Conditions for Creating Divine Abilities

On the little road outside Changfeng City, an ox cart faced the blazing sun, moving slowly yet steadily through a sea of green.

On the cart, the uncle and nephew no longer continued their conversation about creating divine abilities.

Lu Mingyuan had no idea what his second uncle, Lu Yi, was thinking, but he didn't much want to bring it up with him.

He was simply afraid his second uncle would be saddened.

As far as Lu Mingyuan knew, although his second uncle was now in his fifties, nearly sixty, and had already lived through almost half his life, he had never created a single divine ability.

Even the Divine Ability Stone he'd received for free when he awakened still lay untouched in his Soul Space.

Was it because his second uncle didn't want to use the stone to create a divine ability?

No. In fact, he wanted to more than anything. He dreamed of it.

But he didn't have the means.

For most people in this world, creating a divine ability required meeting two conditions, besides having Qi Luck Points.

The first was opportunity.

Usually, an excellent idea wasn't easy to come up with. That was why opportunity mattered so much.

With a good opportunity, it was easier to sell the divine ability you created, and you wouldn't end up taking a loss.

What counted as a good opportunity? In plain terms, it meant understanding the market, watching the trends, and then following them.

Following a trend might not earn as much as being original, but it was still far better than blindly tinkering.

Some people refused to believe that and spent their whole lives tinkering away, only to sell one or two copies of the divine abilities they created. At that point, forget breaking even—they'd lost their entire dowry.

So, for most people, the best choice was to hold on to their free Divine Ability Stone, keep studying, and wait for an opportunity to come along.

Take Lu Mingyuan's Chicken and Rabbit in a Cage Divine Ability from a while back. It had only been available for two or three days when it began to catch on. Then pirated copies flooded in, and within a few days there were thousands of them. Before long, there were even tens of thousands.

Only after he released an upgraded version with far more technical complexity did he manage to put a stop to it.

But even then, the major races that had entered the market late weren't willing to settle for scraps. They wanted to keep profiting from it, so they poured enormous amounts of Qi Luck Points into reproducing most of the divine ability's new features.

After that, pirated copies made by independent creators without capital finally fell into decline.

Even so, the first ten who followed the trend each made at least several million.

That was the power of opportunity.

And now, Lu Mingyuan's Agricultural School tool-type divine ability was clearly another opportunity.

This tool-type divine ability of his was also easy to imitate.

As long as someone knew roughly how it worked and spent some time on it, they could create a new divine ability with the same basic idea but completely different contents.

And it was easy to foresee that anyone who seized the initiative would make a fortune.

It was easy to imitate, and it had great profit potential. That made piracy all the more likely.

So Lu Mingyuan didn't object at all to his father-in-law's idea of creating a similar kitchen-tool divine ability. On the contrary, he was all for it.

Since someone was bound to take advantage of them, they might as well let their own family benefit. They couldn't just leave it to outsiders.

If his second uncle, Lu Yi, had an idea, Lu Mingyuan would have been wholeheartedly in favor.

But, clearly, his second uncle couldn't ride this wave.

That brought them to the second condition for creating divine abilities: foundational knowledge.

Opportunity could help your divine ability become a bestseller, but only if you could create it in the first place. If you couldn't, all you could do was gaze across the ocean and sigh.

And to create a divine ability, you needed the relevant foundational knowledge—or, in other words, an inheritance.

His second uncle, Lu Yi, lacked exactly that. He had never studied any of this knowledge.

Without it, he couldn't ride the wave even if he wanted to.

So where could you find this foundational knowledge?

As far as Lu Mingyuan knew, ordinary people had two places where they could most easily access it: academies and the military.

At an academy, if you studied for twelve years and paid the tuition, the teachers would teach you step by step until you learned.

That was part of what made academies important.

They didn't just teach students how to study; they also passed down knowledge about creating divine abilities. Private schools didn't offer that last part.

As for the second place, the military, you had to serve for twenty years.

Lu Mingyuan's father-in-law, Jing Hu, and Li Tiezhu's father, Li Fuhong, were both in that situation.

After serving in the military for twenty years, they had not only gained an inheritance of their own, but also earned a place at an academy.

As for Lu Mingyuan's second uncle, Lu Yi, he had neither attended an academy nor served in the military. So he had never had a chance to access that knowledge.

There was no way to even talk about creating divine abilities.

In fact, among the two families of Lu Mingyuan and Jing Zhi, which together numbered a dozen or so people, only Lu Mingyuan, his father-in-law Jing Hu, and his brother-in-law Jing Yao had the foundation to create divine abilities.

