Fish Pond LV1

"Come back tomorrow. If you are still behind on this month's Immortal Residence Fee, you can get the hell out of our Zengtou City."

"Understood."

"..."

Remember the first-publication website domain

Ji Yuan watched that black-robed male stomp away, his steps heavy and uneven in the muddy bank, and had just reached to close the courtyard door when he unexpectedly saw someone else step out from the neighboring courtyard.

It was a bald old man smoking a dry tobacco pipe. He eyed Ji Yuan's bitter expression and said cheerfully,

"Little Brother Ji, why don't you go borrow some from Lousy Liu and pay off that Immortal Residence Fee first?"

"Otherwise, with your Second Layer of Qi Refining cultivation, leaving Zengtou City means you'll likely meet only a dead end."

Borrow from Lousy Liu?

Eighty-percent interest. Once he borrowed it, the interest would roll over and compound, ruining his entire life... Ji Yuan nodded. "I'll figure something out."

With that, he pulled the courtyard door shut.

Huang Laotou didn't try to persuade him any further. He had only spoken up entirely out of a desire for that little referral fee; if it worked out, great, and if it didn't, it was no loss.

Ji Yuan returned to his dilapidated shack and, looking at everything around him, couldn't help cursing inwardly: Damn it, I've transmigrated to cultivate immortality, and I still have to pay rent?!

"With conditions like this, it's three Low-Grade Spirit Stones a month—why don't you just go rob someone!"

In a fit of rage, Ji Yuan raged for a moment.

He knew the reality of the situation. Just as Huang Laotou had said, as a rogue cultivator at the Second Layer of Qi Refining, leaving Zengtou City to travel the wilderness meant becoming a lamb waiting for slaughter.

Either he would be stripped clean by bandit cultivators and then murdered to eliminate witnesses.

Or he would be murdered to eliminate witnesses first, and then stripped clean.

Even inside Zengtou City, rogue cultivators occasionally turned into bandits to plunder, let alone out in the wilderness.

In this world, houses were worthless, and plots of land were worthless.

Safety, however, was worth money.

Three days ago, Ji Yuan was still working as a beast of burden in Blue Star, eating hot pot and singing songs with friends after getting off work. Never had he expected that after a single sleep, he would arrive in this so-called Cangluo Continent.

He had even possessed a youth with the exact same name in Zengtou City, which was under the jurisdiction of the Water Dragon Sect.

The Water Dragon Sect bordered the Cloud-Rain Marsh, which spanned thousands of li, and had also constructed many markets along its banks to gather nearby low-level rogue cultivators to catch spirit fish and collect earth treasures for them.

These rogue cultivators were all called "fishermen".

Zengtou City was one of such markets, and the original Ji Yuan was one of those fishermen.

The original owner's parents had been too, except that two months ago when they went out with their boat, they died at the claws of a Mid-First Rank spirit fish.

Both parents dead, and now he was about to be driven out of Zengtou City for overdue rent... Wasn't this a pitch-perfect doomed opening!

Yet it wasn't absolute. Usually, this was the exact moment when cheats arrived.

Ji Yuan recalled the novels he had read on Qidian in his past life, and in a daze, a light screen truly appeared within his field of vision...

The light screen was covered all over with numerous characters.

[Fish Pond lv0 (Upgradeable)]

[LV1: Spirit Effect: Fry growth rate +20%, half-spirit fish have a certain chance to evolve into spirit fish]

[Upgrade Conditions: Low-Grade Spirit Stone ×1, plant water-clearing reeds, dredge the waterway (Achieved)]

[Chicken Coop lv0]

[lv1: Spirit Effect: Spirit eggs produced one per day, containing trace spiritual qi, can sustain Inanition]

[Upgrade Conditions: Low-Grade Spirit Stones ×2, ordinary rice ×50 catties (Unachieved)]

[Pigsty lv0]

[LV1: Spirit Effect: Spirit pigs gain a hundred catties of muscle in seven days, flesh contains Body Tempering medicinal properties, and can accelerate wound healing]

[Upgrade Conditions: Low-Grade Spirit Stones ×5, iron ingots ×50 catties, coarse salt 10 catties (Unachieved)]

[Cave Abode lv0]

[LV1: Spirit Effect: Wall self-healing, basic dust-avoidance barrier, nighttime spiritual qi concentration +20%]

[Upgrade Conditions: Low-Grade Spirit Stones ×5, glutinous rice paste ×3 barrels, repair damaged tiles (Unachieved)]

[Spirit Field lv0]

[LV1: Spirit Effect: Crop cycle -30%, yields containing faint wood spiritual qi]

[Upgrade Conditions: Low-Grade Spirit Stones ×5, plant ash ×50 catties (Unachieved)]

[...]

