Assessment

Su Bai quickly returned to the courtyard.

Unexpectedly, only Zhou Chang, who had happened to return, was there.

The other fellow disciples, like Su Bai, had all gone off to carry out various Outer Sect tasks.

After exchanging pleasantries and encouraging each other with Zhou Chang, Su Bai went to Wu Tian's new courtyard to visit him.

Having rid himself of that housekeeping disciple who had committed every kind of evil, Wu Tian looked noticeably better.

However, after having his cultivation delayed, he had yet to advance to Qi Refining Layer Two.

Su Bai's Spirit Root had been copied from Wu Tian.

The minute differences in their Spirit Roots were exactly identical.

Yet their current cultivation progress had been pulled so far apart.

Clearly, on the path of cultivation, aside from Spirit Roots, luck was also an important component.

After Wu Tian asked Su Bai about several key points of Outer Sect tasks, he too decided that after advancing in cultivation, he would follow Su Bai's example and perform tasks in the Outer Court, exchanging them for pills to speed up his cultivation progress.

After chatting briefly with Wu Tian, Su Bai left the Outer Court and returned to the Spirit Fields, beginning his dull life of standing watch over Spiritual Fields while cultivating.

At his current cultivation pace, Su Bai was confident that in at most another four or five months, he would advance to Qi Refining Stage Three.

"After advancing to Qi Refining Stage Three, I can look after one more Spiritual Field!"

After personally taking part in the Spiritual Field watch duty, Su Bai discovered that some disciples at Qi Refining Stage Three often chose to look after an additional Spiritual Field.

This was because after disciples reached Qi Refining Stage Three, their enhanced Spiritual Power made the Dewdrop Technique more enduring, and they themselves had more energy as well.

If he looked after one extra mu of Spiritual Field, the Essence Replenishing Pill rewards he received would also increase.

"In that case, I can receive three more Essence Replenishing Pills every month..." Su Bai planned his future arrangements in his heart.

"Qi Refining Stage Four is the first bottleneck of the Qi Refining Stage, separating Qi Refining Early Stage from Mid Qi Refining Stage."

"With Three Spirit Root Talent, breaking through to Qi Refining Stage Four could take as little as one or two years, or as long as four or five years."

"I've heard that the breakthrough process is also related to one's state of mind."

The Qi Refining cultivation technique provided by the sect only went as far as Qi Refining Stage Four.

Clearly, they believed that it was already outstanding for New Disciples to cultivate to Qi Refining Stage Four within a few years.

Thus, Su Bai remained stationed long-term at the Fifteenth Layer of Mountain Ring Spirit Fields.

With Spirit Field No. 1523 as his companion.

During that time, several Spiritual Field disasters occurred, but under the old steward's guidance, they could all be easily resolved.

As a result, Su Bai gradually became an experienced "Cultivation Old Farmer."

At the end of August.

The Spirit Rice Paddy in Spirit Field No. 1523 ripened.

Harvesting was very simple for cultivators.

Walking through the rice field and using the Object Manipulation Technique, grains of Spirit Rice rapidly flew into the Dedicated Grain Storage Bag provided by the steward.

The rice stalks were reduced to ash in a single fire spell cast by the old steward.

Afterward, Labor Disciples came to turn over the soil.

Once that was done, Su Bai collected Spirit Rice Paddy seeds and simply used the Object Manipulation Technique to scatter them across the Spiritual Field at the prescribed intervals.

There was no need for Seedling Cultivation and Transplanting like with mortal rice.

Nurtured by Spiritual Energy and the Dewdrop Technique, these seeds would rapidly grow and sprout, becoming another batch of mature Spirit Rice Paddy after three months.

Cultivation Without Years.

At the end of November, Su Bai went through another harvest and planting.

On the night of planting, while cultivating in exhaustion, Su Bai successfully advanced to Qi Refining Stage Three.

"Finally, I've broken through." The exhaustion on Su Bai's body was immediately swept clean away.

The next day, Su Bai headed to the Outer Sect Affairs Hall and asked Steward Su to update his advancement records.

By the way, he asked around and confirmed that he was still the third disciple of this batch to advance to Qi Refining Stage Three, giving him an excellent chance of receiving a reward.

Afterward, Su Bai went to Steward Lin and took on one additional Spiritual Field.

Su Bai had informed the senior brother responsible for Spirit Field No. 1524 in advance.

This senior brother was also a straightforward man.

He was willing to give Spirit Field No. 1524 to Su Bai and transfer himself to another Spiritual Field.

