After returning to the sect, Yun Lie headed back to Little Slaughter Peak, while Xu Ziqing turned in another direction and went to the Ten Directions Pavilion.
The Ten Directions Pavilion consisted of several buildings. Besides the Merit Pavilion, Library Tower, Treasure Pavilion, and others, it included a Pill Pavilion, Artifact Pavilion, Heavenly Works Pavilion, Treasure Formation Pavilion, and many more facilities provided for the convenience of the sect’s numerous disciples.
The first place Xu Ziqing intended to visit was the Merit Pavilion.
Anyone wishing to obtain resources within the sect had to use a special currency known as merit points. Disciples earned these points by exchanging tradable materials obtained through their regular missions. The system existed to encourage them to strive harder; no other currency circulated within the sect.
Xu Ziqing wanted to convert all the demon crystals he had collected into merit points before going anywhere else.
The instant he descended from his cloud, numerous gazes settled on him. Xu Ziqing smiled bitterly to himself but kept walking.
It was not surprising that people were staring.
He wore Yun Lie’s black brocade robe. It had been rather oversized to begin with, and even though he had secured it tightly around his waist with a cord of grass essence, it still hung loosely and looked quite improper. Moreover, those robes were normally worn only by the Disciplinary Officers of the Peak of Discipline while carrying out their duties. Xu Ziqing was merely a Foundation Establishment cultivator and plainly unqualified to wear them. Naturally, onlookers wondered which Disciplinary Officer could have been generous enough to lend him such clothing.
Fortunately, clothes were only clothes. The true token of a Disciplinary Officer was a black dragon command tablet. Otherwise, Xu Ziqing might have been seized and taken to the Peak of Discipline the moment he appeared in public.
He quickly entered the Merit Pavilion through its main doors, leaving those uncomfortable stares behind him.
He let out a breath of relief and looked around.
To the left was a side hall with three characters written above it: Merit Hall. This was where merit points could be exchanged.
Xu Ziqing went in and found several stewards busy with their records. He selected one whose desk was unoccupied and greeted him. “Senior, may I exchange items for merit points here?”
The steward was a middle-aged cultivator whose cultivation was higher than Xu Ziqing’s, so it was appropriate to address him as Senior. He had been examining an account ledger, but looked up at the question. “Of course. Take out whatever you want to exchange.”
Xu Ziqing did not hesitate. He first took out the storage pouch containing the many demon crystals he had obtained himself, placed it on the desk, and pushed it over. “Please have a look, Senior.”
The steward accepted it. “I wonder what you’ve brought…” Before he finished speaking, he exclaimed, “You hunted this many demon crystals?”
Xu Ziqing smiled modestly. “I collected them over quite some time, which is how I came to have so many.”
The steward had worked in the Merit Hall for years and had seen plenty of things. He had been surprised largely because Xu Ziqing was so young and possessed only middle-stage Foundation Establishment cultivation. Once he examined the grades of the crystals, he calmed down.
The youth had indeed brought many crystals, but Green Heavenly Demons were only comparable to Qi Refinement cultivators, while Indigo Heavenly Demons were merely equivalent to Foundation Establishment cultivators. Neither kind was especially difficult to defeat. However, the thirty-two Red Heavenly Demon crystals, corresponding to Essence Transformation, and the three Yaksha Heavenly Demon crystals, corresponding to Golden Core, impressed him considerably. After a moment’s thought, though, he assumed that the youth had happened upon them while exploring the cavern. Such accidents had occurred before, so he did not make a fuss.
After a quick calculation, the steward said, “A Green Heavenly Demon crystal can be exchanged for ten merit points, an Indigo crystal for two hundred, a Red crystal for two thousand, and a Yaksha crystal for fifty thousand. Altogether, that comes to two hundred and thirty-four thousand, five hundred merit points.”
Xu Ziqing was surprised. He had never imagined that the crystals he had hunted himself could be exchanged for so many merit points. It was a tremendous sum of wealth.
Without further delay, he took out the sect identification talisman he had received. It was a palm-sized command talisman encircled by a soft spiritual radiance, glossy and cool to the touch. “Please.”
The steward was efficient. With a sweep of his hand, a row of characters appeared on the talisman.
Xu Ziqing thought that since he had already obtained so many merit points, there was no need to take out the crystals his senior brother had given him. If he needed more in the future, he could always come back.
But Xu Ziqing was still inexperienced. How could his modest worldly knowledge compare with that of a steward who had spent years conducting business in the Merit Hall? The steward immediately detected something unusual in his expression and said, “If you have more demon crystals, young friend, you’d be wise to exchange them as soon as possible. If you keep them near you for too long, the demonic qi can leak out and cause you considerable trouble.”
Xu Ziqing hesitated.
Seeing this, the steward realized that Xu Ziqing knew very little about demon crystals. He therefore patiently explained their various uses.
Demon crystals were condensed masses of demonic qi. To Heavenly Demons, they were what inner cores were to beasts and birds: the location of their vital essence and the crystallization of their strength.
If demonic cultivators obtained them, they could use the crystals to cultivate demonic arts and improve their cultivation. Immortal cultivators could not use them to cultivate in that fashion, but the crystals still had other applications.
