Chapter 19: The Rich Dog

By the afternoon, he returned to Wuchao Town and went straight to the grain shop in town.

The shopkeeper looked at the four sacks he was carrying on his shoulder, his eyes lit up, and he asked: "Little Immortal Master Liu, is this spirit rice?"

Liu Xiaolou put down the sacks: "Shopkeeper, weigh it."

The shopkeeper was beaming with joy, immediately calling two assistants to weigh it, asking: "Little Immortal Master, you came early this year, the first one! Is this spirit rice from Eyang Mountain?"

Liu Xiaolou watched the two assistants weigh the sacks and said to the shopkeeper: "Besides Eyang Mountain, where else in Xiangxi is there spirit rice?"

Soon, the weighing was finished, totaling three hundred and twenty-eight catties and six taels. This was Liu Xiaolou's harvest from six days of hard work.

"I'll take the fraction, keep three hundred catties. Shopkeeper, give me a price," Liu Xiaolou said. Spirit rice, well, just tasting it is enough. He was all alone, not from a cultivation family, and didn't have the fortune to eat spirit rice as a staple. Three hundred catties of spirit rice, how long would that take to eat? He couldn't digest it all in half a year. Staying on the mountain every day guarding this spirit rice and eating it meal by meal was too time-consuming. Was he still going to work?

"Same as usual, one hundred catties of spirit rice for one hundred and sixty taels of silver..."

"I don't want silver, I want spirit stones. Shopkeeper, I know you have them. You can't use this stuff anyway, just exchange it for me."

"Hehe... spirit stones are not easy to get..."

"Same as Eyang Mountain, one hundred pounds of spirit rice for one spirit stone."

"Hehe, Little Immortal Master, are you bullying me for not being a cultivator? Although I don't understand cultivation, I understand the market. What you're talking about is the penalty at Eyang Mountain, not the market price."

"Then... two spirit stones in total, plus one hundred taels of silver! My spirit rice is the first harvest, fresh!"

"Little Immortal Master is joking. Three hundred catties of spirit rice, the market price is one and a half spirit stones. Of course, there's no such thing as half a spirit stone, I'll make up two hundred taels of pure silver for you."

"Shopkeeper, my teacher just ascended to immortality, leaving me alone in the world, without any relatives..."

"This, what does this have to do with your teacher ascending..."

After some negotiation, Liu Xiaolou finally left all three hundred catties of spirit rice in the grain shop, exchanging them for two spirit stones. This price was actually quite good. The shopkeeper looked at the twenty-plus catties of spirit rice left in his bag and asked: "Not selling anymore?"

Liu Xiaolou laughed: "The rice I worked hard to harvest myself, I should at least taste what it tastes like. Speaking of which, it's shameful. I've harvested spirit rice twice, but I've never eaten it properly, and I don't know what it tastes like."

The shopkeeper nodded: "That's true."

Just as he was about to deliver it, a group of people crowded around a young master and squeezed over, pushing Liu Xiaolou to the side.

Liu Xiaolou was about to get angry, but saw one of the young master's followers sneer and show him half a long sword. The other half was still in the scabbard, but it was already emitting a frost-like sword light.

Liu Xiaolou's anger was instantly extinguished, and he had to step aside again.

The young master didn't look at him directly, but asked the shopkeeper with interest: "Yo? First harvest spirit rice? This is rare? Does your Xiangxi also produce spirit rice?"

The shopkeeper immediately greeted him with a smiling face: "This young master has an extraordinary bearing. May I ask where you come from?"

Someone answered for him: "My master is from the Ouyang clan of Yuezhou. We are passing through here. Don't think we are easy to bully. Do your business honestly, and there will be benefits for you!"

The shopkeeper was surprised: "So it's the young master of Lianxi Hall. This old man pays his respects! This is spirit rice from Eyang Mountain in Xiangxi, with the deepest spiritual roots. Is the young master interested?"

