In Blue Deer village, Zhen Yuan didn't prepare his own talisman paper and talisman liquid.
On one hand, it was because Blue Spring town was remote and refining ingredients were hard to come by. On the other, it was because he couldn't be bothered to work so hard.
After all, the talismans he drew were for sale and not for personal use.
However, things had changed.
Now, he was no longer alone and was no longer an observer.
Since he wanted to accompany his wife to live an extraordinary life, Zhen Yuan couldn't continue compromising.
With such thoughts, he left the bamboo house and walked toward a certain area of the Chaos Flame space.
Less than one hundred breaths later, he arrived before a patch of spirit grass.
The area was about fifty square metres.
At a glance, it was divided into one hundred small squares and a spirit grass was planted on each square.
"The seven-leaf fir grass is growing well." Zhen Yuan muttered to himself.
In reality, it had been close to one month since Xiaoren planted the seven-leaf fir grass.
However, in space time, it was almost one year.
After one year, the seven-leaf fir grasses were fifty centimetres tall and thirty centimetres wide. Additionally, the seven leaves on each stalk were a light green and about to turn darker.
Seeing this, Zhen Yuan nodded in satisfaction.
The colour change signified initial maturity.
After a few days, he could harvest a few stalks to refine level one talisman paper.
However, Zhen Yuan didn't plan to do that.
In the Canglan continent, it was easy to buy level one and level two resources.
However, it was almost impossible to buy level three materials.
Because he had long exhausted his stash of level three talisman paper, Zhen Yuan hadn't drawn level three talismans for a long time.
Considering that, he planned to wait until the seven-leaf fir grass matured for a few more years. When that happened, he would harvest it to refine level three and level four talisman paper.
After looking around the space and checking on the egg, Zhen Yuan returned to the bamboo hut.
Unfortunately, Shen Xu's door was still closed.
'It's only been a few days but I already miss him.' He thought and with a complicated look in his eyes, he left the Chaos Flame space.
Instantaneously, he appeared in their inn room.
The room was as they had left it.
There were no missing things or repositioned items.
Seeing this, Zhen Yuan left the inn and walked towards the city centre.
His first stop was a large herb shop.
"What does the young master need?" A young attendant asked.
"Seven leaf-fir grass. Do you have it?"
"Our herb shop is the largest in Dragon City. We have many stalks of seven-leaf fir grass with maturities ranging from one year to ninety years. Which kind and how many do you need?"
When he heard this, Zhen Yuan fell into thought.
Generally, the higher the age of seven-leaf fir grass, the better the quality of the refined talisman paper. Similarly, the better the quality of talisman paper, the easier it was to draw a high-quality talisman.
Considering this, Zhen Yuan decisively chose high-age spirit grass. In this way, he could more easily draw high-quality talismans.
"I want fifty stalks of level one and level two seven-leaf fir grass. The higher the age, the better." He said.
Hearing this, the attendant was overjoyed.
Although seven-leaf fir grass was not valuable, it was rare to encounter such a large order.
After all, a single stalk of seven-leaf fir grass could refine one hundred pieces of talisman paper.
Ordinarily, talisman masters would not buy more than ten stalks at a time.
With resumed enthusiasm, the attendant smiled and pointed to a seat.
"Young master, please rest here while I prepare your order."
"Good." Zhen Yuan said and sat down.
Less than an incense stick later, the attendant returned with two wooden boxes.
"Young master, please check them carefully." He said and handed over the two boxes.
Zhen Yuan was not pretentious.
Although he had a lot of spirit stones and the loss of a few wasn't a big deal, he still checked the herbs carefully.
After confirming nothing was wrong with the spirit grasses, he paid for them and left the store.
Seeing it was still early, Zhen Yuan didn't return to the inn.
Instead, he began to walk around Dragon City.
Dragon City was several times larger than Anyang City.
It had wider streets and more shops.
Whenever he saw a bookstore, Zhen Yuan would enter to search for rare books and inheritances.
Unfortunately, his luck was not good.
Although he found some good books, he didn't encounter any rare or special ones.
While walking around the city, Zhen Yuan also visited a few other shops.
One of the shops he went to was a monster materials shop.
