Forging the embers of the furnace fire into his body was not a difficult task. The Eternal Physique was, after all, one of the publicly available sacred occupational sequences within the sect. A considerable number of people had taken up this path, aning there was a highly mature and established thod for it.
When Su Chen retrieved the relevant occupational requirents, he also received supplentary materials for the induction process. All he had to do was follow the steps thodically.
"I just need to collect one more portion of the Cunning Fox Essence and acquire the extra reward ability to complete the induction."
Calculating the tifra, he figured it would only take a few days. He still had a portion of the Scarlet Essence left over from last ti. If the elevated difficulty of the Cunning Fox Essence proved impossible to overco in the short term, he could simply use the Scarlet Essence to weaken it.
The path to becoming a Hundred Refinents Forger was now completely clear and unobstructed.
Su Chen's gaze then shifted to the Weapon Master sequence. It still had two pending requirents. The difficulty lay not only in forging a weapon but doing so barehanded. As for extracting spirituality, he was entirely clueless.
However, within the sect—even putting aside his status on the Creation Bronze Core—ordinary Sanctuary mbers could apply to the sect for assistance with their occupational requirents.
Naturally, because the Sanctuary mbership was so massive and complex, this kind of assistance ca at a proportional cost. But as a Star Seed, he inherently enjoyed certain privileges.
'The Weapon Master's occupational requirents are a combination of several other classes. Although there are differences in quantity, it doesn't an I can't find soone to consult.'
After a mont of thought, he pulled up Luo Shuhang's contact information and sent a ssage, inviting him over for a chat.
The other party replied promptly, stating he would head over imdiately.
"There's quite a lot to get done right now..." Su Chen muttered. As he thought about it, he suddenly felt a headache coming on.
The various occupational requirents laid out before him, the Treacherous God Essences, talents, and the impending arrival of the Divine Son—
"One step at a ti. Rushing won't help anything."
Su Chen sighed. Taking advantage of the ti before Luo Shuhang arrived, he began circulating his body-tempering thod, unwilling to waste a single second.
Barely an hour later, Luo Shuhang arrived at his floating island. Su Chen invited him into the lounge and had a mitic ch serve them tea.
"Mhm." Luo Shuhang took the teacup from Su Chen with both hands. After taking a sip, he repeatedly praised, "This truly is excellent tea."
Su Chen was secretly speechless. He had no idea what kind of tea it was; the mitic chs prepared everything according to established behavioral routines.
After setting his cup down, Luo Shuhang finally addressed his question. "Forging a weapon barehanded should be a requirent for the Thunderfire Spirit Caster,
right? The difficulty actually isn't that high..."
He elaborated, "Tier-five weapons are not considered excessively precious within the sect. There are even standardized production lines for them, aning every single step has a strict, standard procedure."
"Even if you are completely ignorant about weapon forging, all you need is soone assisting from the sidelines to guide you. However—"
Pausing here, he weighed his words carefully. "Barehanded forging does impose certain demands on physical toughness."
Aside from those who specialized in strengthening physical defense, ordinary professionals could rarely match the durability of a weapon of the sa tier, let alone use their bodies to hamr the necessary materials.
"I see." Su Chen breathed a sigh of relief. It seed the situation was much better than he had imagined. He initially thought he would need to learn tallurgy or advanced forging techniques.
'It makes sense,' he mused. 'As long as there's a team supervising the process, I just have to follow the standardized steps.'
Since barehanded forging was a normal occupational requirent, he wouldn't be revealing anything bizarre, so having people watch him was perfectly fine.
As for physical toughness, there was no need to worry. His Armor Bone abilities would play a role here; defensive strength was effectively physical strength. Using his hands as hamrs, he could definitely withstand the impact.
"As for extracting spirituality, that's a bit troubleso. Generally speaking, it's very difficult for ordinary weapons to develop spirituality," Luo Shuhang said hesitantly. "Weapon spirituality only has a chance of forming through constant, day-and-night companionship with its user. Before one reaches their absolute tier limit, weapons are swapped out far too frequently to provide the right environnt for it to erge..."
