Exchange

"Don't dwell on it, young friend. This spirit tea only has such an effect for the first cup!" Gu Jia saw Li Shiming's expression, understood what he was thinking, and answered with a smile.

"Thank you, Fellow Daoist Gu, for the tea!" Li Shiming said, bowing in thanks.

He saw it clearly. Among the more than twenty cultivators present, aside from him, only seven had spirit tea in front of them.

The tea before the other cultivators was probably about the same as his fake spirit tea, and the spirit water in it was even made from the Spring Breeze Transforming Rain Art he had given away.

"Once you enter the sect, you'll have to pay me back!" Gu Jia said with a smile.

He and Li Shiming chatted and laughed at ease, but the rogue cultivators to the side wore solemn expressions, exchanging information with their eyes.

"Fellow Daoist Gu, that day a masked cultivator came to the market. He had restrained his spiritual power fluctuation, yet he repeatedly revealed low-level mistakes, making us mistakenly think he was a cultivator who had just set out from home!" Cultivator Deng said aloud.

Gu Jia nodded, signaling him to continue.

"That cultivator bought three secret manuals from me and spent twenty spirit stones, without asking about the related true intent!" Cultivator Zhang continued.

"It seems that cultivator set a trap for you, and experienced cultivators like you still fell for it!" Gu Jia could not help shaking his head as he spoke.

As he spoke, his gaze turned to the Hao Family Elder. The Hao family had suffered the greatest loss.

Li Shiming was somewhat stunned at this point. So the biggest flaw had been the three secret manuals he had bought.

The secret manuals Cultivator Zhang sold did not come with the matching true intent. They did not even mention true intent at all. Experienced cultivators would never buy secret manuals like that.

And the secret manuals Cultivator Zhang sold were also divided into two parts: the spell rune part and the true intent part.

If an inexperienced cultivator bought the spell rune part, they would find they could not practice it, and would then have to come back again to buy the true intent part.

That way, Cultivator Zhang could sell one item twice, earning two profits, and the profit from a spell's true intent was even higher.

When Li Shiming bought the three secret manuals, he did not ask about the spell true intent, which let the cultivators in the market know he was a newcomer.

And before that, he had sold spiritual rice and even revealed that he had a storage bag. All of this gave the rogue cultivators the idea of robbing him.

This was how many rogue cultivators survived: robbing resources for their own use.

Because after Li Shiming left, he killed the two Hao family cultivators at Qi Refining Stage 3 and Qi Refining Fourth Level, even Gu Jia now believed this had been entrapment.

"As you know, with the strength of us rogue cultivators, there are not many who can surpass Fellow Daoist Hao Yanming.

"Fellow Daoist Hao Yanming was a novice talisman master. He was at mid-stage Qi Refining and had a large number of talismans, yet he still fell at that cultivator's hands.

"The Immortal Ascension Gathering brings us opportunities, but it also brings us great trouble. Our strength truly isn't enough to control the market at this stage. We hope you can agree to let the market be held inside the city from now until the end of the Immortal Ascension Gathering!" Cultivator Deng said with a bitter expression.

"We have discussed it. The spirit stones we hand over will be increased by fifty percent. Please grant this, Fellow Daoist Gu!" Cultivator Zhang stood up and bowed as he pleaded.

"Please grant this, Fellow Daoist Gu!" The other six cultivators with spirit tea in front of them all stood up and bowed as they spoke.

After that, all the other cultivators in the main hall except Li Shiming also stood up and bowed toward Gu Jia.

Gu Jia's eyes flickered as he weighed the gains and losses in his heart.

"I agree to this matter!" He quickly made his decision.

The fact that he was the Sky Ocean Sect's garrison cultivator, and a late-stage Qi Refining cultivator, were both reasons he dared to agree.

Besides, the closer it got to the Immortal Ascension Gathering, the more cultivators would come wanting to curry favor with him. Within Sky Ocean Sect territory, there were not many cultivators who dared to embarrass a sect disciple.

Smiles appeared on all the cultivators' faces. Though they had to pay more spirit stones, stabilizing the market meant safeguarding the foundation of their survival.

Without the market, who would they sell the spiritual objects they produced to?

One-on-one transactions had no guarantee in the cultivation world, and killing to seize goods was even more common.

After Gu Jia relented, the atmosphere in the main hall grew lively.

The rogue cultivators began talking about their cultivation experience. For cultivators like them, who had no sect, this kind of exchange was extremely important.

Of course, no one would say anything truly important, but even hearing a bit of new experience might give a rogue cultivator a new direction.

"Young friend, don't listen too much to the experience they discuss. Wait until you enter the sect!" Gu Jia did not listen to what the rogue cultivators were discussing, instead sending Li Shiming a secret sound transmission.

Li Shiming heard the voice by his ear, while the cultivators beside him did not notice. He guessed this should be a method of secret sound transmission.

Since he could not use the same method to reply, he could only nod to show he understood.

Indeed, much of the experience rogue cultivators figured out on their own was wrong. As a cultivator who had only just begun practicing, his future path was not that of a rogue cultivator.

Seeing that Li Shiming had taken his warning to heart, Gu Jia smiled and went to chat with several cultivators of higher status.

"Fellow Daoist Li, my surname is Hao, and I'm at Qi Refining Stage 6. What spell are you good at? Why don't we exchange some pointers?" Old Cultivator Hao had arrived beside Li Shiming at some point and proposed this with a smile.

He looked as if he was preparing to guide a junior, showing that he was taking care of Li Shiming in accordance with Gu Jia's request.

But after Li Shiming entered the main hall, his five senses had been connected to IBMz15. Through a facial analysis program, he judged that Old Cultivator Hao was wearing a false smile.

This facial analysis program was something Li Shiming had written in his spare time. It borrowed a large amount of research results on human behavior, anatomy, criminal psychology, and so on from IBMz15, and also drew on several ready-made police facial recognition systems.

If this had been his previous life, the program he wrote would have infringed on many patents, but in this world, there was no need to consider such things at all.

"Fellow Daoist Hao, I haven't learned any real spells. What I'm best at is the Body Lightening Art!" Li Shiming was extremely careful as he answered, outwardly pretending to be very shy.

He would only turn sixteen after the new year, so his behavior matched his age well enough.

"I also have some insights into the Body Lightening Art. Why don't you cast it, and I'll analyze it for you!" Old Cultivator Hao said warmly.

Gu Jia, who was speaking with someone, glanced over at them and said nothing. Li Shiming would need to deal with cultivators in the future, and he was also confident that Old Cultivator Hao would not dare use any tricks on Li Shiming.

Gu Jia had only just said that Li Shiming was his young friend, and in the Central Capital region, he still had plenty of face.

"Then thank you very much, Fellow Daoist Hao!" Li Shiming said, looking excited.

He casually drew a lightness rune, and while deliberately slowing himself down, took two seconds to make a cyan glow appear on both his legs.

When Old Cultivator Hao saw the cyan glow on Li Shiming's legs, he breathed a sigh of relief.

"Looks like I was mistaken!" he said to himself.

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