Zhang Zhixuan waited outside Fangshi for three days and finally met Chen Hongyuan. The two met to drive to Qingyangfang City and headed straight to Lushan Tiantai Peak.
Both of them were foundation-building monks and could already fly with swords. It only took them more than twenty days to reach the bottom of Tiantai Peak.
As soon as the two of them arrived at Hantan in the back mountain, the clan leader Zhang Leqian came out.
"It turns out that Zhixuan is back. How did you go to Qingxuanzong this time? This fellow Taoist seems to be a friend you made in Qingxuanzong. How is your Aunt Hanyan doing recently?
Is there anything you need help from the family?"
"Thank you to my third uncle for your concern. This trip to Qingxuan Sect went smoothly.
This time I went to Qingxuan Sect, and under the introduction of Aunt Hanyan, I met Daoyou Chen. Chen Daoyou has a very high level of weapon refining skills and successfully used poisonous fire spider materials to make two third-level magic weapons.
I invited him to come to the family this time in the hope of building a spirit-detecting platform for the family on Tiantai Peak. It happened that he had time recently, so he left Qingxuan Sect and came to Lushan with me.
In the past fifty years, there has been no spirit-detecting platform, and the monks in the family have almost completely relied on the experience of the elders to choose their techniques.
Sometimes the elders are inexperienced and choose the wrong technique, which delays a lot of people. If the spirit detection platform is built, the situation will be much better." Zhang Zhixuan cupped his hands towards the clan leader and introduced Chen Hongyuan to the clan leader as he spoke. Zhang Leqian.
Fifty years ago, Zhang Leqian was defeated in Jiuhua Mountain. He lost to Wei Mazi, He Laodao and others, and lost the Jiuhua Mountain spiritual veins. Also lost was the family's valuable spiritual measuring platform.
The spiritual measuring platform is a special building and a large magical instrument. Its main function is to measure the spiritual roots of monks.
Building a soul-detecting platform is very troublesome. It not only consumes a lot of materials, but also requires the weapon refiner to burn special formations to perfectly smelt different materials into one.
If the level of the weapon refiner is not high enough, the spirit measuring platform they make will not be very sensitive, and there will be errors when measuring the spiritual roots of the monks.
Therefore, when a cultivating family builds a spirit-measuring platform, they often hire high-level weapon refiners. Only those with level 3 or above can build a spirit-measuring platform that can accurately measure a monk's spiritual roots.
It takes about ten months to build a spirit-finding platform, but it often takes longer to correct errors in the spirit-finding platform.
It often takes a weapon refiner three years to build a spiritual detection platform.
There is no doubt that Chen Hongyuan's level is very good. He just showed his hand and made Zhang Leqian completely relieved.
With the support of Zhang Leqian, the nineteenth uncle Zhang Mengling began to send a large number of family manpower to Xihefang to purchase building materials, preparing to start the construction of the spirit measuring platform immediately.
After returning for more than ten days, Zhang Zhixuan has not seen Zhang Mengqin, the eighteenth aunt.
It is said that this is a good opportunity for her to learn the art of weapon refining. It is very rare for her to work behind a third-level weapon refining master.
With a trace of doubt, Zhang Zhixuan directly approached his 19th uncle Zhang Mengling.
“Uncle Nineteen, why haven’t you seen Aunt Eighteen recently?
Let Eighteen Gu follow Master Chen Xian, as long as she can learn a skill, it will be very beneficial to her weapon refining skills."
Zhang Zhixuan's words suddenly revealed a trace of sadness and shame on Zhang Mengling's face. He shook his head with a wry smile and took Zhang Zhixuan directly to the family cemetery.
A new tomb stands in the cemetery. On her left is the fourth uncle Zhang Menglong, on the right is the fifteenth uncle Zhang Mengchong, and on the left is the ninth uncle Zhang Mengquan who has been missing for twenty years.