Su Chen's expression remained unchanged. He was unconcerned about the point Luo Shuhang was worried about.
The Weapon Master's requirent explicitly stated that he needed to extract spirituality from a controlled mystical artifact. This already implied that the weapons under his control possessed spirituality.
His curiosity lay elsewhere, prompting him to ask, "Does this weapon spirituality an that the weapon develops its own consciousness?"
"Not exactly." Luo Shuhang shook his head. "It's not a concrete consciousness, but rather sothing akin to occupational spirituality."
"Are there any benefits?"
"There are benefits." Luo Shuhang nodded, then shook his head again. "However, they only manifest at extrely high levels. For instance... if you want to forge a Morning Star artifact, you must use a weapon possessing spirituality as the foundation."
'A Morning Star artifact...' Su Chen could not help but think of that mottled Crimson Thunder Cauldron.
He fell into thought, guessing that the sect also had a Weapon Nurturer class, but in reality, very few people took it up.
The reason Su Chen was taking up the class was because he had the Mystical Artifact Control ability, which allowed him to compress his own powers into a weapon to synergize with it.
Furthermore, it created a chemical reaction with his other classes.
But to anyone else, this class was simply a massive resource sink. It wasn't particularly difficult for high-tier weapons to naturally develop spirituality, so there was no need to slowly nurture one from tier-one or tier-two. The cost-to-performance ratio was simply too poor.
Seeing Su Chen deep in thought, Luo Shuhang offered, "I am a Rune Master. I can teach you how to observe weapon spirituality and the thod for extracting it."
"Oh?" Su Chen snapped out of his reverie, quite surprised that Luo Shuhang actually knew how.
"Please wait a mont..." Luo Shuhang raised his right hand, bringing his index and middle fingers together, and slowly began tracing lines in the empty air before him.
Pale golden trails, ford purely from ntal energy, lingered in the air. Like living entities, they extended on their own,
intersecting and gradually weaving into a highly complex, three-dinsional symbol that faintly rotated.
Once the symbol was completely stable and fully ford, Luo Shuhang's gaze sharpened, and he lightly tapped the symbol with his joined fingers.
The pale golden ntal symbol quivered before transforming into a streak of light. It drifted forward and soundlessly sank into Su Chen's eyelids.
Su Chen's eyelids twitched, feeling a faint, cooling sensation. He looked down at the combat boots he had been wearing all along.
Sure enough, there was a vague, misty color flowing over them.
"So this is spirituality," Su Chen remarked, finding it quite profound as he shifted his feet.
"The extraction thod is comparatively more difficult. It requires you to gradually soak the weapon with your own ntal energy, which is a rather complex process." As Luo Shuhang spoke, he explained the intricacies involved, such as how to use ntal energy to sense the spirituality.
'Uh... aren't mystical artifacts already saturated with my ntal energy by default?' Su Chen's expression turned odd for a split second. The difficulty of this didn't seem very high at all.
"Hmm..." After listening to the explanation, Su Chen nodded and said, "Captain Luo, if you aren't busy, could you accompany on a trip to the Occupational Assistance Departnt?"
Luo Shuhang's face lit up with joy, and he hastily stood up. "Not busy, not at all."
The two exited the main building, chatting casually. Naturally, the conversation turned to the topic everyone was closely monitoring lately: the disappearance of a Morning Star expert.
Luo Shuhang sighed. Only after following Su Chen onto the aircraft did he say, "If sothing really has happened to Venerable Qin Yun, then our sect will beco virtually the weakest among all the sects."
Worry was evident in his eyes. Many people within the sect shared this thought, including Wei Zhenghong and others.
Because of the Sacred Fla, the Bronze Ancient King was unable to leave the Ancient King's Hall.
