Li Jun climbed the hill to Master Shen's house, and it became easier with each advancement he made in his cultivation. He barely even felt the strange pressure surrounding the hill that was meant to keep people away.
As he reached the peak, he saw Master Shen sitting on the porch of his house with another old man beside him. Between them was a metal bowl with red hot coals and a wire grate above. Some kind of meat was being cooked.
Li Jun sauntered over to see that they were grilling some kind of slimy meat. At a single glance, he could tell it was meat from the beast king snake he had killed.
"There he is." Said Master Shen as the other man looked up from the meat to see Li Jun approaching. The two of them stood up and went to greet him.
"Come here." Master Shen instructed. "I want you to meet an old friend of mine."
Li Jun felt a little confused by Shen Guo's strange behavior. He had never seen him act so respectful to someone before, not even his own son.
"Greetings, Master Shen." Li Jun bowed his head towards his teacher and then bowed once more to the other old man. Like Master Shen, he didn't emit the faintest amount of spiritual energy, indicating that he had surpassed the body refining stage.
"What a polite student," the old man said with a smile. "I wish the youngsters at Pill Tower were so respectful."
"This is Grandmaster Mao Lin. He came to thank you for your donation." Master Shen winked as he spoke.
'Donation?' Li Jun thought, but he knew better than to question his teacher, especially in front of someone else.
"Yes," The old man bowed respectfully. "The bone marrow from the rock-scaled snake is the missing ingredient we needed to refine an ancient pill that had been lost to time due to a lack of materials. Without your generous donation, we never would have been able to revive the recipe. And due to the beast king's spiritual energy, every single pill we made was successful."
"You are welcome, Grandmaster Mao," Li Jun said hesitantly. He didn't have the slightest clue about refining pills, but he knew that some pills were extremely valuable to martial artists like the one Master Shen had used to restore his energy or the one the city lord gave him to heal from a pretty serious injury.
"As a show of gratitude, please use this whenever you stop by the pill tower." Grandmaster Mao handed him a jade plaque with the word Mao engraved in bold letters.
"Thank you." Li Jun accepted the gift and sat with two old men who were eating snake meat. After a while, Grandmaster Mao excused himself and left.
"What was that about?" Li Jun asked as he was now alone with Master Shen.
"You see, the pill tower owes my Shen family a lot of money for the materials we helped them gather. I felt bad making them owe even more for what we gathered from the snake, so I told them it was a donation from my student. As you can see, it worked out well. You even got a lifetime supply of pills out of it." Master Shen chuckled.
"A lifetime supply of pills? What do you mean?" Li Jun asked as he pulled out the jade plaque from his universe bag.
"That's Grandmaster Mao's personal identification plaque. As long as you see a pill for sale in the pill tower, you can take it without paying," he explained.
Li Jun was stunned. 'So this is what it means to make friends with people in high places.' Li Jun thought as he remembered that his mother had traded an invitation to the imperial college for a tendon-repairing pill so he could use his arm again.
"Master Shen?" Li Jun asked curiously. "What kind of pills would best help me with my cultivation?"
"Spirit-gathering pills, for one. I would also suggest you get some recovery pills like tendon repairing and bone forging pills. I heard you were in a pretty sorry state after your fight with the beast king." He laughed. As the two of them discussed the best pills to help with cultivation a voice called out from the edge of the plateau.
"Grandfather! Can you open the formation? I'm here for my lesson." A girl's voice cried.
Master Shen's face became pale as he let out a defeated sigh. He waved his hand and the air temperature rose for a moment before falling back to the usual cool atmosphere that was neither to cold or too hot.
As Shen Yan approached the house, she spotted Li Jun sitting with her grandfather, and her expression became sour.
"Grandfather, can you please teach me again? I think I'm getting the hang of the technique." She said with a smile.
Master Shen stood up.
"Li Jun, go split some logs. Yun'er, come and show me your progression. If I'm not satisfied, then I will send you home again."
"Yes Master Shen." Li Jun bowed his head and made his way over to the stack of logs that he had split the last time he was here.
He doubted Master Shen's intentions at first, but after seeing how efficiently splitting logs had made his overhead slice with a sword, he felt that there was some hidden meaning behind this way of training.
Li Jun considered picking up the axe but instead he pulled out his sword. If he was going to continue the overhead strike it was probably best if he continued practicing the heaven splitting sword strike.
He placed down a log and slashed his blade down towards it. Before the edge of his sword touched the log it shattered. The log splintered into pieces and shot out around the yard.
Master Shen looked up with a surprised expression but then frowned as he saw the lingering spiritual energy around the sword.
"Stop trying to show off. Now there's a girl here!" Master Shen shouted with a sly smile. "And use the damn axe, it's there for a reason."
Li Jun sighed at the scolding, but he didn't argue back. He put away his sword and picked up the axe. It felt heavier than it did last time, which didn't seem right since he had broken through to the second stage since then.
'I see, so there really is a reason behind using the axe.' He thought as he figured it was to train his strength. He placed another log down and slammed the axe against it.
The axe head bounced upward, he almost lost his grip on it as he hadn't expected that kind of result. It felt as if he had hit a brick wall.
Determined not to embarrass himself he swung the axe again, this time making sure to keep the head aligned with the grain in the wood. It smacked against the log once again but this time left a slight chip.
It seemed that this time, his training was going to be much more challenging. He continued to swing with as much strength as he could, aligning the head carefully each time so it didn't bounce back again. He slowly chipped away at the wood and split it into two.
He let out a long sigh, but the pieces were still too big to be usable as firewood. He would have to split them in half once more. He placed down one of the two halves and began to swing the axe again.