Yun Che had originally planned to milk King Qin for more loot, but he had returned to the academy at two in the morning. The next day had yet to begin, so Divine Hand could not be activated.
Just then, King Qin approached with a man whose eyes were long and narrow. The man wore a moon-white robe and held a white paper fan bearing the words "Buhuo." He looked refined and scholarly, with a distinctly cultured air.
Yun Che's interest stirred. This guy might be worth a snatch.
Just as he was about to use Divine Hand, King Qin spoke.
"Yun Che, this is Mr. Zhuge Buhuo, the greatest sage of our Great Yuan Empire. He was also the chief strategist in the battle against the siege by the Four Great Bandits. You should learn as much as you can from Mr. Zhuge."
A flicker of surprise crossed Yun Che's face. He had never met this man during the closed beta, but he had heard his name and knew of his exploits.
Not because the man was particularly powerful in combat, but because he was an utterly hopeless romantic.
And the object of his devotion was none other than Yun Che's own wife, Qin Keyi.
For her sake, Zhuge Buhuo had outright defected from the Great Yuan Empire and joined Qin Keyi's faction, serving as her strategist.
That, however, happened several years later. In the original storyline, the character Yun Che was dead, and Qin Keyi had no husband.
Now, thanks to his interference as a transmigrator, the plot had already veered considerably off course.
Qin Keyi was a married woman now. Surely Mr. Buhuo would no longer fall hopelessly in love with her... right?
As Yun Che used Divine Hand on him, he cupped his hands in greeting. "A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Zhuge."
"Ding! Snatch successful. Congratulations on obtaining one Married Woman Seduction Research Manuscript." [Married Woman Seduction Research Manuscript: A detailed seduction guide compiled by Zhuge Buhuo through extensive reading and personal research.]
Yun Che's eyes widened and his mouth fell slightly open. His whole mood instantly soured.
He had let his guard down. He had still underestimated this bastard's devotion to Qin Keyi. The man had already started researching how to seduce married women!
Or had this guy always been into married women, and Yun Che's arrival had merely awakened that preference?
None of that mattered, though.
What mattered was that this bastard was researching how to cuckold him!
The sheer audacity!
Zhuge Buhuo smiled faintly and returned the greeting. "You're too kind, Young Master Yun. I've long heard of your great reputation. Meeting you today, I see it is well deserved."
Yun Che inwardly curled his lip. What reputation could a useless live-in son-in-law like him possibly have? Wasn't this guy just mocking him? What a jerk!
After parting with the two men, Yun Che continued searching the academy for high-quality targets, snatching for a full three hours.
In total, he gained 528 experience points, 21 strength, 15 endurance, 19 agility, 11 constitution, and 20 spirit, along with some mid- and low-grade cultivation methods and combat techniques. The haul was neither good nor bad.
The only drawback was that these low-level cultivation methods could not provide additional attribute bonuses, unless they involved more unusual attributes, such as the relatively rare and difficult-to-obtain resistances to poison, fire, lightning, freezing, and corrosion.
"Even cultivating the mid-grade Poison Suppression Demon Codex to perfection only gave me 50 poison resistance. That's far too little."
"If I can get enough poison resistance, I'll be able to enter the Poison Miasma Snake Forest and take that diamond treasure chest."
At that thought, an idea suddenly struck Yun Che. Could his Divine Hand snatch poison resistance from Poison Spirit Plants?
He carefully reread the description of his Divine Hand talent.
[Divine Hand (unique): Simply lock onto a visible target to snatch one random thing from it. Note: Each use of this talent consumes five spiritual energy points. The farther away the target, the greater the spiritual energy consumption.]
Yun Che's eyes lit up, and he muttered, "A visible target. It doesn't say it has to be a person. This could really lead somewhere!"
Eager to test his theory, Yun Che hurried to the spiritual herb fields on the mountain behind the academy, found the garden where Poison Spirit Plants were grown, and used Divine Hand.
"Ding! Snatch successful. Congratulations on obtaining 5 poison resistance."
