Flying Leaf!

A squirrel that loved hoarding food had awakened a divine ability that combined resources. Lin Jing did not know what to say.

Wasn't this bullying the little fellow, making sure it could never build up a stockpile?

Seeing the Pineleaf Squirrel look so utterly heartbroken, Lin Jing's lips curled up slightly.

The Pineleaf Squirrel immediately stopped crying and fixed its gaze on Lin Jing.

Lin Jing smiled. "I'm happy for you. From today onward, you're no longer an ordinary spirit beast, but a treasure beast!"

"Squeak!" The Pineleaf Squirrel was still thinking about its spirit rice.

"Look on the bright side. Your spirit rice was just stored in a different form. It turned into spiritual energy and will stay with you forever. Don't you feel how much your spiritual power has grown?"

Lin Jing's words jolted the squirrel out of its daze. Only then did the Pineleaf Squirrel notice that it was already approaching the fourth level of Qi Refining, brimming with stamina and spiritual power.

The Pineleaf Squirrel suddenly had no idea how to express what it was feeling and stood rooted to the spot.

Lin Jing continued coaxing it. Otherwise, with a divine ability like this and its current temperament, the Pineleaf Squirrel might keep having breakdowns in the future.

He had to break its bad habit of looking only at "quantity" and ignoring "quality."

At the very least, it needed to care about both.

"This divine ability is excellent. You need to practice it more."

"Think about it. Spirit rice might be scarce for us now, but once we reach Foundation Establishment and Core Formation, won't we have as much as we want?"

"Even if we have Storage Bags and Storage Rings, using them to hoard spirit rice would be far too wasteful."

"We shouldn't hoard every kind of resource."

"Since your eye technique can combine a certain quantity of low-grade resources into high-grade ones, we can just stockpile high-grade resources from now on."

"You've seen what the golden spirit rice can do."

"If we ever get high-grade spirit fruits or pills that are hard to digest, this golden spirit rice might very well be the key to consuming resources above our level!"

"Squeak!" The Pineleaf Squirrel thought that made some sense.

"Or consider this. Now that you've mutated into a treasure beast, plenty of bad people are bound to covet you."

"This golden spirit rice... we could also use it as a weapon!"

"You were so hungry just now that you nearly lost your mind. If we fed an enemy a few grains of golden spirit rice, then laid out a few hundred doses of laxative, we might win without even fighting!"

The Pineleaf Squirrel took a step back and raised its head. Appetizer Spirit Rice plus laxatives?

That made sense!

Once its Storage Bag arrived, it would stockpile a few hundred doses of laxative too!

But wouldn't getting the spirit rice into an enemy's mouth be a little difficult?

"Squeak?!"

"Uh." Lin Jing froze. He had only been making an offhand remark. Why was this squirrel seriously examining its feasibility?

"It could work," Lin Jing added hastily. "Have you forgotten your Pineleaf Squirrels' signature move, flying leaves?"

"If you can throw leaves accurately, you can surely throw spirit rice accurately too."

Hearing this, the Pineleaf Squirrel pondered.

That was true!

It immediately picked up a fallen leaf from the ground, shot a sharp look to the side, and flicked its little paw!

In the next instant, the fallen leaf shot out, becoming a streak of green light that sliced a branch off a tree in the courtyard!

Crack!

The branch fell to the ground.

In the various martial arts stories from Lin Jing's previous life, there was an impressive realm of mastery where "flying leaves and plucked flowers could both wound a foe." In this cultivation world, however, that move was merely a Pineleaf Squirrel's basic means of attack.

Satisfied that it had not grown rusty with this skill either, the Pineleaf Squirrel nodded.

Watching this, Lin Jing rubbed his chin and said, "I wonder if your eye technique could combine... a pile of ordinary leaves."

The moment the idea occurred to him, Lin Jing put it into action.

Using his true qi and his cloth shoes, he shook all the leaves off several green trees in the courtyard with a few kicks.

Fallen leaves carpeted the ground, leaving the trees bare.

