Golden Pearl Spirit Rice

Shen Long took off the somewhat worn blue storage bag from his waist, a look of reminiscence appearing on his face. This was a gift from his father, Shen Guang, when he first advanced to the first level of Qi Refining.

"I must see the person if they live, and their body if they die. Dad, Mom, I will definitely find you."

Shen Long muttered to himself, his gaze firm.

He turned the mouth of the storage bag downward and gave it a gentle shake. After a flash of blue mist, several items appeared on the ground: a cyan cloth bag, an earthen pot, a blue flying knife, a black shield, a Golden Armor Talisman, thirty-two spirit stones, and a bottle of Qi Cultivation Pills.

This was his entire fortune. He possessed water, wood, and fire spiritual roots and cultivated the Mystic Water Art, which could only be practiced up to the ninth level of Qi Refining. This was the primary cultivation technique of his mother, Liu Yun, and had been passed down for seven generations.

He had cultivated the Fireball Technique and the Mystic Water Shield to the Great Perfection stage. The former was an offensive spell, while the latter was defensive. However, he had never used the Mystic Water Shield in front of others; one must always be wary of others.

Hunting monsters with a team was dangerous, but the greatest danger was not the monsters themselves, but other cultivators. It was not uncommon for monster hunters to turn against each other over wealth and engage in life-or-death battles.

Shen Guang and Liu Yun had followed friends to search for treasure. It was highly likely they had discovered something valuable, and their friends had been overcome by greed, killing them to seize the loot.

This was the worst-case scenario Shen Long could imagine. Having worked at the Craftsman Hall for five years, he had come into contact with many rogue cultivators. Many of them had gone out and never returned; no one knew what they had encountered.

Shen Long opened the cyan cloth bag, which contained golden rice grains. The grains were plump and emitted a fragrant aroma.

This was Golden Pearl Spirit Rice, which ripened once a year and typically yielded over three hundred catties per mu. Golden Pearl Spirit Rice contained spiritual energy and was suitable for Qi Refining cultivators to consume, offering some benefits to cultivation, though its taste was average.

The greatest advantage of Golden Pearl Spirit Rice was its affordability: one spirit stone for ten catties.

Higher-quality spirit rice had longer growth cycles, contained more spiritual energy, and tasted better, but the price was not cheap. A rogue cultivator like Shen Long could not bear to purchase it.

For him, as long as it could fill his stomach and provide some help to his cultivation, it was enough. He had heard that the Chen, Han, and Li clans grew a significant amount of Silver Marrow Spirit Rice.

Silver Marrow Spirit Rice ripened every three years, yielded two hundred catties per mu, contained abundant spiritual energy, had a chewy texture, and the grains were slender.

The younger generation of the Chen, Han, and Li clans grew up eating Silver Marrow Spirit Rice, which was distributed monthly and provided for free until they reached the age of eighteen.

Shen Long was seventeen and had reached the fifth level of Qi Refining. Despite having the same three spiritual roots and being the same age, most of the younger generation of the Chen, Han, and Li clans were at the sixth level of Qi Refining, with a few reaching the seventh.

Beyond their faster cultivation speed, the younger generation of the Chen, Han, and Li clans lived in areas with abundant spiritual energy. Some had auxiliary magical artifacts or spirit-gathering arrays to assist their cultivation, and those with deep pockets even raised spirit beasts.

Spirit beasts required more resources than cultivators, which was a disadvantage, but they generally lived longer than cultivators of the same rank, which was an advantage.

Cultivators born into cultivation families or sects were likely to inherit spirit beasts, birds, or insects from birth, giving them a much higher starting line than rogue cultivators.

There were many rogue cultivators in Thousand Bamboo Valley who hunted monsters, but those who owned spirit beasts could be counted on one hand, and most were combat-oriented spirit beasts.

As for the ornamental types of spirit beasts, only wealthy cultivators would keep them.

Shen Long had heard that the Li clan raised many Ice-Whiskered Spirit Fish. The meat of this spirit fish was delicious and could be cooked into spirit meals for sale. It was expensive and also beneficial for cultivation, but ordinary Qi Refining cultivators could not afford it at all.

