Pay-to-Win Cultivation: I Get 10,000x Returns

Chapter 300: The Blackened Wives Attack

Zhang Xian dusted off his hands, admiring his handiwork with a satisfied smirk. “Done and dusted! Shame I couldn’t bring my luxury flying boat in here. Parking that baby right here would’ve been a total flex.”

Zhang Lele stepped into the formation, which was now practically overflowing with spiritual qi. She shot Zhang Xian a complicated look, unable to hold back her questions any longer. “How do you know all this? How did you know there was a formation and spirit stones hidden under that secret chamber, let alone that this rundown Taoist temple was perfectly suited for a revamp?”

Zhang Xian chuckled. “Didn’t I tell you? After I died and respawned, I became the Duke Protector of the Great Liang Kingdom. Back in the day, a couple of my friends cultivated in this very temple, and I crashed here for a while too.”

He pointed at the ground. “Right where we’re standing? That’s exactly where I faced my first Foundation Establishment heavenly tribulation. I was strapped with gear, prepped to the teeth. And the result?”

He shook his head with a self-deprecating laugh. “My aptitude was utter trash back then, so I only triggered a single, pathetic bolt of lightning. It was embarrassingly weak. Half the disciples in the temple were watching, too. I practically died of cringe right on the spot.”

“As for that life-draining formation in the secret chamber? That was real too. I smashed it to pieces in the real world. That was actually the clue I used to track down and execute Desire, avenging the old village chief and my godfather.”

Zhang Lele watched him speak. The rich details, the raw sincerity—it all felt too terrifyingly real, as if he were recounting actual memories.

She caught herself drifting again and quickly bit her lip, forcing her mind back to the present. Don’t fall for the illusion. “I remember now,” she murmured softly. “By the time I successfully reached Foundation Establishment, ten years had already passed since our promise. I went back to the mountain village, but you were gone. I didn’t give up, though. I scoured every inch of this minor world, searching for you for thirty whole years.”

She glanced around the temple walls. “I think I’ve been here too. It feels vaguely familiar.” Looking back up at him, a trace of genuine gratitude flickered in her eyes. “Thank you for telling me such a realistic story.”

[Ding! Current Favorability: 27]

Hearing that she had spent thirty years blindly searching for him felt like a punch to the gut. Zhang Xian fell silent for a heartbeat before forcing a breezy laugh. “Hey, as long as you can justify it to yourself, that’s fine by me. Just stop trying to stab me every five minutes, and we’ll make a great co-op team!”

For the next stretch of time, the two of them hunkered down in the temple’s back mountain and devoted themselves to grinding their cultivation.

During this period, Zhang Xian took a gamble and scouted the greater world outside. Just as Lele had warned, it was entirely overrun by the Seven Emotions Evil Thoughts. The air was thick with miasma, and safe havens were non-existent.

Zhang Xian checked his own stats. Sure, he had Heaven-grade techniques carrying him, but without a decent spiritual treasure and his usual pay-to-win inventory of pills and talismans, his actual combat output capped out around the mid-Nascent Soul realm. Running out there naked was basically feeding, so he tactically retreated back to base.

However, grinding in the illusion came with an unexpected perk: the EXP multiplier was insanely high.

In just one year, his cultivation rocketed straight to the fourth level of the Nascent Soul realm. Zhang Lele’s progress was just as terrifying, pushing from the fifth level to the absolute peak of the sixth level, just a hair’s breadth away from the seventh.

Eventually, the ambient spiritual qi provided by the Supreme Spirit Stones dried up, causing the Spirit Gathering Formation’s buffs to plummet. With their temporary safe zone exhausted, they had no choice but to venture back out into the deadly, unpredictable world.

After months of living and cultivating side-by-side, Zhang Lele’s wariness toward him had essentially evaporated. She was becoming increasingly skeptical of her own “subconscious guide” theory, though she stubbornly refused to pull at that thread. Breaking the illusion remained the main quest.

The moment they stepped out of the minor world and back under the oppressive, ashen sky, Zhang Lele’s figure blurred.

Like ripples across a pond, her form shifted. She rapidly aged up, reverting to the breathtakingly stunning young woman Zhang Xian had seen at the bottom of the sea. Her skin was porcelain-fair, her features flawless, and her eyes impossibly clear.

Zhang Xian stared, momentarily spellbound.

Catching his awestruck gaze, Lele felt a warm flutter of pride but kept her face totally deadpan. “What? Not quite the scrawny, tanned little girl you remember?”

Zhang Xian snapped out of it and smiled gently. “No. When you were sealed at the bottom of the sea, I used to sneak down and check on you all the time. You just never knew.”

It felt as if an invisible hand squeezed Lele’s heart, hitching her breath for a split second.

Shaking off the moment, they scanned their surroundings, and their moods instantly tanked. The entire sky was smothered under a thick layer of sickly gray smog, so oppressive it was hard to breathe.

“The corruption is getting worse,” Lele said grimly.

Zhang Xian nodded. “Looks like the whole server’s been completely overrun. Are we hitting up your master first?”

Lele gave a curt nod. Within this illusion, Su Yunmiao was the highest-level NPC ally they could recruit. Finding their bearings, they shot into the sky, tearing straight toward the Yunmiao Sect.

However, barely half a day into their flight, a creeping sense of dread settled over them.

The landscape below was a desolate wasteland. The earth was violently cracked, rivers were dried up, and every trace of vegetation had withered into ash. It looked like an apocalypse had thoroughly glassed the realm.

Suddenly, a massive swarm of streaks lit up the distant horizon, accelerating straight toward their coordinates.

As the mob closed in and the details of their robes became clear, Zhang Xian’s pupils constricted. They were all cultivators from the Yunmiao Sect. He even recognized the mini-bosses leading the charge: Head Seat Zhao from Po Yun Peak, alongside several elders from Heavenly Palace Peak.

Only, their faces were terrifyingly slack, their eyes vacant voids, and their bodies practically oozing thick, black miasma.

“Crap!” Lele hissed. “They’re all from my sect. It looks like they’ve been completely corrupted!”

“Yep,” Zhang Xian sighed. “Lots of familiar faces in that mob.”

But with both of them sitting comfortably in the mid-Nascent Soul realm and wielding Heaven-grade techniques, their stats were leagues above what they used to be. There was zero reason to panic.

In an instant, the sky erupted in a chaotic clash of sword light. Relying on their overpowered mechanics and monstrous Five Elements spiritual qi, Zhang Xian and Lele easily steamrolled the corrupted mob. Zhang Xian didn’t hold back; his sword flickered like lightning, mercilessly reaping the lives of the corrupted puppets.

But just as they cleared the trash mobs, a blinding, aqua-blue sword aura tore out of the sky like a falling star. Its speed was absurd, and it was locked dead onto Lele’s face.

The terrifying power radiating from the strike carried the unmistakable signature of the Heaven-grade Yunmiao Sword Scripture.

Zhang Xian’s reflexes flared. He teleported right in front of Lele, raising his blade to tank the hit.

BOOM! The deafening collision sent a violent shockwave through Zhang Xian’s meridians. He was forced back several steps before he could plant his feet.

Damn, what a heavy hit! he cursed inwardly.

The streak of light slammed down, solidifying into a figure. It was a peerlessly beautiful girl clad in flowing silver-white robes, gripping a water-colored spirit sword. Yet, her face was a mask of absolute, glacial indifference.

Zhang Xian blurted out, “Yinyin?”

Standing before them, fully corrupted by the Seven Emotions Evil Thoughts, was Lin Yinyin. And her cultivation had shockingly skyrocketed to the fourth level of the Nascent Soul realm.