Stellar Transformation-Chapter 560 - 16 episodes 21 - s Path of Artifact Refining
Like the countless years before, snowflakes continued to fall over Northern Pole Snow City, landing on the ground and being absorbed by the black slate tiles. Northern Pole Snow City was mostly bustling, yet the ancient ’Mu Mansion’ remained as tranquil as ever.
Outsiders had no idea that a few more people had joined Mu Mansion.
Qin Yu was determined to enter his own cosmic space to start researching the "Path of Artifact Refining," and Li’er also wanted to accompany him. She said that while Qin Yu studied the "Path of Artifact Refining," she would be beside him to comprehend the spatial perceptions left by Zuo Qiumei.
Under the Mistwillow Tree, beside the stone table.
"Big Brother Qin Yu, I really don’t want to be apart from you for long periods anymore," Li’er said, looking up at Qin Yu earnestly.
How could Qin Yu refuse?
Besides, Qin Yu hoped for the same.
"I will place the Mishen Palace into my cosmic space. I will study artifact refining in the Fire Refining Hall of Mishen Palace, and you can cultivate beside me," Qin Yu decided.
Li’er immediately smiled sweetly and nestled into Qin Yu’s chest, while Jiang Lan, seeing how inseparable Qin Yu and Li’er were, also smiled.
"Ahem!" Hei Yu deliberately coughed from the side.
Then Hei Yu turned to Jiang Lan, "Uncle Lan, you should let me enter the Jiang Lan Realm to start cultivating. I really can’t stand watching them anymore."
Qin Yu glanced at Hei Yu with a bit of irritation, but Hei Yu just chuckled.
"Little Black, your Flowing Light Spear Path indeed contains parts of the Time Law. Though I can’t understand how you comprehended it, its existence makes sense. You should carefully study it further, for I really want to see what level you can reach," Jiang Lan said to Hei Yu with a smile.
Immediately after, Hei Yu entered the Third Layer of the Jiang Lan Realm.
"Uncle Lan, we will take our leave now," Qin Yu and Li’er said as they both stood up.
Seeing Qin Yu and Li’er standing side by side, Jiang Lan felt a heartfelt comfort, nodded with a smile, and said, "Alright, Little Yu, study the artifact refining well. I am waiting for you to become the new ’Artisan God.’"
Qin Yu looked at Li’er by his side and nodded slightly.
******
New Universe, New Zixuan Star, on Donglan Mountain of Hidden Dragon Continent.
Qin Yu directly placed the Mishen Palace on the mountainside opposite Cloud Mist Villa, which corresponded well with its location.
In the courtyard of Mishen Palace.
"Is this the Mishen Palace? I’ve heard of its great reputation in the Divine World, but I’ve never really had a chance to take a good look inside," Li’er remarked as she looked around, clearly impressed.
"Follow me, Li’er," Qin Yu said as he led Li’er towards the Fire Refining Hall. In Qin Yu’s mind, the Fire Refining Hall was where the Artisan God Che Hou Yuan usually refined artifacts, so there must be some objects inside.
However, when Qin Yu broke the Formation at the entrance to the Fire Refining Hall and entered, he found—
"Eh, what’s happening?" Li’er also looked around in surprise at the Fire Refining Hall. "Big Brother Qin Yu, it seems like there’s nothing here."
"I’m not sure either," Qin Yu carefully examined every part of the Fire Refining Hall.
The exterior of the Fire Refining Hall didn’t seem large, but the interior was a vast hall exceeding a kilometer in length and width. There were no small rooms in the entire Fire Refining Hall, only the great hall.
Black floors, and four golden pillars.
But in the center of this great hall, there was only a golden scroll.
"Refining definitely needs tools, but why didn’t Che Hou leave a single thing behind?" Qin Yu reached out with one hand, and the golden scroll floated towards him and unfolded.
Qin Yu swept his divine sense over it.
"To the junior inheriting the Mishen Palace, I’m sorry... This time, to craft the ’Heavenly Venerable Spiritual Treasure,’ I had to be thoroughly prepared. This set of tools is the one I’m most familiar with, so I took the refining tools with me."
At this point, Qin Yu was also taken aback.
It seemed he had celebrated too soon. Nevertheless, Qin Yu continued reading.
