**Chapter 9: The Dao of Brewing and the Lightning Baptism**
The morning after the installation of the *Nine-Palace Thunder-Fire Array*, Lu Yuan did not wake up at dawn. For the first time since he had crossed over into the brutal, unforgiving Azure Cloud Realm, he slept deeply, dreamlessly, and until the sun was high in the sky.
He woke to the soft, golden light filtering through the cracks in his bamboo shutters. The air inside the thatched hut was still and quiet, completely isolated from the turbulent world outside by the *Minor Dust Obfuscation Array*.
Beneath the dirt floor, he could feel a faint, rhythmic vibration—the heartbeat of the slaughter array waiting patiently for a trespasser.
Lu Yuan stretched his arms, a profound, heavy weight having been lifted from his shoulders. He was no longer a naked man standing in a forest of wolves. He was a man sitting inside a steel bunker.
He called up his interface, watching the familiar blue panel materialize in the air.
**[Name]: Lu Yuan**
**[Lifespan]: 18 / ∞**
**[Cultivation]: Qi Condensation Level 2 (19/100)**
**[Cultivation Method]: Evergreen Qi Art (Initiate: 65/100)**
**[Spells]:**
**- Spring Breeze and Rain Spell (Proficient: 15/400)**
**- Earth Turning Art (Initiate: 82/100)**
**- Fireball Spell (Novice: 14/100)**
**- Golden Shield Spell (Initiate: 5/200)**
**- Wind Blade Spell (Initiate: 12/200)**
**[Skills]:**
**- Sutra of Hidden Origins (Proficient: 12/400)**
**[Professions]:**
**- Spirit Farmer (Initiate: 20/200)**
**- Talisman Crafting (Proficient: 45/400)**
**- Array Master (Initiate: 2/200)**
His progression was steady, an unstoppable march across the board. His cultivation was slowly creeping toward the third level of Qi Condensation, fueled entirely by the passive grinding of his daily chores and the restorative cycles of the Immortal Lotus.
He stood up and walked to the corner of the room, pulling up a loose floorboard. Beneath it lay his remaining fortune: ten spirit stones set aside for rent, and exactly eight disposable spirit stones.
"Eighty stones spent in a single night," Lu Yuan murmured, shaking his head. "If Fatty Wang knew I blew a lifetime of savings on a paranoid defensive perimeter, he'd have me committed to a mortal asylum."
The *Nine-Palace Thunder-Fire Array* was active, but its hunger was absolute. It passively drained the equivalent of three low-grade spirit stones a week just to maintain the latent charge in the Thunder-Iron nodes. If it triggered, the blast would consume ten stones' worth of energy.
"I have enough liquid capital to keep the array powered for two weeks," Lu Yuan calculated. "After that, the nodes will drain, and the array will shut down. I need a steady, sustainable income stream that doesn't require me to expose my talisman arsenal to Pavilion Master Zhao every week."
He looked at his spatial pouch resting on the table. Inside, compressed into the spatial fold, lay five hundred pounds of flawless, premium-grade Azure Spirit Rice.
It was a mountain of raw, wood-attribute Qi. Selling it directly was dangerous; the quality was too high, too suspicious for a Level 2 farmer. It screamed of secrets.
"To maximize profit and minimize suspicion, raw materials must be refined," the immortal accountant reasoned. "I need to change its form. I need to condense it, mask its origin, and increase its market value."
In the cultivation world, there were two primary ways to refine spiritual plants: Alchemy and Brewing.
Alchemy was a bottomless pit of expenses. To become an Alchemist, he would need an expensive bronze furnace, a dedicated earth-fire vein or a high-tier fire cultivation method, and hundreds of rare herbs to practice with.
Brewing, however, was the alchemy of the patient. It required minimal equipment, basic elemental control, and time.
"Spirit Wine," Lu Yuan decided, a slow smile spreading across his face. "A staple consumable for cultivators. It nourishes the body, warms the meridians, and high-grade vintages can even assist in breaking through bottlenecks."
He had the perfect raw material. The premium Azure Spirit Rice was packed with gentle, pure energy, ideal for a foundational brew. He had an endless lifespan, meaning the long aging process of high-tier wines—a massive barrier for mortal cultivators—was entirely irrelevant to him. He could bury a cask of wine for a thousand years and drink it when it became a heavenly elixir.
He wasted no time.
