Shun Long's way involved the 'immortal-grade' cultivation techniques that Shun Long had given to Bai Longtian and the rest.
Of course, Liu Mei herself had no need to absorb qi, and she could naturally reach the peak of the Nascent Soul just by killing other cultivators and absorbing their energy.
However, Liu Mei had also found out that she couldn't do that too recklessly, or the negative effects of the 'Blood Absorption art' would probably start affecting her.
Thankfully, Shun Long was already prepared about this and wasn't planning to let Liu Mei be affected by the Blood Absorption art.
The melodious sound of a guqin would often fill the room, immediately expelling any negative emotions that tried to bubble inside Liu Mei along with the blood energy that she had absorbed and slowly influence her personality.
With Shun Long's guqin and as long as Liu Mei didn't go overboard, the 'Blood Absorption art' was a miraculous cultivation technique with no drawbacks!
As for Jiang Chen, Xingyi, and Bai Longtian, now that they all had unique immortal-grade cultivation techniques as well, reaching the peak of the Nascent Soul within a single year wasn't an issue for them.
But Shun Long knew that just that by itself wasn't going to be enough.
He knew that even if he, and Jiang Chen and the rest, all reached the peak of the Nascent Soul within the next year, they would still be unable to breakthrough to the Dao King realm even if they went to the King's Palace with the Grand Elder.
After all, there were 3 things that one had to fulfill before even thinking of breaking through to become a Dao King.
Not only did a person's cultivation needed to reach the peak of rank 9 in the Nascent Soul, but their comprehension of their Dao as well, along with the quality of their soul had to have reached that level.
Shun Long knew that even if they all reached the peak of rank 9 in the Nascent Soul within a year, in reality, they had simply been cultivating for far too short of a duration.
Compared to the other outer court disciples of the Holy sect, Shun Long, Jiang Chen, and the rest, were all simply too young.
There was no way that the quality of their souls would reach the peak of the Nascent Soul within a single year.
Even if they were given 10 years, it would still be unlikely that they would reach that level by themselves.
However, Shun Long knew that there was a way to solve this issue.
There was a specific rank 5 medicinal herb that he needed to refine a rare rank 5 pill, called the 'Soul Purifying flower'.
Although Shun Long had plenty of rank 5 medicinal herbs inside his herb garden, he had yet to find even a single rank 5 'Soul Purifying flower' that he needed in order to refine the 'Soul Purifying pill'.
He knew that practically every rank 5 medicinal herb that could affect a cultivator's soul was considered extremely rare even in the central region, and would be sought after by other Nascent Soul stage cultivators.
Even if a 'Soul Purifying flower' appeared, it would only be found in a few auctions throughout the Holy sect's territory, and other Nascent Soul stage cultivators would do anything they could to get their hands on it, even if it meant paying exorbitant prices for it.
Although Shun Long was confident that he could easily win an auction to obtain the flower, since he didn't lack spirit stones at this point, the issue was that even if he attended an auction, it would be up to luck whether he could really find a 'Soul purifying flower'.
As for the Night star continent, he was uncertain if any 'Soul Purifying flowers' even existed in that place.
But there was one place that Shun Long knew that he could probably find the 'Soul Purifying flower' in... the Golden Treasures Hall.
Since the Holy sect was the overlord of the region it governed, it was extremely likely that it would have at least one 'Soul Purifying flower' inside the Golden Treasures Hall.
After all, it was just a rank 5 medicinal herb.
Dao Kings had no use for such a medicinal herb.
Of course, although the 'Soul Purifying flower' was just a rank 5 medicinal herb, it was still considered to be an extremely rare rank 5 herb that even exceeded some rank 6 medicinal herbs in rarity alone.
Even if the Holy sect had any 'Soul Purifying flowers', they wouldn't put them on the first floor of the Golden Treasures Hall, but on the second floor instead.
Previously, Shun Long couldn't enter the second floor since he wasn't ranked in the top 1000 of the Martial Roll of Honor nor did he belong to any of the top 100 factions.
But after entering the top 600 in the Martial Roll of Honor, he had naturally gained access to the second floor and could purchase the items there.
Indeed, on the second floor of the Golden Treasures Hall there was a pair of 'Soul Purifying flowers' that outer court disciples could exchange their sect points for, but a single flower costed 50.000 sect points!
This price was almost as much as Shun Long's 'Silverbark guqin' and it had already exceeded even the price of some rank 6 medicinal herbs.
And yet, Shun Long still bought it without any hesitation.
To others, a single rank 5 'Soul Purifying flower' may not have been worth the price of 50.000 sect points, aside from those few outer court disciples who had already reached the peak of rank 9 in the Nascent Soul but were still slightly lacking in the purity of their soul.
But to Shun Long, this flower was extremely important.
Besides, this was only the first part of Shun Long's plan.
After using his sect points to exchange for a 'Soul Purifying flower', Shun Long left the Golden Treasures Hall, as he headed straight towards the west of the Holy sect, towards a certain courtyard that belonged to one of the top 100 factions.
