Chapter 923: Courtesy Before Force

The life of a Loose Cultivator, compared to those sect disciples, is quite miserable.

One could say they are "three-no" products.

They rely entirely on luck to obtain a bit of Inheritance, and then embark on this path of cultivation; however, most Loose Cultivators are considered to be of Heterodox Paths.

Wanting to attain the Dao is truly very difficult; those who can cultivate to the Refining Spirit Realm and achieve a Primordial Spirit possess either exceptional talent or the good fortune of receiving an Immortal's Inheritance.

But reaching this step is almost the limit for a Loose Cultivator.

To break through to the Earth Immortal Realm, one must survive the Thunder Tribulation.

And as for this Thunder Tribulation, ninety-nine percent of these "three-no" Loose Cultivators cannot survive it.

Therefore, many cultivators, once they reach the Refining Spirit Realm, dare not make another move.

"Bao Dating" is the same, but he has ambition; he wants to break through to the Earth Immortal Realm, for after all, once he breaks through, he will have ten thousand years of lifespan.

So, in reality, he has also begun to harbor such thoughts.

He naturally knows that taking on a master is extremely difficult.

Those are powerhouses who are close to or already at the Golden Immortal level; for such powerhouses to take on a disciple, it must be one in ten thousand among cultivation geniuses.

He prides himself on being a genius, but he also has some self-awareness; compared to those Peerless geniuses, he is just an ordinary person among the masses.

Yet he is unwilling to give up; no matter what, he must try.

He has already sent people to inquire about that Qiyuan Sect.

"Teacher, those people seem to be discussing you and the senior," Wei Liangqing said with a smile in the private room of the restaurant.

Hearing this, Zhang Liang did not care in the slightest.

Over these past few years in the Xiao Nanyu of Nanzhan Buzhou, he had already grown accustomed to it; he had been to many places and heard people discussing him and Su Fan.

The reason for this was the good deeds the two of them had done over these years, or rather, the deeds he had done.

It had been ten or twenty years since they arrived in Nanzhan Buzhou.

He had spent a few years at the Qiyuan Sect, arranging all of the dozens of mortal towns under the Qiyuan Sect, and had spent several years promoting Su Fan's agricultural techniques and the like.

In just five short years, the population growth rate of those mortal towns had increased rapidly.

It is estimated that in less than twenty years, the population will have nearly doubled, if not more.

And the disciples of the Qiyuan Sect had also been continuously taking in apprentices and expanding over these years, plus, because he and Su Fan would occasionally offer guidance to the disciples below.

In these few years, three people had broken through to the Earth Immortal Realm.

So even though they had left, the strength of the Qiyuan Sect was actually even greater than before.

Today, the Qiyuan Sect has about 1,500 disciples; of course, most of the disciples have only just reached Foundation Establishment and are still at the stage of Refining Essence into Qi.

But the original group of disciples had improved their cultivation very quickly over these years.

During the few years they were stationed at the Qiyuan Sect, the Qiyuan Sect disciples had all made rapid progress.

Now that they had left, the Qiyuan Sect was capable of protecting their current foundation and territory.

After leaving the Qiyuan Sect, Zhang Liang did not choose to station himself in other sects, but instead chose the simplest and most brutal method.

That was to go directly to those sects and have them dispatch disciples to help him promote these agricultural techniques.

After all, it was impossible to rely on just the few of them to promote it; even with the Qiyuan Sect added, it was not enough.

So the best way was to let the sects in various places promote it together.

Therefore, Zhang Liang went to the sects in various places; for those sects with Earth Immortal or Heavenly Immortal Realm experts, he alone was enough.

He used courtesy before force, first visiting the Sect Leaders of these sects, then bringing out the agricultural techniques, and using his silver tongue to persuade these Sect Leaders.

Of course, this process was not so smooth.

The sects here in Nanzhan Buzhou are different from the Imperial Court.

The officials of the Imperial Court are accustomed to being high and mighty; although officials sometimes ignore the life and death of the local commoners.

They also worry that if the local area falls into ruin, once an investigation comes from above, they can forget about their official positions—even their lives will be finished.

Furthermore, as officials, many want to climb higher; besides connections, they need sufficient merit. The military has military merit, and local areas have the merit of governing a region.

Therefore, the Imperial Court—and thus the local officials—might not care much about the commoners at the bottom, but at least if they can increase the farmland tax, they are naturally very happy.

They are also willing to promote it, because the more grain in the fields, the more they can collect, and when they hand it over to the Imperial Court, that is merit.

But the sects of Nanzhan Buzhou are different.

They do not care about the commoners at the bottom; as long as there is no large-scale death, they do not care at all, even if some starve to death.

After all, there are so many commoners under their sects that even if they lose ten or twenty percent, many sects remain indifferent.

They are high and mighty; how could they consider the commoners at the bottom? In their eyes, commoners are essentially no different from pigs and dogs.

No matter how sharp Zhang Liang's silver tongue was, it was very difficult to make these high-and-mighty cultivators waste time to benefit the commoners.

Although Zhang Liang also brought up the benefits after this promotion.

But for these cultivators who had not even reached the Golden Immortal level, they did not understand the theory of Qi of Luck.

Since they did not understand much, they naturally did not believe Zhang Liang's words very much.

As for the population increase allowing them to recruit more disciples, they cared even less about that.

After all, these sects have limited resources, and the high-level members of the sects, in particular, are often unwilling to recruit disciples from the outside.

After all, they have their own descendants; recruiting disciples from the outside only increases the competition for their own descendants.

Resources are fixed; the more "commoner" disciples from the outside there are, the fewer resources their own descendants will have.

This is something every sect needs to consider.

Sect Leaders generally try to balance the two; many internal conflicts in sects often stem from this, as internal competition grows increasingly fierce.

And when the Sect Leader cannot balance the interests involved, it ultimately leads to civil war.

Yet the Sect Leader was unable to balance the interests within, ultimately leading to a civil war.

Therefore, Zhang Liang used these two points to lobby those sects, and the final result goes without saying.

It was not that he was beaten and thrown out of the mountain gates; just kidding, Zhang Liang was at least at the Heavenly Immortal cultivation level, so many sects needed to treat him with courtesy.

Even if they disliked him, on the surface, they all maintained an amicable appearance.

So Zhang Liang failed in his first step; if he could not persuade them with words, then he could only change his method, which was his fists.

Courtesy first, force later; if he spoke to you nicely and you did not listen, then he would use his fists to beat you until you listened.

He was a Heavenly Immortal, and among Heavenly Immortals, his combat power was the most outstanding, even capable of fighting against the True Immortal Realm.

How could those sects below the True Immortal Realm withstand his fists?

After a round of "friendly" exchanges, those sects were passively persuaded and could only act according to his wishes.