10 Out in the Wilderness (2/2)

”Don't thank me Yue, it's normal ! As my sister you can come here anytime to spend the night with me. I really enjoyed it too.”

Xiao Yue asked Shin Sumi what her plans were for the day. Shin Sumi was going to cultivate while Xiao Yue planned on working for some quests.

”I have accepted three quests this time. The month already started a week ago and I plan on getting into the top one hundred again. I will hunt in the southern mountains for a few days or weeks, depending on the time it takes to finish the quests. Maybe you can give them a try too !”

That was a good idea, since Shin Sumi had a plan already.

Xiao Yue left the courtyard first, hugging Shin Sumi goodbye and wishing her well for the days to come.

Shin Sumi left soon after in the direction of the lower valley fields. She collected a few handfuls of seeds from flowers called Worm Roots Flowers. She had picked up the flower randomly but she knew its petals were used to make spirit food.

With people around, Shin Sumi didn't have to worry about the little nut showing itself. For some reason the nut seemed completely uninterested by the seeds when there were people around.

Maybe it was a measure of protection but anyway, it was a good thing.

This time Shin Sumi didn't go back to her house and went directly to the Quests Pavillion.

Xiao Yue had already left for her quests and it was time Shin Sumi tried for herself.

She didn't have any faith in getting into the top hundred considering her talents, but maybe she could at least obtain some status points and a spirit stone or two by the end of the month.

Besides, she needed to leave the sect for her plan.

What she needed the most to cultivate was spirit stones. They were the most efficient way to progress and Shin Sumi firmly believed that with enough high grade spirit stones, even a simple mortal with no talent could eventually succeed.

She had no proof of this whatsoever but it was her only option.

According to what she had learned recently, Shin Sumi knew that the best source of income was the quests system as well as the market.

”Right now I don't have anything to sell in the market, but I have the little nut. With it I can definitely work something out !” she thought as she arrived at the Quests Pavillion.

The place was crowded as usual and with the time it took Shin Sumi to pass the mass of disciples, she had enough time to read the ranking jade screen.

Xiao Yue's name wasn't displayed but Jun Qian's was still in the first place, with two thousand points more than the previous day.

”Big Brother Jun fought a Snake Raven yesterday ! ”

”I bet he will have more than fifty thousand status points by the end of the month !”

”Second Brother Li is not bad either, but it's a shame he will never be able to beat Big Brother Jun.”

The scoring board was the talk of the whole sect it seemed. Jun Qian really was impressive.

Once inside, Shin Sumi looked around at a few posters listing possible quests for red robed disciples. Now that she knew what it entailed for her, she didn't go to the second floor.

She had been searching for a few minutes when finally she found what she was looking for.

”A spirit plant quests list ! For this one I need to find ten stalks of White Cloud Lotus. And this one, any seed of Purple Vine will do ! It is a good opportunity to explore around the sect too !”

Following Xiao Yue's explanations from the day before, Shin Sumi took out her identification medallion and lightly pressed it against the quest she was interested in.

That was the procedure. The spirit automaton of the Quests Pavillion was called and instantly inscribed a complicated character next to the quest information.

This way, other disciples would know that the quest was taken and it would instantly disappear once Shin Sumi would report her success.

In case of failure or abandonment, the symbol would be erased and make the quest available again.

Shin Sumi selected three different spirit plants quests, which was the limit for one disciple.

Remembering the information detailed in her newcomer's manual, Shin Sumi quickly walked to the western gate of the lower valley.

She met Lan Hui right before the gates opened into the wilderness of the training ground and told him about her quest so that he wouldn't find her absence strange.

The Dark Sky Starry Sect was a small sect in the cultivation world but it still encompassed a few dozens peaks of the Blue Fire mountain range.

”The size of the sect may be small in the world but for a mortal it is still incredibly big !” Shin Sumi thought. ”According to the information in the guide, I guess it would take months to walk from one side of the sect to the other !”

It was with big shiny eyes filled with excitement that Shin Sumi stepped out of the lower valley boundaries for the first time.

The old her would probably not have enjoyed going out into the wilderness but Shin Sumi was slowly starting to adapt to the new version of herself.

And that version was brave and excited instead of shy and afraid.

***

Shin Sumi had been walking for a few hours now. Soon after she had left the western gate, the thin and tortuous path had disappeared completely. The vegetation was getting denser and denser the further away she went.

Shin Sumi was nowhere near the borders of the training grounds, which could only be reached by walking for more than three days, but she still needed to exert caution. If a normal red robed disciple reached the borders, their identification medallion would inform them. For an orange robed disciple, the limit of where they could go was a bit further. And so on.

With her identification jade imprinted for a green level disciple, Shin Sumi didn't know the extent of where she could go safely with her inexistant cultivation.

The training grounds were still the propriety of the sect though, which ensured that normally no disciple would find themselves in mortal peril. But there was no surveillance of the area and no one knew for sure what kinds of beasts were roaming around.

Shin Sumi walked carefully, taking in the noises of the jungle.

She wasn't used to the wilderness but she was a clever girl. Looking at the ground and the trees, she kept constant notes of her position compared to the entrance of the sect.

A few broken branches and footprints indicated that the area frequently saw disciples passing through. Shin Sumi decided to go further away from the marks.

There was no trail to follow but it was relatively easy to find a location remote enough to be safe.

The danger of spirit beasts was constant but at least she could easily avoid other disciples. The training grounds were the property of the sect but not technically part of the sect. Hence the rules would not apply and friction between disciples could escalate quickly. In this case the Affairs Pavilion would not bat an eye, even if a fight to the death over some treasure took place.

After a few hours of walking, the environment seemed untouched for Shin Sumi. No footprints nor any indication of man presence were visible.

Just to be sure, she kept advancing for a little while.

A strange sound suddenly resonated within her ears. It sounded like an infant's laughter.

Shin Sumi lifted her head to look at the canopy. The sound originated from a strange bird that had a beak that parted four ways. The bird looked at Shin Sumi with malice in its eyes before flapping its wings and flying away.

”The creatures in the Immortal world are nothing like those from the mortal world” said Shin Sumi. She recalled the many stray dogs of her East Seaside Village and the swallows in the sky during spring time. Compared to them, everything in the jungle was strange, exotic and colorful.

It was a wonderful sight, albeit filled with danger.

Shin Sumi was still absentmindedly pondering about this new world opened to her when her wrist flashed with a deep red light.

A second later the little grey nut was biting her arm so hard that it stopped Shin Sumi right in her tracks.

”Aiiiee ! What's wrong with you ! It hurts you know ?!” she cried while trying to cup the always evading nut.

It took her a few seconds and around ten more bites to understand what was going on.

All around her were gigantic leaves approximately the size of her. There was nothing unusual about it, but as Shin Sumi moved around, she briefly saw between the leaves out of the corner of her eye.

A few steps in front of her was a gigantic ravine !

It was about twenty meters wide and went on for what seemed like a kilometer. The most terrifying of all was the depth which Shin Sumi could not clearly see the bottom of.

Had the nut not been there she would have fallen to her death immediately ! The nut had saved her life !

Shin Sumi slowly extended her neck over the chasm.

”I would have fallen a few hundred meters if you hadn't saved me...”

The rush of adrenaline made her tremble from her head to her toes.

When Xiao Yue told her about the dangers of the training ground, Shin Sumi would never have expected this kind of thing. And Xiao Yue had seemed so casual about it too !

Shin Sumi was about to go back on her tracks when her eye caught a sliver of light reflected from somewhere in the ravine.