In the gathering dusk, on the outskirts of the southern marketplace of the Tianling Sect.
Lu Feng walked barefoot along the main road of the marketplace ahead, muttering to himself from time to time.
"They always say transmigrators come with their own golden fingers, yet it took twenty years after my transmigration just to unlock this thing. If it had only activated a few years earlier, I wouldn't have been reduced to such a state."
"Still, it's not too late—at least it has let me see the true faces of these people in the Tianling Sect."
Looking at the marketplace drawing near, Lu Feng decided to find a place to settle down here first.
He needed to recover his physical strength first, and then thoroughly figure out this Proficiency Panel.
A quarter of an hour later, Lu Feng arrived inside the marketplace. This marketplace was an affiliated property of the Tianling Sect, and he had visited it once two years ago.
However, he didn't know much about the specific situation within the marketplace. During his four years of sect life, he had spent most of his time in closed-door cultivation, and the few times he ventured out were simply to follow his master to see the world.
At that moment, Lu Feng stood before the doors of a rice shop belonging to the Chen Clan, a shop primarily engaged in buying and selling spirit rice and immortal grain.
To survive, he had no choice but to walk inside and see if he could find any odd jobs here.
As soon as he stepped into the shop, a shop assistant hurried over, but upon seeing Lu Feng's tattered clothes, a look of disgust appeared on the assistant's face.
Before the assistant could speak, Lu Feng took the initiative and asked, "Excuse me, brother, are you still hiring hands here?"
With only the cultivation of Qi Condensation Layer 1, he was not yet able to fast and dispense with food, so solving his food and lodging was his top priority.
If those two Law Enforcement Hall disciples hadn't robbed him of his storage bag and magic treasures, he wouldn't have been reduced to this miserable plight.
The shop assistant pulled a long face and snapped rudely, "Where did this stinking beggar crawl from? We're not hiring any hands here, scram, get lost!~"
The other's attitude was thoroughly vile. As a former inner sect disciple of the Tianling Sect, Lu Feng had never been treated this way, but he gritted his teeth and endured it.
"My apologies for the intrusion, I'll leave right now."
Just as Lu Feng turned to leave, a manager inside the shop suddenly spoke up, "Wait! Is this Fellow Daoist looking for work?"
Lu Feng turned back to look at the manager. The man was around forty years old, slightly plump, with a pair of phoenix eyes that made him look extremely shrewd.
"Greetings, Fellow Daoist. I am indeed looking for work."
The manager looked Lu Feng up and down carefully, then smiled and said, "Our Chen Clan rice shop is indeed not hiring anyone right now, but the Chen Clan is still recruiting tenant farmers. I wonder if Fellow Daoist might be interested?"
After listening, Lu Feng pondered for a brief moment. Given his current state, he no longer had the luxury of picking and choosing.
As a mere Qi Condensation Layer 1 cultivator, it was better to keep a low profile.
Besides, this was still within the sphere of influence of the Tianling Sect; if he were to be targeted, even his little life would be hard to preserve.
Actually, Lu Feng wanted to get far away from the Tianling Sect as well, but his current physical condition and cultivation made that utterly impossible.
"Fellow Daoist, what are the requirements for these tenant farmers, and what is the compensation?" Lu Feng didn't rush to agree, wanting to understand the specifics clearly before making a plan.
Seeing that Lu Feng was interested, the manager walked over slowly. "I am Chen Donglai, manager of the Chen Clan rice shop. How should I address Fellow Daoist?"
"Ah, I am Lu Shan." Lu Feng casually made up a name for himself.
"So it is Fellow Daoist Lu. Tenant farmers for the Chen Clan only need a cultivation of Qi Condensation Layer 1 to sign the contract. After signing, for the first year the Chen Clan will provide the farmland along with the relevant spirit tools and spirit seeds, and the tenant farmer only needs to turn over a certain amount of farm tax each year."
