Students who frequently patronized Yan Xiaosan's snack stall discovered that standing in front of the stall was no longer the refined and unrestrained owner, but a puppet dressed in black with a large tree embroidered on its chest.
Given their level of insight, a careful observation revealed that the puppet was a Fifth-tier Divine Mobility Spirit Puppet known for its high intelligence.
This was not the only stall of its kind.
That's right, including the original location, there were a total of eighteen stalls.
The location of Penglai Market was actually a large open space roughly surrounded by various academies.
To facilitate communication, sparring, resource trading, and recreational entertainment among students, the academies gradually established Penglai Market.
The eighteen stalls were scattered across clever locations throughout Penglai Market. Once you left your academy and went to the market, if you wandered around with a bit of attention, it wouldn't be hard to spot one of these snack stalls.
Judging by the development path of the old stall, without Meng Haize's identity and reputation to attract customers, it would only be possible to gradually accumulate a customer base. However, the business of the past half month had not been in vain; those who had tasted the food before but were unwilling to make a big trip to buy it constituted potential customers as well.
Aside from the original old stall, the business of the other stalls was somewhat desolate for the time being.
...
On the other side of Penglai Market.
"The Divine Mobility Spirit Puppet possesses considerable intelligence. I have given it the command that a single face can only purchase two pieces of Put Chai Ko; it will use its own reasoning to judge this, and ordinary people cannot exploit any loopholes. If anyone causes trouble, even if the Divine Mobility Spirit Puppet is no match for them, it can still record the faces of the troublemakers at that time."
"Those who contact the Divine Mobility Spirit Puppet to trade and buy Put Chai Ko at any of the stalls will temporarily have a faint scent of mine left on them by the puppet. The scent is harmless to humans and will only linger briefly to allow the Divine Mobility Spirit Puppet to distinguish whether this person has bought Put Chai Ko from other stalls, preventing anyone from making repeat purchases."
The exotic fragrance naturally came courtesy of the system.
The Divine Mobility Spirit Puppet worked diligently and conscientiously at its post like a standard worker.
The only slight flaw was that the Divine Mobility Spirit Puppet consumed a bit too much energy. If there were no other accidents, it would be fine, and half of the stock would still remain after a day of operation at each stall.
Mu Jian sat in a restaurant shelling river crabs for Qingshu, occasionally letting his gaze drift past Yan Xiaosan toward the snack stall opposite, as if recalling something, a barely perceptible smile flashing in his depths.
Meng Haize couldn't understand why the boss was worried about the stall's business; Put Chai Ko was already invincible in his eyes!
"Boss, you can rest easy. Both my sister and I have had familiar students and good friends come to try it. I let it slide a few times before, but if they don't come this time, I'll go pay them a visit and beat them up. The Put Chai Ko is bound to sell like wildfire."
Yan Xiaosan poured himself a cup of tea. Most of the people who had previously come to the stall to buy Put Chai Ko were students who had just entered the Penglai Realm and whose cultivation levels were not very high. His satisfaction points mostly came from this batch of students.
As for people like Meng Haize and Mu Jian, who could casually suppress occasional troublemakers with just their aura without even making a move, they were likely elite students from various academies whom he rarely encountered.
His next goal was to grow bigger and stronger.
From the elusive elite students at the top down to the ordinary students who hadn't gotten to eat at his previous, overly scarce stalls.
Satisfaction points, harvest away~
"If you can't suppress your cultivation anymore, go back and make your breakthrough." Mu Jian looked at Meng Haize, who kept talking endlessly, and spoke out of the blue.
Meng Haize: "......"
Give me a break, you just want to drive me away.
Since the conversation had reached this point, Meng Haize couldn't help feeling aggrieved again: "...Isn't it because I'm not ready yet? This bottleneck has trapped me for several years, and my accumulation is so heavy that I don't even dare to imagine how terrifying the lightning tribulation will be."
If it weren't for meeting the boss, without any other opportunities to delay his breakthrough for another few years, it would really be hard to tell whether he could survive.