"However, you shouldn’t be too disappointed. Because for the various tools of refining, a real Artifact Refining Master wouldn’t use someone else’s tools; they use their own crafted tools, as they are most familiar with their own. Through trial and error, and repeated adjustments, only then can a tool be perfectly compatible with the refiner. The first challenge of refining is to craft your own set of tools..."
After reading this, Qin Yu fully understood.
"Big Brother Qin Yu, what happened?" Li’er asked, concerned that Qin Yu might be disappointed that there was nothing left in the Fire Refining Hall, "Big Brother Qin Yu, don’t be disappointed, to receive is luck, to not receive..."
Qin Yu smiled and stroked Li’er’s hair, "It’s okay, I’m not disappointed. Well, Li’er, you cultivate there, and I will start by reading some scrolls on artifact refining beside you." 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖
Qin Yu gestured with one hand.
Suddenly, two jade-colored cloud beds appeared in the vast Artifact Refining Hall. With a slight nod, Li’er set herself on one of the cloud beds.
Qin Yu moved and promptly sat cross-legged on the other cloud bed.
With a wave of his sleeve, nearly two thousand golden scrolls floated before him. These scrolls all described the skill of artifact refining, most of which were bestowed by the East Pole Saint Emperor.
Li’er smiled softly at Qin Yu, then closed her eyes and quietly started comprehending the insights left by Zuo Qiumei.
"Increase the flow of time to the maximum," Qin Yu controlled the flow of time within the range of the Fire Refining Hall to its utmost limit.
More than two thousand years passed inside the Fire Refining Hall, while only a year went by in the outside world.
Then Qin Yu began to carefully read through each golden scroll. Qin Yu was now a Middle Level Heavenly God, his divine sense was much stronger than before, and he read much faster. However, reading nearly two thousand golden scrolls still took a long time.
As he read,
A new, boundless world of artifact refining unfolded before him. Qin Yu fully immersed himself in it, constantly drawing from the experience of the forefathers.
"So that’s how it is, so that’s how it is!"
As he read, Qin Yu cheered involuntarily. If one didn’t understand the basics of refining, they would forever linger outside the door, but once inside, they would discover how vast and wonderful the world within was.
...
To briefly summarize artifact refining, it can be divided into three steps.
The first step: Achieve the Artifact Embryo!
The second step: Quenching!
The third step: Enlightenment!
...
In these three steps, the first step "Achieving the Artifact Embryo" is the most difficult. The artifact embryo is essentially the foundation of an "artifact". If the embryo is not good, even if the quenching skill and the enlightenment skill are high, that weapon cannot become a treasure.
If the first step is successful, then the artifact refining is eighty percent successful.
Nearly two thousand golden scrolls, with over ninety percent of the content, discuss how to refine a good, perfect artifact embryo.
The so-called "Artifact Refining Skill" can even be considered the method to refine an artifact embryo.
The quality of an artifact embryo, the first prerequisite is the material. If the material is poor, high skills are useless, akin to the saying, "without rice, even the cleverest housewife cannot cook."
The second prerequisite is: Flames!
The so-called flames are not merely about the strongest power of the flames, after all, Divine Kings are capable of using "Nihility Karma Fire". Possessing Nihility Karma Fire does not mean one can pass the test in the aspect of "flames".
Because some materials’ melting temperature, vaporization temperature are not necessarily high. Yet, their impurities’ melting temperature might even be higher than the main materials.
An ordinary refiner might accidentally vaporize the main material while leaving behind the impurities. Thus, this tests the control over the flames.
The three levels of flames, Nihility Karma Fire, White Pure Fire, and Black Divine Fire, must be controlled to a masterful degree, even to the extent of mixing them with each other to achieve the most perfect stage.
The third prerequisite is: Ratio of refining materials!
Indeed, there are many hard substances in the Divine World, but relying on a single material to refine artifacts is extremely rare in the entire Divine World. Among a hundred Heavenly Divine Artifacts, ninety-nine are a combination of multiple materials merged successfully.
Mixing various materials to complement each other’s strengths and weaknesses makes the weapons crafted even more perfect.
Dozens of different materials, each with different melting temperatures, and each material, possessing different properties, must be perfectly matched. The requirement is extremely high and quite terrifying.
Even the ratio is very complicated.
Because there is one point — in the Divine World, there are few things that are completely pure. Almost all materials have impurities; it’s just a matter of how much.
A substance might seem absolutely pure to a Divine Being, but in front of Heavenly Gods, impurities can be detected, because impurities are too difficult to notice.
