Chapter 172 - 171: Are You...a Devil?

In a blink of an eye, half a month has passed.

In just these fifteen days, Linglong and Qingfeng have both completed their digestion of spiritual materials, and transformed into level four and level three spiritual weapons, respectively.

With the rise in the level of the spiritual weapon, their powers are increasing day by day.

However, this explosive growth period is soon coming to an end.

For Li Jing, with his current Spiritual Power Intensity, every time he upgrades a spiritual weapon level, the nurturing effect decreases by 5%.

At level four of a spiritual weapon, it can only increase by 4% in a day.

Currently, the level three Qingfeng Sword still maintains a daily nurturing efficiency of 9%.

Meanwhile, after ascending to level four, the Linglong Tower barely maintains a nurturing rate of 8% under double efficiency.

If both spiritual weapons go up another level, they’ll basically hit their limit.

When Qingfeng reaches level four, it can still maintain a nurturing rate of 4% at least.

When the Linglong Tower reaches that level, it could barely maintain a daily increase of 2%. And this is based on the premise that there’s a minimum guaranteed nurturing efficiency of 1%.

Li Jing is not a person with unattainable ambitions.

In just half a month, both weapons have advanced to level four and level three respectively and Linglong will soon be promoted to level five in a few days. He has nothing to be dissatisfied about.

Normally speaking,

For someone who has just stepped into the Fifth Boundary like him, it’s certain that they have spiritual weapons. However, the quality is usually not that good, with a level two spiritual weapon being quite precious.

Only a few lucky ones like Chen Yuran, who can tame the already high-level spiritual weapons, can possibly have even higher-grade spiritual weapons.

How many Chen Yurans can there be in the world?

What’s really bothering Li Jing is,

After his vacation, he went to report to the Major Crime Unit, but for two weeks there were no cases. The entire sixth team of the Major Cases Unit was on standby at home; they didn’t even have to go to the Inspection Bureau.

Forget about monsters; in half a month, he hadn’t even had a chance to see a thief.

The experience points required for his upgrade, which he was only four thousand points short of, hadn’t moved at all in half a month.

Sensing the arrival of the new year, he felt like an idiot.

Whereas his comrade in frustration, Chen Yuran, had spent his days practicing. Li Jing, who didn’t practice, could only sit at home each day like a fool.

When he was at home, at least Liu Sisi was there.

However, ever since Liu Sisi started working at the Management Bureau, she had been busy every day. After returning home and eating dinner, she would immediately lock herself in her room for cultivation.

The time that Li Jing was able to spend with her each day did not exceed one hour.

He had an early taste of the feeling of being an empty-nester, as he stepped into the new year and technically turned twenty-two.

Compared with Li Jing, Liu Sisi has achieved a lot in this half month.

In these fifteen days, she perfectly adapted to handling the various affairs in the Management Bureau.

She has been managing ten thousand employees efficiently.

Training, welfare benefits, declarations of all sorts, all were carried out on time with no delay.

At first, many members of the Heavenly King Group called her Secretary Liu, but not with much respect.

Now, every member of the Heavenly King Group treats her with respect.

Even Jiang Yini allowed the new recruits who had completed military training in the past half month to join the Heavenly King Group, so now they had a staff of twelve thousand instead of ten thousand due to Liu Sisi’s impressive management skills.

As a result, both Tong Gaojie and Jiang Wenqian, who essentially started from scratch, got to manage their own teams of a thousand people.

However, these two teams are all newbies, who not only lack experience but also have poor coordination skills.

To be considered formal teams, they need systematic advanced-level training first.

Apart from the Management Bureau’s affairs,

During that half-month period, Liu Sisi also made a breakthrough in her cultivation level, successfully reaching the mid-stages of the Third Realm.

Persistent learning and hard practice is indeed effective.

In this half a month, aside from working and eating, Liu Sisi was basically in a state of non-stop cultivation round the clock.

In the middle of winter, with her Cold Heart Physique, cultivation was a lot more effective.

With the aid of elixirs, her cultivation level rose rapidly.

Compared to her previous rapid advancement from the Second Realm to the Third Realm in just seven days, her speed of improvement has slowed down immensely. However, when compared to others, her speed is still considered oddly fast.

Looking solely at cultivation speed, she’s even on par with Chen Yuran when he was in the Third Realm.

Of course.

She wouldn’t be able to keep up this cultivation speed for much longer.

The New Year had started, and it would be spring in just over a month. The warming weather would greatly affect her.

What was regrettable was...

Having spent half a month buried in vigorous practice, Liu Sisi was still deficient in magic skills. Only her Sky Control magic, which she needed to use daily for work, had reached the entry-level standard.

Improving Sky Control wasn’t too difficult—she was flying to and from work every day, naturally bolstering her skill.

Now, it took Liu Sisi only half an hour to travel to and from the Management Bureau.

...

On this day, Liu Sisi headed to work as usual.

