Chapter 9: It Still Relies on Yourself

The apprentice lacks the awareness of an apprentice, and the teacher seems to lack the awareness of teaching properly. Since he managed to make a breakthrough by practicing on his own after being abandoned, he might as well continue this way. If this kid doesn't show much improvement after a while, Old Ge has already thought it through: he will go to the chief's office and change the register, pretending he never had this apprentice. As for the contents of the jade slip, if Lin He can't comprehend them, it means he isn't qualified to be his disciple. In short, the apprentice is accepted, but his cultivation still relies on himself. If there's no progress, he will nip it in the bud; the old man can't afford to lose face. After all, Lin He has a record of failing to cultivate, and Old Ge doesn't dare to take too many risks, so he acts secretly.

After the apprenticeship, there were no stories of being brutally abused by the master. Lin He's life slowly returned to its original track. As for the jade slip forced upon him by the old man, Lin He, adhering to his principle of not eating Zhou's grain, threw it into his spatial bag and pretended it didn't exist.

Life continued in the monotonous and repetitive cultivation. The greatest pleasure in his boredom was watching the little white tiger sleep. Since hatching, this little thing has only done two things: eat the Yuan Gathering Pills, which have increased in price by another ten percent on the black market, and sleep. After a month, the little white tiger woke up three times, growing a bit each time, and its appetite increased each time. The last time it woke up, it ate twenty Yuan Gathering Pills in one go and grew to the size of an adult dog.

Lin He's verdict was that it was a glutton, and if it continued like this, he would definitely go bankrupt. Fortunately, he no longer had to hand over the Yuan Gathering Pills, which was the only benefit of being an apprentice. Being able to eat, sleep, and grow, at least it didn't waste Lin He's Yuan Gathering Pills.

No matter what, it was the end of another month. Lin He looked at a new batch of Yuan Gathering Pills he had just refined and felt a deep sorrow. With the little white tiger's appetite, this batch of forty-five pills wouldn't last a month. Originally, he hoped to save some assets, but since this little guy entered his life, his personal assets were rapidly decreasing.

After a month of cultivation, Lin He's progress was significant, almost reaching the fourth level of Qi Cultivation. This result made him feel deeply comforted. Even if he couldn't return to his master's wife's sect, with his current cultivation speed, it wouldn't be difficult to reach the Foundation Establishment stage in three to five years, right?

If other cultivators knew this thought, they would definitely want to chop him up. How many cultivators spend their entire lives just in the Qi Cultivation stage, and you're already thinking about reaching the Foundation Establishment stage in a few years? It's absolutely heaven-defying and human-hating.

Even more outrageous, Lin He, who always felt he was a bit of a failure and needed some self-defense skills to survive in the cultivation world, spent his days, apart from the three daily self-cultivation sessions, either refining pills, exploring arrays, or forging artifacts. In short, Lin He didn't look like a professional cultivator at all; his main focus was on all sorts of miscellaneous things. Unlike ordinary cultivators, even at the Qi Cultivation stage, it's very normal to seclude oneself for one or two months to seek a breakthrough and advancement.

Apart from the three daily self-cultivation sessions, there were no other active cultivation actions, which was a truly insane cultivation method.

Not having to hand over Yuan Gathering Pills as an outer sect pill refining disciple was a unique situation. Old Ge managed it, and Old Qian didn't dare to ask. This matter was left unresolved. Soon, Lin He's peaceful days came to an end because the sound box formally notified him: "Inner Disciple Lin He, you have been included in the list of inner disciples for the selection competition. Please arrive at the competition venue at the third watch of the morning on the first day of June to collect your number. This is repeated..."

After the sound box responsibly repeated it three times, Lin He acknowledged he had heard it, and that was it. In fact, the new inner disciple responsible for conveying the message was also puzzled. Where did this kid come from? He had never heard of him before.

The purpose of the selection competition was to fairly select ten of the best new cultivators to participate in the biennial competition between the Northern and Southern Sects. The rule was set by a group of elders, considering that the old guys had good relationships and it wasn't suitable to fight to the death. Instead, they decided to select ten disciples who had been cultivating for less than twenty years to compete, and the same for the masters' generation. The competition used a lottery system to ensure absolute fairness. It wasn't that you could become the sect leader just because your master was powerful; you had to teach capable disciples to deserve the position of sect leader, otherwise, how could you develop the sect?

Participating in the competition? This was the first time for him. Even as an inner disciple, he didn't have the qualifications to participate before. The rule was simple: if you hadn't broken through to the next level, you couldn't participate. So, Lin He used to play a minor role, running errands to deliver Yuan Gathering Pills or Spirit Concentration Liquids.