Lu Yuan left his hut, ensuring his *Sutra of Hidden Origins* was active, masking his aura as he walked to the Clear Breeze Valley Market.
The market was noticeably emptier today. The Flowing Water Sect patrols had drastically increased their presence following the Flute Demon incident. White-robed disciples walked the muddy streets in squads of five, their eyes sweeping over the rogue cultivators with blatant suspicion.
Lu Yuan kept his head down, moving with the shuffling, defeated gait of a peasant. He visited a general goods stall and spent three of his precious spirit stones.
He bought two massive, glazed clay vats, each capable of holding fifty gallons of liquid. He bought a bundle of wild, low-grade Spirit-Bramble berries, known for their high yeast content. Finally, he bought a few yards of fine silk mesh for straining.
He carried the bulky items back to his farm, utilizing a basic weight-lightening technique to avoid drawing attention to his physical strength.
Once safely locked inside his obfuscated perimeter, Lu Yuan cleared a space in the corner of his hut, setting up the two massive clay vats.
"Let the Dao of Brewing commence," he announced to the empty room.
The first step was preparation. He withdrew fifty pounds of the premium Azure Spirit Rice from his spatial pouch. He placed the grain into a large wooden tub and utilized the *Spring Breeze and Rain Spell*.
He didn't summon a cloud. Instead, he forced the water Qi to condense directly over the tub, releasing a steady stream of absolutely pure, spiritually charged spring water. He washed the rice thoroughly, letting his Qi gently scrub the starchy exterior without damaging the kernels.
Next, he needed to steam the grain.
He transferred the washed rice into a large iron wok, resting it over his stone hearth. He added a precise measure of spiritual water.
Here, the control of the flame was paramount. Mortal brewing relied on wood fires, which fluctuated wildly. Lu Yuan raised his hand, channeling his *Fireball Spell*.
Instead of forming a sphere, he flattened the spell, spreading the orange flame into a wide, even disk of heat beneath the wok. He maintained the spell, locking the temperature in place with absolute, unyielding focus.
The water boiled. Thick, fragrant steam filled the small hut. The smell was incredible—a sweet, earthy aroma that made his mouth water and his meridians hum with anticipation.
*Ding.*
**[Fireball Spell proficiency +1]**
He maintained the perfect temperature for an hour, draining and refilling his Dantian twice by chewing raw spirit rice and cycling the *Evergreen Qi Art*.
When the rice was perfectly steamed—translucent, soft, but retaining a firm core—he transferred it to one of the massive clay vats to cool.
While it cooled, he prepared the starter. He took the wild Spirit-Bramble berries, crushed them in a stone mortar, and mixed them with a small amount of warm spiritual water and a handful of cooked rice. He let it sit until a thick, bubbling foam formed on the surface.
"The catalyst," Lu Yuan whispered, pouring the foaming, purple-tinged mixture into the cooled vat of steamed Azure Spirit Rice.
He added fifty gallons of pure water summoned via his *Spring Breeze and Rain Spell*.
He took a long wooden paddle and began to stir.
This was not a mundane physical action. As he stirred, he extended his wood-attribute Qi down the length of the paddle, guiding the yeast, encouraging it to bind with the sugars in the spirit rice. He could feel the microscopic reactions occurring within the vat. It was a chaotic, beautiful dance of life and decay.
*Ding.*
**[Spirit Brewing proficiency +1]**
**[Profession Unlocked: Spirit Brewer (Novice: 1/100)]**
**[Recipe Unlocked: Azure Clear-Wine (Novice: 1/100)]**
Lu Yuan's eyes lit up as the system permanently codified his new path.
He sealed the clay vat with a thick wooden lid and sealed the edges with wet clay to ensure it was airtight. He then utilized his *Fireball Spell* once more, not to burn, but to radiate a gentle, ambient warmth around the base of the vat, locking the internal temperature at the exact optimal degree for fermentation.
For the next ten days, Lu Yuan established a new, grueling routine.
He was a farmer by day, tending his vegetable patch and making a show of preparing his fields for the winter cover-crop.
He was a Talisman Crafter by dusk, burning through cheap paper to maintain his lethal stockpile and slowly push his *Basic Fireball Talisman* toward the elusive 'Master' level.
And he was a Spirit Brewer by night.
Fermentation was not a passive process for a cultivator. It was an active battle of Qi.