After eating lunch at home, Li Jing went alone to the spiritual object market.

His girlfriend was so hardworking; he had to support her even if he was just loafing around.

Liu Sisi had already finished the Nurturing Spirit Elixir; she barely had enough Spirit Gathering Pills to last another week.

She could only maintain her rapid improvement throughout this winter.

In other areas, Li Jing couldn’t help.

But buying some elixirs to take home, that was something he could do.

Regarding the Four Realm, no need to consider it.

But with Liu Sisi’s efficiency in cultivation, it was not impossible for her to reach the late stage of the Three Realm within the remaining month.

Once she reached the late stage of the Three Realm, she should be able to take a breather.

Unless she simply breezed through as she did before, without encountering any cultivation bottlenecks, otherwise she would have to wait until she felt the bottleneck.

At the spiritual object market, Li Jing easily found Xu Jiayi’s appraisal shop.

If there was business to be done, of course, he would take care of those he knew.

Fortuitously...

Right as he was at the door, Xu Jiayi happened to come out from inside.

Having bumped into each other, both were momentarily stunned before Xu Jiayi revealed a smile.

"Oh! Officer Li, you’ve been absent for half a month! I thought you had forgotten about patronizing my family’s business. What are you selling this time?"

With that, her eyes sparkled.

"What are you selling now?"

Seeing her hungry, almost desperate gaze, Li Jing grinned.

"I’m not here to sell anything today; I’m here to buy."

"Buy?"

Xu Jiayi looked surprised and furrowed her eyebrows.

"A few days ago, the Security Department busted a monster gang dealing in contraband. Didn’t you get a piece of the action?"

"..."

Li Jing remained silent.

Not mentioning it was fine, but bringing it up made him sour.

Xu Jiayi referred to an incident that had occurred three days prior and made the news.

Even though Li Jing was at home, he was aware of what had happened.

According to the news reports...

The monster gang consisted of sixteen individuals roaming around the chaotic dark alley areas of North City, selling contraband in the form of a gang.

At the beginning, the Security Department wasn’t aware that they were all human-shaped monsters until a fierce resistance was encountered during the arrest.

However, as the gang was cunning, the Security Department mobilized a hundred on-duty patrol officers for the operation at once.

If Li Jing hadn’t been reassigned to the Major Crime Unit, he might have been involved in this operation.

The Security Department moved in at night.

According to the regular shift rotation, he would have been on the night shift if he was still at the Security Department.

The Security Department had many members, but typically had fewer than two hundred officers in each of the three shifts.

If he had been on duty, there was a fifty percent chance he could have participated in the operation.

Given his abilities, wouldn’t these criminals, who at most were human-shaped monsters at the late stage of the Three Realm, lie down one after another, providing him with heaps of experience points?

With a sigh, Li Jing decided not to continue with this frustrating topic and said in a flat tone.

"I haven’t been a part of the Security Department for half a month, I now work with the Major Crime Unit, and I wasn’t involved in the case three days ago."

"So, you’ve been promoted?"

Xu Jiayi suddenly realised, beaming.

"Should I congratulate you?"

Li Jing smirked, a silent ’thank you’ he swallowed back.

"I came today to buy elixirs. I need eight Nurturing Spirit Elixirs and four Spirit Gathering Pills. Also, please recommend a few auxiliary elixirs that significantly help with cultivation."

Xu Jiayi is a merchant’s daughter.

On hearing that Li Jing was asking for eight Nurturing Spirit Elixirs and four Spirit Gathering Pills, she became excited.

The total cost of the eight Nurturing Spirit Elixirs would be 16 million at market price.

And the four Spirit Gathering Pills would cost 4 million.

Just these amount to 20 million.

Li Jing even wanted her to recommend a few auxiliary elixirs that significantly enhance their cultivation...

Without any hesitation, she grabbed Li Jing and pulled him towards the lift, explaining.

"There’s a large variety of elixirs out there. The ones you mentioned are among the best. Of course, there are better ones as well, but they’ll be more expensive."

She continued.

"If you are looking for better Qi Refining efficiency, I would recommend Heaven Spirit Pills. They’re quite expensive, costing 5 million each, and their duration is seven days. But if you’re looking for overall enhancement, I’d recommend Jade Marrow Pills. They’re inexpensive, only 1 million per pill, with the same seven-day duration. Consuming Jade Marrow Pills during cultivation can enhance Qi, God Soul, body, and essence all at once. The single improvement is weak, but it’s more comprehensive."

Li Jing listened to Xu Jiayi’s recommendations and he found both options quite good, so he nodded saying.

"Fine, I’ll take four of each. Total of 14.4 million, I’ll pay in cash."

"Deal!"

Xu Jiayi was grinning, her eyes lighting up.

"Boss, have you recently come into some money, or do you plan on making a breakthrough? Buying four types of cultivation elixirs all at once amounts to a one-month supply. Even wealthy families only afford this during cultivation breakthroughs."

