Chapter Ninety: The Sevenfold Ice Seal

For Liu Pan, Jia Xu had never paid him much mind.

Back when he first saw Liu Pan surrounded by a crowd in the plaza of the Flowing Cloud Sect, Jia Xu’s very first thought had been that the man was finished.

He did not believe Liu Pan would still be running about lively after he emerged from seclusion. After all, among people of the same age, it was terribly difficult to find one whose temperament surpassed his own.

And for a newly admitted disciple with neither power, backing, nor patron, surrounded by a pack of fellow disciples, even if he gritted his teeth and endured, there was no way he could live at ease in the short term.

So when he saw Liu Pan, Jia Xu was somewhat stunned.

The third floor of the Sutra Pavilion was not a place ordinary disciples could simply reach.

Unconsciously, Jia Xu’s gaze dropped to the token hanging at Liu Pan’s waist. Then he was utterly dumbfounded.

Besides the black jade token, Jia Xu also saw two other tokens. One was dark gray, the ordinary identity token worn by common sect disciples. The other was blue-green, the identity token of an apothecary boy from the Alchemy Hall of Cloudpeak.

Within the Flowing Cloud Sect, the identity token of an apothecary boy was a highly unusual thing. Or rather, only the identity token of an apothecary boy from Cloudpeak was highly unusual.

Many disciples knew that such a token existed, yet very few had ever seen one.

And there was only one source for that token: Elder Zhao of the Alchemy Hall on Cloudpeak.

Over the years, no one knew how many apothecary boys Elder Zhao had taken in, yet not a single one had ever received the identity token of an apothecary boy. The reason was nothing more than Elder Zhao’s peculiar temper.

That was why Jia Xu was so dumbfounded by the blue-green token. To him, it was truly inconceivable.

Still, Jia Xu’s temperament was far more mature than that of his peers, so he quickly came to himself. Even so, the way he looked at Liu Pan remained a little strange.

After a brief thought, an unreadable light flickered in Jia Xu’s eyes. He still remembered what the middle-aged man had told him in the Flowing Cloud Sect plaza before: if this person was still living well after you came out of seclusion, then you could make friends with him.

However, after a slight hesitation, Jia Xu did not approach Liu Pan.

With Jia Xu’s present temperament, even if Liu Pan was still alive and well after his seclusion ended, he would absolutely not rush over to make friends with him.

Or rather, for someone with a mind more mature than the average person, currying favor with the powerful was a sign of profound lack of confidence in oneself.

Although Jia Xu had encountered some problems in his cultivation before, now that he had broken through to the rank of martial master before adulthood, he was filled with confidence in his future.

In the end, what concerned Jia Xu most was still the token hanging at Liu Pan’s waist.

A single token might not mean much on its own. But when the black jade token and the apothecary boy’s token were worn together, one could not help but think deeply.

After all, they were now on the third floor of the Sutra Pavilion. Liu Pan was merely an apothecary boy; there was no way he had obtained a black jade token for no reason.

And given Liu Pan’s status as an apothecary boy, the greatest likelihood was that it had come from Elder Zhao. But on what grounds would Elder Zhao give a black jade token to an apothecary boy? There was only one possibility… Jia Xu thought of the Earth Origin Pill he had taken a few days earlier.

Jia Xu knew very well that Elder Zhao had been unable to refine Earth Origin Pills before.

Yet now, Elder Zhao had suddenly refined one. Then Cloudpeak had sent down another apothecary boy wearing an apothecary token. Even more astonishingly, this apothecary boy also possessed a black jade token. It was enough to make one’s imagination run wild.

Naturally, Jia Xu linked Liu Pan with Elder Zhao’s refinement of the Earth Origin Pill.

However, although he felt there was some connection between Liu Pan and the Earth Origin Pill, he still did not think much of Liu Pan himself.

In the end, it was still a matter of mindset. Jia Xu felt that more time was needed to prove whether Liu Pan was qualified to become his friend.

