The moon set and the sun rose, its light shining across the land.
Chen Yuan was out of bed before six. Ever since arriving in this world, he had completely quit staying up late, following instead the natural rhythm of rising with the sun and resting when it set.
He glanced at the settlement comment:
[Someone had been very competitive and held a grudge after losing. After their spar, you gave Tian Peng a way to save face and won him over with virtue, avoiding unnecessary trouble. This aligned with the principles of the Dao of Survival. Dao of Survival Points +8.]
Adding that to his previous nine points made seventeen. Chen Yuan fed them all into his brain.
He changed into the Li Family's clothes, buckled on his belt, washed up, and headed out.
As soon as he stepped outside, he saw a stooped old woman passing by, struggling to carry a sack on her back and trudging along unsteadily.
Seeing this, Chen Yuan hurried over and took the sack from her shoulders with a smile. "Granny Wang, let me carry that home for you."
Granny Wang lived in Hundred Herb Lane too, so they were neighbors. But after her only son married, he moved elsewhere and refused to take her in, giving her only a little money from time to time.
So Granny Wang lived alone in Hundred Herb Lane, scraping by. When Chen Yuan ran into her, he helped whenever he could.
"Oh, it's Little Chen! Thank you so much." Relieved of the heavy load, Granny Wang looked up, and the wrinkles on her face eased.
"It's no trouble." Chen Yuan just smiled.
When he was little, he had lived in the countryside and watched the old folks in the village toil away. Some would sweat buckets as they swung their hoes, rooted in the fields; others would stoop under heavy loads yet still carry their crops several kilometers to town to sell. He had always felt sorry for them.
After reality had beaten him down over and over, he figured he would laugh at himself for being a fool, sympathizing with other people's suffering at such a young age.
But whenever he saw scenes like this, the stirring in his heart never died.
After helping Granny Wang, Chen Yuan set off for Huo Academy with a light step.
He couldn't skip breakfast.
The Li Family's meals were better, but they cost money.
A little after six in the morning, plenty of disciples had already arrived at Huo Academy's Dining Hall.
As the saying went, "Train through the dog days of summer and the bitter cold of winter." With the crisp autumn weather, naturally, they made the most of the season to practice.
Tao Ping was among them, of course.
Chen Yuan carried his tray over and sat across from him. Smiling, he said, "Good morning, Senior Brother Tao."
Tao Ping gave a slight nod. "I didn't see you at dinner yesterday. If you missed a meal, you can register it and make it up later."
Then he looked up and noticed something unusual about Chen Yuan. "Huh, those clothes..."
Chen Yuan smiled faintly. "No, I came back later and ate. I went to the Li Family to sort out the details of my position. Luckily, I passed, so you don't need to keep an eye out for other openings for me."
A flicker of interest crossed Tao Ping's eyes. "The Li Family in the Inner City? Congratulations, junior brother. A talent like you will shine wherever you go."
Chen Yuan shook his head with a smile. "I have Senior Brother Huang to thank for recommending me. Otherwise, I wouldn't even have made it through the door."
Tao Ping understood. "You need real skill to forge iron. Senior Brother Huang's willingness to recommend you means you have something special."
After a brief chat, Chen Yuan took his leave.
It was his first day on the job, and getting there early could only be a good thing.
There was still a quarter hour until the Chen hour when Chen Yuan entered Huo Academy and made his way to the Martial Arts Arena. There were even more people than yesterday, but they were all new faces. The shifts must have just rotated, with the day and early shifts here.
The people from yesterday had probably been on the midday shift.
Fan Dajiang soon showed up too. He briefly introduced the newcomer, Chen Yuan, then began explaining the early shift's duties.
Most of his instructions were for Chen Yuan.
At the end, he called out, "Kong Liang, show Chen Yuan the ropes for a day and teach him the duties of a guard."
"Yes, sir." A man wearing a darker-colored guard uniform stepped forward.
He was probably the early shift's head guard.
And so Chen Yuan began his day on duty. Just as he'd expected, it wasn't especially busy.
His main job was patrolling and keeping the residence secure. Whenever the household needed someone for heavy lifting, they would assign the guards to help out too.
He did his duty conscientiously, working for two whole hours before slacking off to practice the Rock-Solid Stance Technique in the Martial Arts Arena.
