A Visit

After nursing his wounds for three days, Chen Jue's strength had surged by leaps and bounds. His true qi broke through two hundred strands, and he smoothly entered the third level of the True Qi Realm.

However, compared to Chen Jue's rapid improvement in saber arts, the fixed daily accumulation of twenty-five strands of Five Elements true qi was truly not enough to look at.

Especially after Chen Jue's experiment using Wind-Splitting Saber Art as a blueprint achieved tremendous success.

His two saber arts seemed to have strapped themselves to a rocket, mutually promoting each other as they soared rapidly.

Wind-Splitting Saber Art took no more than six days in total to go from "Beginner" to "Perfection."

The two successive insights of "Mastery" and "Perfection" indirectly drove the difficult-to-cultivate Six Directions Saber Art swiftly past the "Mastery Realm," allowing him to comprehend three obscure and difficult Six Directions true intents.

Chen Jue took the sealed "spirit grain sprouts" from the zero-degree freshness-preserving refrigerator.

After three days of spirit gathering and germination, every grain of spirit grain in the ceramic jar had sprouted crystalline "crystal roots," along with pale golden spirit sprouts two inches long.

By now, all the spirit grain had absorbed its fill of water-element spiritual qi, at least doubling the overall amount of spiritual power it contained.

But the spiritual power gained in such a short time was all insubstantial. If a martial artist consumed it directly, they would not gain any more spiritual power than from simply eating "spirit grain rice."

Following the pill formula, Chen Jue spread the sprouts evenly across a Dragon-Pattern Bamboo Steamer he had prepared beforehand, then added a small amount of the first-tier spirit plant, Woodbell Flower.

Then he boiled water in a large pot, using the rolling steam to spur the Dragon-Pattern Bamboo Steamer into drawing in external wood-element spiritual qi, allowing the Woodbell Flowers within, mixed with that qi, to meld into the spirit grain sprouts.

The steaming process would take roughly six to seven hours.

Chen Jue cultivated his true qi without hurry, and in his spare time, he flipped through his Diligence Rewards Log.

[True Qi Realm Level Three (1.5%)]

[Qi and Blood Value (170%)]

[Six Directions Saber Art · Mastery (3600/10000)]

[Wind-Splitting Saber Art · Perfection (7960/10000)]

[Wandering Dragon Body Technique · Minor Mastery (1460/10000)]

[Basic Alchemy · Beginner (240/10000)]

His progress could only be called astonishingly swift.

One had to know that he was genuinely cultivating all five qi at once. His 203 strands of true qi already equaled the total true qi of some single-element martial artists at the sixth level of the True Qi Realm.

Even if he discounted it for dual-element martial artists, he was still equivalent to the fourth level of the True Qi Realm—properly stepping into the middle stage of the True Qi Realm.

Just as he was smugly admiring himself, someone knocked on the living room door.

Chen Jue leaned close to the peephole and saw that Miss Pei, in a burst of kindness, had come to feed him again with freshly prepared medicinal cuisine.

Pei Qingying wore a mint-green, vertically striped fitted dress with a Peter Pan collar. Her long black hair was coiled into two cat-ear buns, while the slender gold bracelet still adorned her wrist.

She had deliberately put on light makeup today. Her almond eyes were soft as rippling water, and her fresh, sweet, adorable air made one want to reach out and gently pinch her little cheeks and the cat ears atop her head.

"Big Brother Chen! Why are you injured again?!"

Seeing the bandages wrapped around Chen Jue, Pei Qingying stood at the doorway with a goose-yellow thermos in hand, looking somewhat annoyed.

"..."

Chen Jue awkwardly rubbed his nose and explained, "I ran into some unexpected circumstances and handled them a little."

"Look, I can move around just fine. It's not a serious injury."

Pei Qingying shot Chen Jue a glare, skillfully shut the door, and changed into her bunny slippers in the entryway.

"Eh?!"

The girl caught the fragrance of steamed spirit sprouts. She stuffed the goose-yellow thermos into Chen Jue's hands and skipped into the kitchen with brisk, cheerful little steps.

The Dragon-Pattern Bamboo Steamer, thick enough for one person to wrap both arms around, was still steaming the spirit grain sprouts.

Driven by the unceasing steam, the surrounding wood-element spiritual qi flowed along the spirit patterns on the steamer and continuously entered it.

"Big Brother Chen, are you preparing to make Spirit Sprout Pills?"

Pei Qingying blinked her shimmering, water-bright eyes and turned back toward Chen Jue.

"I think I have a decent talent for alchemy, so I'm giving it a try... What if it works?"

