Chapter 2

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As the old saying goes, a worker must first sharpen his tools if he wants to do well. The same was true for cultivation: in addition to one’s own cultivation base, immortal treasures, elixirs, and techniques were all indispensable companions on the road to immortality. Hence, if the sect’s background was deep enough, there would usually be halls dedicated to such matters.

The Immortal Destiny Sect’s Immortal Herb Hall was mainly responsible for the task of planting medicinal herbs within the sect. It was vertically integrated with the Alchemy Hall and the Beast-Rearing Hall, supplying them with immortal herbs and spirit plants, which would be refined into various pills or be used as fodder for those spirit beasts.

As soon as Ye Xing said his words, everyone was silent. The main ones shocked were the female cultivator in charge of registration and the woman in black clothes. The former seemed to hear some unimaginable words, while the latter looked at him with pleasant surprise.

“You said you wanted to enrol at the Immortal Herb Hall? The Eldest Sister of the Immortal Herb Hall is me!”

The black-robed woman scurried over as if she had found a supreme treasure, continuously looked him up and down, and even utilised spiritual techniques to probe his cultivation base.

“5th Rank of Qi Refining, indeed higher than the juniors,” the Eldest Sister said sincerely, nodding in satisfaction, while firmly grasping Ye Xing’s wrist with both hands. “According to ‘seniority by cultivation base’, you’re probably only under me.”

“You must come to the Immortal Herb Hall! The junior brothers and sisters will all welcome you! Is anyone else coming?”

There was absolute silence.

Such an obvious act of hustling had already violated the sect’s regulations, and the nearby elderly cultivator supervising the harmony of the registration process coughed twice, indicating that she should stop there.

Seeing that no one answered, the Elder Sister sniffed regretfully. Her sleeves gently fluttering, she was about to cast a spell and prepare to leave. Before doing so, she deeply looked at Ye Xing a few times.

Why? Why is it like this? The first time coming to a cultivation sect, and the first time seeing a fairylike senior sister: with these two joyous events superposed, the doubled joy should elicit more and more happiness. It should have already been a time of ethereal bliss, yet, why do I suddenly have a sorrowful feeling, as if recalling when I was lonely and helpless in the faraway mountains, when I couldn’t even see a shadow of a woman…

She actually held my hand and looked back at me. Right, she certainly likes me!

“Ugh.”

The female cultivator in charge of registration sighed, and expressed her meaningful and heartfelt words: “Do you really want to enrol at the Immortal Herb Hall? After completing registration, before a full year passes, you cannot change halls or leave without authorisation.”

“What, don’t tell me that there are some special requirements?” asked Ye Xing, returning from his self-pitying melancholy.

“Well, not really.” The female cultivator hesitated, torn between apprehension and sympathy. In the end, she only said one sentence, “It’s just that the Immortal Herb Hall is the place with the highest turnover rate within the sect, with most newcomers staying for less than a year…”

A bunch of lazy people. With such a beautiful senior sister, how can you still be dissatisfied with your work?

Ye Xing ridiculed them in his mind.

The Eldest Sister’s mountainside patrol was just a small episode; the registration procedures were completed quickly. Escorted by the sect’s disciples, the diverse cultivators from all over the world officially entered the immortal sect.

The people were divided into two groups. The larger group consisted of mortals who had never cultivated before. They would go to the Soaring Immortal Hall to be re-examined one by one, determining those with talent for cultivation. According to Ye Xing’s hypothesis, the plotline of those mortal cultivators would be as follows: they would experience the clear disparity between innate talents and the shadowy machinations amongst sect disciples. Then, proceeding events such as reaching Minor Accomplishment and severing the mortal karma, they would either rise up and become a Mr. Perfect, or leave the sect and return to the mortal world after squandering the prime of their life.

The other group, composed of various cultivators who had already tread on the immortal path. As long as you took a step into the threshold of Qi Refining, you could be considered as having entered the world of cultivation. The requirements for entering the sect were only to have not too low a cultivation base, to be not too old, to have a law-abiding background, and to pass the examination.

Ye Xing was in the second group. As for why he didn’t choose the first type, it was because those plots had pretty much already become clichés in the mortal world’s “inspirational novels”. A random person, of average appearance, became determined to cultivate after his goddess was snatched away by some rich scion. He would later have some accomplishments and go back to the mortal world; however, he’d find that that the so-called “goddess” was nothing but a mortal. Or, after his family suffered a sharp downturn in fortunes, there’d be a bitter cancellation of the marriage agreement, then he’d tirelessly cultivate, and finally succeeded in pretentiously returning the face-slapping, and so on…

He didn’t have a goddess snatched by a Mr. Perfect, nor did he have a proud and arrogant tsundere breaking off an engagement, so he simply omitted the exposition and directly entered the world of cultivation.

The first two conditions were easily satisfied. Ye Xing’s true age was not yet over eighteen and his visible cultivation was only at the 5th Rank of Qi Refining. In normal cultivation novels, he would have been fully qualified to play the role of a middle or upper-middle level passerby character, or a villain who wouldn’t survive more than five chapters.

As for the third condition, he had preliminarily fabricated an archetypal protagonist’s backstory.

The person in charge of this round of evaluation was an old Foundation Building cultivator. Beard dragging on the floor, drooping eyelids… it made people suspect whether he had already fallen asleep.

“The story’s like this, I was born in the southern part of the Qing Continent, in a remote mountain settlement called Ye Village. The villagers mainly relied on farming and hunting. Although I lived in poverty, it was quite peaceful. Originally, I should have spent my whole life like that, farming and hunting, marrying a wife and having children, until one day, an evil cultivator passed by…”

“Then he either massacred the villagers or killed your relatives. For some unknown reason, you happened to survive.” The old cultivator continued without opening his eyes.

“Yes, yes, yes! The plot was exactly like this!”

“Afterwards, you were either accepted as a disciple by upright cultivators who came to help, or you just happened to pick up an incomplete cultivation manual deep in the mountain forests, and thus stepped on the path to immortality. If it was the former, your sect was either destroyed by internal strife, or had no choice but to disband. Personally, you chose to continue to cultivate in order to avenge or resurrect your loved ones.”

“…”

“This template is already outdated. The currently popular story is of an unknown young man who happened to save a female cultivator one day. Mutual feelings were gradually born, but because of the barriers between mortals and cultivators, he strived to cultivate, thereby returning to the classical setting of the road of cultivation. Of course, you can also display your own creativity. For example, you met a male cultivator, and formed a secret relationship…”

The old monk patted Ye Xing on the shoulder, and finally opened his eyes.

“Young people shouldn’t always think about fighting and killing, back in my years…”

“I’ve received instruction!”

Ye Xing hurriedly interrupted him to avoid triggering the thousands of words of reminiscences to come, and at the same time decided to update his story templates on time in the future.

“Well, you’ve passed. Next!”

After Ye Xing wiped his sweat and walked out, another young cultivator began to tell his background story.

“The story’s like this, I was born in the eastern part of the Qing Continent, in a remote mountain settlement called Wang Village…”