Chicken Coop lv1

Ordinary Half-Spirit Fish were valued in Spirit Fragments, but Ji Yuan's five Half-Spirit Fish had cost him five Low-Grade Spirit Stones.

No other reason—he had bought nothing but "premium goods."

Once they evolved into Spirit Fish, each would be worth at least fifteen Spirit Stones.

The cheap part was evolution, and the expensive part was also evolution. Since this [Fish Pond] would not suffer from any weakling bias, naturally, he had to pick the best ones to raise.

The three Green-Yellow Chickens were even more expensive, costing him a full five Spirit Stones.

After all, Green-Yellow Chickens themselves carried a trace of spiritual energy. Their flesh was highly nourishing, and they could also lay Spirit Eggs.

Though the chance of laying a Spirit Egg was rather low.

He estimated that they laid one egg every three days, and perhaps only one out of every ten eggs would be a Spirit Egg.

But once one was laid, a single Spirit Egg was worth five Spirit Fragments. Two Spirit Eggs were worth one Low-Grade Spirit Stone.

If they laid more, the Green-Yellow Chickens would quickly pay for themselves... so the Rogue Cultivator selling the chickens had said.

He said that to everyone, but Ji Yuan had actually believed him.

If he had not been short on Spirit Stones, he would have wanted to buy a few more. After all, probability was something that only applied to other people.

For him... his probability was one hundred percent.

Because the Green-Yellow Chickens he raised could lay one Spirit Egg every day!

After putting all the fish into the Fish Pond, Ji Yuan used wooden planks to piece together a simple Chicken Coop in the backyard. The moment it was finished and he put the three Green-Yellow Chickens inside, a line of text appeared above the coop.

[Chicken Coop: lv0]

The requirement to upgrade the Chicken Coop was two Low-Grade Spirit Stones, and Ji Yuan happened to have exactly two left on him.

He also had the remaining fifty jin of rice at home.

Before Foundation Establishment and Grain-Repelling, even immortal cultivators at Peak Qi Refining still needed to eat the five grains, though most of them took Grain-Repelling Pills instead.

Ji Yuan looked at the only two Low-Grade Spirit Stones left in his hand. Those eighteen had not even lasted half a day before being spent again.

Spirit Stones really did not last.

Ji Yuan shook his head. With a thought, he chose to upgrade the [Chicken Coop].

He watched helplessly as the Spirit Stones in his hand turned to powder, while the number after the Chicken Coop changed from zero to one. The upgrade requirements and Spirit Effect for the Level Two Chicken Coop then appeared on his Panel.

[Chicken Coop lv2]

[Spirit Effect: Spiritual patterns grow on its claws; can scratch up a minute amount of Spirit Soil (one qian per day); can briefly control spirit birds]

[Upgrade Requirements: Low-Grade Spirit Stone ×50, Chicken Coop made from Centennial Parasol Wood (not met)]

Ji Yuan's eyes lit up as he looked at the words on the Panel.

This Level Two Chicken Coop could actually scratch up Spirit Soil!

Would that not complement the [Spirit Field] perfectly? If he had a Spirit Field paved entirely with pure Spirit Soil, coupled with the Panel's effects, Ji Yuan did not even dare imagine how good the results would be.

And that ability to briefly control spirit birds... was that not a method exclusive to the Beast Taming Sect...?

When that time came, he would have to raise a chicken at the level of a spirit beast. At critical moments, it could even guard the household.

But looking at the enormous number of Spirit Stones required to upgrade the Chicken Coop, Ji Yuan felt some pressure as well.

There was no helping it. He could only take it slowly.

After setting up both the [Chicken Coop] and the [Fish Pond], the sky had grown dim. He used the last bit of rice in the house to fill his stomach, then lay down to rest with peace of mind.

Once he lay down, he could not help thinking about the road ahead.

He was currently at the Second Layer of Qi Refining, born with a Metal-Wood-Water-Fire Four-Spirit Root. In this cultivation world, Four-Spirit Roots and Five-Spirit Roots were both called False Spiritual Roots.

That was nothing much, though, because every fisherman in Zengtou City had a False Spiritual Root.

Some "gifted children" with all five elements still had their noses to the grindstone in bitter cultivation. Ji Yuan's Four-Spirit Root was already considered decent.

As for true seeds of cultivation with two or three Spiritual Roots, they had long since been taken away by the Water Dragon Sect and groomed as the sect's backbone.

As for those heaven-defying freaks with a single Spiritual Root, Zengtou City had never produced one.

The cultivation art Ji Yuan currently practiced was also the "Azure Sea Tide Art," something as common as dirt throughout Zengtou City.