What kind of cheat was this?

A farming cheat?

Before Ji Yuan could ponder it carefully, a plethora of memories arose out of nowhere in his mind. This Golden Finger of his was called the "Building Upgrade Panel". In short, as long as corresponding conditions were met, the panel could upgrade the corresponding buildings and thereby grant corresponding abilities.

For instance, the only building currently capable of being upgraded was the fish pond in his household.

The conditions required 1 Low-Grade Spirit Stone, plus the planting of purifying reeds and the dredging of waterways.

The fishermen inside Zengtou City each had a small fish pond in their households to store the spiritual fish caught from Cloud-Rain Marsh, so the conditions of purifying reeds and dredging waterways had naturally been met long ago.

As for the 1 Low-Grade Spirit Stone... all the worldly possessions Ji Yuan had left on his entire body truly amounted to just 1 Low-Grade Spirit Stone.

Otherwise, he wouldn't even have been unable to afford the rent.

Whatever little was originally saved at home had all been exchanged for Cultivation Pills and Talismans by the original owner's parents during their final voyage.

Never had they expected it would be lost overnight in Cloud-Rain Marsh.

As for the abilities the fish pond could gain after upgrading from lv0 to lv1, they were a +20% fry growth rate and a certain chance for half-spirit fish to evolve into spiritual fish.

The former was easy to understand, while as for half-spirit fish and spiritual fish, Ji Yuan also learned about them from the original owner's memories.

When these fishermen went out on voyages to catch fish, what they mainly caught were these half-spirit fish and spiritual fish. The so-called spiritual fish could be simply understood as fish demons and Demon Beasts.

Regardless of whether it was their flesh, blood, scales and armor, or certain special parts on their bodies, all were resources of the Immortal Realm.

Spiritual fish were First-Order Demon Beasts that had entered the ranks.

In the water, it took at least a cultivator at the Fourth Layer of Qi Refining or above to be able to deal with an Early First Tier spiritual fish.

Take the original owner's old man, for instance, who was already at the Fourth Layer of Qi Refining, yet never had he expected to run into a Mid-First Rank spiritual fish, ending up losing his life.

Half-spirit fish were fish species situated between ordinary fish and Demon Beasts, and they were also the primary catch targets for someone like Ji Yuan who was at Early Qi Refining.

Right now inside Ji Yuan's household fish pond, there happened to still be one half-spirit fish.

It was a Seven-Star Perch caught back by the original owner who had risked his life going out on a voyage three days ago... and it was precisely because of that voyage that the original owner died in the boundless Cloud-Rain Marsh, coincidentally benefiting the later Ji Yuan.

Ji Yuan took the sole remaining Low-Grade Spirit Stone out from inside his embrace... if he had saved a bit more, say another 5 Low-Grade Spirit Stones, he would still hesitate a little.

Yet with just this single one, there was nothing left to hesitate about.

Upgrade!

Following a thought in Ji Yuan's mind, the Low-Grade Spirit Stone in his hand turned into fine dust, and at the same time, the effects and upgrade conditions of the Level Two [Fish Pond] floated up upon his Panel.

[Fish Pond lv2]
[Spirit Effect: Can produce 1 drop of Waterbloom Dew daily, probability of half-spirit fish advancing increases, growth rate +30%]
[Upgrade Conditions: Low-Grade Spirit Stone ×30, Cold Iron Sand ×5 catties, engrave Congealing Ice Talisman]

A Level Two fish pond could actually produce Waterbloom Dew?

This was a fine treasure indeed, capable of healing injuries, recovering spiritual qi, and being used for cultivation. Just this 1 drop alone had to sell for 8 Low-Grade Spirit Stones on the outside.

Before Ji Yuan could even feel pleasantly surprised, the sound of churning splashes came from inside the fish pond in his backyard.

"Not good!"

Ji Yuan strode into the backyard, only to see that the small fish pond in the northwest still had splashes flying upward.

Floating above the fish pond was a line of small characters that only he could see.

[Fish Pond: lv1]

Inside the fish pond, however, there was an extra dark shadow about the length of an arm. He walked forward feeling somewhat unable to believe it.

With just a single glance, he froze.

Originally inside this fish pond, only a single half-spirit fish, a Seven-Star Perch, worth 1 spirit stone had been raised.

Yet now, that half-spirit fish was gone.

Replaced and appearing inside this fish pond instead was a Coldblood Perch—an Early First Tier spiritual fish worth at least 15 Low-Grade Spirit Stones.

Was this the effect of a level-1 [Fish Pond]?!