After returning, Chen Lin continued to refine pills.
Having obtained ten Initial Essence Pills as he had hoped, he began to craft talismans.
Although he still had some spirit stones on him, he needed to sell some talismans to keep up appearances and maintain his persona as someone who made a living through talisman crafting.
Perhaps due to the increase in his cultivation, his state of mind was surprisingly good today, and his proficiency in crafting Fireball Talismans improved once again.
Coupled with his innate talent, he actually succeeded three times out of ten!
Three talismans bearing flame patterns were lined up before him, and the more Chen Lin looked at them, the happier he became.
With a success rate reaching thirty percent, after deducting costs, he could earn seventeen or eighteen spirit stones from ten sets of materials. Among the loose cultivators in the shantytown, he could be considered a cut above the rest.
After a burst of excitement, he picked up his talisman brush, preparing to strike while the iron was hot and craft a few more.
Before he knew it, the night had deepened.
"Clang!"
A dull bell toll startled Chen Lin, who had been immersed in his crafting.
He was stunned for a moment, then stood up with a puzzled expression and walked over to the bronze bell.
"This is definitely the timer I set, but why did I set it to ring at this time?"
Looking at the mechanical device on the bronze bell, Chen Lin realized once again that he had forgotten something.
But the time for the bell to ring was certainly set by him; even the timing device itself was crafted by his own hands, made possible only by his "ten-try-guaranteed" talent.
What exactly had he forgotten?
Why did he set an alarm for this time?
Chen Lin racked his brains.
Right, the red threads!
Suddenly, a flash of light crossed his mind, and everything he had forgotten came rushing back.
He hurried to the window, opened it, and looked up at the sky.
Silence.
The moon in the sky was full, and the stars were bright, but there were no other anomalies.
The red threads that appeared every night were nowhere to be seen.
"Did the red threads not appear, or have I become unable to see them?"
Chen Lin’s expression began to shift uncertainly.
After waiting for a full half-hour, he closed the window with a gloomy face.
"It must be that something is wrong with me."
He muttered to himself, sitting powerlessly in his chair.
The joy of his improved talisman-crafting skills had vanished completely.
After a moment of silence, he stood up again, quickly stripped off all his clothes, and checked himself inch by inch.
Finding no abnormalities, he began to look inward, checking his internal condition.
After a thorough examination, his face grew increasingly grim.
There was nothing wrong with his body.
The greater possibility was that the abnormality did exist, but he was unable to perceive it.
He didn't need to think hard to guess that it must have something to do with him being connected by those red threads last night.
He was now one of those "marionettes" too!
Not only could he no longer see the red threads, but he had even previously thought the sidelong glances and sneers of those people were perfectly natural.
He had been "assimilated"!
The more he thought about it, the more terrified Chen Lin became.
Fortunately, he was cautious enough to have set an alarm to give himself a reminder.
Although this alarm wasn't a magical artifact, it was made from fragments of one and had a certain spirit-clearing effect; when he made it, he had considered the possibility of such things happening.
Of course, the reason he was able to regain his clarity wasn't just because of this small alarm; it likely had to do with his innate talent or his special soul as a transmigrator.
Chen Lin looked up at the sky, his face as still as water.
To be able to turn all the cultivators in an entire city into marionettes—it was hard to imagine how powerful such an existence must be. Even if he had some special traits, it was useless.
But why would the other party do this? What was their goal?
How could he escape?
He fell into a state of deep helplessness and panic.
For several days in a row, Chen Lin failed to see the spectacular scene of red threads filling the sky at midnight, and he gradually calmed down.
Regardless, he had no good solution.
Fortunately, his mind remained relatively clear, and he was aware of his situation, unlike the other cultivators in the city who were completely oblivious.
Therefore, he had to stick to his original plan: raise his cultivation to the middle stage of Qi Refining and leave this place once he learned the Flight Technique.
Following this, Chen Lin began to frantically craft talismans. Once he accumulated enough spirit stones, he would purchase pill-refining materials to make Initial Essence Pills.
