Chapter 60

Normally speaking, as a Sequence 8 practitioner and a spirit chef responsible for medicinal cuisine, Li Yu's status should not be high.

But in reality, the status of spirit chefs in every exploration team is not low. Even if every member of the exploration team is a Sequence 7 powerhouse—and not the kind who had accidents during their advancement rituals, but those who advanced perfectly—they are all very polite to Li Yu.

Especially after he took out two types of medicinal cuisine: Hundred-Flavor Meatballs and Longevity-Nurturing Hundred-Turn Immortal-Ascension Soup.

All six of them revealed expressions of great joy, exclaiming repeatedly:

"So the mysterious stall owner mentioned in the 'Wanfu Daily' is you."

"Good, good, good. We accidentally recruited a rare chef."

"The meatballs taste too strange, but the Longevity-Nurturing Hundred-Turn Immortal-Ascension Soup is excellent. I like it very much."

"Idiots, look here. This is what you call good luck, this is what you call a blessing in disguise. Envious, aren't you? Hahaha..."

The last sentence came from the team captain, Zhan Kui.

This powerhouse, clad in scarlet armor and seemingly having just slaughtered his way out of a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood, was currently grinning wide, holding a gourd of meat-jelly-like Immortal-Ascension Soup, and walking around the camp several times.

He displayed the rainbow-colored mist and the aromatic phenomenon as much as possible, letting the other camps see it.

With this show-off!

Before long, everyone knew that the mysterious medicinal cuisine stall owner who had stolen the spotlight in the 【Taiping Mystic Market】 last night had finally joined the City Lord's Mansion.

After returning from showing off, Zhan Kui said to Li Yu:

"This soup looks good, tastes good, and its spiritual effects are not bad, but it cannot be taken into the forbidden areas."

"There are too many 'mystics' in there, all sorts of things. If it attracts some big ones, the few of us might very well be finished."

"The strange-tasting meatballs are fine, but their spiritual effects are too low. If you want to get good pay in the future, you must research medicinal cuisine that can also have significant effects on us."

Li Yu nodded to show he understood.

Subsequently, he spoke directly:

"My medicinal cuisine techniques can be tailored to each of you, specifically researching corresponding medicinal spirit food."

"It's just that it will take quite a bit of time and expensive materials."

These two sentences from Li Yu were entirely true.

Tailor-made medicinal spirit food—how could it not be expensive?

However, he was also paving the way for his own potential "corruption" and "lining his own pockets" in the future.

As the saying goes, a person cannot get rich without windfall, and a horse cannot get fat without night grass.

Now that he, Li Yu, is living in Wanfu City, if he is rigid and obedient, how can he ever get ahead?

And as soon as he finished speaking, the eyes of the six members of the exploration team lit up in unison, and expressions of surprise appeared.

Looking at each other, they all felt that their Ninth Exploration Team had struck gold this time.

"What kind of problem is that? With the City Lord's Mansion's accumulation of heritage over so many years, the thing it fears least is spending money."

"If you can really tailor-make it, that would be great. Just tell us what we need to provide."

"Your Sister Mi has been fighting and exploring outside for so many years and has hidden many old injuries. If you are going to tailor-make something, shouldn't you check me first?"

"This kind of ability is already at the Sequence 7 level. It seems the pathway you are on is truly specialized in this... Could it be the 【Food God Pathway】 that appeared during the Warring States period and then quickly went extinct?"

Taking advantage of the six people's joy, Li Yu began to ask about their malignant traits, preferences for the taste of spirit food, whether they had any dietary restrictions, old injuries, and other such information.

At the same time, he intentionally or unintentionally guided the conversation and asked some secret questions he was interested in but couldn't reach.

For example: Is it true that only practitioners in the Evil God camp have to pay the price of malignant backlash?

After hearing this, the "Wizard Luo Sheng" of the Foolish God pathway answered Li Yu.

He saw that shrunken, tumor-like head give a hehe laugh and say hoarsely:

"Naturally not!"

"To obtain extraordinary power through cultivation, one naturally has to pay a price that ordinary people cannot bear. Both righteous and evil sides are exempt from nothing."

"We have malignant traits, while those so-called righteous god brats have to face even more troublesome problems like 【Eccentricities】, 【Personality Distortion】, and 【Alignment Shift】."

"For instance, a Sequence 8 Wandering Soul of the Yin Son pathway under the Earth Mother—he might privately have the eccentricity of liking to sleep in graveyards. Or another Sequence of the Corpse Collector pathway might develop necrophilia. Once they cannot curb their eccentricities and become obsessed, their personalities will also become distorted, eventually falling into loss of control."

"Hehe, by that time, the righteous gods they believe in and follow will want to 'purify' them."

"In Wanfu City, I don't know how many city residents fled here exactly because of that."

"Come to think of it, we are actually better off; there's no room left for us to continue falling."

Hearing these words, Li Yu was first stunned and speechless.

Then he felt it really made sense—the Evil God believers were already in the basement; there was indeed no room to go any lower. They won.

And as this "common knowledge" unknown to low-level rogue cultivators entered his ears, the progress of the seventh Truth Bubble jumped forward a notch.

With even more motivation, Li Yu continued to probe for transcendent knowledge through casual conversation.

Most of it was stuff that low-level rogue cultivators could never come into contact with.

"The City Lord's Mansion has established over a dozen exploration teams and is still expanding. The lower the number, the more powerful the team."

