"Temporarily safe."
Beneath the moonlight, Lu Ming's grass-form stretched out in the soft glow, silently sensing the changes in his body. With spiritual energy now accumulated within his grassy frame, he felt much more agile.
However, the usable spiritual energy was still far too meager, rendering the various wondrous techniques in the *Mystic Heaven Spirit-Attachment Record* practically useless. Still, he had finally taken the first step; all that remained was to quietly wait.
The next morning, atop the precipitous cliff.
Lu Ming's body swayed in the morning breeze, his green leaves unfurled as droplets of sunlight fell upon his blades, rising and falling with his breath.
Three hours later, he finished practicing the *Mystic Heaven Spirit-Attachment Technique*. Feeling the pitifully small amount of spiritual energy inside him, he let out a silent sigh.
"The share I receive is still too small. If I want to move around freely, I'm afraid I'll need to accumulate enough spiritual energy for the Qi Refining 1st Layer. Relying solely on Wang Ran is still too slow; I need to find more seed-bearers."
He calculated silently in his mind, then wriggled his roots, bringing the small white porcelain bottle he had hidden in the soil right in front of him.
"Vegetation cannot use human cultivation techniques to raise its cultivation level, and the *Mystic Heaven Induction Chapter* is useless to me either. But the spiritual energy of plant spirits can increase naturally in places rich in spiritual Qi. If I'm not mistaken, the liquid in this bottle should have some effect on me. I just need to test it to see if this item is truly the Heaven-Averting Bottle."
Pondering this, he swayed his flexible body and easily nudged the bottle cap off with two of his leaves.
Inside the small white porcelain bottle lay a single drop of milky-white liquid.
"It took nearly a week to condense just a single drop of liquid. I hope the results don't disappoint me."
Using his roots to wriggle, he pulled up a wild grass growing nearby. Then, he cautiously tipped the porcelain bottle over.
The milky-white liquid trickled out of the bottle's mouth and onto the wild grass, emitting a soft white glow. Yet, the bead-like liquid did not dissolve, nor did the wild grass show any sign of its age increasing.
"Is this... not the Heaven-Averting Bottle?"
Lu Ming felt a pang of disappointment. He lowered a green leaf and tried to drag the wild grass, coaxing the white dewdrops to slide toward its roots.
This time, it seemed to have a certain effect. The roots of the wild grass began to grow slowly, and the vitality that had been fading started to revive gradually. Then, the roots wriggled and burrowed into the soil.
As the white liquid gradually vanished, the wild grass actually began to grow, continuing its strange transformation until late in the evening.
Upon close inspection, Lu Ming discovered that apart from having much stronger vitality, the wild grass seemed little changed. Its age had not increased, nor had it undergone any mutation.
"Experiment number one seems to have failed. The liquid in this small bottle doesn't have the special effect of forcing accelerated ripening, but it does possess the function of bringing plants back from the brink of death and enhancing their vitality."
Feeling somewhat disappointed, he capped the porcelain bottle once more and settled down to wait for the next drop of liquid to form.
Hengyue Sword Sect, Outer Disciple Living Quarters.
Rows of small grey-tiled courtyards were arranged along the mountainside, not far from a patch of thriving spirit grain.
Having just joined the sect, Wang Ran underwent the tedious admission registration, after which he was issued one low-grade Spirit Stone, a bag of spirit grain seeds, a Storage Bag, and an Outer Disciple identity token. Inside the Storage Bag was also a jade slip titled *Basic Spirit Planting Training*, along with the fundamental cultivation techniques of the Hengyue Sword Sect.
"Although outer disciples don't have to squeeze into large shared dormitories like chores disciples do, we do have designated living areas. One small courtyard per person—oh, and the housing is free.
The instructions on how to use the Storage Bag have already been given to you. Inside are the basic cultivation methods of my Hengyue Sword Sect, used for cultivating spiritual energy. There is also a jade slip meant exclusively for spirit planters, which records the techniques required for several types of spirit plants; you need to master them as quickly as possible. Once you're proficient, you can go to the steward's shop to select a plot of spirit fields and begin cultivating and planting spirit grain.
Considering your shallow cultivation, the sect has a rule: the corresponding quota for your first-year harvest is waived, but starting from the second year, you must hand over 150 catties of spirit grain to the sect annually. Of course, any surplus spirit grain can also be sold to the sect in exchange for sect contribution points, which you can use to acquire whatever you need."
