JSCMU-Chapter 144: Golden Core Within Reach

At this moment.

After Yun Jin’s proficiency level, a “simplify” button appeared.

Yun Jin tapped it.

“Forging one hundred pieces of Hundred-Refined Iron will increase proficiency by one point. When proficiency reaches 100%, you can advance to second-rank artifact refiner.”

Yun Jin raised an eyebrow and immediately spent ten simplification attempts.

“Forging fifty pieces of Hundred-Refined Iron will increase proficiency by one point. When proficiency reaches 100%, you can advance to second-rank artifact refiner.”

Fifty pieces of Hundred-Refined Iron?

That’s still a bit much.

Her time’s extremely precious.

Yun Jin continued tapping.

She kept spending simplification attempts, fifty times in total.

Finally, the condition became.

“For every ten pieces of Hundred-Refined Iron forged, proficiency increases by one point.”

Yun Jin tried once more afterward, but the condition no longer changed.

It was clear that ten pieces of Hundred-Refined Iron was some sort of threshold.

Yun Jin didn’t keep experimenting. She obediently began forging.

At her speed.

One quarter of an hour was enough to complete forging one piece of Hundred-Refined Iron.

But forging Hundred-Refined Iron consumed too much spiritual energy. After finishing one piece, one would normally need to slowly wait for spiritual power to recover.

But Yun Jin was a cheat user.

She could use pills to instantly recover spiritual energy.

Which meant that before long, she could start forging the next one.

If she didn’t stop, ten pieces of Hundred-refined Iron could be finished in two hours.

There were twenty-four hours in a day. If she worked hard, she could increase proficiency by six points a day.

At that rate, in less than twenty days, she would be able to advance to second-rank artifact refiner. By then, eldest senior brother should also have the materials ready for upgrading the Tai’a Sword.

She could then attempt to begin the star upgrade process for the Tai’a Sword.

Under this plan, the timing was extremely tight.

The advancement of the artifact refining profession seemed to be even harder than the alchemy profession for Yun Jin.

But in fact, Yun Jin felt that each method had its own advantages.

This alchemy-style cultivation required spending a large number of simplification attempts and was only targeted toward specific pills. For example, a simplified Foundation Establishment Pill could be refined easily. But for any other second-grade pill, she would have to use simplification attempts again to learn it.

This kind of method was a rich person’s cultivation by burning simplification attempts.

But if she used this approach for every secondary profession, she’d run out of simplification attempts quickly.

The artifact refiner’s method, although slower and more exhausting, was much more economical in terms of simplification usage. You could say both had their pros and cons, and both fit the nature of their respective professions.

Yun Jin didn’t dwell on this much. She looked at the amount of black iron and estimated it might not be enough, so she used her transmission token to tell Yue Zhao to buy another batch.

Soon, a new batch of black iron was delivered.

A disciple of Artifact Forging Peak placed the black iron at the door and rang the bell on the door.

When Yun Jin went out to retrieve the black iron, she smiled faintly at the disciple and handed him an object tightly wrapped in cloth.

“Senior brother, I’ll have to trouble you to please give this to Peak Master Yang for a look.” Yun Jin also handed over a mid-grade spirit stone as a delivery fee.

The disciple’s eyes flickered slightly, and he quickly accepted, “Don’t worry, I’ll deliver it. But I can’t guarantee the Peak Master will accept it.”

“Of course,” Yun Jin said with a smile.

The disciple nodded and turned to leave.

Yun Jin carried the new batch of black iron inside and began her tireless forging life.

Not long after.

The tightly wrapped item was placed on Yang Hui’s desk.

Yang Hui squinted his eyes.

Didn’t Yun Jin enter the Earth-Fire Chamber not long ago?

And she already requested another batch of black iron, and even sent something to him?

Recalling the awkward encounter last time, he didn’t dare think she was delivering a gift again. Still, he found himself feeling suspicious.

Yang Hui quickly swept his divine sense over the package and his expression slightly changed.

He suddenly felt a bit of urgency and unwrapped the bundle. In the innermost layer was a perfectly forged piece of Hundred-Refined Iron.

This…

Even Yang Hui’s beard started trembling.

Where did this come from?

Did Yun Jin bring in a piece of Hundred-Refined Iron ahead of time?

If that were the case, then delivering this to him now would be meaningless!

Is she trying to say this Hundred-Refined Iron was forged by her own hands?

Yang Hui subconsciously shook his head.

How long had Yun Jin even been in there?

Not even a full hour!

And she could already refine her first piece of Hundred-Refined Iron?

No matter how he thought about it, it seemed impossible.

But remembering Yun Jin’s overly confident expression…

For a moment, he actually hesitated.

She had no reason to try to fool him with a store-bought piece of Hundred-Refined Iron, did she?

There was no benefit for her in doing so.

But then again…

Yang Hui’s expression flickered, then settled. He calmly put the piece of Hundred-Refined Iron into his storage pouch.

Yun Jin resumed her seclusion.

There was no way to ask her anything now.

All truth would naturally be revealed one month later.

Inside the Earth-Fire Chamber.

There was no distinction between day and night.

The illumination stones above worked around the clock.

The flames constantly emitted heat.

Yun Jin began her most intense twenty days.

Every day, she did nothing but refine Hundred-Refined Iron.

When spiritual power was depleted, she took pills to recover it.

Once recovered, she continued refining.

During this period, she hardly had a single moment of rest.

To her, the time it took to restore spiritual power already counted as rest.

This kind of intense cultivation led Yun Jin to discover something.

When she depleted her spiritual energy and recovered again, each time her recovery speed was faster than the last, and the total amount of spiritual energy increased slightly with each cycle.

Her spiritual energy was growing rapidly at a visible pace. Even her soul realm, which had been progressing slowly, was improving much faster.

On the fifth day, Yun Jin’s soul realm broke through to early Golden Core stage.

On the tenth day, her spiritual cultivation reached the peak of Foundation Establishment. She vaguely felt the urge to break through.

But she was still busy forging, so she tried compressing her spiritual energy.

Unexpectedly, she succeeded.

So Yun Jin didn’t bother with it and just kept forging.

Each strike of her hammer, though clearly landing on the black iron, seemed as if it also hammered her spiritual energy.

Her spiritual energy became more and more condensed, just like the black iron under the hammer.

Ten more days passed like this.

Yun Jin successfully became a second-rank artifact refiner a few days ago, but her spiritual power still continued to become more and more condensed. This sensation was extremely mysterious. Yun Jin did not stop, she continued forging iron until her spiritual power could no longer be further refined.

Only then did Yun Jin sit down cross-legged.

Originally, her spiritual power was like a vast ocean, quietly resting in her Dantian.

But after days of continuous refining, that ocean already condensed into a massive sphere.

This meant that the preliminary step for advancing to Golden Core Stage was unknowingly completed during her forging process.

The next step.

Was to compress this sphere!