"Smack!"
Then Fairy Lingyue reached out and touched the Tiger Wraith between the brows, tracing a rune there with a ray of milky-white light.
When the rune sank into the Tiger Wraith's brow, he rose with a vacant expression. Ignoring Fairy Lingyue before him, he turned to leave, muttering to himself:
"How did I trip and fall here? Never mind, never mind. I'd best return and report to the Great King. When I see him, I'll tell him another young cultivator has come to tend the Medicine Garden at Green Bamboo Abode. We can come back when the spirit herbs in his garden have ripened and take both his life and the whole garden's herbs at once. The Great King might even reward me with a fresh, tender heart or liver. Splendid, splendid!"
By the end, the Tiger Wraith could not help wagging his head, clearly delighted with his own scheme.
"Ah, letting a tiger return to the mountains is a risky business, but I hope little Taiping will one day understand his master's painstaking intentions."
Fairy Lingyue murmured to herself as she watched the Tiger Wraith leave, his head still bobbing.
Although she had yet to have Xu Taiping formally become her disciple, and did not even know whether he wanted to, that did not stop Fairy Lingyue from slipping into the role of his master.
Still, she certainly would never admit that her chief reason for doing so was that several hundred years inside the Earth Treasury Fruit had left her terribly lonely, and she wanted some amusement.
The next day.
Xu Taiping rose bright and early.
First, he weeded the Medicine Garden, then added a few shovelfuls of soil to the spot where the Earth Treasury Fruit was buried. After all, it would be a major pillar of his future foothold in the cultivation world. He could not let anyone steal it.
Fairy Lingyue had not appeared again since returning to the Earth Treasury Fruit the previous night. Xu Taiping thought she might really not emerge for another month or so.
After clearing the weeds from the Medicine Garden, he spent the rest of the morning tidying the three thatched rooms at Green Bamboo Abode.
The accommodations were extremely basic: a bedroom containing only a bed, a main room, a kitchen, and a latrine built behind the Medicine Garden.
While cleaning the kitchen, Xu Taiping discovered two very interesting things-a water vat that could never be emptied, and a rice vat that would produce a full vat of rice whenever a single Merit Coin was dropped into it.
With water and rice, plus a dried fish hanging on the wall, Xu Taiping had his first meal at the Azure Profound Sect sorted.
After eating, he made the bed with the sheet and quilt from the cupboard, then sat cross-legged on it and took out the jade slip and Bronze Mirror he had received earlier at the West Wind Pavilion.
"When Fairy Lingyue passed me the recipe for the Marrow-Washing Bone-Cleansing Soup, she tapped my brow. This jade slip also passes on its teachings by being pressed against the brow. That must be the standard way to transmit teachings in the cultivation world."
He picked up the jade slip and muttered softly.
According to the pavilion master of the West Wind Pavilion, this jade slip contained a Qi Refining cultivation method of the Azure Profound Sect, along with many of the sect's rules and instructions for using the Bronze Mirror.
"Phew... this jade slip is passing on far more than Fairy Lingyue did with that touch."
As passage after passage of text flooded his mind, Xu Taiping felt so dizzy that he nearly toppled headfirst off the bed.
Fortunately, before long, new words stopped appearing in his mind, and he finally breathed a sigh of relief.
But he immediately discovered another problem.
The words that had entered his mind were like books arranged on a shelf: he had to open and read them before he could see and understand their contents.
"So the way this jade slip transmits teachings is still a little different from Fairy Lingyue's method. Her touch let me know directly how to gather and brew the ingredients according to the recipe, but this jade slip can only stuff these things into my head."
Xu Taiping carefully examined the difference between the two.
Still, perhaps the difference comes from the contents being different.
He immediately added that thought to himself, then stopped dwelling on it and settled down to read the lines of text in his mind, bit by bit.
Three days later.
After spending nearly three days on it, Xu Taiping finally finished reading everything in the jade slip.
Just as the Pavilion Master of West Wind Pavilion had said, the jade slip contained three main texts—the Remnant Sunset Scripture, a volume entitled "Essential Guide to the Profound Mirror's Functions," and the Azure Profound Sect Code.
During that time, he had also tilled the Medicine Garden while "reading."
"According to the method taught in the jade slip, once the ground has been tilled, I can gather some animal dung, dead branches, and fallen leaves to burn over the soil and enrich it."
"But there's no hurry to do that. Today is the first day of the month, when Elder Ziyang lectures on the scriptures. He'll be covering the Remnant Sunset Scripture and the basics for beginning cultivators. It only happens once every three months. I mustn't miss it."
"After the lecture, I can also choose which seeds to buy through the Bronze Mirror. That way, the Merit Coin won't go to waste."
While eating alone in the main room, Xu Taiping began planning what he would do that day, then casually tore a page off the almanac on the wall.
The removed page revealed the words "First day," with a line of small annotations beside them written in vermilion ink: "Favorable for study; avoid disturbing the earth."
He had bought it the day before, when he summoned a Spirit Bird to help purchase daily necessities. Altogether, he had spent six Merit Coins, which had left him aching over the expense for quite a while.
After finishing his meal, he returned to the bedroom.
Xu Taiping took the Bronze Mirror from its box and carefully placed it on a battered table before him.
Besides the Bronze Mirror, the table held half a bowl of clean water, a few flower petals, and one Merit Coin from the Azure Profound Sect.
Xu Taiping recalled the instructions for using the Bronze Mirror, then dipped his fingers into the bowl and dripped some clean water onto it before placing the flower petals and Merit Coin on it in turn.
"Whoosh..."
Almost the instant he placed the Merit Coin on the Bronze Mirror, a gentle breeze blew out of it, carrying a faint scent of sandalwood.
Then a voice came from the Bronze Mirror:
"Xu Taiping, Outer Sect Registered Disciple of the Azure Profound Sect, has taken his seat. Do not leave. Elder Ziyang will begin his scripture lecture shortly. If you miss it today, you must wait another three months."
Having read the jade slip in full, Xu Taiping was not startled by the voice. The "Essential Guide to the Profound Mirror's Functions" had mentioned it: this was the voice of the Profound Mirror's spirit.
According to the "Essential Guide to the Profound Mirror's Functions," the Profound Mirror's spirit was like a guide who could help him find whatever he wanted to see within the Bronze Mirror.
Of course, the Azure Profound Sect's forbidden grounds were excluded, and each act of "guidance" cost one Merit Coin.
"Thank you, Lord Profound Mirror."
Xu Taiping offered his thanks.
The Profound Mirror's spirit was not entirely an inanimate thing, so he felt it was only right to offer a word of thanks.
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