Chapter 24

  To Be a Master (III)

  I've never quite liked rain back on Earth.

  City traffic would slow down to a crawl, the soot of fumes would get trapped in the air, and my mood would always become slightly more depressive while staring at the ashen clouds above.

  Today, however, I welcome it with open arms!

  Compared to the sizzling scorch of the midday sun (which, I swear, burned at triple digits at least), the rain was like a welcome oasis. Yes, it was still wet, and it was still annoying, but it was vastly better.

  Well, not for construction--far from it--but for my well-being. Besides, I needed a break.

  I've been working three days straight and barely felt like I made much progress. A day off allowed me to put my struggles into perspective: I was building a house. Making no visible progress in three days was normal.

  Perfectly normal.

  As with all other times I was bored and had nothing else to do, I perused the Creation System, fiddling with it. In my experimentation, I uncovered a few things--I could seemingly not produce an art higher than Earth-tier at the moment, with only one of my combinations just barely breaking into the early Sky-tier, though costing a full 100 Creation Points.

  It made sense, after all--the way the system qualified the Arts was the same as the world around me did.

  Mortal Arts were the most prevalent, but there was scarcity even among them when it came to the high-tier ones. A good Mortal Cultivation Method, after all, would allow a person to reach all the way to the Spirit Manifestation, my current realm. Wanting to go beyond that, however, required an Earth-tier method.

  As far as I know, the sect's main cultivation method was at the mid-Earth tier, which was just barely enough for someone as talented as Spirit Sage to reach Void Transformation.

  Rather, it was a miracle I could even produce stuff within this range. The sheer luck of the system practically giving me the Heart-Stitching Art, a mid-Sky tier method, was quite unprecedented. I'm fairly certain, in fact, that I won't be able to make arts at that level until at least the peak of Revolving Core, maybe slightly before that.

  None of that mattered, however, as the system didn't prevent me from experimenting and looking up options. There were certainly some that were still just '????', causing no small amount of worry and anxiety, as some of the stuff that was unlocked was already kind of, well, bonkers. For lack of a better word.

  Perfect Imbuement of Qi, for instance, was one of the modifications that would reconstruct the method and ensure a 100% perfect Qi transition. It had to be said that even the best methods of the sect maxed out at about 30%. There would always be waste, as no things were perfect... except the ones made by the system.

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  It did cost 10,000 Creation Points, however, so... you know, I will probably never be able to use it.

  Nonetheless, with my 60 points, I did have a few options to select from, but none that could be used to help anyone immediately. Long Tao, naturally, didn't need anything--except that cloaking art that I couldn't (and kind of didn't want to) create.

  As for Dai Xiu, she still had to drink the tea for a long while before resuming cultivation, and even then, the system recommended peak-Earth tier, something I couldn't create. And the recommendation was of 'at least peak-Earth tier'.

  "Master, Elder Qin has come to visit," hm? What's that old dude doing here? Is he here to check up on me?

  Regardless, I couldn't just ignore him, so I hurriedly put on my robes and went down. Considering the downpour on the outside, I expected the man to be as wet as a puddle, but he wasn't. He was as dry as a desert, with no visible umbrella in sight. Did he seriously use Qi to shield himself from the rain? Tsk. Showoff.

  "Elder Lu," the old man greeted with a faint smile, his eyes darting between Long Tao and Dai Xiu.

  "Elder Qin, what a surprise!" I put on my brilliant smile, bowing as a greeting. "Dai Xiu, brew a pot of tea for our visitor!"

  "At once, Master!" she hurriedly scurried to the kitchen. Whether she knew of Elder Qin or not, it didn't matter--she knew that he was an Elder, after all, just like me.

  "Please, come inside; you could have called for me, and I would have made the trip down instead!"

  "It is good to occasionally stretch my old bones," he said with a chuckle as I suddenly got a bad feeling. No way, right? He didn't come here to conscript me and make me go to war? No way! I'm too young to die!

  "Ah, yes. Khm, to what do I owe the pleasure?" I probed gently.

  "We missed you at the meeting of Elders." I winced, my eyebrow dancing for a moment; that's because NOBODY INVITED ME. No, wait, Lu Qi had never gone to any of these meetings, and it's never been an issue before. So, I simply smiled and waited for more. "I thought I should let you know that the Fire Sun Sect had sent over 5,000 mid-grade Spirit Stones as a form of apology."

  Hm? That's... not bad? I mean, I do feel bad for the kids having lost their lives, but if it's only 2-3 Outer Disciples, or even Inner Disciples, it was... well, not all bad.

  From what I grasp of the memories, raising a disciple to the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm costs about 1,000 mid-grade Spirit Stones.

  "One of the fallen was a Core Disciple, Zhangxian," Elder Qin's voice cooled and grew with murderous intent. Oh.

  Then 5,000 mid-grade Spirit Stones were a slap in the face, basically. The amount of resources poured into Core Disciples could not be measured merely in Spirit Stones, as the investment didn't immediately reflect in their cultivation realm.

  The Sect had also fed them rare herbs to increase the potency of their talent or to help smoothen the breakthroughs, and numerous other things. Even 50,000 mid-grade Spirit Stones still would not have been enough, as finding saplings talented enough to even be considered for the position of a Core Disciple is so extremely rare that it only happens every ten years or so.

  For instance, of the last batch, there was nobody (well, there was Long Tao, but they didn't know that) that could become a Core Disciple.

  "Though she was only at the peak of the Foundation Realm," Elder Qin continued. "She showed a lot of promise, manifesting a tiny Sword Embryo. There was hope she would be able to reach the Revolving Core Realm in her lifetime."

  Even if I had no personal connection to the sect's goings-on, I was still tied to its existence. And losing one of the future pillars... was difficult to swallow.

  "What did you decide?" I probed.

  "We won't go to war... yet," Elder Qin said with a heavy tone. "But the sect will issue a decree to make it so that none of the important disciples will be allowed to leave the sect without an Elder as an escort."

  Hm?

  Hmmmm?

  No... no, right?

  Please... please don't make me go out to guard some kids; I can't even guard myself!