[You cannot be happy.]

["Five more years. Don't even mention Immortal Artifacts, I might not even be able to refine a Heaven-Grade Spirit Artifact in that time."]

[The Ten Thousand Souls Banner looked dejected.]

["We're done for, buddy. Lately I feel that that old geezer has gotten a lot stronger. Let's just wait to die... I should have joined him earlier (whisper)."]

[The Ten Thousand Souls Banner got beaten again.]

[Year Thirty-Six, age fifty-four.]

[Extracting a trait entry...]

[Extraction successful!]

["Enhancement!" (Prismatic Myth):

Young man, still bothered that your craft skills are poor and you create a pile of trash?

Worry no more! From now on, everything you create will have its grade increased by +1!

Do it yourself, and you'll be well provided for~]

[Would you like to adjust the trait entry?]

[Yes/No]

"Are you kidding me... Since when did the system get so thoughtful? Do myth traits have a hidden chance? This is the third one, almost as many as golden traits!"

You had been worried about the short time left and not being able to refine an Immortal Artifact.

The system just handed you a myth trait!

"This grade +1, I wonder what the exact effects are. Put it on and see!"

[You replaced "Effort Guarantees Reward" with "Enhancement!".]

[New trait equipped, your confidence instantly skyrocketed.]

[After some hands-on testing, you confirmed the new trait's function.]

[When you refined the pill "Hundred-Spirit Pill" intended to increase Spirit Sea realm cultivation, it instantly became the "Soul Refining Pill" that increases Spirit Condensation realm cultivation upon completion!]

[When you refined a Low-Grade Spirit Artifact, it immediately became a Mid-Grade Spirit Artifact upon completion!]

[When you casually piled some mud to build a thatch hut, it instantly became a finely crafted small wooden house!]

["Matter is not conserved anymore... This really is a myth!"]

[It is worth mentioning.]

[Both the "Hundred-Spirit Pill" and the "Soul Refining Pill" are actually Earth-Grade pills; there is no difference in quality between them, only a difference in effect.]

[In other words, this "grade +1" does not necessarily upgrade an item's quality by one tier, it might strengthen some other aspect's "grade".]

[At least for Spirit Artifacts, the effect matched your expectations!]

["That means, once I master the method to refine Heaven-Grade Spirit Artifacts, whatever I produce will naturally come out as Immortal Artifacts! Then the Ten Thousand Souls Banner will be able to completely suppress the Shen Family Founding Ancestor's soul form and refine him!"]

[But this is a race.]

[Your learning progress is competing against the Shen Family Founding Ancestor's recovery.]

[If he recovers too strongly, even the Immortal Artifact Ten Thousand Souls Banner might not be able to refine him.]

[Year Thirty-Seven, age fifty-five.]

[With deeper study of the mountain of works left by the Shen Family Founding Ancestor...]

[You actually admired the old immortal a lot.]

[You could focus on delving into research these past years because if you didn't research, you'd die.]

[And you were practicing using his resources, so breaking them didn't bother you.]

>If you had to gather and accumulate resources yourself, you'd never waste materials so casually.

[But the Shen Family Founding Ancestor?]

[He sustained research across all kinds of Daoist schools for over thirty thousand years!]

[And he compiled his findings into a room full of books.]

[These were distilled into the finest classical written forms!]

[This man was not only a genius, but also a polymath and a scholarly researcher!]

[To the Shen Family, this ancestor was not a blood-sucking parasite on the clan, nor a tyrannical ancient alive for show; his thirty-thousand-year achievements were all contributions to the Shen Family's prosperity!]

[No wonder the entire Shen clan united to obtain his body for a possession ritual.]

[Whether the human world can survive without Shen Yang is unclear to you, but the Shen Family definitely cannot do without this ancestor.]

[Year Thirty-Eight, age fifty-six.]

[Your martial cultivation rose to Spirit Sea realm, layer five.]

[With Low-Grade Bone Structure reaching the Spirit Sea realm, in theory, natural training alone would not be enough to advance even one minor sub-realm before death.]

[Yet you forcibly raised your cultivation using the resources from the Star Force Mystic Realm.]

[So what was the cost?]

[The Star Force Mystic Realm was stripped bare!]

[The grass was gone, the flowers were gone, even the tree bark was half gone!]

[What had once been alive with bees and butterflies now showed no living creatures at all.]

[You more or less used up all the remaining spirit materials in the Shen Family's Star Force Mystic Realm to raise your Spirit Sea cultivation by five layers.]

[That was truly a loss-making deal!]

[Of course, from the Shen Family's perspective.]

[The day the Shen Family opens the Star Force Mystic Realm's gate draws ever closer.]

[The Shen Family Founding Ancestor, still latent within the Ten Thousand Souls Banner, resembled a sleeping jackal that could pounce at any time.]

["Ah... failed again..."]

[Looking at the shattered metal fragments and spirit sand, you couldn't help but glance around.]

[The Ten Thousand Souls Banner was stuck to one side, its banner face fluttering in the wind.]

[The Nine Provinces Cauldron had transformed into a five-meter-tall furnace for your refining work.]

[The Qiankun Mirror hopped nearby, amusing itself.]

[The Star Force Mystic Realm was not only barren.]

[It was dug up into pits and hollows.]

[The initial refining materials found in the cave must have been the Shen Family Founding Ancestor's usual practice supplies.]

[They were nowhere near enough for you to squander.]

[Later you discovered that digging deeper unearthed spirit materials similar to iron, silver, and gold, so you excavated whenever you had nothing else to do.]

[You even had the Ten Thousand Souls Banner release Demon Souls to help with the digging.]

[The entire Star Force Mystic Realm now looked like a wasp's nest due to your excavations.]

["Not good!!"]

[Just as you prepared to continue digging for more refining materials, the Ten Thousand Souls Banner suddenly screamed.]

[On the banner surface, the Shen Family Founding Ancestor's face reflected.]

["He's coming out!"]

["Hold him down! Da Chun! A Kun! Help!!"]

[The Three Phantom Gods joined forces again, each displaying divine might to suppress the Shen Family Founding Ancestor attempting to break free from the banner.]

[The Shen Family Founding Ancestor had obviously recovered a lot in recent years.]

[This time he dared to break outward, likely because he felt confident.]

[You saw his head gradually stretch out from the banner.]

["Junior! Your time to die has come!"]

[The Ten Thousand Souls Banner practically wailed its doom.]

["Bro!! We can't hold him!! He's way stronger than before!!"]

["Even if we can't hold him, we have to try!! If he gets out we'll all be pulverized!!"]

["Well, we could surrender, actually."]

["I'll beat you to a pulp first! Then he'll beat me to a pulp!"]

["Then you think of something! Aren't you full of cunning tricks?!"]

[Tricks?]

[Huh?]

[A real idea popped into your head.]

["Little Wan! A Kun! You two hold him! Da Chun, come with me!"]

[The Ten Thousand Souls Banner instantly broke voice.]

["What??!"]

[The three great artifacts together could not suppress the Shen Family Founding Ancestor.]

[And you wanted to take one away at a time like this?]

[The Ten Thousand Souls Banner and the Qiankun Mirror were under tremendous pressure right then.]

[Both were giving everything they had, smoking, cracking.]

["What exactly do you plan to do?! This broken mirror and I can't hold him!!"]

["I'll refine a pill and feed it to him! Make him sleep!"]

[The Ten Thousand Souls Banner was stunned on the spot.]

["That's insane! You're going to give him a pill?? Have you been around that damned cauldron too long, you got infected by it?!"]