"What?"

"Artifact Spirit." The Golden Blade Master said coldly, "In ordinary weapon forging, incorporating two attributes of materials simultaneously to ensure they complement and do not counteract each other is already extremely rare.

But if you want to accommodate five attributes or even more at the same time, unless this weapon, from the beginning, has already activated an Artifact Spirit.

An Artifact Spirit with self-awareness can self-evolve. As long as the owner diligently nurtures it and its intelligence is high enough, it can manipulate the changes in the Five Elements’ power, avoiding conflicts and enhancing synergy."

Understood, an Artifact Spirit is equivalent to adding an automatic control system, an autonomous AI, to the weapon to help the owner automatically compute and arrange the combination of Five Elements’ power during use.

Chen Yan immediately nodded and said, "In that case..."

He immediately took out that flying sword and gently placed it on the table.

Chen Yan slowly asked, "Although this sword has not yet activated an Artifact Spirit, it already has a preliminary consciousness. I wonder if it is usable?"

The Golden Blade Master squinted and pondered for a moment, furrowed his brows, and said, "Usable, but also not usable."

This time he did not let his apprentice answer, probably because the question was rather profound. The Golden Blade Master looked directly into Chen Yan’s eyes: "A consciousness still in the incubating phase has its pros and cons without having formed an Artifact Spirit.

The advantage is, the Artifact Spirit hasn’t been born yet, similar to a fetus stage, its attributes are undecided. At this time, whatever you teach it, it learns. Since it hasn’t fixed its characteristics, there’s more choice, making diversifying from the fetal stage easier.

But the downside is... it’s that old adage again: bite off more than you can chew. The incubation of an Artifact Spirit itself is very difficult.

From consciousness to the birth of an Artifact Spirit, if you only pursue one of the Five Elements, then this consciousness only needs to be nurtured along one path.

However, nurturing five at once means that the resources and energy the owner must invest are fivefold, and the difficulty is more than tenfold.

Moreover, the possibility of successfully incubating an Artifact Spirit will be greatly diminished.

The guest should know that cultivating an Artifact Spirit is not easy! If you try to have the Artifact Spirit cultivate all five elements simultaneously in this process, the difficulty and required investment will probably be insurmountable..."

Chen Yan felt a moment of internal conflict.

He understood what the Golden Blade Master meant.

Logically, he should honestly choose one of the Five Elements, two at most.

Then, given the skills of this top Artifact Refining Master of the Ghost Race, crafting a weapon he would be satisfied with shouldn’t be difficult.

But at this moment, an inexplicable impulse arose in his heart, as if a faint voice from deep within was reminding him.

To cultivate all!

The Five Elements, all of them!

Only children make choices; adults, I want it all!

"Guest, the Primordial Qi consumption during the cultivation process is one thing. However, the consumption of Five Elements materials is not as easy as you imagine!

Even though there are plenty of Five Elements materials, not all of them can be used to forge weapons. Moreover, for the weapon’s grade, using high-quality materials from the start is necessary to ensure a high grade!

But if the materials used during the initial forging were of high quality, then you can’t invest lower-grade materials in the subsequent nurturing of the Artifact Spirit!

If the Artifact Spirit starts with the best, it won’t be willing to settle for less later."

The Golden Blade Master still tried to persuade Chen Yan.

However, Chen Yan suddenly sighed, his voice not loud but his tone very firm: "I’ve decided, I want it all! All the Five Elements’ attributes, I want them all!"

The Golden Blade Master was taken aback upon hearing this.

Chen Yan noticed the displeasure in the master’s eyes. He smiled slightly and proactively bowed with cupped hands: "As cultivators, since we’ve chosen this path, we must have the resolve and courage to forge ahead despite difficulties!

Though this path is hard, if I can make it through, the achievements will far surpass others!

Without the aspiration to reach the summit, willing to be mediocre—this is not my ambition!

Please grant my request, Golden Blade Master!"

The Golden Blade Master looked at Chen Yan with a complex expression, finally nodding slowly. He picked up the flying sword on the table, which had already incubated a sliver of consciousness: "I’ll take this sword home and give it a thorough study. What you want... I’ll try my best.

To be clear, the initial blank material of this sword doesn’t truly count as Upper Grade. I’ll take it back for quenching and re-forging with better materials, gradually ’purging’ the original one while maintaining that sliver of consciousness already there. This job won’t be easy."

Chen Yan stepped back, bowing deeply: "Then I’ll leave it to your care, master!"

The Golden Blade Master said no more, picked up the flying sword, and casually tossed it into his bag.

However, his two apprentices were both looking at Chen Yan with a gaze meant for lunatics, though out of respect, they only bit their tongues instead of speaking.

Chen Yan then took out the broken Substitute Puppet from his collection.

"Can this be made?"

The Golden Blade Master glanced at the item and showed slight disdain: "Such an object is simple. There’s no need for me to take action; my apprentices can repair this Substitute Puppet for you."

Chen Yan felt a sense of relief in his heart—ever since he acquired this Substitute Puppet, he had always wanted to restore it to keep as a lifesaving trump card. But his own skills in Artifact Creation were lacking, and the materials were perpetually insufficient, so he had never been able to fully repair the puppet.

Now, in front of this Golden Blade Master, it was merely a trivial issue to be resolved with ease.

Chen Yan was delighted, and he carefully placed the Substitute Puppet on the table.