Under the accumulation of medicinal pills, his cultivation rose rapidly.
During this period, the city became increasingly unstable.
Following the disappearance of the Zhang family's Foundation Establishment patriarch, the head of the Han family—one of the five great families—also vanished without a reason, making the already chaotic city's cultivators even more panicked.
Moreover, because of this heavy snow, not only were the plants in the wild covered, but the merchant caravans that used to appear frequently hadn't been seen for a long time, and food in the city began to run low.
It wasn't just food; the prices of other cultivation resources were also climbing steadily.
Fortunately, he had purchased a large amount of supplies in advance for his closed-door cultivation, otherwise, he would have gone hungry.
Chen Lin ignored the events outside, focusing single-mindedly on refining pills and cultivating.
With such focus, time passed quickly.
Winter passed and spring arrived.
Three months later.
Chen Lin, who had been sitting cross-legged, suddenly opened his eyes.
He checked his body in disbelief, and only after confirming it did a look of wild joy appear on his face.
"I really broke through!"
Chen Lin clenched his fist slightly, feeling the increased mana within his body, his heart surging.
He had only been trying it out; he hadn't expected to break through to the fourth level of Qi Refining just like that. Even he found it hard to believe.
The process was simple and smooth, with no astonishing events occurring. It was just that he had taken three pills at once, which caused the medicinal power to be too intense, leading to a series of stinging pains in his meridians.
But compared to advancing to the middle stage of Qi Refining, this minor side effect was not worth mentioning.
Calming his mood, Chen Lin raised his hand and struck the air toward the table in front of him. Immediately, an invisible energy was released, causing the table to shake.
It worked!
Mana projection—this was the hallmark of entering the middle stage of Qi Refining!
He nodded with satisfaction.
In the early stage of Qi Refining, one needed to use a medium to utilize mana; it could not be released into thin air.
Only by entering the middle stage of Qi Refining could one do so.
This was why those in the early stage of Qi Refining could not learn spells.
Don't look at how the mana he just released only made the table shake; that was because he hadn't learned any spells yet. Once he did, the power would naturally increase greatly.
With his internal mana having increased several times over, Chen Lin, in his excitement, kept trying various projection poses, making a mess of the room.
After a while, he finally calmed down.
Then, he took out two more things.
A book titled *Detailed Explanation of Elementary Spells* and a small, slightly greenish short sword.
He had prepared these before his closed-door cultivation, fearing that if a major incident occurred in the city, he wouldn't be able to buy them, or the prices would skyrocket.
It seemed he had done the right thing.
The short sword was called the Carefree Sword.
The name sounded quite imposing, but in reality, it was just a lowest-grade, first-tier low-grade magical artifact, with limited amplification of mana.
Even so, it was worth several hundred low-grade spirit stones.
This was already the cheapest among magical artifacts; slightly better ones cost even more.
After learning the prices of magical artifacts, Chen Lin even toyed with the idea of becoming an artifact refiner.
The *Detailed Explanation of Elementary Spells* was much cheaper.
This was normal; after all, books could be copied. If he hadn't been afraid of buying flawed fakes from regular shops, he could have bought it at a street stall for the price of two Fireball Talismans.
He opened the book first, and the first page recorded the "Fireball Spell."
This spell was basically one of the essential spells for cultivators; all middle-stage Qi Refining cultivators knew it.
In fact, it was common knowledge in the cultivation world that there were barriers to practicing spells.
To practice a certain series of spells, one needed to possess the corresponding spiritual root.
For example, to practice this Fireball Spell, one would normally need to possess a Fire Spiritual Root; otherwise, one could not sense the fire-attribute elements in the world and could not form the spell.
However, during the Qi Refining stage, the barriers to spells were not strong. Even without the corresponding spiritual root, one could use certain media to cast spells, and low-end media items were easy to find and very cheap.
Of course, a more labor-saving method was to use talismans.
Can't learn fire-attribute spells?
It doesn't matter; whichever spell you want to use, just buy the talisman!
Money can solve everything.
(End of chapter)