At the sight, the Pineleaf Squirrel fell silent.

"Squeak, squeak, squeak!"

Leaves had been practically countless where it used to live and held little value. Even though it used them as weapons, it had never stockpiled them.

As it turned out, the Pineleaf Squirrel really did not hoard everything!

But now... following Lin Jing's idea, it swept its Glazed Immortal Eyes over the fallen leaves covering the ground.

It was curious whether ordinary leaves could be combined too.

In the next instant.

Two more beams of emerald light shot from the Pineleaf Squirrel's eyes.

They fell upon the tens of thousands of ordinary leaves.

Then a familiar scene unfolded. Shrouded in emerald light, those tens of thousands of unremarkable green leaves vanished outright, just as the spirit rice had before!

What appeared in their place was a single red leaf, resembling a maple leaf.

Although the spiritual energy fluctuations coming from this maple leaf were weaker than those of a single grain of ordinary spirit rice, Lin Jing was rather surprised to see that it had actually worked. He immediately called to the Pineleaf Squirrel, "Try throwing it."

"Squeak, squeak..." The Pineleaf Squirrel scampered eagerly over to pick up the Red Leaf. But the moment it did, its eyes began to ache and sting. Perhaps it had overused its ocular power, leaving it deeply uncomfortable.

Seeing this, Lin Jing quickly stepped forward and placed his hand on the Pineleaf Squirrel's head, activating the Spirit-Nurturing Art. A halo enveloped its head, easing its mental fatigue.

"Are your eyes all right? I was careless. You're only at the third level of Qi Refining. Using a divine ability like this twice in a row must have taken a lot out of you." He grew worried.

After nearly a month together, he certainly did not want anything to happen to this squirrel.

"Squeak!" The Pineleaf Squirrel rubbed its own eyes, then pushed Lin Jing's hand away. Although it felt awful, it was even more eager to find out how powerful this Red Leaf was!

After picking up the Red Leaf, it vaguely sensed an extremely close connection to it, as though it had refined the leaf itself!

Whoosh!

Aiming at the bare tree, the Pineleaf Squirrel threw the leaf. Red light flashed in the next instant. This time, the flying leaf was far faster than the previous green one. In the blink of an eye, a thick branch fell, its cut surface perfectly smooth.

And that was not the end.

Previously, the green flying leaf had flown on for only a short distance after cutting off a branch before losing its power and fluttering down. This time, however, not only did the Red Flying Leaf continue much farther, but the Pineleaf Squirrel also widened its eyes as it discovered something incredible.

With the Flying Leaf Technique, a Pineleaf Squirrel used spiritual power to launch a leaf, which would then attack in a straight line.

But after this Red Flying Leaf flew out, the Pineleaf Squirrel could actually sense that it seemed able to control the leaf's flight path at will, and even call it back!

With a thought, the Red Flying Leaf immediately turned and flew back toward them, slicing through a stone block beneath the tree along the way.

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Under the Pineleaf Squirrel's focused control, the Red Flying Leaf skimmed along the ground, then shot straight up like a scallion yanked from dry earth, wheeling endlessly through the air.

"Squeak!!!" The sight made the Pineleaf Squirrel's eyes shine!

Lin Jing was also slightly taken aback. Elder Mo had said that compared with the immensely strong Battle Apes and Horned Oxen, or the Fire Spirit Sparrows that could use fire spells, Pineleaf Squirrels were not particularly powerful.

The Flying Leaf Technique was of limited use in battle.

But now, the Flying Leaf Technique in the Pineleaf Squirrel's paws seemed to be something entirely different from what it had been at first.

This was practically the Object-Controlling Art! The Leaf-Controlling Art!

It was as though it had obtained a life-bound magic treasure-the Red Leaf...

The more the Pineleaf Squirrel used it, the more carried away it became. It pointed skyward, and the Red Flying Leaf soared into the heavens, as though it would pierce the firmament and slay an immortal with a leaf!

"What blind fool's chucking stuff into the sky?!" An angry voice rang out from the clouds, and an Immortal Crane poked its head out.