Dual Cultivation: Beasts and Women!

Liam made his way through the Lotus Temple, reaching the room he had just paid 50 merit points to use for the next two hours.

He had been saving his merit points to use with calm, learning a little bit in and out of special environments. As Ann herself had said, there was a limit to how much one could improve every day. Coming to the Lotus Temple every day or spending a whole day there wouldn't help him as much as it might seem at first.

But today, he had a new artifact to train his runic inscription on, something that demanded the utmost of him.

'Time for me to create an enchanted weapon!'

A broad smile broke out on Liam's face as he locked the door to his cultivation room. He placed his artifacts and tools around and sat down on a cushion, feeling his heart beat faster.

What were enchanted weapons? They were offensive items with runes on them, in other words, with special properties.

Spirit Lords like Liam would rarely have a single enchanted weapon. The reason for that? They were special and sometimes had their own abilities, which made them expensive.

If an ordinary Second Class weapon could cost between 50 and 150 gold coins, the same weapon of the same rank and quality, but enchanted, could cost double or triple the value of a non-enchanted weapon!

But that's not all. Depending on the set of runes inscribed on the weapon in question, it could even unbalance the fight against opponents stronger than its users!

Today, Liam wanted to make his initial First Class enchanted weapon!

Picking up a wooden staff—the cheapest type of weapon he could find in the Runemasters resource shop—Liam prepared to begin his inscription, opening the bottle of ink and taking the brush.

'I'm going to create the Magic Staff and turn this simple wooden staff into something as strong as a metal weapon. I'm going to inscribe four runes on it. One to absorb mana from the environment, another to store the mana, another to use the mana and compatible elements to strengthen the structure of the staff, and the last to create a connection between the staff and the user.'

It wasn't uncommon for magical weapons to have the last component. Since they were much more powerful artifacts than their non-enchanted versions, any enchanted weapon was powerful and had great potential. Most, if not all, had some sort of connection to their owner, making them useful only to their owner.

Liam began his work with the mana storage rune, a very common type of rune that he had created many times before.

With time and experience, his brush skills became more practical, faster, and more efficient. In a few moments, he had completed the last character of the first rune, finishing it with no difficulty.

Liam moved on to the second rune, which would absorb mana from the environment, another one he was already familiar with.

At the end of his first ten minutes in the cultivation room on the second level of the Lotus Temple, he finished inscribing the second rune and moved on to the third.

Beads of sweat formed on his forehead and back while his breathing increased.

The mana in Liam's body focused on his senses and hands, enhancing his abilities as he observed every factor at his disposal.

Ignoring the sweat on his body and the signs of fatigue, he moved on to the rune responsible for the connection between user and weapon.

As interesting as this rune was, it wasn't complex. What it did was basically create an 'identity' for the weapon—an aura of its own—and connect it to the user's aura, something unmistakable.

Similarly, this rune acted like a padlock. Without the right key, it was impossible to access the weapon's other properties, which would remain dormant in the hands of strangers.

It wasn't such a complex rune, but Liam was getting a little more tired in his training, because he wasn't quite used to it yet.

He raised one arm in front of his head and used the sleeve of his shirt to wipe away the sweat that threatened to get into his eyes.

He opened his mouth and took a deep breath, watching the third rune glow and then disappear into the wooden body of the staff; 75% of his work was done.

'Now comes the hard part.'

He returned the brush to the body of the staff as his eyes narrowed and his pupil became as small as the tip of a needle.

The next rune had six characters, the most complex combination Liam would face until the end of this job.

'The rune of the staff's transformation must use the elements of the staff itself and its surroundings to strengthen its structure. In a way, this is like what we cultivators do with our mana when we strengthen our bodies.

There's a complete process of directing appropriate amounts of mana to each part of the body, using the elements we have at our disposal to enhance the characteristics of our muscles, and achieving the desired result.

For cultivators, this is natural. But it's not so easy for an artifact, an inanimate essence.'

He inscribed the first character, followed by the second simplest of the rune's six symbols.

But Liam had practiced runic inscription for several hours before this attempt, and even studied the combination of characters of this more complex rune for three days.

Using his much larger cultivation base than he would have needed to master it, he bypassed the problems that would have stopped others from learning the how to do it and reached the last character.

As he began the ultimate step, his hands were shaking and his mana reserves were below 20%. Fortunately, what he had left was enough, and with a firm grip on his brush, he drew the last part of it.

While he reclined, a smile spread across his face despite his quick breaths, and he experienced a surge of fulfillment that permeated every inch of his being.

"Done!" he said aloud, one of his fists clenched and raised in the air.

He was full of curiosity in his mind, but with 28 minutes left to use this cultivation room, he started cultivating to recover.

In another 15 minutes, he would finish, open his eyes, and quickly put away his brush, pad, and ink bottle. With only the brown 1.5 meter long staff in his hands, he looked at it, already connected to this enchanted artifact.

When he tapped the bottom of the staff on the ground, he heard a dull, dense sound, different from the typical hollow or reverberating sound that wood makes when touched.

It was still made of wood. That would never change. But now it seemed to be a solid piece of metal, extremely powerful and solid.

Liam was sure that a Spirit Apprentice could easily use the staff in his hands for defense and attack, considering the hardness and resistance of the weapon.

'Perfect. If I'm not mistaken, the staff can be classified as First Class, and it has an Ordinary Quality... Hmm, that's good. I'm getting close to High Quality.' He thought with a smile on his face, eager to produce more enchanted items.

Unfortunately for him, there was almost no market for First Class items in City Thirteen. Most of the disciples were second realm cultivators or higher, and even the most basic unenchanted Second Class weapons were better than the best enchanted First Class weapons. Otherwise, he could easily triple the amount he paid for the staff and the runic inscription materials!

'This Magic Staff must be worth between 40 and 60 gold coins.' Liam tightened his fingers around the staff as he moved it and used it against an invisible enemy. 'I will sell it outside the sect in the future, but what it represents is enough for now.'

Coins were important everywhere. Anything that could improve people's lives was of immense importance, regardless of whether it was in a magical world or a world like Earth.

Liam craved power, but he knew he would also need resources to achieve the freedom he sought. His magical power could help him, but his fighting skills were no match for what he had just created.

'If it were a Second Class staff, I would now have an item worth over 300 gold coins in my hands, and I only paid a fraction of that to make it!'

Feeling good about himself and his future prospects, Liam put the staff into his ring and left the Lotus Temple.

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