Chapter 344: Competition Team

Hearing Zhang Yu's question, Zhang Pianpian was slightly stunned and said, "In this world, who doesn't need money?"

"I am indeed scraping together some money. Although I'm still a bit short, it shouldn't take long to gather the full amount."

Upon hearing Zhang Pianpian's reply, Zhang Yu thought to himself, "It can't be that she's short exactly 50 spirit coins, can it?"

But he wasn't sure whether the 50 spirit coins reflected by the Dao Seed were related to the money Zhang Pianpian was gathering, and he couldn't bring himself to ask, so he could only bury his doubts deep in his heart for now.

At the same time, Zhang Yu also felt that his own spirit coins were becoming increasingly insufficient.

"Sigh, as expected, spirit and flesh must merge. I'll try it myself first, and if I can't manage it, I'll spend the money."

Over the next few days, the four of them went about their studies, cultivation, and work as usual, as if nothing had happened.

That day, Zhang Yu was still practicing his breathing technique in the cemetery as usual.

After these days of hard training, he had already completed the seventh breathing technique of the Qi Meridian Eternal Flow and was now practicing the eighth—the Spirit Attraction Body Tempering Art.

At that moment, his mana circulated, and dense spiritual energy flowed through his meridians, constantly dispersing to silently temper his muscles and tendons.

During his time working and cultivating in the cemetery, since he spent more time each day meditating and practicing breathing techniques, he had specifically chosen a breathing technique that could temper his muscles and tendons during practice, so as not to fall too far behind in his body refinement progress.

But as he practiced the seventh and eighth breathing techniques, he could also feel his cultivation efficiency slowing down.

And this slowness… was not due to the environment or any change in his condition; it was simply because the breathing techniques Zhang Yu was practicing had grown increasingly difficult.

"But there's nothing to be done about it."

Zhang Yu sighed inwardly, "There are only over a dozen breathing techniques in the Qi Meridian Eternal Flow set. The simplest ones have already been mastered by me, and the rest are quite complex. Each one takes a considerable amount of time to cycle through a full round."

"At this rate, even for me, it will probably take half a month, or even a full month, to raise a single breathing technique to level 20."

Zhang Yu knew that if anyone heard his lament, they might want to beat him up.

But for someone accustomed to rapidly leveling up his skills, taking a month to master a technique to level 20 was indeed somewhat disappointing.

After a long while, Zhang Yu felt that the medicinal power from his last dose had been fully consumed, so he slowly withdrew his practice and took a moment to check the accumulated messages in his eye socket.

First, he replied to the group pill-sharing information in the dorm chat, then skimmed through some assignment messages from the class group.

After that came all sorts of miscellaneous messages from various groups.

There was a forging group that Ye Xingli from the Artifact Refining Department had pulled him into, where two factions were arguing over which brand of leg tendon artifact was better, Diamond Mystic Forge or Celestial Craft.

There was also bad news from the Songyang hometown group: a student from a Water Prefecture Demon Descendant Vocational College, trying to save money by not taking medicine and forcing himself to stay up all night, had suffered a cardiac arrest and nearly died. Now he was borrowing money in the group to buy energy capsules so he could stay up late in peace.

Chu Qiuhe from Diamond University: No borrowing money in the group; first warning, second time you're out.

Xiong Wenwu from Celestial Demon University: We're all fellow townsmen. He just wants to borrow a little money to stay awake—do we have to be so strict?

Chu Qiuhe from Diamond University: If you don't have money, go to sleep.

Another demon descendant student jumped in and replied: "Telling a college student to sleep every day—what's the difference between that and telling him to die? He's a college student. He just doesn't want to sleep; he wants to get up and study. What's wrong with that?"

Chu Qiuhe from Diamond University: Who knows if it's a scam? If you're so poor you can't even afford the money to stay up late, what's the point of cultivating immortality?

Glancing briefly at the argument in the group, Zhang Yu turned his attention to the other accumulated messages.

Then he noticed that Cong Na from the competition team had sent him a message.

Cong Na: Everyone else in the team has agreed. I'm sending you the competition materials and adding you to the group.

Zhang Yu first accepted the competition materials, skimmed through them, then accepted the invitation to join the group.

Zhang Yu: Hello everyone, I'm new here. Please take care of me, seniors.

Cong Na: Welcome.

Ma Xuan: Welcome aboard.

Zhang Yu greeted them, but aside from Cong Na and Ma Xuan, no third person welcomed him, and their chat was quickly buried by new messages.

Zhang Yu took a look and saw that three other people in the group were deeply engrossed in a heated discussion about Dao techniques, with lines of text flying by rapidly, filling the entire chat box.

Zhang Yu also checked the profiles of the other five people in the group besides himself.

He noticed that except for Cong Na, who only showed her class rank as fifth, the others displayed their department rankings as well.

Among them, Ma Xuan was ranked 35th in the department, and the remaining three were around the 40s to 50s.

Including Zhang Yu, a total of six people made up one competition team.

Zhang Yu also checked their academic years and found that at most they were fifth-year university students.

Zhang Yu understood that being able to break into the top 50 of the entire department at this stage clearly meant these few were elite study geniuses of the Civil Engineering Department.

"No wonder nobody paid me any attention."

Zhang Yu completely understood this; after all, it was normal for high-ranking students to even humiliate low-ranking students, and ignoring low-ranking students... that was actually quite polite.

Just then, one of the students named Bu Ziran posted a short video showing a lung Dharma Body that had just been unboxed.

