Li Qi’s eyes beheld the familiar scenery of the Qingrao Domain once more.
It had to be said, Li Qi’s current realm had undergone a tremendous improvement, not to mention his combat power.
The speed accompanying this surge in strength had also increased manyfold.
Compared to before when Li Qi traveled between the Qingrao Domain and the Dizhu Realm,
Li Qi now took only half the time to traverse between the two locations, and the journey was
much more comfortable than before.
Li Qi was still unaware that his breakthrough to the Mahayana stage in the Dizhu Realm had been detected by the three Immortals from the Cangyun Realm.
In his opinion, he had hidden the Dizhu Realm well, and no one should know that it had already reached the Mahayana stage.
However, fortunately, as a stroke of luck, even though Li Qi did not know that his breakthrough to the Mahayana stage in the Dizhu Realm had been discovered,
at least the Heavenly Dao of the Cangyun Realm could not detect the specific location of the Dizhu Realm.
“Those eight merchant guilds must have accumulated quite a few treasures over these two hundred years. It’s time to check on them.”
Upon his return this time, Li Qi immediately remembered the eight merchant guilds he hadn't visited in a long time.
He had been too busy with other matters to attend to them previously.
Now that Li Qi had no pressing matters and his strength meant he didn't need to worry about anyone causing trouble,
he naturally thought of visiting the eight merchant guilds again to gather some resources.
After all, Penguin Medicine Pavilion only sold a small portion of their pills, which didn't mean they had taken away all the business from the eight merchant guilds.
Those eight merchant guilds were, in any case, top-tier merchant guilds in the Qingrao Domain.
Even with a small share of the pill market being snatched by Penguin Medicine Pavilion,
their earning capacity was still undeniable.
But it was a pity that the patriarchs of their merchant guilds were already under Li Qi’s control.
Therefore, Li Qi was naturally not going to be polite about the wealth accumulated by those eight merchant guilds.
With this thought, he decided to act immediately.
Li Qi’s spirits were lifted. He glanced at his current location,
then confirmed the distance to one of the merchant guilds.
With a flicker of his form, he vanished from his original spot.
In the time that followed,
Li Qi roamed among the eight merchant guilds.
Whenever Li Qi arrived at a merchant guild, the first thing he would do was head directly to their treasure vault.
The guild masters of the eight merchant guilds could only watch helplessly, daring not to intervene.
Fortunately, unlike the last time when he had emptied their treasure vaults completely,
this time, Li Qi did not deplete all the resources accumulated by these eight merchant guilds over the past two hundred years. He only took half.
Finally, Li Qi departed calmly amidst the complex expressions of relief and apprehension from the guild masters.
Li Qi returned once more to the desolate meteor zone he had found in the Qingrao Domain long ago.
Even though Li Qi’s strength had grown significantly, making him virtually unrivaled in the Qingrao Domain,
he had grown accustomed to staying in this place and did not wish to cultivate ostentatiously elsewhere.
After all, others sought places with abundant spiritual energy for cultivation,
while Li Qi, with his immense resources, could completely disregard such concerns.
A hundred years passed quietly in this manner.
During this century, Li Qi remained in his location, cultivating diligently.
His realm, the peak of Tribulation Transcension, remained unchanged.
Although Li Qi's foundation was exceptionally solid and his talent, amplified by the system's enhancements, was unimaginably exaggerated compared to ordinary individuals,
he had, after all, advanced from the sixth heaven of Tribulation Transcension to the peak in one go.
To directly break through to the Mahayana stage in a short period was, even for Li Qi, an impractical wish.
However, Li Qi was not in a hurry this time.
After all, he had already undergone such a significant breakthrough, so a lack of immediate progress in his cultivation was understandable.
However, it was worth mentioning that
with the passage of these hundred years, Penguin Medicine Pavilion in the Qingrao Domain had reached its zenith.
Even under this prosperity, with the arrangement of his two life-bound spirit puppets, many cultivators selling retail pills under Penguin Medicine Pavilion had even left the Qingrao Domain to sell in neighboring great domains.
This was because the pill market in the Qingrao Domain had become saturated.
The surrounding great domains, however, were all virgin territories waiting to be exploited.
Although there were dangers and long distances between great domains,
after the first cultivator who returned from another great domain reaped a bountiful harvest,
many retail cultivators of Penguin Medicine Pavilion were spurred on like being injected with adrenaline, heading out into the world.
Indeed, allowing them to earn substantial profits themselves was the primary motivator for people.
It could even be said that over this past century, many cultivators in the surrounding great domains had heard of the name Penguin Medicine Pavilion.
The achievements of Penguin Medicine Pavilion had shocked the eight merchant guilds that had been secretly observing them.
They had indeed considered expanding their guilds' influence to neighboring great domains in the past.
However, each surrounding great domain naturally had its own local merchant guilds.
A powerful dragon cannot suppress a local snake, and moreover, they couldn't be considered powerful dragons, as their guilds didn't even have a single true Mahayana stage cultivator.
Thus, when they first established branches in other great domains, they suffered significant setbacks within a short period.
But unfortunately, a half-step Mahayana stage cultivator was acceptable in the local Qingrao Domain.
However, in other great domains, facing the Mahayana stage cultivators of those local guilds, they were not to be trifled with. If they dared to go, they might be ambushed and killed.
Therefore, the merchant guilds' desire to expand into surrounding great domains had been indefinitely postponed for this reason.
Perhaps there were still some scattered branches or scouts in the surrounding great domains, but such loose, small branches were of little use.
However, Penguin Medicine Pavilion's approach directly broke through the predicament that they could not expand out of, no matter how hard they tried.
Moreover, due to the cultivators from the Qingrao Domain,
many cultivators in the surrounding great domains who were in need of money heard of this lucrative path and traveled vast distances to the Qingrao Domain, wanting to obtain some pills to sell.
The merchant guilds in the surrounding great domains had no good solutions for this, much like the eight great merchant guilds in the past.
This was because, for the pills produced by Penguin Medicine Pavilion and transported to surrounding great domains, Penguin Medicine Pavilion had no branches, nor did they have established transportation routes for these pills.
Or rather, everyone was a transportation route for Penguin Medicine Pavilion's pills.
After all, who would know that a seemingly ordinary and inconspicuous Tribulation Transcension stage cultivator might have a large batch of pills purchased from Penguin Medicine Pavilion stored in their spatial ring?
Even the most powerful merchant guilds in those surrounding great domains could not possibly refuse every cultivator arriving from other great domains, not even true Mahayana stage cultivators.
Unless they were drunk and dared to do as the eight great merchant guilds did, personally dispatching powerful individuals to the Qingrao Domain to destroy the two branches of Penguin Medicine Pavilion.
But if that were to happen, Li Qi would naturally not mind making a trip himself, increasing the number of merchant guilds under his control by one or two, or even more.