Every night, he would unseal the vat. He would plunge his hands into the thick, bubbling mash, directly injecting his *Evergreen Qi* to purify the mixture, forcibly separating the toxic methanol byproducts and enhancing the conversion of spiritual energy into alcohol.
It was an incredibly delicate process. Too much Qi, and he would kill the yeast. Too little, and the wine would sour into useless vinegar.
*Ding.*
**[Spirit Brewing proficiency +2]**
**[Azure Clear-Wine (Novice: 15/100)]**
The failures were frustrating but educational. Several times, he pushed too hard, and a batch of mash would spoil, emitting a foul, rotting smell. He would simply dump it in the corner of his field as fertilizer, clean the vat, and start again with another fifty pounds of his premium rice. He had the raw materials to spare.
By the end of the second week, the atmosphere in the Clear Breeze Valley reached a boiling point.
The Flowing Water Sect had lost its patience. The Flute Demon had struck again, this time ambushing a patrol of outer sect disciples in the northern woods, draining three of them dry before vanishing into the shadows.
The sect retaliated with overwhelming force.
Lu Yuan was sitting in his hut, carefully filtering a promising batch of mash through the silk mesh, when the very air in the valley suddenly grew heavy, pressing down on his shoulders like a physical weight.
He stopped pouring, setting the wooden bucket down.
He walked to his window and pushed the shutter open a fraction of an inch.
The sky above the Azure Cloud Realm, normally a pristine blue, was stained a violent, pulsing violet.
High above the Whispering Canyon, suspended in the air, were three massive flying ships. They were galleons constructed from polished spirit-wood, their hulls heavily armored with overlapping iron scales. Massive crystalline arrays thrummed on their decks.
Standing on the prow of the central ship was a figure radiating a light so intense it hurt Lu Yuan's eyes to look directly at him.
*Core Formation Realm,* Lu Yuan realized, his breath catching in his throat. An Elder of the sect had personally taken the field.
"By the decree of the Flowing Water Sect," a voice boomed from the sky. It wasn't loud; rather, it echoed directly within the minds of every living creature within fifty miles. It was a voice of absolute, undeniable authority. "The Whispering Canyon and the surrounding southern forests are hereby declared a Purge Zone."
Lu Yuan felt a chill run down his spine.
From the three flying ships, massive pillars of violet light shot downward, striking the earth at three distant points forming a massive triangle that encompassed the entire canyon and the deep woods.
The moment the pillars connected, a visible, shimmering dome of violent energy snapped into place.
The Great Sweeping Array.
It was a tactic used only in extreme circumstances. The array didn't kill indiscriminately, but it aggressively constricted, slowly shrinking the perimeter over a period of days. Any creature carrying demonic Qi, violent intent, or an unregistered cultivation base caught within the shrinking dome would be crushed by the atmospheric pressure.
It was designed to flush out rats.
And the rats immediately began to run.
Lu Yuan watched in grim fascination as the distant tree line of the pine forest began to thrash.
It wasn't just the Flute Demon the sect was flushing out. The deep woods were home to hundreds of rogue cultivators hiding from warrants, violent gang remnants, and low-tier demonic beasts that normally avoided human settlements.
The shrinking violet dome acted as a massive, terrifying broom, sweeping all the hidden filth of the valley directly toward the outer farming districts.
The chaotic sounds of combat began to echo across the hills. Sect patrols on flying swords dove into the forest, intercepting the fleeing criminals and beasts in brutal, one-sided skirmishes. Flashes of fire, lightning, and the sharp shrieks of dying beasts filled the air.
"The perimeter is breaking," Lu Yuan muttered, stepping back from the window.
He was perfectly safe. His farm was located just outside the projected path of the shrinking violet dome, meaning he wouldn't be crushed by the sect's array. However, his isolated plot of land was directly in the path of the fleeing refugees and desperate beasts being pushed out of the woods.
He walked to the center of his hut. He looked down at the floorboards where the jade control token for the *Nine-Palace Thunder-Fire Array* was hidden.
He retrieved it. The green jade was warm to the touch, pulsing with the latent, violent energy of the Thunder-Iron nodes buried outside.
"I bought this for a reason," Lu Yuan whispered, slipping the token into his inner robe. "Let them come."
He didn't cower in fear. He returned to his brewing vat. He had a batch to finish.
