Chapter 31: Inspecting the Sect (Part 2)

That team was led by Pang Xiaolei.

Pang Xiaolei had been the first to come into contact with cultivation, and he had also learned Spirit-Charge Fist to treat his injuries. Although he had not contributed any strength during the mission a few days ago, the arm that had once been injured by an aberration had not only recovered under the nourishment of spiritual energy, but its toughness and strength were three to five times greater than his other arm. His combat power was quite impressive, and people jokingly called it his “Qilin arm.”

Another team rotated on duty, reporting to the Demon-Suppression Bureau to carry out the aberration incidents now appearing frequently throughout the country.

The results were also remarkable.

Chen Yi looked a little longer at Captain Ye, who was about to break through.

In the end, Tang Qirui had still helped Captain Ye obtain two Qi Refining Pills. His breakthrough would happen within the next day or two.

Once he reached the later part of early-stage Qi Refining, he would be able to cultivate those seven minor arts.

Chen Yi had personally experienced these seven minor arts. Their practical value was extremely strong. In the early stages, they would absolutely be the mainstream spells for cultivation, daily life, and combat.

That way, if anything happened again, Chen Yi would not need to run back and forth.

No longer disturbing Captain Ye’s cultivation, Chen Yi circled around the square. Progress: twelve percent.

Then he went toward the Mountain Gate.

Beside the Mountain Gate was the spirit field. Old Zhang and Old Huang, leading their students, appeared at the edge of the spirit field every day regardless of wind or rain, recording and collecting all kinds of related data.

Under their careful tending, the spirit seeds had grown into seedlings half a meter tall. Their emerald green color was a picture of thriving vitality.

Chen Yi squatted beside the spirit field and chatted with the two elders for a few sentences. In the end, they drove him away for getting in the way.

Other people were curious about Chen Yi’s mission rewards, but these two old men were not. Unless Chen Yi could bring out another spirit field or more spirit seeds, they were too lazy to pay him any attention.

Chen Yi rubbed his nose and stood up. Check-in successful. Progress: nineteen percent.

He walked past the Mountain Gate.

Whoever the capable person was, they had built Da Huang three doghouses here, each bigger than the last, representing Da Huang’s increasingly frightening size.

Country mutts seemed born knowing what they ought to do. Even after changing places, Da Huang had still taken on the job of guarding the sect. Every day, he would patrol three to five times.

Aside from that, he had also arranged a job for himself: taking care of his little masters.

At this moment, he was outside the sect playing with the children.

Chen Yi followed the stairs down. He reached the end, stepped out of the sect space, glanced at the civil construction project outside that changed every day, then turned and returned to the sect.

Progress: twenty-six percent.

After returning, he headed toward the back of the sect.

What entered his eyes was a large stretch of disciple residences.

Identical courtyard houses were neatly arranged before him.

This was not only the place where the disciples of the sect lived. It was now also the residence of Chen Yi and his family inside the sect.

Courtyard number one was Chen Yi’s residence. He lived inside with Qianbao and Linbao. The neighboring courtyard number two housed his parents, and they also kept Big White Goose and Da Huang there.

However, most of the time, Da Huang lived in Chen Yi and the children’s courtyard.

There were thirty-three houses, and they were not yet fully occupied.

One team was long-term rotating outside on missions. With the sixty-plus people remaining in the sect, there were still many vacant residences.

Chen Yi went back to his own courtyard and walked around. It was unremarkable, extremely plain, like a place for bitter cultivation. All one could say was that it was somewhere people could live.

When he came back out, the progress jumped to twenty-seven percent.

So it was just as he had thought. He had to walk through the courtyards one by one.

The third, fourth, and fifth courtyards in the first row were all Tang Qirui and his assistant team’s residences. Before entering the houses, Chen Yi even specially ran back to notify them, and only then entered their courtyards.

A little farther away, courtyards six, seven, and eight were the ordinary team members’ residences.