Usually, talisman masters preferred talisman papers when drawing talismans. However, monster skin was also a good material for drawing talismans and inscriptions.
Considering this, Zhen Yuan bought monster skins, bones, blood, and demon cores.
The monster skins were for drawing talismans and inscriptions, the bones for engraving formations; the blood for refining rune liquid; and the demon cores for refining explosive beads.
In addition to the monster materials shops, Zhen Yuan also visited a jade shop.
From the shop, he purchased more than one hundred pieces of spiritual jade.
On one hand, the jade could be put in the spiritual lake to warm the spiritual water. On the other, the better pieces could be used to engrave formation accessories.
When Zhen Yuan finished everything he needed to do, it was already afternoon.
If it were up to him, he would return to the space to continue his retreat.
However, now that he had Shen Xu, he couldn't ignore the world.
Thinking of this, he went to the most popular restaurant in Dragon City.
As usual, he sat at a hall table, drank wine and diligently eavesdropped on gossip.
"Have you heard about the Shi family?" A female voice whispered and Zhen Yuan was immediately attracted.
With an indifferent expression, he subtly looked over and saw a group of five sitting at the next table.
Among the five, three were women and two were young men.
"Who hasn't heard?" One of the young men said, rolling his eyes.
Seeing this, Zhen Yuan frowned and narrowed his eyes in concentration.
From what he knew, the original Shen Xu belonged to the Shi family in Dragon City.
However, Shen Xu was an adopted child and didn't have the surname 'Shi'.
Instead, his adoptive mother, his maternal aunt, surnamed him after his biological father.
When Zhen Yuan remembered this, his frown deepened.
However, now was not the time to think about that.
With a shake of his head, he suppressed his thoughts and continued to eavesdrop.
"It's said the double has been missing for several months now. Why is the Shi family suddenly looking for him? They have even offered such a high reward."
"I heard the double is an alchemist."
"Is the Shi family short of alchemists?" Someone snorted, and several people looked at each other.
The Shi family was an alchemy family.
Although it hadn't produced extraordinary alchemists in several generations, there was no shortage of talented ones.
"The double has a fire root. Although he has a high talent for alchemy, he is inferior to wood element alchemists. I don't think the Shi family is looking for him because of his alchemy talent."
"He is their family after all."
"What family? The double is the adopted child of the fourth son. However, the fourth son and his wife have already fallen. As far as I know, the Shi family couldn't care less about the double."
"In that case…." The speaker frowned and tried to figure it out.
Unfortunately, no matter how much he thought about it, he couldn't guess why the Shi family was looking for the double. Normally, they wouldn't care about the life and death of the child.
"Who cares about the reason? This matter has nothing to do with us."
"To be honest, I know a little about what is going on." Someone suddenly said.
When they heard that, everyone at the table turned to look at a young lady.
The young lady had been quiet all along and it wasn't until now that she decided to speak up.
"Come to think of it, aren't you from the Shi family?" A young man asked, his eyes wide in disbelief.
After all, they had been gossiping about the Shi family, completely forgetting that one of them was an involved party.
The young woman was less than twenty.
She wore a light blue robe and looked pretty in an ordinary way.
"Mmmmh." She nodded and sighed.
"I shouldn't be telling you this but you are my friends. If you promise not to spread the matter, I will tell you what I know." The young woman said.
The person was called Shi Miao and she was the daughter of the second son.
If Shen Xu was present, he would recognise her as one of the people who were beating him when he just travelled into the book.
Unfortunately, Shen Xu was not around and Zhen Yuan could only listen.
"As you said, we are friends. Are we the kind of people who gossip about other people's business?" One of the gossipmongers asked.
"Fellow Daoist Zhao is right. We won't spread what you tell us."
"I will also keep it a secret." Another assured.
"In that case…" The young woman looked around and leaned over before she started speaking.
"We thought our cousin encountered an accident when he was out training but…" The young woman whetted her audience's appetite and several people couldn't help but be impatient.
"But what?"
"Didn't he encounter an accident?"
"It turns out my cousin didn't encounter an accident." Shi Miao said, sighed, and quickly continued.
"We recently received news that my cousin eloped with a wild man." She revealed.
At the same time, a handsome man entered the restaurant, saw Zhen Yuan, and made a beeline for his table.