This ant that their Ancient King-level combat power could only be utilized if enemies attacked their doorstep. This alone was a massive handicap.
If another Morning Star expert died, the Bronze Sect's status wouldn't necessarily plumt to rock bottom, but their interests would undoubtedly suffer severe damage.
But as soon as the words left his mouth, Luo Shuhang silently cursed himself, rembering that the Star Seed before him didn't exactly see eye to eye with Venerable Qin Yun.
Yet, he couldn't just backtrack and say he hoped sothing bad would happen to Venerable Qin Yun either.
"Yes, let's hope Venerable Qin Yun returns safe and sound," Su Chen chid in, agreeing with him.
The awkwardness on Luo Shuhang's face eased slightly, though he couldn't help but feel a surge of admiration. After all, Venerable Qin Yun had previously intended... no, not intended, she had actually taken action against this Star Seed.
The Occupational Assistance Departnt—fully known as the Occupational Requirent Assistance and Completion Departnt—covered a vast area. Because of this, it wasn't located on the Bronze Core itself, but rather in one of the three satellite cities that orbited the Bronze Core in a specific formation below.
The vast majority of families within the sect, the headquarters of nurous sub-departnts, and the residences of regular mbers were all situated within these three satellite cities, respectively nad Cloud Dragon, Northern Deep, and Silver Mountain.
The two were heading to Silver Mountain City. Although they were taking a standard-issue aircraft, because they were descending from the Bronze Core, all traffic lanes were given the green light for them.
It was a straight, non-stop flight, but even so, the journey took two to three hours.
On the way there, Luo Shuhang had already communicated with the Occupational Assistance Departnt. When they parked the aircraft and stepped out of the cabin door, they saw a group of people already waiting for them.
"Your Excellency Su Chen, it is truly a rare honor to et you!"
The leader of the group stepped forward warmly. He was short but looked highly capable. He rattled off, "I have long admired you from afar! It is a rare opportunity to finally see you in person!"
"My na is Liu Zhengan. I am one of the Deacons here."
"Deacon Liu, you are too polite," Su Chen replied with a humble deanor.
These people were all seasoned veterans of the sect, smooth operators who could sing any tune to suit their audience. Anyone who actually believed their flattery would be an absolute fool.
"With you being so polite, I'm honestly not used to it," Deacon Liu joked.
The supervisors of these sub-departnts were clearly not on the sa level as the Deacons of the main halls on the Bronze Core. His rank was only tier-six.
He led the way, saying, "Co, co, please head inside. I've prepared a welcoming banquet for the two of you."
Su Chen narrowed his eyes slightly.
Luo Shuhang, however, beat him to the punch. "Old Liu, look at you. How many tis have I told you to drop these empty formalities? His Excellency Su Chen has urgent matters to attend to. He doesn't have ti to sit around trading toasts with you."
Luo Shuhang seed fairly well-acquainted with the man, speaking in a half-joking, half-serious tone.
Deacon Liu's expression sobered for a mont, but he quickly broke into a smile again. "Is that so? Then that's my oversight."
However, Su Chen smiled and said, "It's nothing too urgent, and Deacon Liu has good intentions. Since it's already prepared, let's go."
Hearing Su Chen's response, Deacon Liu's smile grew even wider. The small banquet didn't take up too much ti, and there weren't many people—only three or four attendees.
Su Chen put on no airs whatsoever, exchanging toasts and laughing freely with Liu Zhengan during the al, making for a highly harmonious atmosphere.
After they had eaten and drank their fill, Liu Zhengan beca even more attentive, guiding Su Chen and Luo Shuhang into the tallest building of the Occupational Assistance Departnt.
As the elevator humd, Liu Zhengan wore a face full of smiles. "You require assistance with forging a weapon, correct? I've already requisitioned three senior blacksmiths from the Forging Division for you."
"Each of them is fully capable of independently forging a tier-five weapon. With the three of them keeping an eye on things, you can rest completely assured."