For example, some demonic formations were tremendously powerful but could not be driven by the true essence of immortal cultivators. Embedding demon crystals in such formations could make many effects possible. Some magical artifacts possessed an extremely righteous aura and needed a small quantity of demonic qi to balance it, which could also be extracted from crystals. Furthermore, when immortal cultivators refined puppets, external incarnations, and similar constructs, they sometimes used the bodies of demonic cultivators as materials. Once completed, such constructs often needed to be fed demon crystals to advance.
The possible uses of demon crystals were numerous. For that reason, they could often be exchanged for substantial amounts of merit.
At the same time, however, the purity of the demonic qi within them made them harmful to the Dao bodies of immortal cultivators. Xu Ziqing had a single wood-attributed constitution, which made him especially vulnerable to contamination. Only those with water-attributed constitutions were more easily affected. Expelling the demonic qi afterward would consume a great deal of time.
That was why the steward had taken the trouble to warn him.
Having understood, Xu Ziqing would not foolishly disregard good advice. After hesitating briefly, he took out another storage pouch and handed it to the steward. “Then please exchange these as well.”
Pleased by his willingness to listen, the steward sent his spiritual sense into the second pouch. The next instant, he was dumbstruck.
“A-are all these yours?” he exclaimed. “How could you possibly have obtained so many… demon crystals?”
Although he swallowed the words “Yaksha Heavenly Demon,” his voice was so loud that several people nearby turned to look.
Realizing that he had lost his composure, the steward lowered his voice. “Young friend, these crystals…”
Having just heard about the value of demon crystals, Xu Ziqing understood why the steward was reacting this way. He did not conceal the truth. “I did not hunt these myself. My senior brother gave them to me.”
The steward relaxed. “I see. May I ask who your senior brother is?”
At the mention of his senior brother, Xu Ziqing’s gaze grew noticeably gentler. “My senior brother is Yun Lie of Little Slaughter Peak. He recently advanced to become a Golden Core Perfected One. He hunted all these crystals himself.”
The steward paused. So it was that man.
Yun Lie had long been known among certain well-informed people because of his cultivation of the Merciless Slaughter Sword Dao. Later, when he broke through to Golden Core, the extraordinary commotion had shaken even the highest-ranking figures of the sect. Once his ranking on the Heavenly Dragon List became known, one astonishing event followed another, and he had attracted enormous attention.
The steward had naturally heard Yun Lie’s name. Remembering that Yun Lie had successfully comprehended sword intent, he found this hunting record perfectly reasonable.
Because of this, his attitude toward Xu Ziqing became even warmer. “In that case, I’ll calculate the merit value of these for you too.”
This second pouch contained nearly a thousand crystals, three or four hundred of which came from Yaksha Heavenly Demons alone, to say nothing of the lesser grades. When the steward totaled their value, they could be exchanged for more than twenty million merit points.
In the space of a moment, Xu Ziqing became a remarkably wealthy man.
Even this experienced steward could not help feeling envious at the sight of such riches. A mere Foundation Establishment cultivator now possessed more merit points than an ordinary Golden Core Perfected One. If he wished, he could exchange them for countless resources throughout the Ten Directions Pavilion. His luck was truly extraordinary… And that Yun Lie, reputed to be so cold and merciless, certainly doted on his junior brother.
With a sigh, the steward set aside that small flash of greed and envy and recorded the points in Xu Ziqing’s account.
Xu Ziqing took his leave courteously and walked out.
He still felt a little dizzy from the sum, but when he considered everything he wanted to accomplish next, he also felt reassured.
He had heard that artifact refinement, pill refinement, and talisman arts were all enormously expensive pursuits. With so many merit points to draw upon, perhaps he would no longer need to worry excessively about resources…
For the moment, however, the most important task was to visit the Treasure Pavilion and buy a new set of magical robes. He needed to change out of his senior brother’s borrowed black brocade garment. Going about under everyone’s stare like this was far too embarrassing.
With that thought, Xu Ziqing changed direction at the entrance and went to another of the buildings nearby.
* * *
Xu Ziqing was now dressed in green magical robes, faint cloud patterns visible along the cuffs and hem. Compared with his former plain green garments, these made him seem even gentler. But anyone looking carefully into his eyes would notice that his bearing had gained an edge of sharpness and a trace of resolve. The months of tempering in the Sword Cavern and the numerous battles in the Heavenly Demon Cavern had plainly left their marks upon him.
He kept walking until he arrived directly in front of a pavilion.
Looking up, he saw the name written clearly on its signboard: Heavenly Works Pavilion.
If Xu Ziqing were to choose whichever art would be easiest for him to learn, it would naturally be pill refinement. He understood plants and herbs extremely well and was deeply interested in them. But if he wanted to improve his means of self-defense as rapidly as possible, he had to choose something he could master sooner.
After careful consideration, he had decided to begin by studying talismans. That would make it easier to add a few reliable methods to his repertoire before the approaching sect tournament.
Xu Ziqing looked at the signboard, hesitated no longer, and walked inside.
In the Heavenly Works Pavilion, an elderly steward reclined in a wicker chair, his eyes half-closed as he rested.
More than a dozen clean-cut young cultivators bustled about nearby. When Xu Ziqing entered, one of them approached and asked, “Senior, what brings you here?”