Shen Long grabbed a handful of Golden Pearl Spirit Rice, placed it into the earthen pot, and cast the Water Ball Technique. Tiny blue water droplets emerged, forming a bowl-sized blue water sphere that fell into the pot to wash the rice.

A red light lit up in his palm, and a crimson flame emerged, enveloping the earthen pot.

Before long, the clear water in the pot began to boil, emitting a rich fragrance of rice. However, Shen Long did not have much of an appetite; in fact, he felt a bit repulsed.

Ever since his parents went missing, he had relied on Golden Pearl Spirit Rice to fill his stomach and had long since grown tired of it. This was the daily routine for most rogue cultivators. Cultivators from the Chen, Li, and Han clans at least had one or two side dishes, and wealthier cultivators ate spirit meals for all three meals a day.

After a while, the flames in Shen Long's palm dissipated. He placed the earthen pot on the stone bed, took out a wooden spoon, scooped some up, and began to eat.

Not long after, the pot of spirit rice was finished.

His abdomen felt slightly warm, and a faint trace of spiritual energy rose within him, spreading through his limbs and bones.

He quickly sat cross-legged and began to circulate his energy to refine this spiritual energy.

In less than half a quarter of an hour, he finished his session.

With his fifth-level Qi Refining cultivation, the spiritual energy provided by a pot of Golden Pearl Spirit Rice was very little; its primary purpose was to satisfy hunger. If he wanted spirit rice to provide more spiritual energy, he would need to consume more expensive varieties, which was currently a pipe dream.

He only had thirty-two spirit stones on him and wished he could use every single one as if it were two. The spirit stones in his storage bag did not support such fantasies.

He cleaned the earthen pot, put everything back into his storage bag, retrieved the five spirit stones from the array, pushed the door open, and walked out.

Shen Long headed toward the mountaintop. After a while, he reached the mountainside and stood before the entrance of a vast estate. The plaque above read "Martial Practice Garden" in large characters.

This was a place for cultivators to practice spells. Cultivators renting on Thousand Bamboo Peak could practice here for free; it was one of the perks of being a tenant.

Beyond that, one could also exchange cultivation insights with other cultivators.

For those who were not tenants, cultivators had to pay to practice spells in the Martial Practice Garden.

A pale blue water curtain blocked the entrance. Shen Long took out a cyan square token with the characters "Thousand Bamboo" engraved on the front.

He injected spiritual power into the token, and a cyan light shot out, merging into the blue water curtain. The curtain rippled and then dissipated.

Shen Long strode inside, where he could hear the sounds of loud explosions and conversation.

He headed toward a side courtyard. Before long, he appeared in a bluestone corridor with several stone rooms on both sides. The doors were tightly shut, and cultivators were inside practicing their techniques.

Shen Long was not in a hurry. He stood in front of a stone room with the character "Earth" written on the door. Different stone rooms had different terrains, suitable for practicing different spells.

After the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, the door to a stone room opened, and a spirited old man in a green robe and a handsome young boy in a blue shirt walked out.

"Fellow Daoist Qin, what a coincidence!"

Shen Long smiled and greeted the old man when he saw him.

The old man in the green robe was named Qin Qing. He belonged to the same monster-hunting team as Shen Long, and the young boy in the blue shirt was his grandson, Qin Tianhe.

Qin Qing's aptitude was poor; at over seventy years old, he was still at the sixth level of Qi Refining. His son and daughter-in-law had died while out hunting monsters, leaving behind his grandson, Qin Tianhe.

The grandfather and grandson relied on each other. Qin Qing went out to hunt monsters to earn cultivation resources for Qin Tianhe. Shen Long's life was bitter, but the lives of Qin Qing and his grandson were even harder.

Hunting monsters required purchasing talismans or repairing magical artifacts, all of which cost spirit stones.

"Fellow Daoist Shen, what a coincidence! Has Fellow Daoist Xu not come out of seclusion yet?"

Qin Qing asked.

The Fellow Daoist Xu he mentioned was Xu Lei, who was at the seventh level of Qi Refining and served as the leader of their monster-hunting team.