64 Ruining The Sec (2/2)
”Oh no, don't bother, it's fine. Being more of a caretaker is really a good position. I get to learn a lot about the sect and to meet a lot of people. Anyway, what was I saying?”
Shin Sumi had heard from Lan Hui about what had happened to Little Azu. He had been brought to the sect very early in his youth but his talent had only been red. After years of trying, nobody thought that he could reach the Liquid Realm. In a feat of pure luck he finally managed the breakthrough but with only one Shinsoo Door opened, condemning him to be stuck at the very bottom of the Liquid Realm.
Little Azu quickly got hold of his thoughts, his glib tongue endlessly continuing to speak information to his listener.
”Now the Formation Style. That's a good one. More balanced than the rest. The people there focus much more on using magical techniques to fight. They are also more versatile than the others I guess. Depending on your type of magic there's really nothing you can't do. It just takes a lot longer for them to reach higher levels of cultivation within the Liquid Realm.”
”Obviously there's also the stars of the sect. The best fighters almost always go to the Star-Sword Pavilion. That's where you can learn to master all sorts of weapons. Everybody wants to go there! The only thing is...”
”...?”
Little Azu bent his upper body down, closing in on Shin Sumi from over the counter. As if he was afraid somebody would head him, he continued in a very low voice.
”The Swords Masters in charge of the teaching are ruthless. They only want the best of the best. It's basically only for the Inner Sect disciples, the ones chosen by a master.”
”I mean it's understandable. There are so many geniuses in there, they wouldn't want the standard to lower over time.”
Before Shin Sumi could say anything, Little Azu gave her a wink, adding ”But Big Brother Fen is the most genius-y out of all of them!”
”And yeah, that's about what I can tell you. So have you chosen?”
”Erm... What about the Divine-Beasts Pavilion? You left this one out, Little Azu.”
”Tch,” Little Azu almost spat on the floor before remembering that he was in his workplace, ”that bunch of fools who think they are strong. Apart from the Medicine branch they are definitely the weakest of the bunch!
It's all bark and no bite with them.”
”But how do they chose their fighting beasts?”
”Does it really matter?”
Shin Sumi could tell that Little Azu had some sort of resentment towards the Divine-Beast Pavilion. Maybe they didn't accept him either, she thought. But looking at her face of insistence, Little Azu sighed.
”Fine. It's more of the opposite actually, the beasts chose them. Anyone can actually go and visit the Beast Nest on the bottom of the north mountain. But don't do it!
If you go there, with your talent, you're bound to attract a beast and then you'll be stuck with the Beast Style without being able to leave! Sure you might get a powerful Steel Wolf or a Blood Red Tortoise but you should really stick to swords or magical techniques.”
So it's the animal that chooses the cultivator, not the other way around... Could have Shin Sumi been chosen by the little nut before she even started cultivating?
”One more thing... Can more than one beast choose you?”
Little Azu thought about it for a few seconds before recalling some information he was given when he reached the Liquid Realm.
”Yeah, that can happen, but you need to reach at least the third step of the Liquid Realm I think. Most disciples only have one but the Beast Master of the Pavilion has three.”
Shin Sumi pondered for a moment, ”third step...”
”The Liquid Realm is divided in five steps. When you breakthrough you're automatically on the first step. Then you need to condense vortexes in your Shinsoo Sea. When there are five of them you can solidify your Shinsoo Sea into a solid core. That's-
- The Core Development Realm,” she finished Little Azu's words.
Shin Sumi had known about the steps in the Liquid Realm for a long time. In fact it was one of the first questions she had ever asked Lan Hui after meeting him. It was also how Little Azu had presented Fen Wudao on her first day.
Fen Wudao was a genius because at only seventeen years old he was already on the fourth step of the Liquid Realm.
Thinking about it, even with the nut and the Copper Bell and the complete circle of Shinsoo Gathering, Shin Sumi was only in the first step despite being sixteen years old.
Thanking Little Azu for his precious help, Shin Sumi retrieved her prize for placing fifteen in the Rising Star Tournament and left the Resources Pavilion.
Her prize consisted of a hundred and twelve medium grade spirit stones as well as a stabilization pellet. For her the pellet was useless considering the unusual stability of her cultivation base, but the spirit stones were definitely worth the hassle.
If a medium grade stone was worth ten low grade ones, then she was sitting on a goldmine!
Wondering what they would turn into, Shin Sumi discreetly fed the pellet as well as a couple spirit stones to the little nut, keeping the rest in her bag of holding.
She had just stepped outside of the Resources Pavilion when words of Fen Wudao came through in the form of a divine sense message.
”My Master has finished tweaking the records of the sect. Now 'Yan Yan' and 'Bai Fulong' can officially step in the upper valley.”
Shin Sumi was overjoyed. Now all she needed to do was to find a discreet place to swap identities and she would be able to claim even more spirit stones!
Not leaving anything to chance, Shin Sumi returned inside the large building to ask Little Azu for directions.
”The market is on the west side of the valley. Here, I've inscribed the location on your identification jade! Good luck finding what you're looking for Sister Shin!”
The market wasn't far away, and Shin Sumi even heard the bustling activity of disciples selling their goods and arguing about prices before she saw the market with her eyes.
Compared to the lower valley market where she as Yan Yan had made a ton of spirit stones with Yin type spirit plants, the market this time wasn't much bigger.
What changed the most was the quality and quantity of the resources sold.
Her first stop was in front of a disciple claiming in a magically enhanced voice about the best changing rates of the whole valley. There, Shin Sumi exchanged twenty medium grade stones for a hundred and eighty low grade ones.
The disciple was right, it wasn't a bad exchange rate, considering that in a couple of hours they would have almost all turned into high grade spirit stones!
With more currency in her bag than ever, Shin Sumi then found a seller for cultivation robes. For a price as low as a handful of stones, Shin Sumi bought the cheapest red and orange robes she could find.
Her previous ones were all in tatters after the fights she had endured in the tournament, but she needed something for her alternative personalities to wear.
Her first choice was Bai Fulong. Morphing into male features without even needing a Confusion Pill, Shin Sumi donned the newly acquired yellow colored robe in a secluded forest far from the buildings.
From there, all she had to do was go back to the Resources Pavilion!
Little Azu was still behind the counter, this time being far less talkative and friendly.
”I guess Bai Fulong is not better looking than me after all...”
Doing the same thing a while later for Yan Yan, at the end of the day Shin Sumi sat down on a cultivation platform, in the middle of meditating disciples. Probing her bag of holding, she calculated the amount she had acquired in no time.
Bai Fulong had placed nineteen in the trial and Yan Yan twenty. Because of that, Shin Sumi now had an additional two hundred medium grade spirit stones.
When she had asked the Patriarch about the possibility of using all three of her identities to learn from different branches, she had completely forgotten about the rewards.
”Patriarch Sen must have been furious on the inside... Three hundred medium grade spirit stones instead of a hundred... I'm ruining the sect, eh!”
Overall, she was really happy. Now she could virtually do anything in the upper valley. With Little Azu's indications, she now knew where the main buildings of the valley were.
”Okay little nut. First I'm going to stop by the market once more and see if there's any interesting scroll. Then I'll visit the sect's library and buy a few techniques. If after that I still have resources left I'll try to find a few swords! The Void Sword is too strange and recognizable, I need weapons for Yan Yan and Bai Fulong too.”