"For example, the Eighth and Seventh Exploration Teams have ten members, almost all of whom are long-time Sequence 7 practitioners with a high hope of entering Sequence 6. The ones even higher up, the Sixth and Fifth, already have some Sequence 6 members."

"Rumor has it that this 【Great Exploration Plan】 was set by the City Lord. Although he disappeared inexplicably afterward, the City Lord's Mansion still maintains operations and has been pushing it forward."

"The City Lord's pathway sequence?" "That is a secret that no one knows. It is only known to be an extremely special pathway, very complete, but with only three sequences."

"The Three Forbidden Areas?"

"Rumor has it they were formed in an era even more ancient than the Warring States. In every forbidden area, at least one god's corpse is buried."

"There are even more precise secrets: two in the Ancient Black Forest, three in the Terror Valley, and even more in the Ten Thousand Mystic Frozen Plain, but the specific numbers are unknown."

"There is another theory: the three forbidden areas are actually the top-tier Mystic Domain Spirit Realms that were accidentally dragged into the human world, which is why they are so coincidentally gathered together and surrounding a Wanfu City."

"As for other rumors, such as the forbidden areas hiding secrets to godhood, having extremely complete pathway sequences, or burying secret medicines from low to high, and so on—none of them are worth believing."

"Every forbidden area has countless mystic objects. A large number of low-level ones are fine, but the truly deadly ones are things like 【Forbidden Mystics】, which come with their own rules; touch them and you die."

"A Sequence 8 like you can wander around the periphery of a forbidden area and be fine, but go in a little deeper, and you will undoubtedly die."

=9+Shu_Ba

"Who is the strongest among the four district overlords?"

"If we talk about heritage and backing, without a doubt, it's the North District's Blood God Temple and the West District's Wheel Temple. Since the Warring States era, these two major districts have always been their territory. Even the City Lord's Mansion can only follow ancient contracts and share a portion of their tax revenue."

"Next is your South District's Sacred Nest. Those lunatics say they received the grace of the ancient saints and have occupied the South District for many years, though no one knows what secrets they are messing with."

"As for the East District's Xi Wang Mansion, that 'Xi Wang' loves to show off the most, but his strength is the weakest. Relying on relics obtained from the Qian Nation's founding emperor, plus the help of a large group of forces with unknown motives, he only managed to defeat the original overlord and take the position a dozen years ago."

"However, now that he has defected to the Jinshen Sect, his strength has also increased quite a bit."

Gossip is human nature, and the desire to complain about big shots and big forces is something no one can be exempt from.

Even if Li Yu didn't deliberately ask or guide them.

The private chatter of these six members of the exploration team was likely all about this anyway.

When Li Yu finished listening to the last piece of transcendent common knowledge and the topic was exhausted, and he had also finished recording the physical conditions of the six people, he glanced casually at his own eye membrane.

Immediately, a scene appeared that made him quite uncomfortable:

The seventh Truth Bubble!

The charging progress was nearly perfect.

But just the last little bit remained, stuck and not moving.

"First meeting, first day on the job—the scale is just right now. Can't be too wordy or talkative."

"Missing just this little bit. After I get my salary later, I'll buy the leftover news from the Wanfu Daily from Shi Dazhu tonight; that will be enough to complete it."

As these thoughts stirred in Li Yu's mind.

His hands didn't stop, writing down various ingredients, medicinal herbs, mystic objects, and strange minerals, etc.

In short, there was everything, and the quantity was not small.

Subsequently, he deliberately revealed an embarrassed expression on his face and handed it to the team captain, Zhan Kui:

"Alright, Captain!"

"These are the medicinal cuisine recipes I've roughly thought up. Once they are all bought, I can start working to tailor-make medicinal spirit food for you."

"I guarantee there will be no side effects, they can be taken repeatedly, are convenient to carry into forbidden areas, and the spiritual effects will be sufficient."

"Of course, there are indeed quite a few, but they could be reduced, though it might have an effect on the medicinal efficacy..."

Li Yu was about to continue speaking.

He saw Zhan Kui smile and take the dense list of recipes. He didn't know what he did, but immediately a delicate-looking mechanical doll flew over.

"Hand the recipe to the Logistics Office. By tomorrow morning at the latest, all materials must be bought."

"As for the quantity, two copies—oh no, make it three."

"Also, fetch an 【Onboarding Gift Package】, register the house owner Li Yu of Residence 404, Third Old Street, Tianji Workshop, as a newly hired member of the City Lord's Mansion, and transmit this information to the relevant departments under the South District overlord, the Sacred Nest."

"Beep! Command received!"

After sending the mechanical doll away, Zhan Kui's massive body turned around.

His ugly, scar-filled face grinned, and then he used a voice he thought was a whisper but was actually audible to everyone:

"Tomorrow morning, the first batch of materials will be sent to the camp, and the other two will be stored in the warehouse."

"Come and sign in early. After you finish cooking all the medicinal spirit food, just report the remaining scraps to the supervisor doll as 'wear and tear'."

Hearing these two sentences, Li Yu was first stunned, then he also smiled.

At the same time, a thought of regret arose in his heart: Damn, I'm still not greedy enough; I reported too little.

PS: There is more. Also, there was a setting related to the golden finger in the previous text: "Curios verified and judged can be assimilated and stolen by the Truth Soul Body." I forgot to state it clearly. It has already been added in some previous chapters. It doesn't affect readers who have read up to here; just knowing this setting is added is fine. Sorry about that.

(End of chapter)