Lu Feng nodded and continued to ask, "And how much is this farm tax?"
"Two hundred catties of spirit paddy per mu must be handed over each year, and the remaining harvest will entirely belong to Fellow Daoist."
Lu Feng had heard roughly about the yield per mu of spirit paddy. Normally, one mu of spirit field could yield three to four hundred catties of spirit paddy a year.
Yet in a year with a poor harvest, a single mu would produce at most around two hundred catties of spirit paddy.
While the farm tax to be handed over seemed modest, tenant farmers were also cultivators, and the amount of spirit rice they consumed themselves each year was by no means small.
Seeing him remain silent, Manager Chen smiled and said, "I can see that Fellow Daoist Lu must have encountered some hardships. How about this? If you are willing to become a tenant farmer for our Chen Clan, I can personally lend you fifty catties of spirit rice first. You can repay me next year once you have the harvest."
Lu Feng looked at Manager Chen. They were complete strangers, yet the man wanted to lend him fifty catties of spirit rice—he wondered what scheme the other party was hatching.
Now that he had nothing, the first thing he needed to solve to survive was food and drink, and the other party had seized upon his weak spot.
Seeing this, Lu Feng could only nod silently and say, "Then many thanks, Manager Chen. May I ask what the interest on these fifty catties of spirit rice will be?"
Manager Chen gave a faint smile. "Hehe, not much at all! The interest for one year is only twenty percent, meaning next year you will only need to return sixty catties of spirit rice to me, principal and interest combined."
Lu Feng frowned slightly. This interest was certainly not low, but he currently lacked the leverage to bargain.
Thus, he could only agree, "Very well, then I will rent a single mu of land to try out."
"Good, then please follow me, Fellow Daoist Lu."
Lu Feng followed Manager Chen into the inner hall of the rice shop.
The shop assistant remaining in the main hall saw Lu Feng agree and sneered, "What a fool. Working himself to the bone all year just to earn those few tens of catties of spirit rice—how is a tenant farmer any different from a slave?"
Soon, Lu Feng signed the lease agreement with Manager Chen, who produced fifty catties of spirit rice and a copy of the agreement, handing them over to Lu Feng together.
"Fellow Daoist Lu, this is the spirit rice I am lending you. Please keep it safe!"
"Many thanks, Manager Chen!"
"Hehe, Fellow Daoist Lu is too polite. I will have someone take you to claim your spirit field right away."
"Alright!"
A moment later, a mortal youth brought Lu Feng to the cultivation area.
Spirit fields were everywhere here, but the spirit fields were completely barren patches of land with nothing planted on them at all.
Seeing this, Lu Feng asked in puzzlement, "Brother, why aren't these spirit fields planted with spirit grain?"
Without even turning his head, the youth replied as he walked, "It is only early March now; the planting season has not arrived yet. Planting won't begin until mid-April."
"I see. Many thanks for clearing that up, brother."
Although Lu Feng was an immortal cultivator, he was not very clear on the cultivation of spirit paddy.
Before long, the two of them arrived beside a remote spirit field. The youth pointed to the cracked spirit field before him and said, "This mu of spirit field will be yours from now on. There is a thatched cottage over there; inside the house, you will find ready-to-use spirit tools and spirit seeds."
Lu Feng looked at the cracked spirit field, then glanced at the dilapidated thatched cottage not far away, a ten-thousand-strong herd of imaginary beasts suddenly stampeding through his heart.
Setting aside the thatched cottage for the moment, just this mu of spirit field of his was vastly different from the spirit fields he had seen earlier.
At a glance, his mu of spirit field had clearly been neglected for years, and its location was quite remote, making drawing water a major problem.
Lu Feng took a deep breath, cupped his fists toward the youth, and said, "Very well, I understand. Many thanks for guiding me here, brother."
With that, the youth turned and left directly, leaving Lu Feng standing alone on the earthen ridge, fluttering in the wind in utter disarray.