What should he do? Lin He quickly contacted Old Ge, but this old man was so stingy that he didn't even buy a sound box, truly miserly. Lin He had to go to the chief's office to find this old man, but he wasn't there. He asked a few people at the chief's office, and they all said they didn't know where he was.

Stuck with such an irresponsible master, Lin He had to figure out how to participate in the competition on his own. Other disciples participating in the competition at least had a flying sword or something. Lin He didn't even have a wooden sword. Participating in the competition without equipment would definitely end in a miserable defeat. So, Lin He set a principle: "I can't kill others, that's not a problem. But if others want to kill me, that's a big problem." Since he was participating in the competition, he couldn't lose too miserably, right? After all, he was now a third-level Qi Cultivation "expert"!

With half a month left, Lin He got busy. He stayed in the alchemy furnace every day and finally, after ten days of hard work, he was basically prepared. Lin He prepared various defensive magical treasures, all made by himself. First, he set up an array, which he bought from the black market, called the Nine Earth Concealment defensive array. Once this array was set up, unless the opponent was a level higher than Lin He, they couldn't touch him. In other words, if a Qi Cultivation stage cultivator used this array, a Foundation Establishment stage expert would be needed to deal with him. As long as the spirit stones powering the array didn't run out, the opponent could only watch him enjoy himself inside the array. No means would work. Of course, if a high-level cultivator used a powerful artifact, it would be a different story. For example, some offensive weapons used by Golden Core stage experts could break through the Nine Earth Concealment.

In addition to setting up the array, Lin He also prepared over a thousand offensive talismans, such as Fireballs, Ice Cones, and Earth Traps. The goal was to avoid being killed and have some room for counterattacks, which would be considered a basic success and wouldn't be too embarrassing.

After finishing all this, Lin He checked the time and saw that the competition was about to start. He hurried to see the little white tiger, which happened to wake up, growing to the size of a wolfhound. Seeing Lin He, it was very excited and pounced on him. Lin He, caught off guard, was knocked to the ground. The little thing sniffed and licked him, then stared at the spatial bag.

"Why did I end up with such a glutton? What else can you do besides eating?" Lin He grumbled, took out a gourd, and this time, the little white tiger didn't gorge itself but symbolically ate two Yuan Gathering Pills, wagged its tail, and darted out of the house, heading for the mountains. No matter how Lin He called, the little thing didn't look back. Lin He was so angry he cursed: "Ungrateful glutton, you've wasted so many Spirit Gathering Pills."

Before Lin He could finish venting, an unexpected visitor arrived. Yun Xiangyi appeared outside the fence, heard Lin He cursing, and got angry, thinking, "Are you talking about me? I didn't take your benefits for free." She stormed in, ready to kick the door down again. However, this time, Yun Xiangyi was unexpectedly stopped by an invisible wall five meters from the fence gate, as if she had hit a cotton pile.

Yun Xiangyi was startled and quickly stepped back. She looked at the fence yard, which seemed no different from usual. This restriction was definitely set up by Lin He, but how could she break it? There were many ways to break an array: one was to force a way through with sword qi. A more skillful way was to find the array's core, deduce it with the Five Elements method, and then move in a specific pattern, rendering the array ineffective.

Yun Xiangyi looked for a long time but couldn't find the array's core. The entire fence yard didn't look like a place with a restriction. In other words, this restriction was set up very skillfully, harmless to people, but impossible to enter.

"Lin He, come out and open the door!" The impatient Yun Xiangyi shouted from outside.

Lin He came out of the alchemy room and saw her. "Second Senior Sister, why are you here again?" He looked tense and guarded, remembering the eight Spirit Gathering Banners and the array map he had lost last time, which had made him heartbroken for days.

Yun Xiangyi glared and said, "Stop talking nonsense, open the door." Lin He kicked the wall and said, "Alright, come in."

Yun Xiangyi entered without resistance and asked curiously, "What kind of restriction is this?"

Lin He smiled, "It's not really a restriction, just a purely defensive array, the Heavenly Net and Earthly Web Array. It's mainly used to trap myself, so others can't enter." He had been busy these days and set up the array to avoid being disturbed.

"You know a lot, teach me," Yun Xiangyi said, wanting to learn. Lin He looked at her with a pained expression, seeing her determined eyes, and muttered, "I'll lose money again." Yun Xiangyi smiled sweetly and stepped forward, holding his arm. "Don't worry, I won't let you down."

These words sounded like a pyramid scheme recruit trying to lure a new member. Lin He had never seen a pyramid scheme, but he was sure he couldn't trust these words. The problem was, he felt he couldn't beat Yun Xiangyi. If she got rough, the Heavenly Net and Earthly Web Array wouldn't stand up to her sword qi.