After Su Wen returned to the jungle, he found that the Copper Coin Monkeys had returned to the mine entrance and resumed their regular mining work.
For the battles ahead, he planned to use a different approach.
A cautious fighting style could indeed keep him safe to a certain extent.
But now that he had confirmed the Copper Coin Monkeys' combat strength, and his own strength had made a qualitative leap, there was no need to keep playing it safe.
He would show himself openly and slaughter them face-to-face!
Even so, Su Wen knew that if anything changed with the Copper Coin Monkeys, he would flee the battlefield at once.
After all, he was here to make money, not risk his life.
"This shovel's actually pretty handy once you've used it long enough."
Su Wen held the shovel and chuckled softly.
He had just tested it and found that wrapping the shovel's striking edge in blood qi made its tip incredibly sharp.
It might not cut through iron like mud, but at least he wouldn't have to keep replacing shovels as often as before.
But Su Wen had no intention of coating the shovel with blood qi from the start. There was no need when there were so many shovels nearby; if one broke, he could simply switch to another.
He would use blood qi to attack when he ran into a truly tough opponent.
For now, his physical abilities were more than enough.
"Then let's begin!"
Su Wen grinned at the Copper Coin Monkeys working busily at the mine entrance.
The next moment, his body became an afterimage as he charged straight down.
Su Wen's arrival brought a complete change to the mechanical routine of work at the mine.
Flowers of blood began to bloom freely at the mine entrance, displaying their bewitching forms to the fullest as they gradually spread deeper inside.
"Experience: 7.5%."
"..."
"Experience: 11.6%."
"..."
"Experience: 17.7%."
"..."
When Su Wen's experience reached 22.5%, the blood qi in his body suddenly trembled. It was as if a terrifying danger lurked nearby, ready to devour his soul, yet also as if there were no danger at all and a broad, smooth road lay ahead.
Warned by the blood qi in his body, Su Wen did not hesitate. After collecting all the Heavenly Mandate Copper Coins and converting them into Wealth Source Points, he left the mine at great speed and plunged into the vast jungle.
Better to believe it was there than to believe it wasn't.
When training in an unfamiliar world, Su Wen's approach was to consider success or failure in terms of the worst possible outcome.
If he could bear the worst outcome, then he would charge ahead!
If not, he would weigh the pros and cons before deciding whether to advance.
If he started by considering the worst outcome, how much further could things possibly go?
A moment later, an army of apes wearing black armor and bearing black coin marks on their foreheads appeared outside the mine.
The ape army's leader was a burly ape with a silver coin mark flashing on his forehead.
Seeing corpses strewn everywhere outside the mine, the silver-coin ape couldn't help throwing back his head and roaring. The roar contained immense energy, sending surging white waves of air spreading outward.
"Good thing I left quickly."
Su Wen's eyelids twitched as he heard the roar from the direction of the mine.
His opponent's roar had caused such a huge commotion. Could he do the same?
Perhaps he could if he unleashed his blood qi.
But who unleashed all their strength just to roar a couple of times?
Ever since learning what the Wealth Disrupts Space-Time sub-talent did, his goal had been to lie low and stretch out the timeline to see how the future changed.
His talent was obviously a late-game talent!
And it wasn't the kind that gave him explosive combat power to fight frantically on the front lines.
Late game!
Super support!
The kind that could single-handedly carry an entire era!
So all he needed to do was lie low, use the Wealth Disrupts Space-Time sub-talent to keep traveling into the future, and scoop up future cultivation manuals and secret texts, or other things.
Afterward, he could look for a suitable excuse and either hand them over to the country or sell them to it.
Wouldn't it be perfectly normal for the country to reward him for contributing to it?
He was the God of Wealth and had also joined the civil service, so the country would certainly nurture him.
But if he kept giving things away for free, he would eventually feel dissatisfied.
Ultimately, only by handing over future cultivation techniques, especially ones like the Body Refining Art...
...could the country promote and then improve the Body Refining Art, or develop new cultivation techniques based on it.
Only then could he keep fleecing the future.
Otherwise, what use would it be to the changes in the future if he alone held its cultivation techniques?
Most importantly, if he could create a situation where everyone won, why get hung up on the cultivation techniques themselves?
"Cultivation technique: Body Refining Art (+)"
[Mastery stage: The technique's effect was approximately equivalent to ten years of practicing the eighteen physical exercises.]
"Wealth Source Points: 1.55."
A satisfied smile appeared on Su Wen's face when he saw his Wealth Source Points.
But when he saw the Gaze of the River of Space-Time buff, his face fell.
He quickly took a deep breath and wiped away the hint of a tendency toward certain thoughts.
After more than three hours, the buff was finally about to disappear. He couldn't let any of his thoughts add another few hours to it.
"I'm a little hungry. Good thing I brought some food with me."
Su Wen took several packets of compressed biscuits from his pocket. Only after seeing a few small fish swimming in the stream, and even several deer-like animals drinking from it, did he dare cup some water from the stream and drink.
The blue-covered handbook stated that ordinary resources in the Arrow Mirror were identical to those on Earth.
Simply put, the animals and fruit in the Arrow Realm could be eaten, and the water could be drunk.
Even so, to be safe, Su Wen had checked things out before drinking.
What if there was a problem?
While Su Wen ate, drank, and pondered, the Gaze of the River of Space-Time finally ran out and disappeared.
"This time, I'll try the small gate first. If that doesn't work, I'll go through the main gate."
"It's only 0.2 Wealth Source Points. I can afford that now."
With that thought, Su Wen activated Wealth Disrupts Space-Time again.
[As an uninitiated, zero-tier God of Wealth, you consumed most of your Wealth Source Points to disrupt space-time with your wealth source.]
[The powerful force of your wealth source shook space-time, dislodging an extremely faint and fragmented force of space-time that swept you ten years into the future.]
"..."
After making the same choices as before, Su Wen soon arrived at the gates of Jiang City.
Without hesitation, Su Wen chose to enter through the small gate.
[Young God of Wealth! You made a wise choice. During wartime, only the army was permitted to pass through Jiang City's main gate, so that its passage would remain unobstructed.]
[Not long after entering Jiang City, you spotted a somewhat familiar statue nearby.]
[Driven by curiosity, you walked toward it. When you saw what the statue looked like, you turned pale with shock.]
[God of Wealth from the past! In this future space-time, you discovered a statue of yourself, along with a few wreaths around it. Clearly, a memorial ceremony had been held here not long ago.]
[People paid tribute to the past and to their ancestors. God of Wealth from the past, how did you feel upon seeing that you had died young and become an ancestor to whom people paid tribute?]
Su Wen: "..."