"My luck wasn't bad today. I finally bought the scarce Three Radiance Stone and mystic origin true water, but my savings are nearly gone. If I keep guarding this godforsaken place where even birds won't shit, sooner or later I'll eat through everything I have!"
Xia Yifeng sat cross-legged on the Windrider Beast's head, muttering to himself as he headed back toward the Stellar Origin Training Institute.
He was the guarding elder of this training institute under the Spirit Taming Sect. He normally secluded himself in the forbidden grounds on the mountain behind the institute and had no dealings with ordinary disciples. Even the Institute Master and the institute's elders often found it difficult to see him.
For an Earth Rank Expert, a guard assignment here was merely a duty to get through. Once he had accumulated a few years of service, he could finally free himself and return to the dazzling world outside, wandering wherever he pleased.
Then, whether he chose to enjoy himself or shut his doors and devote himself to cultivation, he would have immense freedom.
The duties assigned to Earth Rank Experts were divided into the pure stream and the turbid stream. Serving as an administrator or elder in various institute halls, or guarding a region and shouldering heavy responsibilities, belonged to the so-called turbid stream. In the ancient cultivation world, this had been regarded as a road to dread. By contrast, positions that offered considerable authority and freedom while benefiting one's personal cultivation and advancement were called the pure stream.
Xia Yifeng was already approaching fifty, yet his cultivation remained at the fourth transformation. Naturally, he could not compare with those geniuses who had reached the same rank while still young.
While those geniuses wandered the world and cultivated in peace, he could only remain