169 Chapter 169 (1/2)

Everything was abuzz, people were running through the mine shafts pushing carts and even carrying stones by hands. Things like spatial rings were forbidden, the sect leaders not wanting workers to steal anything. This increased the workload on them though, but that was a price the men in charge were willing to pay.

”Quickly, the Grand Elder has given his order, we must carry it out!”

Everyone was scared of the new Grand Elder that showed up. The people were speculating but they knew that something was off about this situation. The old Grand Elder Zhu was missing now, some came to the conclusion that he was probably embezzling funds from this mine and he got caught red-handed. He was probably getting punished now, but this didn't explain why they were gathering every single spirit stone they have mined into the biggest storeroom here.

The Grand Elder in question was just floating outside the gorge at the moment, seemingly looking into the air while flicking his finger. No one dared to comment as they just hurried up with their work. This mine wasn't all that huge, so in a couple of hours, the last minecart with some raw spirit stone ores was dumped into the storeroom.

The whole room was radiating with spiritual energy now, there was a big mountain of pure refined stones in one corner. Another large pile of the raw ores right next to it. People were even having trouble breathing in this room, too much spiritual energy in one spot could cause something akin to poisoning if your cultivation wasn't high enough to resist.

”This is all we were able to gather Grand Elder Ming!”

A man in a long robe and a funny looking long hat bowed while the elder named Wu Ming stood just before the entrance to the storeroom. He had a vacant look and was just staring at the piles of gem-like stones just piled up to the roof.

”Grand Elder?”

Matt twitched and coughed into his hand before turning to the sect manager that was responsible for gathering everything here.

”Mhm, is this all of it?”

”Yes my lord, everything that hasn't been shipped yet is all gathered here! It's half a year's worth of what the mine produces.”

The man replied while looking at the shiny pile in the storeroom, the spiritual energy making his eyebrows shake slightly.

”This is half a year's worth...”

Matt mumbled to himself while the man next to him continued.

”Yes Grand Elder, you arrived a week before we were planning to ship the stones to the main sect, the processing of the stones takes a while so we don't ship it out often.”

'They probably also have to have one of their nascent soul old farts act as a bodyguard. Probably that's also why they don't transport monthly.'

Matt's reasoning, in this case, was, that the old nascent soul masters would rather cultivate in peace than act as convoy security. They probably came to a consensus of doing it twice a year.

”Mhm, leave me now, I need to check on the spirit stone... quality... don't let anyone else enter this room!”

Matt waved his hand and the large door behind him closed shut. He was now alone in this room, he felt like he was getting a tan from just standing in this radiant blue glow. He moved over to the biggest pile of refined stones and slowly placed his palm on it.

Spiritual energy source detected, absorb Y / N ?

He tapped the 'Y' on the screen, the room quickly filled up with a bright light. The whole blue spirit stone mountain began compressing into itself the moment the system started its absorption process. Matt didn't have much time to react as the mountain of stones quickly turned into a fine powder. He quickly glanced at his spirit point count that was shooting up and reaching into the millions without much effort.

'Yikes, and this wasn't even all of them...'

He stretched out his hand and tried doing something else, he used his spiritual sense to make a connection with the Qi energy that the stones were radiating. To his glee, the system gave him the same prompt about detecting an energy source. He quickly accepted and the whole storage room began shining once more, just this time it was covering a whole lot more surface area than before.

In a matter of moments everything in the room vanished, the refined stones just turned into dust while the rough ores crumbled into smaller chunks of normal rock. The people outside the storage room blinked, they could feel that something was happening inside but they had no way of peeking inside to check.

Before they could come up with a theory they heard the door creaking open. Elder Wu Ming walked out, but he did it in such a fashion so the others couldn't peek inside.

”Mhm, lock the door and don't let anyone inside... also direct the slave workers to leave the mines. I must access the situation, there was an alarming report and it could get dangerous.”

The manager looked at the Grand Elder and then to the side to some of his workers. No one was sure what this man was talking about, was there some unknown dangers in the mine?

”A-are you sure Grand Elder Wu? This mine has been open for years and all the beast within the area have been slain.”

The man asked, but the moment he did he felt an oppressive force wash over him.

”You dare question me?”

The manager's face went pale instantly and he began sweating profusely.

”I dare not, please show mercy, Grand Elder!”

Matt sent a menacing glare at all the people that were standing there and then just walked off without saying much. He was sure that they would follow his orders throughout as they were far too afraid of the thing called a Grand Elder.

'People ruled by fear and power, its probably easy to implement in this kind of world.'

While thinking he made his way back into the mine, he had his map opened up and could see the little dots that were representing the people slowly leaving the corridors. His destination was a certain location, he found it through the help of his map. It looked like one big red blob on it, but if you followed it you realized it spread throughout the whole underground area.