Primordial Mist Immortal City, Sunrise Ward.
Inside the somewhat cramped main hall of Cave Residence No. 48, Category C, He Sheng and Heng Daoyuan sat facing each other across a table.
A pot of spirit tea sat on the table, its fragrance curling through the air. He Sheng was leafing through the list of exclusive-sale supplies Heng Daoyuan had submitted.
The list was a specially made green jade bamboo slip. Once divine sense entered it, the names, grades, stock quantities, and even prices of every kind of spirit material emerged one by one. There were countless entries—hundreds, if not thousands.
"Senior Xiang, over the past year, you consigned two mid-grade auxiliary artifacts, Clear Water Spirit Pearls, through our Four Directions Commerce Association. They sold for six hundred and forty low-grade spirit stones.
"In addition, fifteen high-grade artifacts, Cold Moon Arc Light Swords, sold for twenty-one thousand two hundred and forty low-grade spirit stones, for a total of twenty-one thousand eight hundred and eighty spirit stones."
As Heng Daoyuan recited the accounts, he discreetly observed He Sheng's expression.
When He Sheng had approached him over a year ago, Heng Daoyuan had merely decided to give it a try.
After all, cooperative artifact refiners were not bound by strict terms. Most cultivators who bore the title of "cooperative" with the Four Directions Commerce Association fished for three days and dried their nets for two; very few could maintain a steady supply.
But Senior Xiang was different.
Since their partnership began, not only had he restocked on schedule, but the quality was astonishingly consistent—every piece was fine-grade.
Such stable output was exceedingly rare among Rogue Cultivator artifact refiners.
Even rarer was the clear, limpid water essence inherent in water-refined artifacts. Cultivators of water and wood arts particularly favored it, yet water-refined artifacts were