Chapter 1022: Qiankun Five Qiong Dan

"The Universe Five-Jade Pill!" Mu Xuanyin slowly uttered a name.

"The Universe Five-Jade Pill..." Yun Che murmured, noting that it was clearly the name of a pill, yet named after the universe, suggesting its extraordinary nature. "Master, what is it?"

Mu Xuanyin's icy eyes narrowed slightly. "Since you refused to use Ice Phoenix Primordial Yin to boost your profound energy, then if you wish to reach the Divine Tribulation Realm before the Profound God Convention, the Universe Five-Jade Pill is the only method I can think of."

Yun Che's pupils contracted slightly, and he asked incredulously, "Could this Universe Five-Jade Pill... possibly allow my profound energy to reach the Divine Tribulation Realm in two years?"

"No," Mu Xuanyin shook her head. "It's not 'possibly,' it's 'definitely'! And it won't even take two years. If you can acquire a Universe Five-Jade Pill and successfully refine it, a single one will be enough to elevate your profound energy directly to the Divine Tribulation Realm."

"..." Yun Che's mouth was slightly agape, but he wasn't overly excited. Instead, he said slowly, "It must be very difficult to obtain the Universe Five-Jade Pill, right?" A pill capable of instantly elevating someone from the Divine Origin Realm to the Divine Tribulation Realm would be considered a heaven-defying item even in the God Realm. How could it be easily obtained? Otherwise, Mu Xuanyin wouldn't have first suggested the method of sacrificing many women with Ice Phoenix Primordial Yin.

"Not just difficult, it's far more arduous than you can imagine. To find it within two years, even if we expended the entire Snow Song Realm's power, would be as hard as ascending to the heavens!" Mu Xuanyin spoke coldly, a statement that did not surprise Yun Che.

"To refine the Universe Five-Jade Pill, five extremely rare and distinct ingredients are required: a Qilin horn, an Ancient Dragon heart, a Wood Spirit Orb, Nine-Star Buddhist God Jade, and Imperial Immortal Grass!"

A Qilin horn, as the name suggests, is the horn of a Qilin. Besides this, Yun Che had never heard of the others, finding them difficult even to comprehend. A Qilin itself was only a creature of legend in the Profound Sky Continent and the Illusory Demon Realm, with its very existence uncertain. However, since Mu Xuanyin mentioned a Qilin horn, it at least indicated that Qilins were not merely imaginary profound beasts.

Mu Xuanyin slowly explained, "An Ancient Dragon heart is precisely that—the heart of an ancient dragon. This ancient dragon must be a true dragon with a lifespan of at least 100,000 years, and its heart must be completely intact."

Yun Che suddenly looked up. "Master, when you requested a complete Horned Dragon heart from the Flame God Realm that day, was it for..." The Horned Dragon in the God Burying Inferno had a lifespan of far more than 100,000 years.

"That is not for you to worry about!" Mu Xuanyin interrupted him with a cold voice. "A single Horned Dragon heart, even if successfully acquired, would be completely useless without the other four materials!"

"..." Yun Che remained silent, a strange feeling stirring within him.

"As for the Wood Spirit Orb, it is the life source orb of a Wood Spirit, and can only be obtained from their bodies."

"Wood Spirits?" Yun Che paused slightly, instantly recalling hearing that name from Jasmine, who seemed to have mentioned their powerful natural energy.

Mu Xuanyin glanced at him and continued, "The Wood Spirit Race is a branch of the elven lineage, possessing the most extreme natural energy in the world, capable of accelerating the growth of spiritual plants and flowers. However, in contrast to their highly unique and pure natural energy, their power is very low in offensive capabilities, which is why they are often enslaved to cultivate spiritual medicines. Their life source orb—the Wood Spirit Orb—not only contains the purest natural energy itself, making it a high-grade material, but also has another well-known significant use."

"The higher the grade of a pill, the more difficult it is to refine. Failure means that extremely costly materials, sometimes collected over hundreds or even thousands of years, are utterly destroyed. However, if the power of a Wood Spirit Orb is incorporated during refinement, the success rate will increase dramatically; the higher the spiritual energy in the orb, the easier it is to succeed. Consequently, Wood Spirits have been brutally enslaved and hunted, becoming increasingly rare. Although the enslavement and hunting of Wood Spirits have eventually angered righteous paths, and no one dares to openly act rampant, profound practitioners secretly seeking and hunting Wood Spirits for immense profit have never decreased. Many years ago, the Wood Spirit Race was already on the verge of extinction."

"...Possessing the purest natural energy, they should have been blessed by the Heavenly Way. Yet, their clearly sacred natural energy has become their nightmare," Yun Che murmured. It was easy to imagine that as Wood Spirits became rarer, the price of Wood Spirit Orbs would certainly skyrocket, naturally driving hunters to even greater madness.

"Although hunting Wood Spirits defies the Heavenly Way, compared to the other four ingredients, the Wood Spirit Orb is the easiest to acquire. As long as one is willing to pay a sufficient price, they can usually be bought in the black markets of the lower realms. However, finding a Wood Spirit Orb with over seventy percent spiritual energy... is a hundred times more difficult!" Mu Xuanyin frowned.

"Why? Does the Wood Spirit Orb's spiritual energy easily dissipate?" Yun Che asked.

"You're right, Wood Spirit Orbs require the highest quality black jade for storage. However, their spiritual energy doesn't dissipate during storage, but upon extraction."

Yun Che: "Upon extraction?"

