Condensed with Chen Shouguang's seven years of painstaking effort, this survival manual for outer disciples could be said to be written in extreme detail regarding how new disciples could make money, save money, and avoid being swindled out of their money.
Xu Yuan read intently for a while, and once he put the book back down, he already had a plan in his heart.
For outer disciples like them who wanted to make money, it essentially boiled down to two avenues: selling time or selling the body.
Selling time, as Chen Shouguang recommended here, meant first and foremost mining. It required no capital and no special skills—anyone with a bit of brute strength could go.
Aside from mining, the other two available options were tending to spiritual herbs or serving patrol duty in Biyou Market (the residential area for Xu Yuan's fellow outer disciples).
However, both of the latter options came with certain thresholds. Tending to spiritual herbs required specialized herbal knowledge and demanded that one had learned at least one spell related to the cultivation of spiritual plants.
As for patrol duty in Biyou Market, it had a cultivation requirement of at least the mid-stage Qi Refining, and one also had to possess connections.
Yet if one did not wish to waste time on mining or tending to spiritual plants, outer disciples had a second path, which was selling the flesh.
Selling carried two layers of meaning here. Regardless of whether they were male or female cultivators, anyone with superior looks and no other major ailments could find a job in those Desire Immortal Pavilions within Biyou Market that was not respectable yet could feel good while earning spirit stones...
However, the immortal courtesans here also differed from those in the mortal realm. Upon entering the Desire Immortal Pavilion, they had to sign an additional contract with the pavilion master, after which they would be bestowed with a dual-cultivation technique so that their own cultivation would not lag behind during the joy of yin and yang.
Recalling how he had almost been grabbed by the hand earlier upon arrival, Xu Yuan broke out in a cold sweat. The other party had likely been searching for a male prostitute.
The other form of selling the body meant it completely literally, and constituted the three treasures of bottom-tier cultivators in Biyou Market: selling blood, selling meat, and testing drugs with the flesh.
Selling blood brought two lower-grade spirit stones per catty; selling meat, three lower-grade spirit stones per catty; and testing drugs—payment for this was distributed according to the medicinal properties, with dangerous ones paying more, while non-dangerous or potentially beneficial ones paid little to nothing.
Naturally, of course, these were just the choices of ordinary outer disciples. If one truly possessed great ability, they could also go to the exterior of Merit Hall at the beginning of every month to loiter, where certain sect missions would be issued.
Completing these sect missions yielded not only high spirit stone rewards or material rewards, but also secured sect merit.
Yet the problem lay in the fact that Biyou Market, following all these years of development—especially the integration of various small lineages in recent years—was already overcrowded. With more monks than porridge, for a mere first-layer Qi Refining novice to dare scramble for missions was simply courting death!
Sigh, it seems the only path left for me is mining.
Letting out a sigh, Xu Yuan had not expected that after all this turning around, he would ultimately end up right back where he started.
He had originally thought that upon stepping into Qi Refining and entering an immortal sect, he could rest easy and cultivate with peace of mind. It seemed he was still far too naive.
Having made up his mind, and since the hour was already late, Xu Yuan planned to head to the mine tunnel tomorrow to make inquiries before once again striking a pose inside his room.
After breaking through to Qi Refining, he was already eligible to choose more advanced breathing techniques, such as the Moon-Gazing Breathing Technique from the Dharma Repository.
Yet Xu Yuan knew his own limitations inside and out. With his impure, malformed spiritual roots—relying solely on the aid of the [Innate Martial Bones] trait—he was able to cultivate the Little Blue Mountain Essence-to-Qi Art with such speed; if he casually switched to any other breathing technique, he would be completely lost.
Most importantly, even if he managed to master one, given his spiritual root's affinity for spiritual qi, the speed at which he absorbed spiritual qi might not necessarily match the speed of his own Essence-to-Qi cultivation.
That being the case, he might as well continue cultivating the Little Blue Mountain Essence-to-Qi Art and ponder future matters only after acquiring the powerful [Five Elements Spirit Nurturing] trait later on.
With his body instinctively executing one movement after another, Xu Yuan slowly immersed his mind, casting aside all stray thoughts to focus wholeheartedly on his cultivation.
In the blink of an eye, a day passed.
Early in the morning, feeling that his cultivation had advanced by a fraction more, Xu Yuan stretched his body and pushed open his door.
Bi Qiong's doorway was tightly shut, and there was no telling whether she was at home. Hesitating for a moment, Xu Yuan ultimately decided not to disturb her, instead making a few turns until he reached the bustling main street.
Having changed into his disciple robes, without a crowd of people stopping him to push sales as they had yesterday, Xu Yuan finally had the time to take a close look at this immortal marketplace.
Just as his gaze lingered on a talisman-selling stall before him, a sudden commotion broke out on the street, followed by a heavily armed patrol accompanied by two towering ghost soldiers roaring past right in front of him.
Noticing their aggressive and menacing posture, Xu Yuan wondered whether some turmoil had broken out here, and hurried to ask a bystander for details.
"Fellow daoist, what kind of situation is this with both the law enforcement team and ghost soldiers? Could it be that some demonic beasts are wreaking havoc?"
The person questioned sneered. "Hmph, something far more serious than that."
"Oh?" Xu Yuan's heart tightened. "Could it be that outside forces are invading?"
"Well, practically. Someone reported this morning that cultivators are illegally building houses on the fringe of the market, and worse still, they've lawlessly set up a private spirit-gathering array—they're simply courting death!"
Xu Yuan: "?"
Watching the distant retreating figures of the law enforcement team, Xu Yuan silently withdrew his gaze.
Abandoning the thought of continuing his stroll, he headed straight northeast. After walking roughly three hundred zhang out of the market, a massive mine tunnel entrance came into view ahead.
From quite a distance away, Xu Yuan could hear the sound of weeping and wailing.
"Master, master, I beg you, let me go in and dig for two more hours. I'll do anything! My child recently enrolled in a spell academy and desperately needs spirit stones. I'm begging you, just let me go back in!"
As he drew closer, he saw a thin-faced man wearing a disciple's long robe embracing a large man dressed in the Hidden Moon Sect's standard uniform, tears and snot threatening to smear all over the other's clothes.
"You damned stinking blood slave, after selling your blood and cutting your flesh, you still come running to my mine to dig! If you die inside, that's a minor matter, but if the Enforcement Hall investigates me afterward, that's a huge deal. I don't have that much time to waste on a poor, penniless ghost like you!"
Viciously shoving the man to the ground, he followed up with a fierce kick to the man's stomach. Seeing the other party looking on the verge of death, he finally stopped his assault.
"Hmph, you're nothing more than a bundle of impure spiritual roots yourself, what kind of future could a kid you spawned possibly have? An old beast wasting so many spirit stones on a little beast—are you trying to ascend to the heavens, huh?"
Spitting onto the ground, he then glanced to his left and right. Immediately, someone stepped forward, hoisted the emaciated man up, and tossed him out with a brutal heave.
Only then did Xu Yuan notice that the man's body bore numerous dents, while some of the intact areas on his hands were stuffed with things resembling straw.
With a chill in his heart, Xu Yuan watched as the man staggeringly rose to his feet and departed with a look of utter despair. At that exact moment, the person in charge over there seemed to finally spot Xu Yuan.
"You over there, are you here to mine?"
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