The afternoon turned into evening, and the evening bled into a dark, stormy night. The ambient Qi in the air was chaotic, disrupted by the massive sect array, causing unnatural storm clouds to gather over the valley.
A cold, driving rain began to fall, turning the dirt paths into slick, treacherous mud.
Inside his hut, Lu Yuan was bathed in the warm, ambient glow of his *Fireball Spell*, carefully maintaining the temperature of his final fermentation stage. The smell of high-grade alcohol was sharp and clear, a testament to a successful brew.
*Ding.*
**[Spirit Brewing proficiency +3]**
**[Breakthrough!]**
**[Azure Clear-Wine (Initiate: 1/200)]**
Lu Yuan smiled, wiping sweat from his brow. The system acknowledged the perfection of the process. The liquid in the vat was no longer a cloudy mash; it was slowly settling into a clear, slightly azure-tinted wine.
Suddenly, his sharp ears twitched.
Beneath the drumming of the heavy rain on his thatched roof, he heard the distinct, frantic splashing of boots in the mud.
He killed the *Fireball Spell* instantly, plunging the hut into darkness. He stood perfectly still, initiating the *Sutra of Hidden Origins*. His aura vanished, leaving him as cold and undetectable as a stone statue.
He moved silently to the front window, peering through the narrow slit.
Four figures were stumbling down the muddy path, running desperately away from the tree line.
They were heavily armed, wearing torn, bloodstained leather armor. One of them, a massive man carrying a jagged greataxe, was missing his left ear, the wound cauterized shut by a fire spell. They wore the tattered red bandanas of the Iron Blood Brotherhood.
These were not low-level street thugs. They moved with the heavy, grounded footfalls of seasoned fighters.
Lu Yuan analyzed their auras through the rain.
Three of them were at Level 4 Qi Condensation. The leader, a wiry man wielding twin hook-swords, radiated the heavy, oppressive pressure of Level 5.
They were high-tier gang enforcers, flushed out of their hidden base in the woods by the sect's sweeping array. They were injured, exhausted, and incredibly desperate.
"Keep moving!" the Level 5 leader hissed, his voice barely audible over the rain. "The sect hounds are less than a mile behind us! We need cover!"
"Where, Boss?" the man with the greataxe gasped, limping heavily. "The sect has locked down the market! Every inner-valley farm is heavily patrolled!"
The leader's eyes scanned the darkness. His gaze swept over Fatty Wang's brightly lit hut in the distance, then settled on Lu Yuan's property.
To the leader's eyes, influenced by the *Minor Dust Obfuscation Array*, he didn't see a thatched hut. He saw an abandoned, empty plot of land, surrounded by a dilapidated bamboo fence. It was a dark, silent void in the middle of the populated farming district.
"There," the leader pointed his hook-sword at Lu Yuan's property. "That empty plot. No lights. No aura. We cross the fence, dig a trench in the mud, and throw a cloaking tarp over ourselves. The sect patrols flying overhead will look right past it."
Inside the hut, Lu Yuan's eyes narrowed into cold slits.
They were walking right into the trap.
"Boss, what if the owner comes back?" one of the Level 4 thugs asked nervously.
The Level 5 leader let out a harsh, desperate laugh. "If some dirt-grubbing peasant farmer stumbles upon us, I'll slit his throat and use his blood to water the dirt. Move! Over the fence!"
They didn't hesitate. They were men backed into a corner, completely devoid of morality or hesitation.
The four cultivators rushed the low bamboo fence.
The leader vaulted over it effortlessly, his boots landing softly in the mud of Lu Yuan's front yard. The other three followed, splashing down into the perimeter.
They had crossed the line.
Lu Yuan stood at the window, his expression utterly blank. He didn't feel anger. He didn't feel fear. He felt the cold, mechanical logic of an executioner pulling a lever.
He reached into his robe. His thumb brushed against the smooth surface of the jade control token.
He channeled a single, microscopic thread of Qi into the jade.
*Activate.*
For exactly one-tenth of a second, the heavy rain falling over the two-acre plot simply stopped mid-air.
The ambient spiritual energy in the environment violently inverted. The muddy ground beneath the intruders' feet instantly dried out, cracking audibly as the moisture was flash-vaporized.
The Level 5 leader froze, his sharp instincts screaming in absolute, primal terror. The hairs on his arms stood straight up, and the heavy scent of ozone filled his nostrils.