That didn't mean the others couldn't create one.

After all, even without foundational knowledge, they could still force a divine ability into existence by pouring in Qi Luck Points.

But creating a decent divine ability that way would take a great many Qi Luck Points.

Even with Lu Mingyuan's current assets of more than ten billion, he might not be able to afford it.

Of course, it wasn't impossible to create a divine ability with very few Qi Luck Points. The result would simply be a divine ability with a very limited effect.

Historical records showed that in the early days, several hundred years ago, when extraordinary powers had only just appeared and divine abilities were still rare, most people created them by brute force.

They would usually save up decades' worth of Qi Luck Points—tens of thousands, or even nearly a hundred thousand—and then rely on nothing but imagination and Qi Luck Points to force a divine ability into existence.

But since they lacked relevant knowledge, and the amount they spent really wasn't much, it was easy to imagine how effective the divine abilities they created would be.

Most divine abilities' earliest versions appeared back then, things like Fireball, Ice Cone, Spiritual Qi Blade, and Sword Rain.

When they first appeared, however, those divine abilities weren't much good. They could barely make someone itch.

Lu Mingyuan remembered that there had also been some divine abilities that enhanced the body, such as increasing strength, constitution, and speed. They only raised them by less than ten percent, but back then, they still had a decent market.

Not long after, though, the major powers with vast amounts of Qi Luck Points entered the scene. From then on, divine abilities that multiplied one's physical attributes sprang up like bamboo shoots after rain. Even powerful divine abilities like Dharma Heaven Dharma Earth, Three Heads and Six Arms, and Summoning Wind and Rain were sold on the Heavenly Dao Virtual Network.

By then, the low-cost, low-effect divine abilities created by ordinary people had been completely squeezed out of the market.

In fact, even if they managed to come up with a slightly original divine ability, they were just giving someone else an idea.

Those people had access to inherited knowledge. For the same cost, they could take that idea and create something much better, with effects several times stronger, then crush their rivals with an overwhelming advantage and take over the market.

It doesn't matter if I have no ideas. As long as I have an inheritance and enough Qi Luck Points, your idea becomes mine—and I can do it better than you. How is anyone else supposed to survive?

So nowadays, ordinary people without an inheritance had essentially given up on creating their own divine abilities, even though every one of them had a free Divine Ability Stone.

If they failed, they lost money; if they succeeded, they still couldn't profit. They were simply handing their ideas to others.

So they would rather save their accumulated Qi Luck Points for their descendants than take another gamble.

Lu Mingyuan's second uncle, Lu Yi, was in the same situation. In fact, so were most ordinary people in the world—more than ninety percent of them.

Lu Mingyuan didn't really have a good solution for it.

As for secretly teaching his second uncle the knowledge from his own inheritance...

Lu Mingyuan wanted to, but clearly, he couldn't.

For one thing, he had signed a confidentiality contract when he received his inheritance at the academy. He wasn't allowed to reveal it.

For another, his second uncle wouldn't accept it. He wouldn't want to implicate Lu Mingyuan and his family.

The authorities and the academies strictly controlled these inheritances. Besides, everyone's divine abilities had to be registered. Without registration, you couldn't even spend the money you earned in peace.

Lu Mingyuan hadn't registered his Chicken and Rabbit in a Cage Divine Ability with the authorities, so he didn't dare spend the Qi Luck Points he'd earned openly.

He could only buy Divine Ability Stones or use them to cover the costs of developing divine abilities.

As for exchanging them for silver, he wouldn't dare.

If he hadn't signed the contract, Lu Mingyuan could have used the alias "Anonymous" to publish that inherited knowledge on the Heavenly Dao Virtual Network and break the major powers' monopoly.

Unfortunately, he had signed the contract. If he published it, he would die instantly, and after his death, his family could have the knowledge taken down.

So, throughout history, there had been many incidents of inherited knowledge leaking, but each time it had been fleeting.

Not everyone was willing to die for an ideal.

And even if someone was, what about their family? Would everyone be willing?

Lu Mingyuan had asked himself that before. He wasn't willing, either.

In a small courtyard on Guihua Lane, Jing Zhi sat idly on a tall stool, swinging her legs and occasionally peering toward the entrance.

Just then, an ox cart stopped outside the gate.

Seeing it, Jing Zhi quickly hopped off the stool, her face lighting up as she hurried out.

"Second Uncle, Mingyuan, you're back!"

Lu Mingyuan jumped down from the cart. Seeing Jing Zhi acting like a young wife waiting for her husband, he couldn't resist teasing her.

First he gave her a head rub, then pinched her slightly rounded cheeks. They felt so soft and smooth.