Bu Ziran: The latest model of lung Dharma Body from Ten Thousand Paths Artisan Sect—just by breathing, you can accumulate and refine lung-metal sword qi.

Bu Ziran: Subscribe to Ten Thousand Paths Artisan Sect's monthly service, and there are 23 more types of sword qi you can swap in.

Bu Ziran: Got it for 18.88 spirit coins.

When Zhang Yu saw the price, he wanted to say it was expensive, but then another student named Yang Yan replied: That's cheap—did you get a discount?

Bu Ziran: I have an uncle who works at Ten Thousand Paths Artisan Sect; I bought it at the internal price this time.

Watching the subsequent chat about Dharma Bodies, medicines, Dao techniques, and magical artifacts, Zhang Yu thought about the brick of flour he had desperately snatched not long ago, and he felt increasingly out of place in this group—unable to participate in any of these topics.

And seeing that these fourth- and fifth-year study geniuses in the group hadn't even ranked in the top 20 of the department, Zhang Yu sighed inwardly: "That old geezer Starfire True Person... he told me to transfer to the Artifact Refining Department after joining Civil Engineering—does he know how hard it is to switch majors in university now?"

"To climb into the top 20 of the department before the end of the third year... difficult."

Zhang Yu knew that to surpass middle- and upper-year students with comprehensive scores while still in the lower years, he would need to study middle- and upper-year courses in advance.

This required not only terrifying talent but also a huge amount of money.

And someone like Ji Yuanshu in his class was a prodigy aiming to transfer.

Zhang Yu had gradually figured out the typical cultivation plans of transfer prodigies over this period.

"Freshman and sophomore years are basically still about building the foundation, pushing basic stats to the peak of Foundation Establishment."

"Junior year starts with advance study, using the Spirit Realm to accelerate, finishing a large number of the department's upper-year courses ahead of time, and passing the exams."

"Finally, in that junior year, accumulate a lot of comprehensive scores to push the ranking to the top 50 level—only then can you transfer."

"And transferring from Civil Engineering to Artifact Refining is even more demanding—you have to break into at least the top 20."

Zhang Yu thought to himself: "That old geezer Starfire might have been away from university for too long."

"And my sister thinks... even if I can't do it, I could switch to Artifact Refining in graduate school."

"But..." Zhang Yu's gaze sharpened as he made a painful decision: "I want to enter the Ten Great Sects, and I need to hurry... to get into the Ten Great Sects before their entry channels close."

"And the Ten Great Sects don't accept Civil Engineering."

Zhang Yu thought: "I have to join the Artifact Refining Department earlier and start studying Artifact Refining content sooner."

"Switching to Artifact Refining in graduate school... that's too slow, way too slow."

Looking at the rankings of Ma Xuan and the others, Zhang Yu felt a renewed sense of urgency and seized the time to continue cultivating.

But the medicinal effect from the last dose had already worn off, and his breathing efficiency was much lower now.

So Zhang Yu decided to use this time, before taking the next dose, to attempt the unity of spirit and flesh.

"According to Teacher Feng Jiu in the Dao Heart class, the realm of mind method operation... operating 24 hours a day is just the foundation."

"Above that is the realm of semi-instinct."

"And above semi-instinct is the realm of completely instinctual unity of spirit and flesh."

Zhang Yu felt the mind method operating in his mind and recalled the feeling back on the first floor when the building collapsed and his body was buried, entering a state of suspended animation.

"Back then, to outsiders I seemed completely unconscious, but in reality I held onto the last thread of survival."

"At that time I wasn't thinking about anything, wasn't pondering anything—I only felt myself in a dark world of consciousness, using the full activation of my body to sustain the regeneration of my flesh and blood."

"This state of maintaining the last trace of clarity in the mind is about the level of semi-instinct."

"And the state of unity of spirit and flesh is one where, even if you truly lose consciousness and fall into a complete coma, the mind method continues to operate, just like breathing."

Zhang Yu tried to activate the suspended-animation state of Spring Autumn Boundless Zen, constantly wiping away the distracting thoughts in his heart.

But no matter how he tried to eliminate the many thoughts in his mind, he would always leave behind that one final thought, preserving his last sliver of clarity.

"It really is hard," Zhang Yu thought to himself. "Losing consciousness while still maintaining the circulation of the mental method... This damn well isn't something a human should be doing."

In the following days, whenever Zhang Yu had time during his cultivation, he would attempt to enter the state of unity between spirit and flesh.

Although he never succeeded, he could still feel that the circulation of the mental method had become slightly smoother.

In particular, each time he tried to enter that state where only the last sliver of thought remained in his mind, the speed at which he entered it grew faster and faster.

As time passed quickly, it was soon the beginning of June.

It had been over a month since Zhang Yu first set foot on the cemetery project.

During this month, with the initial support from Wang Zong and later the daily tiger-wolf medicine, as well as the cemetery's unique environment, Zhang Yu's mana still made great progress, surging to 661.3.

As the mana value grew, the efficiency of its quality improvement slowed, but it still reached 168%.

With the constant circulation of the mental method, his Dao heart also steadily improved, reaching level 14 (64.8%).

Because he had focused on breathing exercises these days, his physical strength lacked training time, only increasing to level 15.18.

The Gangqi conduction rate and maximum conduction distance also steadily increased along with the basic values, reaching 42% and 44 meters.

On this day, Ma Xuan contacted Zhang Yu again, inviting him to participate in the competition team's integration training.