Chapter 48: Ancient Wu Spirit Heaven-Connecting Sword Gourd

"Today is your first day taking over our family's shop, acting as a female shopkeeper. How does it feel?" the middle-aged male cultivator asked his daughter with a smile.

"Feels pretty good," the young female cultivator said. "Oh, Father, I just closed a deal too. A little schoolboy just bought a thousand yellow gourd seeds from me. Plus three first-grade Golden Silk Blueberry spirit fruits."

"My daughter's impressive—closing her first deal this early. Ha ha, how many spirit stones did you make?" the middle-aged man asked.

"A thousand gourd seeds, plus three Golden Silk Blueberry spirit fruits. I gave her a small discount. Earned forty-eight spirit stones." The young female cultivator smiled.

"Not bad. That's fine." The middle-aged male cultivator nodded approvingly. "By the way, I'm going to check the secret vault in the back. Watch the front business well."

"Go ahead, Father." The young female cultivator waved with a smile.

The middle-aged male cultivator walked into the rear courtyard, then opened a stone wall inside the main room of the rear courtyard. He followed the steps down into another secret chamber sealed layer by layer with formations. This secret chamber held only a single transparent glazed sealing box.

Inside the box floated a single seed.

If the female cultivator out front were to see it, she would immediately exclaim: "Why does this seed look so much like a yellow gourd seed?"

Moreover, besides resembling a yellow gourd seed, this seed's shell also faintly bore extremely faint sword Qi flowing across it.

The middle-aged man stood there, gazing through the box at the seed inside the sealing box from a distance of some ten steps.

After a long while, he could not help saying: "Tell me—are you, or are you not, that ancient Wu Spirit Tongtian Sword Gourd depicted in the mural?"

It turned out this tightly sealed seed was a trophy from one of the middle-aged man's expeditions. In some hidden cavern deep beneath a great mountain, he had discovered a set of extremely ancient stone-cave murals.

There were twelve stone caves in total.

Each stone cave contained ten murals.

In the largest and oldest of those stone caves, the middle-aged man had found a stone box set into a stone wall, and inside that box was hidden a single seed.

It was the very one before his eyes.

On the stone wall where this seed had been hidden, there was a mural depicting an ancient Wu Spirit. Beneath that ancient Wu Spirit's feet, four ancient Wu characters were inscribed: Tongtian Sword Gourd.

He stood in silence for a long while longer, but the seed gave him no response.

The middle-aged man could only turn and leave the secret chamber.

Just after he left, on the skin of the seed floating inside the transparent box, faint, barely perceptible cracks suddenly appeared, and a tiny fragment flaked off from the seed.

Su Jin timed it perfectly, running to her seat.

She had just sat down when Instructor Liu arrived.

She had almost been late.

The moment Instructor Liu arrived, his expression stern, he told all the schoolchildren: "Recently the clan school is investigating all sorts of items of unknown origin. If any of you are carrying something from the black market, or something of unclear background given to you by so-and-so, you must hand it over.

In a moment, the entire clan school will be searched by the instructors led by the vice principal.

Every cabinet in every classroom must be opened for the instructors to inspect.

So either report it yourselves, or wait until the instructors dig it out—then there'll be no mercy, and you'll definitely be severely punished.

Also, let me remind you once more. Do not casually consume items from the black market.

Otherwise, once the clan school discovers it and investigates any malicious consequences, you will be expelled without exception.

Is that clear?"

"Clear." The schoolchildren answered in unison.

After Su Jin finished shouting, she thought to herself: yesterday leaving the premises required an inspection, today there's a full sweep.

Looks like the banned-drug aftereffects are quite serious?

The clan school takes this seriously!!

Instructor Liu had just finished teaching the basic cultivation knowledge class.

Vice Principal Su Jiuniang walked in with a dozen or so instructors.

"Search. All schoolchildren must stay in your seats. When we tell you to open your cabinets, then you may get up."

Then with a wave of her hand, the instructors who had followed her in began searching the entire classroom, inside and out.

Including the schoolchildren's bookbags, baskets, and the schoolchildren themselves.

This search was extremely thorough.

Almost no blind spots left.

The First Classroom had no issues.

Next was the Second Classroom.

And the result…

"I don't know why this thing would appear in my cabinet. I clearly didn't have it when I left yesterday afternoon." Qi Yi's face was full of the bewilderment of being wrongly accused.

No one had expected anyone to plant an item of unknown origin in her cabinet.

The question was, how had the person managed to put it there?

And another thing—why pick her?

Su Jiuniang, thoroughly annoyed, took her away.

The Third Classroom had only three people, the fewest cabinets to open, and there were no issues either.

Once the vice principal in charge of the search and the group of instructors had left.

Su Wuji could not help asking Su Jin and Su Cheng beside him: "Do you think Qi Yi was wrongly accused?"

"Hard to say," Su Cheng said. "Maybe she's a thief crying 'stop thief,' or maybe she really was wrongly accused."

"How is what you said any different from saying nothing?" Su Wuji said angrily.

"At least I said something sincere," Su Cheng said.

Su Wuji: "…"

"Su Jin, what do you think?" Su Cheng asked Su Jin.

"I'm not a professional investigator—how could I possibly know whether she was really wrongly accused or not?" Su Jin thought for a moment, then added, "But I think now that she's been taken away, it'll probably won't be so easy for her to climb back into the top ten in the future."

"What do you mean?" Su Cheng was puzzled.

"She is an outsider surname, yet she got dragged into this case. The instructors in the Clan Academy will no longer hold any good impression of her. Even if she is not expelled, she likely will no longer be counted in the rankings. That is to say, even if she continues to stay in the Clan Academy, she should lose her qualification as an Outer Sect disciple.

After all, this is the Su Clan Academy. Who would recommend an outsider surname disciple with questionable conduct to become an Outer Sect disciple of the Sect? Do they not have disciples of their own with upright conduct?" Su Wuji quickly grasped Su Jin's meaning and explained it to Su Cheng.

Su Cheng was left speechless with shock.

Can one interpret it this way?

"Would the Clan Academy really do this? After all, Qi Yi might have been wrongly accused!" Su Cheng couldn't help but complain.

"After all, Qi Yi is an outsider surname. As an outsider surname disciple studying in the Su Clan Academy, you should not be so careless.

To put it plainly, because she is an outsider surname, any benefit she takes in the Su Clan Academy will make others envious.

Any tiny flaw of hers will be infinitely magnified in everyone's eyes.

Regardless of whether that thing belonged to Qi Yi or not, it should not have been blatantly dug out.

So she deserves not to obtain the Outer Sect disciple qualification." Su Wuji said ruthlessly and coldly.

Do not think this is just a small matter; placed upon Qi Yi, she will absolutely receive severe punishment.