Some substances may have impurities undetectable by Heavenly Gods but discovered by Divine Kings. Never underestimate the impurities occupying one in ten million of a material, as just that bit of impurity can downgrade the weapon you crafted by two or three grades.
Refining artifacts is a very meticulous matter, and cannot tolerate the slightest negligence!
This is also why, in the entire Divine World, even Divine Kings are inferior to the Artisan God Che Hou Yuan in artifact refining. Even Heavenly Venerable beings can’t craft a Heavenly Venerable Spiritual Treasure, yet Che Hou Yuan dares to challenge this. His power in artifact refining is evident.
There are two points to remember.
1, Even if you take out two blocks of Black Fan Stone, although they are both Black Fan Stones, the amount of impurities in them definitely varies. One must never casually use a fixed ratio to judge.
2, Although the seniors have provided a fixed ratio, that ratio can only be used for reference. It must never be rigidly adhered to. If you rigidly adhere to it, at most you’ll become an ordinary Artifact Refiner.
To refine an artifact embryo, in addition to the above three prerequisites, there is a fourth important condition: Control over the fire condition!
This control over the fire condition, different from the second condition "flames", primarily relies on experience, divine sense observation, etc.
Of course, these four are just prerequisites.
Having these four conditions can only indicate that you have the potential to become an Artifact Refining Master.
To become a true Artifact Refining Master, he was merely at the beginning now.
******
The successful refining of the ’Artifact Embryo’ hinges greatly on four essential prerequisites. Following these, it involves personal insights—devolving a method that removes impurities and allows the integration of multiple materials to perfection.
This method, is the Artifact Refining Skill.
The Artisan God ’Che Hou Yuan’ had his own refining methods, and the scrolls given to Qin Yu by the East Pole Saint Emperor recorded many precursor’s refining techniques as well.
’Che Hou Yuan’s’ method, known as "Thousand Hammers and Hundred Refinements," sounds simple but the process is incredibly complex.
"To become a new ’Artisan God’, you cannot simply copy the methods of the predecessors. You must create one that suits you best, your own refining method!"
These words by Che Hou Yuan in "Thousand Hammers and Hundred Refinements" made Qin Yu feel even more the difficulty of becoming a new Artisan God.
"Believe this, no material is entirely pure, even if Divine Kings consider it pure, that’s because Divine Kings cannot detect it, even if Heavenly Venerables regard it as pure, that is also because Heavenly Venerables are unable to discover it!"
This sentence by the Artisan God ’Che Hou Yuan’ in "Thousand Hammers and Hundred Refinements" greatly shocked Qin Yu.
According to the scrolls bestowed by the East Pole Saint Emperor, as recounted by some predecessors, most substances in the Divine World are not pure, yet a very few materials still are.
However, ’Che Hou Yuan’s’ viewpoint was drastically opposite.
"There is nothing entirely pure. If you keep this in mind, you will continually strive for the ultimate, constantly seeking where the impurities lie! In the end, this will enable you to judge by feeling. Remember, by feeling. A true Artifact Refining Master can judge the amount of impurities in a material merely by feeling."
What the Artisan God Che Hou Yuan imparted to Qin Yu was the ’spirit of skepticism’.
No matter the material, one must always be skeptical.
...
The more he read, the more Qin Yu admired Che Hou Yuan. To Qin Yu, what was precious was not Che Hou’s refining methods, but his unique way of thinking.
"The ability to draw and sculpt is also extremely important." This is a record found in almost all scrolls by artifact refining experts.
An artifact embryo might be called that, yet its form is already greatly successful.
A weapon is essentially an art piece. Only by achieving perfection and naturalness in its form and structure will the weapon possess greater power when ’Enlightened’.
The first of the three great steps: refining the artifact embryo.
Accomplishing all the above successfully concludes the first step.
While the second and third steps may seem not as important as the first, that’s because... the second and third steps test not much of experience, but the conditions one can offer!
"This second step is truly twisted." As Qin Yu continued reading, he felt increasingly the difficulty of refining.
The bold declaration he once made, ’I have the confidence to become the new Artisan God’, now seemed extremely challenging to achieve!
(End of Chapter One!)
(To be continued. For further episodes, please visit WWW.CMFU.COM, where the Chapters are more abundant. Support the author, support genuine reading!)
