.

Now that he was in the Bone Forging Realm, the situation hadn’t changed.

In fact, the time he’d spent lacking elixir pills was much longer than when he was in the Muscle Strengthening Realm.

’After I return from this demon-slaying expedition, I can use the Merit I’ve earned to exchange for some Low Grade Bone Tempering Pills, and then get some more from the Shen Family.’

’That should be enough to cultivate the Dragon Elephant Bone Forging Technique to Perfection.’

’But taking elixir pills from the Shen Family won’t be free. I’ll inevitably owe them a favor, and not a small one at that.’

Low Grade Bone Tempering Pills were simply too precious. Even for a clan like the Shen Family, one of the Four Great Clans of the Inner City, their supply was limited.

Within the Shen Family, only the most core disciples could be allocated a sufficient share.

Having personally participated in the demon-slaying, Chen Cheng had a deep appreciation for just how precious Low Grade Bone Tempering Pills were.

A single Low Grade Bone Tempering Pill required five thousand Merit points from the Demon Suppression Department.

In terms of slain demons, that was equivalent to one Tier Three Demon Beast or ten Tier Two Demon Beasts.

It might not sound like much, but an ordinary Perfect Martial Artist of the Bone Forger Realm would often need a team of three or more to slay a Tier Three Demon Beast.

Slaying one Tier Three Demon Beast meant the earned Merit would be split three ways, with each person receiving only enough for a third of a Low Grade Bone Tempering Pill.

This demon scourge was both a disaster and an opportunity. The Shen Family’s party should be able to kill a dozen or so Tier Three Demon Beasts and several dozen Tier Two Demon Beasts.

If they exchanged all their earned Demon Suppression Department Merit for Low Grade Bone Tempering Pills, they should get twenty to thirty pills.

It seemed like a lot, but once distributed among the dozens of people in the team, each person’s share would be pitifully small.

As for a Tier Four Demon Beast, a single one could be exchanged for fifty thousand Demon Suppression Department Merit points.

Patriarch Shen Mingyuan of the Shen Family and Vice Director Xue Huai’an of the Demon Suppression Department, working together, should be able to slay one or two. The Merit from that would be enormous.

But at Shen Mingyuan and Xue Huai’an’s level, they would naturally want to exchange their points for Marrow Cleansing Pills.

Slaying a single Tier Four Demon Beast yielded fifty thousand Demon Suppression Department Merit points, but that was only enough to exchange for a single Marrow Cleansing Pill!

This was the harsh reality: the higher one’s martial arts power, the harder it was to obtain resources.

Before the Bone Forging Realm, the great clans could rely on their superior numbers to gather resources and cultivate a few Celestial Pride disciples.

But once it came to the Marrow Cleansing Realm, the resources of a Prefecture City’s great clan could only support a pitifully small number of Celestial Prides.

Take the Shen Family, for example. They had only one Organ Refining Realm Martial Artist, their Ancestor Shen Zhaoyi. As for Marrow Cleansing Realm Martial Artists, Patriarch Shen Mingyuan’s generation probably had two or three.

But only Shen Mingyuan had cultivated to Marrow Cleansing Realm Perfection.

And now at his level, Shen Mingyuan undoubtedly had to worry about obtaining Organ Refining Pills.

Of course, in Linji City, Shen Mingyuan was the Lord of Salt Transport Department, a government position that allowed him to officially acquire some resources from the Great Dao Sect each year.

The reason the Four Great Clans of the Inner City were able to dominate Linji City was precisely that they held various important positions within the Government Office.

But each of these positions was spoken for, and the more important the post, the rarer the opening.

The Jiang Family was the strongest of the Inner City’s Four Great Clans precisely because the position of City Lord was much higher than other government posts.

Below the Bone Forging Realm, most disciples of the Inner City’s Four Great Clans chose to cultivate in the Prefecture City because they did not lack cultivation resources.

Upon reaching the Marrow Cleansing Realm, they could also seek a position in the Linji City Government Office to further acquire Martial Arts Resources.

If there were no vacancies in these positions, then there was another option—an even better one.

That was to reach Bone Forging Realm Perfection before the age of thirty and go to Su State City to join the Great Dao Sect.

With such Martial Arts Talent, one could directly become an Inner Sect Disciple of the Great Dao Sect.

As an Inner Sect Disciple of the Great Dao Sect, the Sect would provide some resources annually, and one could also obtain resources by completing various sect missions.

If one achieved success in their Martial Arts Cultivation and was promoted to a True Disciple of the Sect or an Outer Sect Steward, the resources they could obtain would be even greater.

However, a major power like the Great Dao Sect in the State City gathered Celestial Prides from the State City itself and from all the various Prefecture Cities.

Forget about being promoted to a True Disciple of the Sect; even becoming an Outer Sect Steward was extremely difficult.

Every generation, the Four Great Clans of Linji City’s Inner City had disciples who joined the Great Dao Sect as Inner Sect Disciples.

But aside from the Ancestors of the four clans, no one had ever been promoted to Outer Sect Steward of the Great Dao Sect, let alone a True Inheritor.

The Shen Family’s Shen Zhiming had also once been an Inner Sect Disciple of the Great Dao Sect.

When Shen Zhiming was an Inner Sect Disciple in the Great Dao Sect, he was considered a nobody. In his own words, he simply "faded into the crowd."

It was only after returning to Linji City and serving as the County Magistrate of Moshan County, where he painstakingly studied for several years, that he finally gained a preliminary understanding of the Literary Dao Realm and achieved some minor success through the unorthodox path of the Literary Dao.

In Shen Zhiming’s own words: "I regret it now. If I had known, I would have served as a County Magistrate for a few years to properly comprehend the Literary Dao Skill before going to the Great Dao Sect."

"That way, after joining the Great Dao Sect as an Inner Sect Disciple, I could have used my Literary Dao Dharma Aspect to surely stand out on Vast Peak, and I might very well have become a True Disciple."

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