With the moon shining brightly overhead, the courtyard was quiet.
Wang Ran sat cross-legged alone in the courtyard, absorbing the surrounding spiritual Qi.
A short while later, he opened his eyes.
"The basic cultivation techniques of the Hengyue Sword Sect are not difficult, but even at the same introductory level, their effect is still inferior to the *Mystic Heaven Induction Chapter* bestowed upon me by Master."
He murmured softly, looking up at the moon, suddenly feeling a wave of nostalgia for the days of cultivating on the cliff.
After his entire family relocated to Sihaicheng, Wang Ran had come to the Hengyue Sword Sect alone to report for duty. Following his master's plan, he had chosen the path of a spirit planter.
In Lu Ming's words, "Among the six arts of immortal cultivation, spirit planting has the lowest risk and quite decent returns."
He was an absolute novice at cultivation, and now he bore the burden of revitalizing the Wang Family; playing it safe was never a bad thing.
As for the various rules of the outer sect, he had already figured most of them out. On the whole, it wasn't too bad. Days were fairly relaxed—he neither had endless chores to grind through every day like a chores disciple, nor did he have to constantly deal with tasks assigned by the sect like an inner disciple.
Outer disciples were more like contract workers: the sect rented out a portion of the spirit fields to the outer disciples, and the outer disciples were responsible for farming them. The yield was split on a three-seventy basis. Oh, and the seventy percent belonged to the sect.
Of course, outer disciples naturally couldn't enjoy the many benefits available to inner disciples. Everything required resources to trade for—such as better cultivation techniques, sword arts, and pills, all of which had to be exchanged using contribution points. Techniques that only core disciples could access couldn't even be obtained with contribution points.
Still, it didn't matter. In his master's words, "Joining an immortal cultivation sect is actually about standing upon that platform. Only by standing on that platform can you access the true circles belonging to cultivators. Things like these are completely beyond the reach of early-stage rogue cultivators. Take cultivation techniques, pills, talismans, various secret arts, and artifact-crafting inheritances, for instance. For rogue cultivators, obtaining such things is immensely difficult, but once you join a sect, acquiring them becomes much simpler. Furthermore, you gain access to more opportunities for growth, such as trade fairs, secret realms, and shops operated exclusively by cultivators. Naturally, if you want to grow quickly, relying solely on the sect's meager resources is not enough, but once you've firmly planted your feet, I will teach you these things slowly."
His master's earnest teachings felt as vivid as if they were happening right now, yet it was a pity they could not meet in person.
"With Master's capabilities, for him to still be willing to pour his heart into a minor cultivator like me—Master has truly been exceptionally kind to me."
He smiled with a hint of pride, then took out the *Basic Spirit Planting Training* jade slip from the Storage Bag, pressed it against his forehead, and sank his consciousness into it.
Suddenly, a massive wave of knowledge surged into his mind like a reversed torrent. His vision went dark, and he nearly passed out. It took him quite a long time to regain clarity, and various pieces of information regarding spirit plants began to surface in his mind.
" *Minor Cloud and Rain Spell*: a foundational technique for spirit plants, which uses spiritual energy to drive surrounding water vapor into spiritual rain to pour over spirit plants, allowing them to grow rapidly, sprout, and flourish with vitality."
" *Geomantic Qi Spell*: nourishes spirit plants with the energy of the earth's veins, keeping them nutrient-rich and accelerating their growth."
" *Geng Metal Sword Qi*: a basic offensive spell that condenses sword Qi to eliminate pests."
"There are actually three free spirit planting spells; that saves me quite a bit of effort. It's just that my strength is still shallow right now, and I'm afraid cultivating these basic spells will be an uphill battle. I'll master the Minor Cloud and Rain Spell first, and plant the spirit grain seeds tomorrow. That will count as establishing a basic foothold. Once that's done, I can contact Master. I am so unaccustomed to days without Master's guidance. Wang Ran, you can do it."
He encouraged himself inwardly, then closed his eyes once more, silently practicing according to the cultivation path inscribed on the jade slip.
"Talk about a total workaholic, tsk tsk."
Observing all of this, Lu Ming muttered to himself with a quiet sense of amusement.