Chapter 157 Melting (Part One)

More than two hundred mysterious weapons were aligned in order.

The middle-aged shopkeeper carried a gold plated abacus in one hand. With the other hand, he fiddled
with the beads. Aside from the rather loud clacking noise from the beads, no other sound could be
heard in the room. At the end of his counting, he said, "There are 220 mysterious weapons, and each
has a different cost. The total cost of your purchase is 22, 000 cubic crystals." Soon after getting the
result of the calculations, the shopkeeper looked at Zen with a smile and said, "Since you have
purchased such an enormous number of mysterious weapons, Weapon Pavilion will be happy to give
you a discount of 10%. By rounding off the calculated amount to the nearest integer, we only need you
to pay for the weapons with 20, 000 cubic crystals. May I know if you accept the price?"

The shopkeeper had agreed to sell the mysterious weapons at a lower cost. Zen thought the 10%
discount was acceptable. So he nodded in agreement.

Shortly after that, Zen walked out of the Weapon Pavilion accompanied by the middle-aged
shopkeeper. They found a Blessed Draft Bank at a corner of the trading market.

As Zen entered the Blessed Draft Bank, the bank's employees showed indifference to him. But as soon
as Zen took his golden token out, the staff's attitude toward him changed. The staff of the Blessed Draft
Bank knew that holders of golden tokens were either wealthy or noble. Thus, they had to treat these
people kindly and provide them with considerate services.

A few moments later, an employee of the Blessed Draft Bank issued a bank note for 20, 000 cubic
crystals and handed it to Zen, who then gave the note to the middle-aged shopkeeper.

Their transaction was concluded with this exchange.

The middle-aged man was very excited to have gotten such an enormous amount of cubic crystals
from this transaction, but he tried not to show the excitement on his face. After years of hard work at



the Weapon Pavilion, he had been promoted from an ordinary employee to the shopkeeper. By working
in this position, he could earn much more than before. But apart from his salary, he could also earn a
considerable amount of commission from selling such a large number of top-grade mysterious
weapons in this transaction.

Upon their return to the Weapon Pavilion, Zen tucked the stack of mysterious weapons he had bought
into his space ring.

The space ring didn't have much capacity. Once Zen placed the top-grade mysterious weapons, almost
all its space had been occupied.

With a polite smile, Zen bid the shopkeeper goodbye and left the Weapon Pavilion.

After Zen left, an old man with a goatee came downstairs from the second floor. He saddled up to the
middle-aged shopkeeper and said, "That guy is only an outer disciple of Cloud Sect, but he has bought
so many mysterious weapons. What does he buy them for?"

Like the bearded man, the shopkeeper was also confused. He shrugged and shared his guess.
"Perhaps he has bought so many top-grade mysterious weapons to distribute them to disciples of
Cloud Sect?"

The old man with the goatee shook his head. Apparently, he wasn't entirely satisfied with the
shopkeeper's answer.

The two men stared at the exit of Weapon Pavilion long after Zen had left. Each of them pondered over
Zen's actions. Perhaps they would spend the rest of their lives working out this mystery.

After Zen arrived at Cloud Sect, he made his way to Drizzle Peak. The sun had set for hours, and
almost all disciples were settled in their rooms for the night.



Finally in the privacy of his room, Zen allowed himself to feel excited. All this while, he had tempered
his emotions so that other people would not ask him unwanted questions.

Now he had 220 mysterious weapons. If five drops of heavenly essence could be extracted from
melting one top-grade mysterious weapon, he would be able to get 1, 100 drops of heavenly essence
from the weapons he had purchased.

If he were to allow the cyan dragon to consume that many drops of heavenly essence, it would be
enough to light up over 200 dragon scales!

Up till now, Zen had only lit up seven dragon scales, and his strength far exceeded that of disciples
who were at the same level as him. And so, his power would be enhanced a lot if more than 200
dragon scales were lit up at the same time.

However, this was not Zen's plan.

Naturally, Zen would not contribute all the heavenly essence to the cyan dragon.

As he thought of the price of the heavenly essence, an idea came to his mind.

Fifty drops of heavenly essence could be auctioned for 120, 000 cubic crystals. Perhaps 1, 200, 000
cubic crystals would be gained from selling 500 drops of the heavenly essence.

Zen understood that only rare items were valuable.

If he auctioned so many drops of heavenly essence at the same time, there would be too much
heavenly essence in the market. In that case, the heavenly essence would not be worth a high price.
After weighing all the pros and cons, Zen decided that he had to sell the heavenly essence in batches.



But before he reached the stage of auctioning the heavenly essence, Zen needed to melt the top-grade
mysterious weapons inside his space ring.

Immediately, Zen searched through the top-grade mysterious weapons in his space ring and chose a
pair of short cyan blue swords.

Zen laid these swords in front of him. Afterward, he interacted with the huge furnace in his mind. He
hadn't summoned the black fire for a long time. The fire flashed across his mind like a happy bird and
swiftly spread to that pair of cyan blue swords.

"Sizzling..."

In the blink of an eye, the two cyan blue swords were replaced by seven drops of heavenly essence.
Zen marveled at the drops that were now floating in the air over his head.

As the black fire was about to engulf these drops of heavenly essence, a bottle showed up in one of
Zen's hands. The drops slid into the bottle before the black fire could touch them.

The black fire flew around Zen's body like a human soul as though it were protesting against Zen for
plundering the heavenly essence that it should have gotten.

At this sight, Zen flicked his space ring open with one of his fingers and took out a big golden axe.

With the same enthusiasm as before, the black fire swept toward the weapon.


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