Liu Pan naturally noticed Jia Xu’s gaze. Frowning slightly, he only then remembered the token at his waist. At once, he unobtrusively turned his body and put the apothecary boy’s token into his storage pouch.

Liu Pan did not know whether Jia Xu had seen the apothecary token, and at the moment he did not care all that much.

So what if he had seen it? There was only one person here. After choosing a technique, Liu Pan would simply return to Cloudpeak. Even if the other person went out and spoke of it, it would not have much impact.

Besides, Liu Pan had already heard from Yu Yao and Zhang Pingkang that his six or seven days without descending from Cloudpeak had already stirred up quite a commotion in the Flowing Cloud Sect. A little more commotion now would not matter much. In any case, very few people knew what he looked like.

Of course, it was even better if he had not seen it.

Putting away the apothecary token, Liu Pan’s attention also settled on the bookshelves before him.

At once, Liu Pan froze. He had seen the Mystic Ice Formula.

Although the old man in the Sutra Pavilion of the Hundred Sun Sect had once said that the Mystic Ice Formula was a common technique, and Liu Pan had guessed that the Flowing Cloud Sect would certainly have it, when he truly saw it, he still found it somewhat strange.

He casually took down the Mystic Ice Formula and flipped through it. Very soon, Liu Pan confirmed that this technique contained only the methods for the first three levels, all of which he had already cultivated.

Frowning, Liu Pan truly felt that something was off. A technique like the Mystic Ice Formula, from the sharp instinct of a writer, absolutely should not have been a common technique. Yet in fact…

Shaking his head, Liu Pan cast aside the doubt in his mind and turned his attention to the other techniques.

Main cultivation techniques: Ice Saint Scripture, Spirit-Driven Ice Formula, Frost-Slaughter Formula…

Martial techniques: Earth Ice Spike, Triple-Origin Ice Blade, Frostfist…

Very quickly, Liu Pan had gone through all the ice techniques. Then he frowned. Most of these techniques were grade-arcane, yet he felt no stir of temptation whatsoever.

The reason was simple enough: the introductions to these techniques were written far too completely, even describing in clear detail the effects they would have after cultivation.

For a fantasy author who had written too many techniques and battle moves, imagination was indispensable. For that very reason, after reading the stated effects of a technique, it was easy to simulate in one’s mind the scene of actually using it.

Thus, these techniques that inspired no expectation in Liu Pan simply could not satisfy his desires.

As for his main cultivation technique, Liu Pan truly thought the Mystic Ice Formula was excellent, and from the very beginning he had never intended to change it.

However, if he did not choose, then what could he do? Surely he could not let the opportunity go to waste.

His gaze swept across the martial techniques on the shelves. After hesitating for quite a while, Liu Pan’s heart suddenly stirred, and he turned to walk down the stairs.

Soon he reached the second floor, where there was still a shelf of ice techniques. After searching through it several times, Liu Pan finally found the technique he had in mind: Sevenfold Ice-Origin Seal.

Back when he had used ice-type origin power in the Hundred Sun Sect to condense the seventh seal of the Sevenfold Water-Origin Seal, Liu Pan had already thought of cultivating the Sevenfold Ice-Origin Seal. His idea was very simple: fourteen origin seals.

He was very satisfied with the power of the Sevenfold Water-Origin Seal. As for fourteen origin seals, that was his fantasy.

After all, if two different kinds of origin seals could merge, then similar martial arts would have long since appeared, and Liu Pan could never have been the first to eat the crab.

However, although he felt it was impossible, Liu Pan still could not help but let his imagination run wild.

As for using a black jade token to come here and choose a yellow-rank martial art… let others think whatever they wanted. If Elder Zhao asked about it, then he would say he had chosen the Mystic Ice Formula. Liu Pan did not think Elder Zhao would specially come over to ask the man with triangular eyes what technique he had chosen.