Chen Jue began building up his image as an alchemy genius again. When the proficiency of Basic Alchemy shot up in the future, he could use that as an explanation to dispel certain people's wild suspicions.

"Then you have to tell me if you succeed!"

"I have lots of spirit grain in my little storage room. Usually, I just use it to make spirit rice or feed spirit birds, wasting so much of it for nothing..."

Pei Qingying grabbed Chen Jue's sleeve and swayed it from side to side in a coquettish manner, as if she would not let go unless he agreed.

Chen Jue, who had only ever had one online relationship, had no way to withstand such entanglement from a girl. In his muddle, he made her a promise.

"Let go, let go. Once I successfully refine Spirit Sprout Pills, I'll definitely help you clear out all your stock, all right?"

Chen Jue had no idea how enormous a pit he had dug for himself. He thought the little storage room the girl spoke of held, at most, several hundred kilos.

"Big Brother Chen, you said it! Let's seal it and make a contract!"

Pei Qingying extended her snow-white hand, wanting to hook pinkies with Chen Jue and press their thumbs together as a seal.

"Are you still three years old?"

Chen Jue rolled his eyes at Pei Qingying, but he did not spoil her mood. He reached out and hooked pinkies and pressed thumbs with her, completing the "ceremony" of signing their contract.

"Has anything been happening at school lately?"

Chen Jue was referring to the Room Fire Cult infiltrating the martial high school and attempting to lay hands on his younger cousin.

"Not for now..."

"Tang Bi, Feng Li, and the other one have been dead for less than half a month. The Room Fire Cult club at the martial high school is still voting for new stewards. Looks like they'll need to make a fuss internally for a while longer before they remember Tangtang and me..."

Pei Qingying looked relaxed. It seemed that nothing troublesome had happened at school recently.

"Even so, the two of you should still be more careful whenever you're moving around the martial high school..."

While Chen Jue was still cautioning her, little Miss Pei had already opened the thermos.

A rich, fragrant scent filled the living room. Chen Jue sniffed, catching a faint sunflower fragrance amid the intense aroma.

"Great Sun Green Sunflower, stewed Emerald-Scaled Bluefish!"

"Wood and fire replenishment! Helping Big Brother Chen reach the second level of Qi Refinement as soon as possible!"

With her hands clasped together, Pei Qingying introduced the dish in an extremely exaggerated fashion.

Chen Jue could not help rolling his eyes at the girl again. "I'm already at the third level of the True Qi Realm! Are you cursing my cultivation to fall backward?"

"And read fewer cultivation novels. A martial artist's initial realm is called the True Qi Realm, not the Qi Refinement Realm."

"If you get used to calling it that and unconsciously write Qi Refinement Realm instead of True Qi Realm on your martial arts exam paper, you probably won't even get into a martial academy. You'll have no choice but to go home and raise pigs."

Pei Qingying bristled at his retort and planted her hands on her hips. "You're the one who should go home and raise pigs!"

Still, the girl's anger came quickly and went quickly.

Especially when she thought of Chen Jue already being at the third level of the True Qi Realm, little stars immediately twinkled in her almond eyes.

"Are you cultivating wood-fire true qi?"

"Can you tell me what cultivation art you practice? I'll find you a Shared Reference when the time comes?"

Chen Jue glanced sideways at the girl, but he had no intention of concealing it.

After all, he was now receiving salary subsidies from the Zong family. Whether it was the Patrol Inspectorate or the Zong family, they likely had his file sitting on their desks.

He had not even been able to hide it from the people he most needed to conceal it from.

The girl had fed him so often. Hiding it from her would make him seem stingy.

"I can tell you what cultivation art I practice, but don't tell anyone else about my cultivation speed," Chen Jue reminded her.

"I know! I know! The tree that stands tall in the forest will be destroyed by the wind!~~" Pei Qingying smiled until her eyes curved into crescents.

After feeding him for so long, she had finally become one of "his own" in Big Brother Chen's eyes.

"I cultivate Minor Five-Forms Severing. If you have any connections, find me some Shared References."

"No matter how much I raise the reward online or on the black market, I can't buy any..."

"What?!!!~~" Before Chen Jue could finish, the girl sprang up from her chair.

"Big Brother Chen! How can you cultivate Minor Five-Forms Severing?!" Pei Qingying's eyes were full of urgency, and her gaze brimmed with fear.

"..."

Seeing little Miss Pei suddenly react so strongly, Chen Jue's heart gave a thump.

Pei Qingying came from the inner city and surely knew far more than an outer-city person like him.

If even she was this anxious, one could imagine just how much danger was hidden within.