The young master asked: "Eyang Mountain?"

The person who had just shown his sword whispered: "Young Master, we cannot delay, we must travel overnight."

The young master nodded and said: "Then we won't go to Eyang Mountain, take all of these back."

Liu Xiaolou couldn't hold back anymore: "This is my rice!"

The shopkeeper said: "You already sold it to me just now."

Liu Xiaolou said: "You haven't paid the spirit stones yet."

The young master was impatient with their argument and asked Liu Xiaolou: "How much did you sell it to him for?"

Liu Xiaolou replied: "He only gave two spirit stones, I was just hesitating."

The young master glanced at the four sacks and nodded: "That's the price."

The shopkeeper said to Liu Xiaolou: "Look, my shop is the most fair..."

Before he finished speaking, the young master said to Liu Xiaolou: "I'll give you three." After saying this, he swayed away and continued strolling along the street.

The servants behind him carried away the four sacks, and the follower who had shown his sword came over, threw three spirit stones to Liu Xiaolou, and followed closely behind.

Liu Xiaolou looked at their retreating backs and sighed: "Rich dog!"

The shopkeeper nodded: "The Ouyang clan of Yuezhou, indeed a rich family, rich beyond measure..."

Liu Xiaolou felt all over his body and finally took out the remaining twenty taels of silver and placed it on the counter: "Shopkeeper, thank you."

The shopkeeper laughed: "Just a coincidence."

Liu Xiaolou suddenly felt a bit regretful: "I should have kept two catties, I haven't eaten it myself yet."

The shopkeeper said: "It's only natural that farmers can't eat their own rice! Just eat ordinary rice honestly. Here, twenty catties, also new rice, enough for you to eat for a month."

Although he didn't get to eat his own rice, Liu Xiaolou was still very happy. He returned to Wulong Mountain, sat for a while in Uncle Tian's room, didn't hear any news, and then returned home to Gan Zhu Ling.

He put one catty of new rice into the pot and boiled a large pot of rice porridge, which was fragrant and mouth-watering.

The great white goose flapped its wings and rushed over, holding a fat fish and throwing it into the pot, circling around Liu Xiaolou's feet, as happy as if it were a festival. This time the fat fish's internal organs had been removed. Could it actually dissect fish now?

Liu Xiaolou served it a basin of fish porridge. Man and goose sat around the stove, slurping and gorging themselves, eating very happily!

A slight regret was that he didn't eat spirit rice. Of course, the spiritual energy contained in spirit rice was very little. Even if he ate a large pot, only a tiny bit would be converted into true qi, which was almost useless for cultivation. This kind of thing had to be used as a substitute for ordinary rice for a long time, and only after accumulating over time could it be beneficial. For a destitute person like Liu Xiaolou, it was undoubtedly a luxury.

So Liu Xiaolou didn't care. After all, the three spirit stones in his hand were the right path for cultivation.

A poor family couldn't keep surplus wealth. Liu Xiaolou didn't want to delay for a moment and immediately entered a state of cultivation.

He operated the Three Mystical Arts, extracting the spiritual energy from the spirit stones in his palm bit by bit, refining it into pure internal energy in his meridians, and surging it to the second acupoint of the Hand Jueyin Meridian—Tianquan, constantly striking the acupoint gate.

Liu Xiaolou didn't know how other sects' techniques opened up meridians, but his Three Mystical Sect's technique was like this: a process of grinding, time and time again, with perseverance. It naturally contained various changes, sometimes light, sometimes heavy, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes like a thin stream, sometimes like a storm.

It seemed to have no rules, but it had a consistent purpose of cultivation: all methods of cultivation were based on responding to the various feedback from the acupoint gate being struck, and according to the various feelings brought by the feedback, different striking strategies were applied.

Therefore, practicing the Three Mystical Arts wasn't boring at all, but rather very interesting, even making people indulge in it and unable to extricate themselves. ===== CHAPTER 20 =====