Seeing himself being referred to as "boss" within a few minutes, Li Jing shook his head with a laugh, saying.

"I did make a bit of money recently. But these elixirs aren’t for me, they’re for my girlfriend."

"A girlfriend?"

Xu Jiayi was taken aback.

"Miss Liu?"

"Yes."

Li Jing nodded.

Upon receiving the confirmation, Xu Jiayi raised an eyebrow and laughed softly.

"You really do work fast. I thought it would take time when I saw Miss Liu last time. But here you are, less than a month later."

...

Upstairs, Li Jing received the elixirs from Xu Jiayi, paid swiftly, and left.

During the past two weeks, Xiao Ai had been frenziedly trafficking on the low-end market of the dark web.

Just as she had assured him, the dark web market was a bloody mess.

During the first few days, quite a few merchants challenged Xiao Ai over the internet.

Needless to say, they all ended up in a sorry state with some of them even losing everything.

After seeing some of the front-runners get taken down, the other merchants picked up the trend. Whatever Xiao Ai sold, they would sell the same thing, causing the market to go into chaos.

During this process, Xiao Ai made about a hundred million.

She would have made at least ten times as much if she had been focused on making money rather than improving membership level.

Li Jing’s dark web membership level is currently at intermediate level three.

The membership levels on the dark web are divided into low, intermediate, and high, each level having three divisions.

If he is promoted once more, he will become a senior member.

However, these days Xiao Ai has hit a standstill.

The goods in the low-end market are relatively cheap, have a high demand, and are efficient to resell.

However, as the membership level increases, the profits from the low-end market decrease.

In the three-tier market of intermediate members, basic spiritual objects are sold.

Even at their most basic, they’re still spiritual objects.

To operate with cash, you need at least a hundred billion capital chain.

With Li’s fund, he can only grind hard in the low-end market.

Nowadays, the number of businesses following the trend is increasing, making Xia Ai’s operation much more difficult.

And Xia Ai has almost single-handedly controlled the entire low-end market, provoking many big shots lurking in the low-end market. The market competition is increasing day by day.

At the current pace, the previously agreed senior membership will certainly be achieved within half a month, but at most only one level up.

In this regard, Li Jing was not in a hurry at all.

Just take it slow.

He doesn’t have to do anything, Xia Ai earns a hundred million in half a month, what more can he ask for?

Today, for buying elixirs, Li Jing specially asked Xia Ai to transfer fifty million to his account, so he wouldn’t run out of cash.

He didn’t feel bad about spending the freely received money.

After buying the elixirs, Li Jing went straight to the Management Bureau.

Both the Linglong Tower and Flying Sword Blue Edge had fully digested the spirit weapon feeding materials. It was time to replace them with a new batch.

In caring for the weapons, he had to spend, reluctant or not.

The more they eat, the more powerful the spirit weapons become.

The only things spirit weapons can bring are quality improvement and strength enhancement after property purification. You simply need to just keep throwing money at it.

Just like half a month ago, Li Jing went to Logistics Fourth Department and exchanged for ten pieces of Yin energy crystals and ten pieces of wind spirit, spending another 200,000 merit points at once, leaving only 20,000 for unexpected needs.

Finding a place to secretly feed the materials to the two spirit weapons, Li Jing headed to the Heavenly Kings Group’s office.

The time was just past one in the afternoon.

According to Liu Sisi’s "work schedule", she should have just finished lunch and was handling the afternoon’s affairs and had not yet started cultivating.

Sure enough, when Li Jing arrived at the Heavenly Kings Group’s office, the office door was half open.

This signal meant Liu Sisi was accepting "visitors".

In half a month of working, the whole Jianghai Management Bureau had already known about the diligent and hardworking Secretary-General in the Heavenly King’s group’s office. During her working hours, she doesn’t slack off and as soon as she has the free time, she meditates and cultivates.

If the door is left open, it means you can visit.

If the door is closed, it means she is in cultivation.

Standing at the office door, Li Jing knocked on the door.

After the sound of "tap, tap," Liu Sisi responded from inside the office.

"Come in."

With this response, Li Jing pushes the door.

Liu Sisi looked up and saw him, slightly surprised, and then asked with confusion.

"Li Jing, why are you here?"

"I came to bring you something."

Li Jing gave her a small smile, taking out four brocade boxes, each holding different kinds of elixirs.

Seeing the four brocade boxes, Liu Sisi couldn’t help but stiffen.

Li Jing hadn’t told her he was going to buy elixirs.

But she knew that these kinds of brocade boxes were used to hold elixirs.

Looking up at him, Liu Sisi swallowed and asked:

"These are..."

"These two boxes are Nurturing Spirit Elixir and Spirit Gathering Pill for January, and the other two boxes are Heaven Spirit Pill and Jade Marrow Pill for January."

Li Jing made a response with a smile on his lips.

Liu Sisi looked down silently.

After a while, she raised her teary eyes.

"Are you... a devil?"