"Zhi, did you help Second Aunt make dinner today?"

"Of course I did! We've already got the food ready. We were just waiting for you to come back."

"Wow! Look at you!"

Lu Mingyuan put on a suitably astonished expression, though it looked a little fake and exaggerated.

Jing Zhi didn't mind. She raised her eyebrows. "Of course. And Second Aunt even praised me."

"Praised you?"

Seeing Jing Zhi's expression that clearly said go on, ask me, Lu Mingyuan played along.

"Mhm, she said I was clever and capable, deft and skillful, and that I'd definitely make a good wife someday."

After saying this, Jing Zhi raised her chin slightly, looking utterly proud.

Lu Mingyuan almost burst out laughing. This girl really was...really adorable.

He couldn't help stroking her glossy black hair again. "Actually, I think Second Aunt should praise me instead."

"Why should she praise you?"

Jing Zhi widened her eyes and asked curiously. How had the praise suddenly become about him? They'd been talking about her!

"Exactly. Wasn't I the one who found this wife? If it weren't for me, Second Aunt wouldn't have such a gentle, adorable niece-in-law. Don't you agree?"

At that, Jing Zhi let out a giggle, then curled her lips into a bright smile.

"How can you be like this? Aren't you embarrassed?"

As she spoke, she leaned against Lu Mingyuan, wriggled playfully, and lightly pounded his chest with her little fists.

A moment later, Jing Zhi looked up at Lu Mingyuan, her expression focused and a little nervous. "By the way, Mingyuan, have you and Second Uncle finished testing the divine ability? Did it go well? Do you still have to go this afternoon?"

"We're done. And it went very well."

"That's great!"

"Zhi, I'm planning to go to the academy this afternoon. I'll register the divine ability and see if I can join the Agricultural School."

"Okay, I'll wait for you at home."

After the meal, the family sat in the shade in front of the house to rest.

Suddenly, Jing Zhi asked, "Mingyuan, you're about to upload the divine ability. Have you thought of a name for it?"

"A name? Do you have any good ideas?"

"Me?"

Jing Zhi pointed at herself, looking surprised.

"Of course. You're my wife, so I should respect your opinion."

"Oh! Right."

Jing Zhi nodded with a smile, thinking, I get to be part of this, too?

Then she thought hard for quite a while before speaking. "I think we should give it a really impressive name. How about 'Peerless Agricultural School Grand Divine Ability: Complete Collection of Farm Tools'? What do you think?"

When Lu Mingyuan heard the words "Peerless Agricultural School Grand Divine Ability," he froze. Why did that sound so familiar?

Then he thought it over and understood. It sounded a lot like the name of his first divine ability.

Was this the fabled similarity between husband and wife, where they even thought alike?

"Isn't that a little too over-the-top? I think we should just use the latter part, 'Complete Collection of Farm Tools.' Or 'Complete Collection of Agricultural Tools' would work, too. What do you think?"

Lu Mingyuan didn't want it to follow the same naming pattern as his first divine ability. That might make people connect the two to him.

Two divine abilities becoming famous so quickly, with names that followed a similar pattern, would inevitably make people suspicious. If they kept an eye on him, he'd be in trouble.

Hearing this, Jing Zhi considered it briefly. It really was a little too showy, and didn't suit Mingyuan's low-key nature.

"Then let's go with the latter. Second Uncle, Second Aunt, what do you think?"

"Let's call it 'Complete Collection of Agricultural Tools.' Simple and straightforward."

"Your second uncle and I agree. The latter name sounds good."

Once they had settled on a name, Lu Mingyuan immediately uploaded the Complete Collection of Agricultural Tools to the Heavenly Dao Virtual Network.

Of course, the uploader was "Road Under Feet." He couldn't get that wrong.

The listed price was 100 Qi Luck Points.

The minimum price, as always.

The moment it finished uploading, the divine ability's sales count jumped to one.

Just as Lu Mingyuan was wondering why, he saw a curved plow appear beside his second uncle.

So his second uncle had learned it.

He'd been right. How could this Agricultural School divine ability have sold even faster than the Mind-Fixing Divine Ability last time?

After that, his second uncle summoned each of the tools in the divine ability in turn, thoroughly enjoying himself.

A hand-pulled plow, a sickle, a hoe...

Second Aunt watched the tools keep changing, her eyes fixed on them and her expression growing more and more exaggerated. Well, it was her first time seeing this divine ability.

"Honey, it looks like we can throw away most of the tools we have at home. Mingyuan's divine ability is so well made. It saves money and spares us the effort.

You've done well!"