Immortal Potential? Give Me Some!

Chen Zhuo wanted a loan—and a big one.

What was there to fear?

He had a cheat and still wouldn't dare take out a loan to start a business?

What a joke!

The loans he took out early on would only be temporary. Once his business succeeded, everything would work out!

And if it didn't succeed, well, there was nothing he could do about that.

If he couldn't make it even with a cheat, he might as well jump off a roof.

Ding-dong!

A crisp notification sounded. Chen Zhuo looked down and saw that Sijing had sent him a string of messages.

[Still staying up late to save Spirit Coins?]

[Keep running out of Spiritual Qi injections?]

[Our platform offers small loans based on your Spirit Bone credit! Repay in as few as three installments. Needle nourishment, tendon tempering, meridian expansion—we've got you covered. Never let money hold back your cultivation!]

"Junior Chen Zhuo, click the link below. I've already helped you apply for a loan limit of 300 Spirit Coins. The interest is very low, and you have thirty years to pay it back. Almost every new student takes one out..."

Then came a long string of voice messages from Sijing: "Junior, once you've taken out the loan, do you want to buy some medicine? I can help you decide! What's your major? Want to grab a meal together this weekend?"

"..."

After learning Chen Zhuo wanted a loan, Sijing had clearly grown much warmer toward him. She showed him every concern, even offering to meet for a meal and help him plan his future cultivation.

"Junior, you actually have pretty good talent! Your spiritual root is average—even a little poor—but reaching the second level of Qi Refinement in three months says plenty about your talent and hard work. Your comprehension is heaven-defying! As long as you keep at it, you have a bright future!"

"I think you could graduate early. You might even become a Foundation Establishment Cultivator!"

"But without medicinal injections, your chances are slim. A Qi Refinement cultivator earns only twenty or thirty Spirit Coins a month on average, while a Foundation Establishment Cultivator can earn hundreds, even a thousand! The gap is as vast as heaven and earth. Borrow a few Spirit Coins now, and once you reach Foundation Establishment, paying them back will be a breeze!"

"Some juniors really have no Immortal Dao Potential. They hem and haw over even borrowing Spirit Coins. They don't have what it takes to cultivate..."

"..."

Chen Zhuo let most of Sijing's words go in one ear and out the other.

Right now, he was busy nodding, blinking, and opening his mouth.

[You have applied for a small loan of 300 Spirit Coins.]

[Your credit is good. Application approved!]

That settled it. Immortal Dao Potential? Give him some!

Chen Zhuo glanced down at his Spirit Message Jade Slip.

[You have received a 300 Spirit Coin loan from Xiuxiu Tong. Current balance: 311.32 Spirit Coins.]

Seeing his Spirit Coins increase, Chen Zhuo was delighted. He could almost feel his Immortal Dao Potential growing!

Wealth, companions, techniques, and land—wealth came first!

Without Spirit Coins, how was anyone supposed to cultivate immortality?!

Seeing that Sijing was still trying to sell him things, Chen Zhuo politely typed a question: "Thank you. Are there any other Spirit Coin loans I can take out? I'd like to borrow more."

Si Jing: !!!

Whoa, I've found a promising seedling for the immortal path!

Si Jing, who had just returned to her dorm, sprang up from her bed!

Luckily, she wasn't tall, or she might have hit the ceiling.

"Good kid! You remind me of myself back then!"

Si Jing blinked her bright eyes, her slender fingers flying across the jade slip. "Of course. Xiuxiu Tong is currently the biggest Spirit Coin lending platform for newcomers. There are also a few other small-loan platforms, though you can probably only borrow a few dozen Spirit Coins from each. If you want, I can send them to you..."

After typing that, Sijing broke into a pleased smile.

Another commission. Yay!

Si Jing thought well of Chen Zhuo.

The young man wasn't afraid of loans at all. He reminded her of herself back then.

When she first enrolled, Sijing had borrowed more than two thousand Spirit Coins in a frenzy and equipped herself with all kinds of tools. She had made a splash in her first year and won a scholarship on the strength of her excellent grades.

Then she had used the scholarship to repay her loans before taking out new small loans.

She had repeated the cycle ever since. Now, only in her ninth year, she was a prodigy with over seventy thousand Spirit Coins in debt.

The results had been gratifying, too.

Sijing was now at the ninth level of Qi Refinement. There was a good chance she could attempt Foundation Establishment within the next eleven years, then take the exam to transfer into Taiqing University and become a distinguished university student.

Once she got into university, she could push repayment of those loans back again.

The reason was simple.

The Immortal Estate had rules.

While someone was studying at a university, lenders couldn't pursue repayment—even on overdue loans.

Only after graduation could lenders come after them!

And if she couldn't repay the loans, that was simple enough too.

Under the Immortal Estate's rule, the law was strict. No matter how badly those capitalists wanted to flay their debtors and tear out their tendons, they had to obey the Immortal Prefecture Edict issued by the Immortal Estate's Spirit Transformation cultivators. They couldn't carve a person into pieces.

Of course, the Immortal Estate wouldn't let cultivators remain in debt forever.

Those whose payments were seriously overdue would be sent to the front lines to fight in the Star Realm War.

The Star Realm War was especially terrifying. All of the Five Domains and Nine Heavens under the Immortal Estate's rule had been seized through Star Realm Wars, each war bringing another plunder of resources.

Without them, the Spiritual Qi of the Immortal Estate would have withered long ago. Heaven and earth would have been cut off, and it would have become a mundane world. Where would any cultivators come from then? Everyone might as well be mortals in an age without magic.

As for Chen Zhuo...

Si Jing's expression turned pitying.

The junior might keep increasing his Immortal Dao Potential, but he had fallen behind from the very start. No matter how much more Immortal Dao Potential he gained, it would be useless!

The reason was simple.

His single, inferior low-grade Spiritual Root had already sealed his fate.

As Sijing saw it, what Chen Zhuo needed most was to find tens of thousands of Spirit Coins' worth of immortal potential and replace his spiritual root first.

What room was there to grow with a single, inferior low-grade Spiritual Root?

Worse, Chen Zhuo came from a "mortal class." Under the rules, students in those classes couldn't attend in-person lessons and didn't even get dorm rooms on campus. They could only take online classes from home.

After twenty years, the lucky ones might graduate at the fourth level of Qi Refinement.

The unlucky ones would probably be stuck at the third.

Just right for working on a Taiqing Pharmaceutical assembly line.

Still...

Sijing checked Chen Zhuo's major.

Pill Appraisal and Rating.

"Mm."

Sijing sighed, pressed her palms together, and typed 1 to pray for Chen Zhuo.

The major was commonly known as Waste Pill Appraisal.

Its students were mainly responsible for writing appraisal reports on pills refined by seniors in their fifteenth year and above.

Of course, it was also a major that paid.

After all, eating those pills carried an extremely high risk of injury or disability.

That was why the seniors paid them to test each batch.

Maybe this junior, Chen Zhuo, really could pay back all the Immortal Dao Potential he had borrowed...

After letting her thoughts wander for a while, Sijing put on her sweet act again and said playfully to Chen Zhuo, "Junior, interested in campus medicine? These are all..."

Whether Chen Zhuo could repay his loans was none of her damn business.

First, she needed to pocket her commission.