More than half a year ago, the eighteenth aunt Zhang Mengqin followed Zhang Zhixuan to the Black Python Mountain. At that time, she was still safe and sound.
Zhang Zhixuan was only busy for more than half a year, and when he came back, he was separated forever.
As soon as we said goodbye when we went home that day, we couldn't see each other again.
"She is already fifty-nine this year. After next year, her vitality will begin to decline. After you left the family and went to Montenegro, Sister Meng Qin decided to take the risk and reach the foundation-building stage.
Although she was a woman, she was arrogant and arrogant compared to most male cultivators. After she came back, she ignored everyone's advice and insisted on choosing to retreat to death.
You left home and went to Qingxuan Sect. Because the half-year period has arrived, we forcibly opened her cave.
Although we were mentally prepared, I still can't accept this reality.
She died miserably, every inch of her skin was bursting open. A person who loved beauty before had turned so ugly.
In order to give her some dignity in the afterlife, we had to use needles and thread to sew up the wounds on her body and bury her in the family cemetery.
When she left, no one in the family was by her side, and no one knew how miserable she was inside.
Zhixuan! Although your aunt is a woman, she is far stronger than me.
After more than three hundred years in the family, there are only one person who dares to take the risk of attacking the foundation building level without a foundation building pill.
Except for you who succeeded, the remaining four people became a pile of bones. There was only one female cultivator among them, your Aunt Meng Qin.
Your fourth uncle also wanted to attack the foundation-building realm back then, but under the strict orders of the clan leader, he didn't take the risk.
He is the third-level formation mage of the family and the most important monk in the family besides the patriarch. Once the patriarch is gone, we can only rely on him to protect the family.
Sister Meng Qin left, which made me deeply understand that I am not a monk. I am far from having the determination of a monk to fight to the death.
I used to feel sorry for myself, thinking that I was born in the declining Zhang family by mistake. If my surname was Wu, I would have already established my foundation.
But the moment Sister Meng Qin left, I knew clearly that even if I could succeed in building the foundation, I probably wouldn't have much of a future.
So what if we live an extra hundred years? Everyone must die one day.
From this year onwards, I am going to marry a wife and have a concubine and enjoy happiness."
Zhang Zhixuan knew that Uncle Nineteen had always been strict with himself and did not approach women. Even though he was nearly sixty years old, he had not broken Yuanyang. The reason why he had such self-discipline was to attack the day of foundation building.
If Aunt Meng Qin's tragic death hadn't dealt him a huge blow and made him feel a serious setback, he wouldn't have been so depressed.
This kind of struggle deep inside a monk's heart often requires him to rely on himself. Although Zhang Zhixuan can give him some encouragement, I'm afraid it won't be of much help.
He is already over sixty years old and is not a six-year-old child, so he can be coaxed.
Maybe his choice to give up the path was the right choice.
After all, although he was halfway through his life span, he still had a happy life for a decade. Being able to spend his old age in peace and die in the arms of his wife and children was considered a blessing.
The farewell to Black Python Mountain has become an eternal farewell.
The six elders of the family when Zhang Zhixuan came down from the mountain at the age of sixteen are now gradually withering away.
The ninth uncle was the first to disappear. Later, the fifteenth uncle died from the mouth of a monster in the southern wasteland. The fourth uncle's heart was exhausted and he died prematurely. The eighteenth uncle died in the cave in order to attack the foundation.
Back then, the five-man group that was full of energy in the Southern Wilderness and hunted down third-level monsters as monks in the Qi-training stage, today, only Zhang Zhixuan and Han Yan are left.
Until now, the scene of the five people showing off their prowess in the Southern Wilderness and completing the mission of good deeds that even the foundation-building monks could not accomplish is vaguely still yesterday.
But now, facing the family cemetery, Zhang Zhixuan suddenly felt an unspeakable loneliness.
Perhaps monks seeking the Tao are cutting off worldly ties bit by bit and living alone until the sea is dry and the stone is torn apart.