Yan Xiaosan comforted him, "Fortune favors the kind, you will succeed."
Through their time together over this period, he knew that Meng Haize only looked carefree, but actually held a breath in his heart, desperately seizing every opportunity to strive. Otherwise, why would he have clamored to cling to him right after tasting the Put Chai Ko?
Born into a major family and capable of making a name on the rankings, how could he possibly have no temper at all?
However, Yan Xiaosan didn't believe that Meng Haize had zero confidence; it was probably just that the moment he had anticipated for so many years was finally at hand, leaving him feeling anxious and unsettled within.
Mu Jian casually tossed a bottle of pills to Meng Haize.
Meng Haize caught it clumsily, opened it, and immediately burst into tears. "Wuwuwuwu, Brother Mu, I wronged you. You truly are a great guy. From now on, I will be your beast of burden, go through fire and water for you, and..."
"Scram."
"Will do~"
Meng Haize hugged the bottle of pills like a treasure. If Qingshu weren't still here and might corrupt a child, he would have couldn't help but kiss the jade bottle a few times.
The bottle contained a single pill — a Guoyuan Pill, which Mu Jian had accidentally obtained in a Divine Miracle. Because it was properly preserved, its medicinal efficacy had not been lost, and since he wasn't short on money, he had simply left it sitting in his spatial ring.
It wasn't necessarily that the Guoyuan Pill was exceptionally precious, because it was of little use to ordinary Spiritual Root cultivators or even single-element Water Spiritual Root cultivators, but to a Ocean Abyss Spiritual Physique, it was no less than a divine medicine.
Unofficial histories recorded that the Guoyuan Pill was created by an alchemist who poured their heart and soul into it, specifically for a Daoist companion with an Ocean Abyss Spiritual Physique. However, things did not go as heaven desired; just as they managed to refine a Guoyuan Pill whose medicinal power reached the effect of the Spirit Severing stage, the Evil Clan invaded. At that time, the Daoist companion, possessing Integration Stage cultivation, went to the battlefield to drive back the Evil Clan, winning a tragic victory.
By the time they returned, they could no longer suppress their realm. At that moment, the Guoyuan Pill was merely a drop in the bucket for an Integration Stage cultivator, and they ultimately failed their tribulation, turning to ashes beneath the lightning tribulation. The alchemist also vanished thereafter, leaving no further news.
The formula for the Guoyuan Pill was also lost.
Sensing it carefully, the medicinal power of this Guoyuan Pill should be suitable for Nascent Soul stage cultivators. Although he was only at the Golden Core stage, he had confidence in his own constitution.
Meng Haize finally put away his silly grin and said, "Since the boss doesn't need to tend the stall personally, why don't you come to the Meng Family Academy as a guest with Brother Mu? My sister has had some insights into her cultivation technique recently and has been in secluded meditation, so she hasn't had the chance to thank the boss yet."
"And Qingshu, do you want to learn some awesome stuff? Uncle will pull strings for you!"
Meng Haize's words reminded Yan Xiaosan. Although Qingshu had ancestral inheritance memories and didn't need to worry about cultivation techniques and skills, they were all related to dragons and really shouldn't be displayed in front of people.
If he could truly go and learn just a little bit of the surface, it would already be a huge profit.
Forces capable of establishing academies in the Penglai Realm had even the most superficial scraps that others would drool over if placed in the outside world.
Yan Xiaosan lowered his head and asked Qingshu, "Does Qingshu want to go?"
Qingshu swallowed the crab meat in his mouth, clenched his greasy little hands, and waved them. "Go! Qingshu is going to learn lots and lots of things, and go rob treasure vaults in the future! There are tons of treasures in the treasure vaults!"
Mu Jian: "......"
Meng Haize: "......"
Yan Xiaosan expressionlessly wiped away the crab roe that had been flicked onto his face. From now on, bedtime stories would definitely not include Western ones; they corrupted children.
Eastern ones were always supreme!