Three people to one courtyard, one person to one room. However, after a few days, some personal belongings had appeared in the courtyards. Some people had placed small tea tables and stools in the yard; others had strung ropes in the yard to dry clothes.

There were many courtyards with this kind of sense of daily life. When it was time to rest at night, this area was very lively.

Recently, Linbao and Qianbao no longer thought much about going out to play either. The older brothers and uncles here all doted on them. They could play in anyone’s courtyard, and sometimes they even could not be called back.

In the second row, the courtyard directly behind Chen Yi’s family was where Old Zhang and Old Huang lived.

But their assistant students did not live next door. They lived farther back.

The person living next door was Lou Ting.

Lou Ting lived alone in one courtyard. The main reason was that his work system was very unique. Whether special talents were each given a separate courtyard, or all special talents were arranged together in the future, it could be slowly planned out.

Next came the residences of Captain Ye, Pang Xiaolei, Captain Sun, and the others.

The captains did not enjoy any special privileges. Even Captain Ye, the grand captain, shared a courtyard among three people and lived together with Pang Xiaolei and the others. On ordinary days, it was also convenient for them to discuss work-related matters, and it helped cultivate rapport and tacit understanding.

Third Brother Wang and Wang Xiaosi lived right behind Captain Ye’s house. The two brothers lived in one courtyard, and only the two of them lived together.

Wang Xiaosi was at first-stage Qi Refining. After the ancient bacteria completely dispersed, because his aptitude was “extraordinary beyond compare,” Third Brother Wang placed great hopes in him and forced him to cultivate every day.

But from what Chen Yi occasionally saw, Wang Xiaosi was obviously even more interested in Da Huang. Whenever he had nothing to do, he would run over to Chen Yi’s courtyard to groom Da Huang, muttering all the while, “Big Brother, you’re way too handsome. Just look at how sleek this fur is. How many female dogs would be charmed to death by it? And those sharp teeth and claws of yours…”

Chen Yi sometimes thought that after the Spirit Beast Pavilion was built, there would be a ready-made talent right here.

He walked through the courtyards one by one. Even the unoccupied courtyards were places he went in and strolled around.

Not only did he gain a deep understanding of the sect’s current situation, his progress also happened to reach forty-five percent.

It seemed the progress from each house was not one percent, but included invisible decimals.

Calculating the places he had not yet gone, Chen Yi lowered his eyes and thought for a moment. He walked out from the living area and deliberately followed the edge of the space for a stretch.

He shifted his gaze away from the orange trees that could be seen but not touched and looked at the progress. Forty-eight percent.

His guess had been right. It looked like the sect’s boundary also counted among the inspection check-in points.

Chen Yi did not delay either. He circulated Gale Legs and rushed swiftly along the sect boundary.

In only five minutes, he ran a five-kilometer long-distance run.

He returned to the starting point.

Progress: eighty-eight percent.

It seemed that inspecting the boundary was the main part of this mission!

If he had not thought of it, the difficulty of this mission would actually have been here instead.

After catching his breath, Chen Yi went to the storehouse this time.

Research into the storehouse wooden shelves had continued all along. It was just that the time was too short, so they still could not obtain more precise conclusions. They only knew that it was indeed related to time and space.

A wooden shelf that appeared to be thirty centimeters wide and about two meters long could contain objects with a diameter exceeding one meter and weighing under one ton. Each shelf layer could hold ten of them.

The wooden rack had a total of five layers.

In other words, a single wooden rack could hold fifty large objects.

These objects would be shrunk down and appear on the wooden rack in a manner similar to holographic projections. When taking them out, one had to be a little careful.

Next was the “time” function.

This should also be a special effect of the annual rings on the wooden shelves.

Three rings meant the ratio between real time and storage time was three to one.

When three hours passed in reality, only one hour passed inside a three-ring shelf.

And so on.

Six rings meant five to one.

Nine rings meant eight to one.

Twelve rings meant twelve to one.

Fifteen rings had astonishingly reached fifteen to one.