"Then you have my deepest thanks," Su Chen smiled, though he couldn't help but wonder if Deacon Liu would have been this accommodating had he rejected the man's offer of a banquet earlier.
Perhaps he still would have arranged everything properly on the surface, but when it ca to the finer details, it would be hard to say.
Based on Su Chen's requirents, Liu Zhengan had already arranged a spacious, well-lit room fully equipped with a high-end forging furnace and all sorts of necessary machinery.
The three senior blacksmiths were already waiting there. The calluses on their hands were thick and heavy, and their skin was dark, faintly tinged with the color of soot.
Su Chen greeted them one by one, and they exchanged introductions.
All three appeared sowhat reserved. Senior blacksmiths couldn't exactly be considered rare figures, so to them, Su Chen was a genuine VIP.
After the pleasantries, Su Chen asked earnestly, "Gentlen, if I wish to forge a tier-five weapon as quickly as possible, what type of weapon would be the fastest to make?
"Prioritizing speed?" Entering their field of expertise, the awkwardness on the trio's faces faded, and they discussed the matter in low voices for a mont.
The oldest among them, Song Yang, replied in a deep, resonant voice. "If speed is your utmost priority, I suggest Your Excellency forge a dagger. It requires the fewest materials and the fewest steps, and its structure is simple. As long as the material supply keeps up, it can be forged in five to seven days."
"A dagger." Su Chen nodded in understanding. "What else? I need to forge five different types."
"Other types... A dagger, sword, saber, axe, and spear. These are the classic archetypes of cold weapons. We know their forging procedures and possess the experience to make them like the back of our hands."
Song Yang listed off a series of weapon nas, rattling them off with total familiarity.
"Alright, then let's go with these five." He turned his gaze toward Deacon Liu.
Liu Zhengan imdiately said, "Please, you three master smiths, draft a list of the required materials for . I will report it to the sect and have them requisitioned.
I'll get it sorted."
This type of assistance from the sect also required approval.
Even though it was exclusively for Sanctuary mbers, their numbers were not small. The sect wouldn't just allow soone to submit an incredibly difficult, resource-draining requirent and expect them to foot the bill.
It had to fall within a certain scope, and the resources mobilized couldn't be excessive.
Setting aside Su Chen's status, this specific request was perfectly normal for a tier-five professional, so the approval process wouldn't be troubleso.
But Su Chen spoke up again, asking, "Deacon Liu, would it be possible to send these three gentlen, the relevant equipnt, and the materials up to my floating island?"
A round trip between Silver Mountain City and his floating island wasted nearly half a day, which was truly a massive loss of ti.
"Send them to your floating island..." Deacon Liu's expression flickered. This wasn't within the bounds of standard procedure. Even if he refused, the other party wouldn't have much grounds to complain.
However, he thought about it... This Star Seed had been humble and easygoing, and they had enjoyed a very pleasant conversation at the dinner table earlier.
He waved his hand grandly and said in a bold tone, "The back-and-forth travel is indeed a bit of a hassle. I'll have my people deliver everything to you. And to the three master smiths, I'll have to trouble you to make the trip. Your work allowance will be bumped up by twenty percent."
With extra benefits on the line, Song Yang and the other two naturally had no objections and nodded repeatedly.
Having settled this matter, Su Chen and Luo Shuhang took their leave, warmly escorted out by Liu Zhengan.
Luo Shuhang returned with him but didn't enter the island; he tactfully bid farewell at the port.
Before leaving, he made sure to remind Su Chen that if he had any more questions, he could just contact him directly.
Stepping off the aircraft, Su Chen spotted a mitic ch waiting at the port. It was holding a silver-white tal box—the delivery of the Century Furnace Embers.
"That was fast." Su Chen reached out and took it. He opened it for a quick look, and a wave of searing heat instantly washed over his face, causing even him to instinctively lean back.
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