Making Money is Most Important, Crazy Shopping Spree

After leaving the pill pavilion, Su Yun strolled leisurely along the streets of the Azure Cloud Market.

The streets were bustling with noise, the cries of vendors ringing out incessantly.

He was in no rush to return to the Azure Cloud Sect.

With his pockets full of spirit stones, he decided to wander around at his leisure.

His gaze swept across the stalls on both sides, his mind calculating his next move as he walked.

The path of alchemy would have to be put on hold for now.

The three hundred bottles of top-grade pills he had just sold were simply too large a quantity.

It would take the entire Azure Cloud Market a long time to digest them.

Scarcity creates value.

If he were to continue dumping large quantities of top-grade pills in a short period, supply would exceed demand.

The price of the pills would inevitably be driven down.

That would be counterproductive and purely foolish.

One should not put all their eggs in one basket.

Alchemy was shelved for the time being.

So, what should he do to make money next?

Su Yun's eyes flickered slightly as he already had the answer in mind.

Talismans.

Talismans were one of the hard currencies of the cultivation world.

Like pills, they were never hard to sell.

Low-level cultivators needed them for fighting, self-defense, traveling, and exploring secret realms.

They were indispensable.

Fire-starting, water-controlling, wind-riding, body-shielding, explosive—the variety was vast, and the uses were incredibly broad.

Whether for killing, escaping, dueling, or exploring, they were essential.

The consumption rate was high, and the repeat purchase rate was terrifying.

Moreover, the barrier to entry for talisman crafting was extremely low.

It did not require profound cultivation.

As long as one had sufficient spiritual energy, steady control, and understood how to outline the runes, one could get started.

Ordinary people could do it, rogue cultivators could do it, and low-level cultivators could do it just the same.

For others, the difficulty of crafting talismans lay in the ease of making mistakes while carving runes, uneven spiritual power control, or broken lines.

But he was different.

With the Thousandfold Amplification, his spiritual power, insights, and control were all magnified.

While others might spend half a day drawing a single failed talisman, he could likely produce one every minute, all of them high-quality.

In terms of power, appearance, and purity, they would absolutely crush the ordinary talismans circulating on the market.

It was another steady, highly profitable path.

Su Yun smiled as he walked.

Before he knew it, he seemed to have become addicted to making money.

Even though his cultivation was skyrocketing and his strength was growing ever stronger, he couldn't help but want to save spirit stones, hoard resources, and build up his capital.

It was likely that the money-making gene ingrained in the bones of the Chinese people had awakened.

There was no helping it.

It was a habit formed since childhood.

Without savings in hand, he would always feel anxious.

Especially in the incomparably cruel world of cultivation.

The world says that immortality is about longevity, enlightenment, and transcendence.

Nonsense.

In his eyes, the primary priority of cultivation was always money.

As the old saying went: wealth, companions, methods, and land. Wealth ranked first.

Without resources, everything else was just empty talk.

Low-level cultivators needed money to buy medicine, talismans, and magical artifacts.

Mid-level cultivators needed money to explore secret realms, purchase spiritual materials, and improve their cultivation techniques.

Even those high-and-mighty Nascent Soul and Spirit Transformation bigwigs still required massive amounts of spirit stones to maintain the operation of their sects, set up protective mountain arrays, and hoard rare treasures.

No one could bypass the word "money."

In his view, the cultivation world was essentially just a magnified version of the mortal world.

Large sects were like massive corporations.

The sect leader was the chairman.

The elders were the senior management.

Inner disciples were full-time employees.

Outer disciples were interns.

And menial disciples were the bottom-tier laborers.

Everyone performed their own duties.

Disciples worked for the sect, fought battles, completed missions, and gathered resources.

The sect provided stipends, pills, and techniques as compensation.

The bottom tier continuously produced resources to support the upper tier.

The higher the cultivation of the upper-tier powerhouses, the stronger their ability to protect the sect.

The more stable the sect, the more comfortably the bottom tier lived.

It sounded mutually beneficial.

But peel back the skin, and the essence was exploitation.

Bottom-tier disciples worked and risked their lives day after day.

The vast majority of resources were concentrated in the hands of the upper-tier bigwigs.

Low-level cultivators spent their entire lives struggling and crawling.

A tiny minority defied the heavens and changed their fate.

The vast majority became stepping stones.