"Once a Wood Spirit Orb is extracted, the Wood Spirit perishes. And because its power is too pure, once it leaves the Wood Spirit's body, its energy rapidly dissipates. Moreover, if a Wood Spirit knows it's about to die, it will deliberately destroy its own orb. In that case, let alone seventy percent, retaining even fifty percent is extremely difficult. Therefore, to obtain a Wood Spirit Orb with over seventy percent spiritual energy, one must hunt the Wood Spirit without its knowledge, and extract the orb as quickly as possible into a black jade box... Even then, retaining eighty percent of its spiritual energy is already the absolute limit."

"However... the Wood Spirits' power grants them extremely keen sensory abilities, making them exceptionally sensitive to malicious intent. It is incredibly difficult to hunt a Wood Spirit without its awareness. Such Wood Spirit Orbs with high spiritual energy retention are also priceless and almost impossible to find."

"There's another scenario: a Wood Spirit willingly sacrificing its life and voluntarily extracting the Wood Spirit Orb from its body. In this situation, because the life energy remains briefly connected, the Wood Spirit Orb can retain all one hundred percent of its spiritual energy! But, of course, this scenario is almost impossible to occur." Yun Che nodded, listening intently.

"As for the Nine-Star Buddhist God Jade and Imperial Immortal Grass..." Mu Xuanyin's brows furrowed. "These are extremely rare and even little-known exotic treasures throughout the entire God Realm! Their existence is simply beyond your current comprehension. I have already sent people to search for them, but whether they can be found depends on your fortune!"

"What about... the Qilin horn?" Yun Che subconsciously asked, as Mu Xuanyin had not mentioned it specifically.

"That is what I want you to do next," Mu Xuanyin stated.

Yun Che suddenly understood. "Does that mean there's already news of a Qilin horn?"

"Qilins in the Eastern Divine Region became extinct many years ago, and I had originally intended to send someone to the Western Divine Region to search. However, I coincidentally learned that a complete Qilin horn exists in a certain place within our Snow Song Realm," Mu Xuanyin said expressionlessly. "It is in the Ice Wind Empire, north of the Snow Song Realm."

"Ice Wind Empire?" Yun Che murmured, then immediately recalled, "The Ice Wind Empire that Mu Hanyi came from?"

"Precisely," Mu Xuanyin slowly nodded. "That is an Ice Qilin horn, which has been passed down in the Ice Wind Empire for nearly 100,000 years and is revered as their sacred national treasure. Countless nations in the Snow Song Realm have risen and fallen, but the Ice Wind Empire has prospered for almost 100,000 years without decline, undoubtedly attributed to the existence of this sacred national treasure. They will surely value it immensely. It will certainly not be easy to make them hand it over."

"Soon, it will be the millennium birthday of the current Ice Wind Emperor. You will accompany Mu Hanyi to the Ice Wind Empire and retrieve that Qilin horn. Mu Hanyi does not know about this, and the Ice Wind Empire knows even less. As for how you will retrieve it... that will depend on your own abilities."

With just a word from Mu Xuanyin, no matter how sacred a national treasure it was, the Ice Wind Empire would undoubtedly present it from thousands of miles away without a single complaint. How could it be "not easy"? Yun Che instantly understood that this was clearly a trial and a test given to him by Mu Xuanyin. At the same time, it was also for him to truly experience the God Realm—after all, he had never left the Ice Phoenix Divine Sect since arriving there.

"Understood." Yun Che nodded emphatically without hesitation. "Your disciple will not disappoint you, Master." He was, after all, the personal disciple of the Snow Song Realm King. With that identity revealed, even a national emperor would show utmost respect. Even if it was a sacred national treasure, it shouldn't be difficult to acquire, right? After all, in the Snow Song Realm, who would dare disrespect the Snow Song Realm King? Yun Che thought to himself.

"Very good." Mu Xuanyin slowly nodded. "During your trip to the Ice Wind Empire, there will be no one by your side to protect you. Therefore, not only must you retrieve the Qilin horn, but you must also accomplish another task."

"Return alive!"

Yun Che's mouth was slightly agape, his gaze sinking a little, before he nodded again. "Yes, your disciple understands."

Mu Xuanyin extended her arm, then gently pushed. A white and a red jade bottle floated out, landing in Yun Che's hands.

"The white bottle contains Horned Dragon's Breath," Mu Xuanyin said. "A thousand years ago, Bingyun was poisoned by it. I have spent these years researching its toxicity, hoping to find a cure. Now that the poison in Bingyun's body has completely dissipated, it's useless to keep it. You have the Sky Poison Pearl, so controlling poison will naturally be much more convenient for you. Here, take it."

"As for the red bottle, it contains Horned Dragon's Blood." As she spoke of the "Horned Dragon's Blood," Mu Xuanyin's gaze remained icy and stunning, completely unperturbed, as if it had never happened that she had once "schemed" against Yun Che with it. "It's also useless to me now. Hmph, perhaps you might find a use for it."

Yun Che had personally experienced the terror of the Horned Dragon's Blood, and the toxicity of the Horned Dragon's Breath had almost killed a Divine Sovereign Realm expert like Mu Bingyun; its horror was thus easily imaginable. He carefully put away the two bottles, then asked, "Thank you, Master... When should your disciple depart for the Ice Wind Empire?"

"Now," Mu Bingyun said coldly.

"Now?" Yun Che was startled.

"Mu Hanyi should already be waiting in the Ice Phoenix City Region. Besides him, there will be another person; you'll know when you get there." She slightly tilted her cold brow. "What? Do you still need more time to prepare?"

"Uh... no," Yun Che immediately shook his head. "Your disciple will depart now."

The barrier of the Profound Cold Sky Lake opened, and Yun Che exited the Profound Cold Sky Lake, heading directly for the Ice Phoenix City Region.