This way, Su Bai could look after two adjacent Spiritual Fields without running back and forth, saving himself a great deal of trouble.

At the end of December, the mortal year-end was approaching.

Su Bai's batch of disciples had also been in the sect for nearly a year.

The Outer Sect Affairs Hall issued a notice that Su Bai's batch of disciples would undergo an assessment.

Those whose performance was particularly poor would be punitively demoted to Labor Disciples for a period of time.

A few days earlier, the sect had also held an assessment for the newly admitted Labor Disciples. Among the more than one thousand Labor Disciples recruited this time, over a dozen outstanding ones had been promoted early to Outer Disciples.

They would enjoy the treatment of Outer Disciples.

The capable rose and the weak fell. Jade Mist Sect did not simply recruit low-ranking disciples and then wash its hands of them.

In secret, it would also select elites through various means and grant them better benefits.

The news of this assessment was sent directly to Su Bai's Jade Talisman.

Naturally, Su Bai would be participating as well.

Su Bai had already been at Qi Refining Stage Three for nearly two months. Among this batch of Outer Disciples, his Cultivation Speed was absolutely among the very best.

Therefore, he was completely unafraid of this assessment.

Early on the day of the assessment, Su Bai informed the old steward of the Fifteenth Circle and headed for the Outer Sect Lecture Ground.

Because they had communicated beforehand through their Jade Talismans.

Aside from Zhou Chang, the fellow disciples from Courtyard 32 gathered together once again.

Qian Er had no idea what method he used to bring Jiang Han over as well.

This kid clearly only had Four Spirit Root talent, yet he had also broken through to Qi Refining Stage Three.

Though his aura looked somewhat unstable, as though he had only just broken through.

That was already extremely astonishing.

Su Bai surveyed the Outer Disciples around him. Those who had advanced to Qi Refining Stage Three probably accounted for only twenty percent.

With that, all five New Disciples from Courtyard 32 could be considered to have advanced to Qi Refining Stage Three.

"Senior Brother Su, are you still on Spiritual Field watch duty?" Qian Er asked.

Su Bai nodded. "Yes. Before I advance to Qi Refining Stage Four, I probably won't change to another task."

Qian Er spoke with a hint of envy. "Senior Brother Su, you really can keep your composure. I heard the Spirit Rice benefits from the Spiritual Field Task are quite good, but if I had to live alone year after year, my temperament couldn't stand it."

Su Bai smiled. "I'm merely taking things as they come. The Outer Sect tasks you all chose have very good benefits too."

Among the fellow disciples from Courtyard 32, Qian Er had chosen the Patrol Task. The area around Qingyun Mountain was enveloped by the sect's formation, and mortals seeking immortality and the Dao often accidentally wandered inside.

Without a cultivator to guide them, even Martial Arts Masters among those mortals could end up trapped in the formation and starve to death.

Out of humanitarian concern, Jade Mist Sect dispatched disciples to patrol and drive those mortals away.

The benefit of the Patrol Task was the distribution of talismans. Relying on these talismans, patrol personnel could sense the power of certain spells across cultivation levels in advance.

Qian Er had reportedly secretly saved several talismans for his own future use.

Zhang Yanshen assisted with Spirit Herbs in the Medicine Garden.

Spirit Herbs were far more precious than Spirit Rice and ten times harder to tend.

But he was very interested in becoming an Alchemist. Jade Mist Sect's Alchemy Institute was quite good, and his goal was to join it.

Though the Medicine Garden was somewhat more troublesome in daily life, it allowed him to familiarize himself with Spirit Herb knowledge in advance, which could be considered as fulfilling his needs.

However, it consumed quite a bit of his time in the Medicine Garden and delayed his cultivation somewhat. Like Jiang Han, he had only just broken through to Qi Refining Stage Three.

That guy Li Daniu had chosen a Spirit Mine.

He was usually not in the sect at all, but at a Spirit Stone Mine several hundred li away from Qingyun Mountain.

Mortals could not replace cultivators in mining Spirit Stones; they needed specialized spirit pickaxes to extract them.

It was a very exhausting Outer Sect task.

One could get some sense of it just by looking at Li Daniu's sturdy physical body, tempered by the work, and his steady Spiritual Power.

As for Jiang Han, this kid had not said anything himself.

But from the dense killing intent around this guy that made Su Bai somewhat uncomfortable, Su Bai could guess that this kid had most likely taken on the Hunting Ingredients task.