"I wonder when I can break through!" Li Shiming muttered to himself as he felt the vortex of spiritual energy in his body.

Ever since he drank the spiritual tea from Gu Jia, his spiritual power increased greatly. Coupled with half a year of practice and the supplement of spiritual food, he finally reached the peak of the second level of Qi Refining.

He could feel a barrier appearing in front of him. As long as he broke through it, he could enter the third level of Qi Refining.

His consciousness entered the computer room and looked at the spiritual tea tree that had grown six branches. There were not many leaves on it, and he was reluctant to pick them.

Compared with the Fu Lingzhu, the Lingcha tree grows much slower.

After more than half a year, the Lingcha tree was barely able to branch, but it was still far from its normal form.

Picking them now will definitely harm the growth of the Lingcha tree and slow down the time it takes for the Lingcha tree to take shape.

"Let's wait a moment!" Li Shiming gave up the idea of ​​picking spiritual tea. His cultivation was not slow.

Of course, his cultivation speed is compared with that of casual cultivators. It took him a year to go from having no foundation to being only one step away from the third level of Qi Refining.

The independent practitioners he had seen took about ten years to reach this level of cultivation.

During the past six months, he has accumulated more than two thousand kilograms of spiritual rice and a large number of various primary talismans.

If the materials for making talisman ink were available, he would have made even more talismans.

Ever since the Hao family was destroyed, there have been cultivators who wanted to do the talisman business, but due to resource constraints, their businesses are very small.

Li Shiming had a great demand for talisman ink, and he didn't want to attract attention, so he didn't trade with any casual cultivators again.

He was very clear about his situation. It seemed that no one dared to provoke him, but that was not because of his own strength, but because of Gu Jia's influence.

Gu Jia couldn't be by his side all the time, so he needed to stay as safe as possible to get through this period.

When he was thinking about Gu Jia, a "Hundred Miles Message Talisman" flew over, and the bird transformed by the "Hundred Miles Message Talisman" had a talisman in its mouth.

Li Shiming stretched out his hand and the bird jumped into his hand.

The bird turned into a piece of letter and fell into his hand along with the talisman.

"Recently, a cultivator has been controlling corpses to kill people. Keep this 'Hundred Miles Message Talisman'. If you run into trouble, activate it immediately to ask for help!"

Li Shiming looked at the letter in his hand. Even though Gu Jia had a purpose towards him, he had to appreciate the kindness.

He had seen talismans like the 'Hundred Miles Message Talisman' many times, but unfortunately he did not have the relevant spells and could not make one himself.

The 'Hundred Mile Message Talisman' sent by Gu Jia had already set its destination, which was the small courtyard in the imperial palace. Gu Jia would be there most of the time every day.

"Corpse refining?" Li Shiming tried hard to recall his meager knowledge of cultivating immortals, but could not find any content about corpse refining.

However, just by listening to the name, you can tell that this is a method of refining corpses for your own use.

Li Shiming was not without information channels. He was also in contact with other Jinshi candidates of the same year.

These scholars entered various departments of Daxia, and they would hear a lot of inside information during the communication.

The Jinshi scholars of the same period are an extremely clique-like group. Currently, they have not grown up yet and are still in the early stages of entering the officialdom.

During this period, there were few conflicts among the Jinshi candidates. In addition, traditionally, Jinshi candidates who passed the exam in the same year were one of the greatest aids in officialdom, so the connections were relatively close.

Although Li Shiming had no real job, he was still rewarded by the emperor. His peers who passed the imperial examination in the same year did not look down on him and would always invite him to any gathering.

At these gatherings, he heard about recent strange cases, including at least a dozen murders in which all the blood in the body was drained.

Combined with Shang Gujia's reminder, Li Shiming guessed that these cases might be caused by corpse refining.

However, the news from mortals is different from that from monks. He wondered if he should find a monk to ask about the recent major events.

He immediately thought of Patriarch Liu. During the past six months, Patriarch Liu had dealt with him several times and had been very nice to him.

He also knew that Patriarch Liu had been living in the city recently, but that didn't mean that the Liu family had moved to the city like some of the independent cultivators.

Instead, the Liu family was divided into two parts, with one part of the monks staying in the family's original location, and the other part entering the city.

This is to prevent the Hao family from being caught in one fell swoop like the Hao family.

The same treatment was given to the Liu family as to the other three immortal cultivation families.

It is generally believed by casual cultivators that as long as they hold on until the Ascension Conference, everything will be fine.

It is precisely because of the Ascension Conference that so many cultivators have come to Zhongdu, and they also take this opportunity to earn more spirit stones in the Zhongdu city market.

When Li Shiming came to visit, clan leader Liu personally greeted him at the door.

"How come Fellow Daoist Li has time to come to my place?" Clan leader Liu invited Li Shiming into the living room. After both parties sat down as host and guest, Clan leader Liu asked with a forced smile.

"I learned from my Taoist brother that some cultivators were causing chaos by refining corpses, so I came here to find out the details!" Li Shiming did not beat around the bush and directly stated his purpose.

"I do know about this matter. Yesterday, Fellow Daoist Gu, who was at the third level of Qi Refining, was killed by a corpse refiner less than a mile away from here. Fellow Daoist Gu has already reported it to the sect. In addition, the independent cultivators have also received tasks issued by Fellow Daoist Gu to track the whereabouts of the corpse refiner!" Patriarch Liu explained with a worried look on his face.

Li Shiming now understood why Gu Jia reminded him. A murder occurred in Zhongdu City, and a monk was killed.

At other times, even if the monks were killed, it would not have much to do with Gu Jia.

However, this group of wandering cultivators came to seek Gu Jia's protection, but were killed. If Gu Jia did not take any action on this matter, it would be difficult for Tianhai Sect to control this group of wandering cultivators in the future.

"Is this cultivator very powerful? Brother Gu Dao is actually planning to report him to the sect?" Li Shiming asked in surprise.

Gu Jia is the strongest cultivator nearby, and even he had to report to the sect, which made Li Shiming feel the seriousness of the situation.

“I don’t know exactly how strong he is, but he won’t be weaker than the middle stage of Qi Refining. He might even be in the late stage of Qi Refining like Fellow Daoist Gu!” Patriarch Liu replied with a wry smile.

Li Shiming's hair stood on end. A powerful cultivator who was hiding like a hunter was too dangerous for a rookie like him who was only at the second level of Qi Refining.

No wonder Gu Jia sent him the 'Hundred Mile Message Talisman', it turns out it was so dangerous.

"The monks are now trying to stay together and dare not act alone. We suspect that the monks who came this time are related to the monks who wiped out the Hao family half a year ago!" Patriarch Liu continued.

"I hope to find this monk as soon as possible, otherwise I won't be able to sleep peacefully at night!" Li Shiming was reluctant to tell the truth, so he said in a deep voice.

After receiving the news, he did not bother Chief Liu any longer and went home while it was still light.

He didn't want to walk around outside after dark, as that would make him a prey for the monks hiding in the dark.