At the foot of the mountain, nearly a thousand ordinary people had now been gathered.
The spirit well that had been unblocked there barely reached the standard of a Spirit Spring, and three mu of spiritual fields had been added at the foot of the mountain, all planted with spirit rice. They could yield about a thousand catties, harvested every half year, and the first harvest was now imminent, which would fetch around one hundred Spirit Stones when sold.
There were also people specially selected by Chen Fan after testing their Spirit Roots. Although their aptitude was exceptionally poor, they had each stepped into Level 1 Qi Condensation.
Moreover, having bestowed upon them the magical tools he had refined during those past few days, there was no problem at all for their strength to defend against ordinary wild beasts.
They had now been taken in as family retainers, and he was focusing on training them to become spirit planters. Because their aptitude was far too low, even if he spent the effort to train them into Alchemists or artifact refiners, what good would it do if they had little lifespan left by the time they succeeded?
The only shortcoming right now was that his family had far too few people—only three in total, counting his newborn son.
However, thinking of the child in his wife's belly and the lifespan of cultivators:
Those in the Qi Condensation stage could live for about one hundred and fifty years free of illness and disaster, while those in the Foundation Establishment stage could reach around two hundred and twenty years. In the mortal world, that already spanned several generations of people. Anyway, since he was already an immortal cultivator, he had plenty of time to take things slowly and was determined to keep a low profile and develop steadily.
......
A month later, Chen Fan was down the mountain, teaching the knowledge of spirit planting to the few people selected from the village.
Currently, only five people had reached Level 1 Qi Condensation, and among them, only three—Niu Da, Li Er, and Zhang Shan—possessed the talent for spirit planting and were able to grasp a little; the others were completely clueless.
Whenever Chen Fan had free time, he would often instruct these three. While he was lecturing there on this particular day, he suddenly received a visit from his wife's relatives.
Before long, a man appeared who had some white hair and a somewhat aged face, yet possessed a very robust physique. The visitor was Lin Jie of the Li family.
According to seniority, Chen Fan still had to address him as grandfather.
It was just a pity that his wife's parents had passed away early, and even other closer relatives, such as her biological grandfather, were no longer among the living.
Because Chen Fan had broken through to become a First-Tier Alchemist, their strategy of casting a wide net had finally paid off in his case.
During the first few days after his breakthrough, they had frequently come here to persuade him to bring his wife and join the Li family, but how could Chen Fan possibly truly join? He had no choice but to politely decline.
After that, however, they frequently entrusted him with refining various pills. Of course, every time he refined pills, they would give Chen Fan a generous reward, without trying to take advantage of him for free.
Therefore, upon hearing the news that this nominal Li grandfather had arrived, Chen Fan was not too surprised, figuring that this time he must be asking for pills to be refined again.
As Chen Fan happened to be at the foot of the mountain at the moment, he stood up and walked toward Grandfather Lin Jie.
After a detailed discussion, Chen Fan understood the purpose of his visit.
"A Breakthrough Pill, and for the Qi Condensation stage at that," Chen Fan murmured, looking at the new pill recipe in his hand.
He instantly understood in his heart that someone among his wife's family was probably about to break through to High-level Qi Condensation, which was Level 10 Qi Condensation.
This time, they brought nearly ten portions of materials, asking only that he manage to refine at least one top-quality Breakthrough Pill.
Usually, for the sake of keeping a low profile, he would intentionally lower the grade of the pills he refined for others, and only occasionally produce a top-quality pill.
Thus, others had no idea that he could achieve a hundred percent success rate in refining top-quality pills.
Considering this request and that his reward would be this new pill recipe, Chen Fan knew the Li family was about to make a move. Otherwise, aside from those who had lost all hope of breaking through again in this lifetime and would take Breakthrough Pills, ordinary people would rather spend more time polishing their foundation than take this kind of pill.
As far as he knew, the only person in the Li family at Level 9 Qi Condensation was the head of the Li family himself, unless they were hiding something—though there seemed to be no need for that, since Yixin Village had nothing worth plotting against anyway.
If his guess was correct, it was likely Li Yingcai, the family head, who was going to take this Breakthrough Pill. It seemed this Li family was about to make a major move soon. With the Li Family of Qingyang Town and the Li Family of Yixin Village, this Li family certainly produced a multitude of talented individuals!
Still, after thinking it over, neither side interfered with the other at present; it would all depend on who developed faster. After all, only the strong could decide life and death, while the weak could only await judgment.
Having agreed upon the date to collect the pills and sending him off, Chen Fan stopped teaching the people, assigned them the task of tending to the spirit rice, and walked back up toward the family grounds on the mountainside.
.....
Sitting before the Pill Cauldron, Chen Fan looked at the ten portions of pill-refining materials, pondered for a moment, and decided to refine one top-quality pill before giving them ten ordinary-quality pills, leaving five remaining. He would store these in the treasure pavilion to see when they might come in handy.
When the appointed date arrived, the Li family came as expected, though this time it was not Li Lin Jie from before, but someone of Chen Fan's own generation who came to collect the items.
Because of his wife Li Lingyu, most of the people of Chen Fan's generation in the Li family were quite young—at least much younger than him. Yet, despite his youth, this young man had actually reached Level 5 Qi Condensation, making Chen Fan look on with envy. This was the benefit of having exceptional natural talent!
After handing over the pills to this person and exchanging a few polite pleasantries, the young man took his leave and departed.
Watching him leave, Chen Fan knew that the Li family was about to make their move. Pondering this, he pushed himself to be even more diligent and accelerated the pace of building his own family.
After several months of working hard to build up his family, Chen Fan learned—due to the shortage of his own manpower and low cultivation levels—that a month prior, the head of the Yixin Village Li family had broken through to Level 10 Qi Condensation and, cooperating with other members of the Li family, had suddenly surrounded the pseudo-Spiritual Vein and begun constructing a Formation on the spot.
The most powerful cultivators in the village were only at Level 8 Qi Condensation. Ordinarily, a multitude of ants could bite an elephant to death, but now that Li Yingcai had broken through to Late Qi Condensation, working together with the other Li family members, they had left the other two factions dead or fled. The one who escaped had seen that things looked ominous right from the start and bolted while the others were still arguing verbally.
Another was Liu Fengqing, who ran a shop in the village and had somehow broken through to Level 8 Qi Condensation, though he had married a Li family daughter long before that and become a matrilocal son-in-law.
Now, aside from the family head at Level 10 Qi Condensation, the highest cultivation level in the Li family belonged to Liu Fengqing at Level 8 Qi Condensation, while the rest of the clansmen were at Low-level Qi Condensation, with the highest among them at Level 6 Qi Condensation.
With a total of over thirty people, the Li family was now firmly occupying Yixin Village and had been remodeling it for several months, while the original villagers had been assigned other arrangements by the Li family.