"Array—!" he managed to scream, his eyes widening in horror as he looked down at the ground.
He never finished the word.
The *Nine-Palace Thunder-Fire Array* detonated.
It did not build up. It did not offer a warning. It unleashed the pent-up power of eighty spirit stones in a single, localized cataclysm.
*KRACK-THOOM!*
Four blinding, thick pillars of pure blue lightning erupted from the sky, striking the four intruders with absolute precision. The lightning was not a mere shock; it was a physical force, pinning them to the ground with tens of thousands of pounds of pressure, instantly paralyzing their nervous systems and shattering their spiritual shields like cheap glass.
Simultaneously, the nine Thunder-Iron nodes buried in the earth released their compressed fire Qi.
The ground beneath the intruders exploded upward in a geyser of white-hot, roaring flame. The fire spiraled around the pillars of lightning, creating four localized vortexes of absolute destruction.
Inside the hut, Lu Yuan had to turn his face away and squeeze his eyes shut as the blinding light penetrated the bamboo shutters, illuminating the room brighter than the midday sun. The concussive shockwave hit the hut a fraction of a second later, violently rattling the timbers and knocking a clay bowl off the table, but the structure held, protected by the localized nature of the array.
The roar of the thunder and the roaring flames lasted for exactly three seconds.
Then, absolute silence returned, save for the patter of the rain.
Lu Yuan slowly opened his eyes, blinking away the afterimages of the blinding light.
He looked out the window.
The four pillars of lightning were gone. The vortexes of fire had vanished.
Where the four Level 4 and Level 5 cultivators had stood just moments ago, there was... nothing.
The mud had been glassed, turned into four perfectly circular patches of smooth, smoking obsidian. The rain hissed violently as it struck the superheated glass.
There were no bodies. There was no blood. There wasn't even a scream.
The sheer intensity of the dual-attribute array had vaporized their flesh, pulverized their bones, and incinerated their clothing. The only evidence that they had ever existed were two melted, misshapen lumps of iron lying on the smoking glass—the remnants of the leader's hook-swords.
Lu Yuan let out a long, slow breath. The breath plumed in the cold air of the hut.
He looked down at the jade token in his hand. The bright, inner fire of the token had dimmed significantly, indicating that the array had drained a massive portion of its stored energy to execute the intruders.
"Ten spirit stones well spent," Lu Yuan whispered, his voice steady, though his heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs.
He had just instantly annihilated a Level 5 cultivator and his elite squad without even raising a finger, without exposing his aura, and without stepping outside his front door.
This was the power of capital. This was the power of an absolute foundation.
He didn't bother going outside to clean up. The array had done the cleaning for him. The glassed earth would cool by morning, blending into the mud. If a sect patrol flew over, they would just see a few scorch marks—a common sight in a valley currently undergoing a violent purge.
Lu Yuan turned away from the window, walking back to his brewing station in the corner of the dark hut.
He lit a single tallow candle, the small, flickering yellow flame a stark contrast to the apocalyptic light show he had just witnessed.
He unsealed the heavy clay vat containing his newly minted *Azure Clear-Wine*.
He took a small wooden ladle and dipped it into the vat. When he pulled it up, the ladle was filled with a crystal-clear liquid that possessed a very faint, beautiful azure tint.
The aroma was incredible. It smelled of spring rain, rich earth, and a potent, intoxicating sweetness that cleared his mind instantly.
He didn't have a fine porcelain cup, so he poured the wine into a crude clay bowl.
He raised the bowl, looking at the clear liquid reflecting the candlelight.
Outside, the rain continued to fall, washing away the sins of the valley. The sect patrols continued their hunt, and the demonic cultivator continued to flee. The world was a violent, chaotic storm of ambition and death.
But inside the thatched hut, within the impregnable walls of his thunder and fire, the immortal farmer found peace.
"To infinity," Lu Yuan whispered to the quiet room.
He drank the wine.
It was strong, carrying a fiery burn that slid down his throat, immediately followed by a massive, gentle wave of pure, refined wood-attribute Qi that exploded in his stomach and rushed into his meridians.
*Ding.*
**[Cultivation: Qi Condensation Level 2 (20/100)]**
**[Evergreen Qi Art proficiency +5]**
Lu Yuan smiled, feeling the warmth spread to his fingertips.
The wine was perfect. The defenses were absolute.
Let the world burn outside his fence. He had farming to do.