When half a month passed in reality, the items stored in this wooden shelf had only experienced one day. Although it was not like legends where time was eternally frozen, it was still quite terrifying.

If some things that were already shelf-stable were stored there, perhaps they could last until the end of time. Several sect masters might have changed, and those items would still exist.

However, more functions were still under development.

When Chen Yi entered, the staff Tang Qirui had arranged were still continuing their tests. Among this group, Chen Yi saw Academician Li Wei and his students.

As Academician Li Wei’s research deepened, the secret of North Mountain definitely could not be hidden from him.

Two days ago, Chen Yi had already accepted them into the sect, and they had all entered Qi Refining.

Now Academician Li Wei was attempting to use the storehouse wooden shelves’ time function to research ancient bacteria. Xun Shiming, who was second in cultivation at present, followed him. He could now barely use Dust-Removal Art once, which was just enough to let Captain Ye extricate himself and cultivate.

When he saw Chen Yi come in, Academician Li Wei happily called him over. “Sect Master Chen, you came at just the right time. I need your help taking a look at the condition changes of the bacteria in this bottle.”

Chen Yi stepped forward and used Delusion-Piercing Eye Technique. The bacteria were still the same bacteria as before, but in the hands of a professional, they seemed much more obedient.

Especially after Academician Li Wei also entered Qi Refining and no longer needed to specially guard against these bacteria, he began trying many bold experiments, such as bacterial cultivation.

These bacteria revealed their true forms under a microscope. Academician Li Wei dealt with them one by one, found bacteria currently similar to them on Blue Star, and was in the middle of cultivating them.

If the method was correct, this type of bacteria would no longer become a threat.

Chen Yi did not understand it, but he also knew their activity seemed not as strong as what he had seen in the wild. Not knowing whether it was good or bad, he described what he had observed.

Academician Li Wei was very happy. “Thank you. Did you come here for something?”

Was this a dismissal?

Chen Yi could only say he had nothing to do and turned to leave.

Storehouse check-in complete.

Progress: ninety-three percent.

After leaving, he went toward the Scripture Pavilion.

He had started his check-in from the peach tree and come all the way over. The Scripture Pavilion was the endpoint.

Probably because his cultivation had not improved in any obvious way, the Scripture Pavilion had not changed at all.

The open cultivation method was still only the cultivation method Spirit Nurturing Art. There were five martial techniques such as Sword Manipulation, and seven miscellaneous arts such as Light Art.

There were also some civilian-livelihood miscellaneous books opened at seventh-stage Qi Refining, such as how to plant spirit seeds, how to maintain spirit plants, what spirit herbs existed, what spirit veins and spirit stone were, including some mineral materials that could be used for artifact refining.

They belonged to the category of extremely precious knowledge books, but because seas had turned to mulberry fields and so much time had passed, the importance of this knowledge had decreased, turning them into something like archaeology.

Looking at the bookshelves on the first floor, there were still many sealed areas that could not be read. Chen Yi had to advance before they could open.

There should still be more useful things.

Chen Yi finished walking around the Scripture Pavilion and came out.

Ding!

Inspect the Sect completed. Reward: disciple standard-issue weapon x5.

Chen Yi went to the Sect Main Hall with his brows dancing in delight.

With a lift of his hand, the five standard-issue weapons, swords, clattered down in an incomparably heroic pile beside Tang Qirui’s feet.

Tang Qirui asked happily, “The mission is done already?”

“I told you, it was practically free.”

“What’s next?”

Chen Yi looked at the follow-up chain mission.

Chain Mission: Cloud-Roaming

Reward: For every mission completed, receive a random reward of pills, talismans, spirit stone, or experience.

Cultivation: zero percent, incomplete.

“Cloud-Roaming? What does that mean?” After hearing Chen Yi finish, Tang Qirui looked puzzled.

Chen Yi thought for a moment. “…Maybe, probably, publicly funded travel?”

“Tsk!” Tang Qirui was so envious and jealous his cell walls nearly separated.

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