Some guards got itchy for a spar and challenged him. Chen Yuan took on every one of them, meeting attacks from all sides with his steady Six Harmonies Mind Boxing and quickly establishing himself.
When his shift ended, Chen Yuan changed clothes and headed to Huo Academy to immerse himself in martial arts training, steadily building his vital energy and blood.
A steady job was great. The Dao of Survival abhorred complications.
With his routine of moving between three places, more than a month passed in a flash.
Nothing major happened during that time.
He spent all the Dao of Survival Points he earned on improving his comprehension, raising it from twelve to twenty-seven and putting a lot more brains in his head.
Even if his IQ wasn't 250, it couldn't be far off.
During this period, Chen Yuan trained relentlessly in stance work, storing up vital energy and blood and tempering his skin, making the most of his natural endowments.
For the first half of the month, he had three sources of income and could eat as much beef as he wanted. He never had to worry about running low on vital energy and blood, and his progress in Skin Realm was rapid. He would reach minor mastery in a few days.
Chen Yuan reckoned that, at this rate, he could try knocking on the Bone Realm's door in another two or three months.
The Golden Blade Sect and the Black Dragon Gang were still fighting, but the situation hadn't changed much. The Black Dragon Gang was in retreat, its territory steadily being carved up.
Gang takeovers were nothing unusual, and Chen Yuan wasn't too worried.
He was already a martial artist, and he worked as a guard for the Li Family. Even if the Golden Blade Sect took over Hundred Herb Lane, they wouldn't dare go too far with the Cheng Family.
Besides, the authorities were keeping an eye on things. They turned a blind eye so long as their interests were served, but if a gang dared make too much trouble, the authorities would show their true colors as an instrument of violence.
At Huo Academy, old faces left and new ones arrived, the cycle of change never-ending.
The Zhou Brothers had given up hope of reaching Skin Realm and exhausted their family's money, so they had no choice but to leave in dejection and join their cousin in the gangs.
A few days later, the two died without causing much of a stir. Everyone assumed the Golden Blade Sect was behind it, and the matter was quickly laid to rest.
Chen Yuan continued training steadily as usual, though a few coins of silver had found their way into his purse.
They had all received support from the Gu Family, yet their fates were very different.
According to Sun Chengjie, Cao Yan had tried to break through a few days ago but failed. She hadn't damaged her foundation, though, and would probably try again soon.
If Gao Mingchang hadn't been injured by Chen Yuan, he would most likely have already tried to break through too. In any case, he would give it a shot in the next few days. The Gu Family's minimum time limit was four months, after all.
Sun Chengjie and Xue Anping were both holding their breath, planning to wait until the very last moment before trying to break through, so they could maximize their chances of success.
But the most heartbreaking fate belonged to He Qing.
He had finally found a like-minded senior brother, one with formidable skills who had already reached great mastery in Skin Refining and was showing signs of turning his skin to Copper Skin.
They had presumably set out to gamble on finding that precious herb, hoping to use it to break through the Bone Realm.
The two went into the mountains, full of ambition, but He Qing died on the spot, leaving no corpse behind. His senior brother escaped by the skin of his teeth, thanks to his body tempered by great mastery in Skin Refining.
According to the senior brother, there really was a precious herb of considerable age, but it was guarded by two Strange Beasts, one out in the open and the other lurking in the shadows.
They had used medicine to knock out the Strange Beast in plain sight. But just as they approached to pick the herb, the Strange Beast in hiding suddenly sprang out and caught them off guard. They had fled in a panic.
Unfortunately, He Qing hadn't been so lucky.
Chen Yuan thought the senior brother's account was probably more or less true, but there were still details to question about how he'd escaped with only minor injuries.
It was still unclear whether he had attacked He Qing, using his life to buy himself time to escape.
But He Qing was dead, so there was no way to verify anything, and the matter was dropped.
When Chen Yuan first heard the news, he couldn't help but sigh.
He recalled that afternoon when they had first come to Huo Academy, the five of them sitting together and talking about their lives.
He Qing had said his father went hunting in the mountains, where a bear had torn off one of his arms. Later, he had advised Xue Anping not to treat someone stronger than himself as prey. Yet in the end, He Qing had died because of it.
The world was truly unpredictable.
Chen Yuan shook his head and kept practicing his boxing, thinking, What a fine autumn day.
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