It was a water-element cultivation art. Its name sounded invincible beneath the heavens, but its actual effects were utterly ordinary.

Its only somewhat special effect was that cultivators who practiced it had more enduring spiritual energy than those practicing other arts... and that was the defining feature of all water-element cultivation arts.

But which cultivator in Zengtou City did not practice the "Azure Sea Tide Art"?

Once something special became commonplace, it was no longer special.

The techniques he knew were pitifully few. The only one he had mastered was the most basic Waterball Technique. Even the slightly more complex Water Arrow Technique worked only intermittently.

There was no helping it. Whenever the original owner had a little spare time, he had to think about how to obtain Spirit Stones and how to go underwater. He simply had not had enough time to hone his techniques.

Of course, the main reason was still that his cultivation was too low.

At the Second Layer of Qi Refining, one Water Arrow Technique would drain all the spiritual energy in his Dantian.

If he wanted to recover it afterward, that would take another half day.

Under the crushing pressure of the Immortal Residence Fee, Rogue Cultivators in the market town had no mind to spare for such things.

Things were different now. With the Level One [Chicken Coop] and [Fish Pond], he no longer had to risk going underwater and could simply focus on cultivation.

The next morning.

The moment Ji Yuan got up, he went to the backyard. There were still only those five Half-Spirit Fish in the Fish Pond. Then again, how could they advance every day?

The Panel had said it was merely a certain probability. Who knew what that certain probability was?

The Chicken Coop, on the other hand, was different. After Ji Yuan chased the three hens out, he saw three Spirit Eggs giving off a faint white glow.

He hurriedly took them out, scattered several handfuls of rice for the Green-Yellow Chickens, then rushed into the house.

With Spirit Eggs in hand, of course he had to strike while the iron was hot. He quickly cracked one open and poured the Spirit Liquid inside into his mouth. The moment it went down his throat and he felt that pure spiritual energy, he immediately activated the "Azure Sea Tide Art."

As the cultivation art circulated, it absorbed the spiritual energy supplied by the Spirit Egg and guided it through his meridians into his Dantian.

After a while, he finished absorbing one egg. Sensing the few additional strands of spiritual energy in his Dantian, Ji Yuan was pleasantly surprised.

The Spirit Egg's effect was greater than he had expected!

With three Spirit Eggs, he might be able to break through to the Third Layer of Qi Refining!

Ji Yuan did not dare delay. One egg after another, he absorbed all three Spirit Eggs. More than a dozen strands of spiritual energy had appeared in his Dantian, yet he still felt as though he lacked just that final thread.

He had originally planned to absorb the wandering spiritual energy between heaven and earth himself, but if he did that, who knew how long he would have to wait?

But then his gaze suddenly fell upon the three Spirit Egg shells... Before long, Ji Yuan had ground the shells into powder and swallowed them in a single gulp.

In the end, they turned into thin spiritual energy that dispersed through his body.

The gaseous spiritual energy in Ji Yuan's Dantian reached its limit. As though it had broken through some shackle, his aura finally strengthened by a small measure.

The Third Layer of Qi Refining was achieved!

Ji Yuan exhaled a breath of turbid air, feeling as though many hidden injuries within his body had been swept away along with it.

He then spent another half day stabilizing his cultivation. Only after firmly securing the Third Layer of Qi Refining did he stand up.

With this cultivation, he was still ordinary in Zengtou City, but at least he could keep pace with the main crowd.

Among the cultivators of Zengtou City, the Third Layer of Qi Refining was the most common. After all, the next breakthrough would be into the Middle Qi Refining Stage, and that required no small amount of spiritual energy... with the aptitude of a False Spiritual Root, one could only rely on Spirit Stones to break through.

But in ordinary days, they did not even have enough Spirit Stones to pay rent. Where would they find so many Spirit Stones to advance their cultivation?

Not to mention food, clothing, shelter, and travel—everywhere required Spirit Stones.

The original owner had not understood it very well, but Ji Yuan now saw that the Immortal Residence Fee was the Water Dragon Sect's method for controlling the market towns around Cloud-Rain Marsh.

Fortunately, these matters no longer had much to do with Ji Yuan. With the Panel, he could basically achieve small-scale self-sufficiency.

After his cultivation broke through, he returned to the backyard to hone the Water Arrow Technique.

The Waterball Technique was not enough for serious use; it could not even kill a Spirit Fish. What was truly reliable was still the Water Arrow Technique.

By evening, Ji Yuan, who had bitterly cultivated for an entire day, was just about to rest for a while when someone knocked on his courtyard gate.

He rose and went to open it. The one knocking was none other than Huang Laotou from next door.

Seeing Ji Yuan, he asked cheerfully,

"Boy Ji, do you want a wife?"