"It really works!"
Forcing down his excitement, Yun Che kept targeting the Poison Spirit Plants in the garden and snatching from them.
The students responsible for tending the herb fields exchanged puzzled glances as they watched the famous Instructor Yun repeatedly grasp at the spiritual herbs from a distance.
"Isn't that Instructor Yun from Class Nine? Has he lost his mind?"
"Dunno, but look at him! Might be possessed! How about I go whack him with my shovel and snap him out of it? Sound good?"
The speaker was a girl with a distinctive accent and her hair tied into two little buns. She looked sweet and adorable, but her words showed a complete disregard for the consequences.
When a male student beside her saw her actually raise her dirt-stained silver shovel, he hurried forward in alarm to stop her.
"Ding! Snatch successful. Congratulations on obtaining 5 poison resistance." "Ding! Snatch successful. Congratulations on obtaining 2 poison resistance."
By now, Yun Che was completely immersed in the joy of snatching poison resistance, unable to tear himself away.
If that girl really had taken a shovel to him, she might actually have knocked him flat.
Snatch!
Snatch again!
Snatch with everything I've got!
Yun Che felt that snatching from Poison Spirit Plants was seriously satisfying!
There was no randomness involved. Every attempt was a guaranteed success.
For the first time, he truly understood Divine Hand's ultimate essence: getting something for nothing.
In just a few minutes, his poison resistance had climbed past 200 and was still rising.
Rumor had it that reaching 99,999,999 poison resistance would grant a game-breaking divine physique immune to all poisons.
But given how difficult poison resistance was to obtain, even reaching 1,000 was already an extraordinary feat.
To every player, that information about the divine physique was nothing more than a gimmick to draw them in.
In reality, even if they played until they died of old age, they could never obtain 99,999,999 poison resistance.
"Ding! Snatch successful. Congratulations on obtaining 7 poison resistance."
After snatching from the final Poison Spirit Plant, Yun Che stopped and opened his poison resistance stat to check it. Exactly 666.
"Mm, not bad. Nice and smooth."
"With this, won't all those treasures hidden in poisonous places be mine for the taking?"
In high spirits, Yun Che tried using Divine Hand on the other spiritual herbs. Unfortunately, the attempts failed.
"Ding! Notice: The spiritual plant is too young and contains no special attributes. Unable to snatch."
Yun Che pondered for a moment. Too young-did that mean he might be able to snatch something from older spiritual plants?
He silently committed this rule to memory. If he encountered any ancient spiritual herbs in the future, he would definitely try Divine Hand on them.
Just as Yun Che was about to leave the herb garden, an old man in gray robes who had been sitting under a canopy playing a board game called out to him.
"Young friend, do me a favor, and I'll grant you a great opportunity."
"Opportunity, my ass. Not interested!" Yun Che shot back.
The gray-robed old man, who had looked serene and detached from worldly concerns, froze. The game piece he had just picked up fell onto the board with a clack.
The gray-robed old man could hardly believe it. This brat actually refused to play along! He was a distinguished alchemist revered by everyone in the academy!
It was not that Yun Che was being rude. Of course he knew who this old man was: Huang Huihong, Falling Moon Academy's fourth-grade alchemist.
Nor was it that he did not want to accept the man's quests. This NPC named Huang Huihong was simply a shameless deadbeat.
Every quest he issued was troublesome, time-consuming garbage, and the rewards for completing them were especially poor.
Even when he occasionally offered a good reward, it came through an unbearably tedious, drawn-out chain of repeat quests. It was infuriating, and Yun Che had no desire to waste words on him.
Yun Che used Divine Hand on him directly. Once he finished this snatch, he would head straight home to sleep.
"Ding! Snatch successful. Congratulations on obtaining a second-grade pill, the Calm Mind Pill."
Huang Huihong narrowed his aged eyes slightly as he watched Yun Che leave. Won't play along, eh? I refuse to believe I can't win over a mere youngster like you.
"One fourth-grade pill-a Grandmaster Pill!"
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