It was just that this exploitation was draped in the cloaks of cultivation, preaching, and sect loyalty.

It appeared high-sounding, pleasant, and decent.

If there were no profit, who would bother to establish a sect?

Cultivating alone was free, easy, and unburdened.

Why bother managing thousands of disciples?

Why bother worrying about complex, trivial matters?

It was nothing more than this: more people meant more resources and greater power.

The strength of one person was limited.

The strength of a sect was infinite.

The upper tier used the resources accumulated by the bottom tier to grow stronger rapidly.

Then, they used their formidable cultivation to suppress external enemies and guard the sect in return.

A closed loop.

A perfect closed loop.

Having seen through all of this, Su Yun felt no ripples in his heart; instead, he felt even more clear-headed.

Therefore, he had to have money, and he had to continuously hoard resources.

He had to pave his own path.

Azure Cloud Market.

The flow of people was complex, and the streets and alleys crisscrossed.

Su Yun deliberately turned into a remote and quiet narrow alley.

High walls rose on both sides of the alley, overgrown with weeds, and very few cultivators passed through.

The surroundings were so quiet that only the rustling of the wind through the weeds could be heard.

He confirmed that no one was spying.

Su Yun's fingertips moved slightly, and his spiritual power circulated quietly.

He activated the Breath Concealment Art in tandem with the Disguise Technique.

His aged, wrinkled skin regained its firmness at a speed visible to the naked eye.

His hunched, curved back slowly straightened.

His head of gray hair transformed into short, jet-black hair.

A moment later.

A brand-new person walked out of the alley.

He looked to be in his thirties, with an ordinary face and plain features.

Dressed in dark cloth garments, he stood tall with a steady, restrained aura.

His cultivation remained at the sixth level of Qi Refining.

Su Yun raised his hand and touched his cheek.

He had to be cautious.

Although Wang Fugui's attitude was respectful and he was a smooth operator, the human heart was unpredictable.

A large transaction of over fifty thousand low-grade spirit stones was enough to incite greed in everyone at the marketplace.

Who could guarantee that Wang Fugui wouldn't secretly send someone to tail him?

One should not have the intention to harm others, but one must have the intention to guard against them.

Walking the path of the cultivation world, caution would never be a mistake.

Carefulness is the ship that sails for ten thousand years.

An extra layer of disguise was an extra guarantee for his life.

After changing his appearance, Su Yun's expression remained indifferent as he walked out of the narrow alley once more.

He headed straight for the various material shops in the marketplace.

He intended to purchase talisman-making materials in bulk.

Yellow talisman paper, cinnabar spirit ink, beast blood sand, talisman brushes, spirit sandalwood...

There was a wide variety of low-grade talisman materials.

With his current sixth-level Qi Refining cultivation, he was capable of crafting the Blazing Fire Talisman, Wind Travel Talisman, Shield Talisman, Explosion Talisman, and Sharp Metal Talisman.

These five types of low-grade talismans were of moderate difficulty, had the best sales, and were in the highest demand among rogue cultivators.

Since he was going to do it, he would do it to the extreme.

Su Yun walked into the first talisman material shop.

He didn't pick, didn't choose, and didn't ask for prices.

He bought out the entire stock of materials in the shop.

The owner's smile was so wide it wouldn't close.

Next came the second shop.

He swept up all the available stock there as well.

The third shop, the fourth shop...

Su Yun was generous and decisive in his spending.

With a wave of his hand, he spent thousands of low-grade spirit stones, never dragging his feet when it came to payment.

The crisp clinking of spirit stones sounded as they flowed out like water.

Every shop owner who saw Su Yun looked at him as if they had seen a living god of wealth.

They were respectful, nodding and bowing.

A big client who cleared out the entire shop inventory in one go was someone they might not even see once a month.

In less than an hour.

Su Yun had visited most of the material shops in the marketplace.

He had spent nearly twenty thousand low-grade spirit stones.

His storage bag was piled high with thick stacks of yellow talisman paper, jars of bright red spirit ink, and high-quality wolf-hair talisman brushes.

The quantity of materials was immense.

It was enough for him to draw thousands of low-grade talismans without sleep or rest.

His assets had shrunk, but Su Yun didn't care in the slightest.

Only by being willing to spend capital could one earn even more.

This investment would be earned back several times over before long.