Aotian returned to his room after bidding farewell to Rihai. His 'snake' was still raised and uncomfortable between his legs.
He threw himself onto the bed, hoping the discomfort would subside on its own. However, a growing pain began to emerge in his lower region.
"Damn it! Blue balls! I thought, as a martial artist, I'd be immune to this. Women are as dangerous as ever," Aotian muttered, writhing on the bed before finally giving in and heading to the bathroom to relieve himself, thinking of Rihai.
…
While Aotian was inaugurating a five-against-one battle, his avatars were practicing a different kind of art: kidnapping... or, to be more precise, the abduction of cultivators.
Fortunately for Aotian, he could block certain sensations shared with his avatars; otherwise, it would be far too perverted to watch three men kidnapping people with things standing up between their legs. Even stranger would be if, one day, Aotian was in bed with his wife and suddenly started screaming in pain because one of his avatars was injured or even killed.
Definitely, this ability to block sensations was a blessing.
Through Tian Zhu's perspective, Aotian looked at Bao Hui, who was sitting cross-legged on the ground, surrounded by storage pouches. Sometimes, he would toss them into the air; other times, he would hold them and rub his cheeks against them affectionately.
'Damn! So many bad people among the cultivators!' Aotian thought, shocked.
Tian Zhu then turned his gaze to Lie Zheng, who wore a black cloak, and then shifted his focus to Black Rock Mountain, where a fierce and sinister figure was silently descending.
Lie Zheng knew what to do and, without hesitation, advanced toward the man.
…
"Tonight's going to be another night of celebration. I hope to find a good woman during the raid... And that she hasn't been used by too many senior brothers before it's my turn." The man smiled obscenely and murmured to himself.
Suddenly, he stopped, sensing a strange presence. His body tensed as he noticed a black-cloaked figure emerging in his path.
"Answer me, and I'll leave..." A hoarse voice echoed from beneath the hood. "Have you ever raped and killed innocents for pleasure?"
He stiffened at the question but soon relaxed upon sensing his opponent's cultivation level, smirking in disdain.
"Heh! A mere 4th-level Qi Refiner dares to challenge someone at the 8th? You must have a death wish!" The man sneered. "I'll send you to hell to meet the innocents you're looking for!"
Elder Lie already knew that man was doomed the moment he felt his killing intent in response to such a simple question. The final confirmation came when the man inadvertently admitted his guilt under the effect of Lie Zheng's lie detector technique.
"Leader, guilty..." Lie Zheng murmured to the void.
A majestic and imposing presence suddenly emerged out of nowhere. The man who appeared flicked his fingers, effortlessly conjuring a water needle that shot directly at the criminal cultivator's dantian.
The man only reacted when he felt a searing pain in his abdomen as his cultivation was completely crippled.
"AHH—HUMPH!!!" He started to scream, but his mouth was quickly covered by Elder Lie's hand, who carried him into the forest,ignoring his frantic struggles and desperate gaze.
…
While awaiting interrogation, Tian Zhu picked up yet another jade slip he had stolen that day and began studying it. His goal was to accumulate knowledge on spells and synthesize higher-quality techniques in the future.
The water needle was one of the simple techniques he had stolen and quickly learned.
That was how he spent the day. Elder Zhang, cloaked in black, would appear to ask the decisive question. If the target was innocent, they were released. If guilty, Elder Lie took care of them—if he was strong enough. If not, the responsibility fell upon Tian Zhu.
In this way, many stones, various items, and several jade slips were accumulated.
Regarding the jade slips, they were crafted from spiritual jade.
Spiritual jade was one of the resources found in spirit stone mines. Although it formed alongside spirit stones, its functions were quite distinct.
Spiritual stones were minerals infused with purified spiritual energy, storing this energy in their cores, making them a valuable resource for cultivators. In contrast, spiritual jade retained only small amounts of unrefined raw energy, rendering it useless for cultivation, as this energy could not be directly refined. Moreover, its low energy capacity also made it unsuitable for powering spiritual formations.
However, its true value lay in another application: by inscribing a small spiritual formation onto it, it could store information and consume energy only when read. This was how jade slips came into existence.
Low-quality slips would break after a few uses, which was a problem for mortals who had to reread the content multiple times before memorizing it. However, this was irrelevant for cultivators. After all, those born with spiritual aptitude possessed exceptional memory, which improved as their cultivation advanced. If not, how could they remember everything after ten thousand years of life?
The greatest benefit of a jade slip was the instant transmission of knowledge. Instead of spending hours or days reading, one simply had to press it against their forehead, inject spiritual energy, and absorb the content immediately.
However, highly advanced techniques could be dangerous for low-level cultivators, as their complexity could overload their minds when inserted all at once. Because of this, powerful experts stored such techniques in high-quality jade slips reinforced with mental protection formations, allowing their juniors to learn them safely.
The card Rihai used as a key on the platform to access her apartment was also a jade slip. The information about the apartment was read by the formations, which then activated it. Since the stored information was minimal, the card had a long lifespan and only needed to be replaced after a considerable amount of time.
Aotian learned all of this from Rihai when she discovered his intention to sell cultivation techniques written on paper.
He had already encountered jade slips when he came across previous inheritances, but it was Rihai who taught him the common knowledge that selling written techniques had long been abandoned. Paper inheritances were not accepted for sale—no one wanted to waste time reading when they could simply transfer knowledge with a touch.
He had already planned to write down the techniques he acquired and ask Rihai to record them on a jade slip, with the intention of selling them.
Soon, Elder Lie returned. In the place where he had left, only ashes remained.
'Who would have thought that spells make dealing with bodies so convenient?' he thought, amused.
"Leader, I have discovered where they will be gathering," Lie Zheng announced, his voice firm. "The meeting will begin in two hours, in an abandoned spiritual mine about 40 kilometers from here."
"Good, let's go!" Tian Zhu didn't hesitate. He regrouped with Bao Hui, stored the storage pouches, and set off.
Unlike storage rings, pouches did not possess their own internal space. Instead, they used shrinking formations to reduce the size of objects placed inside them.
They were convenient, but they had four major limitations:
First: Unchanged Weight – The objects shrank, but their weight remained the same. Carrying too many full storage pouches could become a burden.
Second: Fragility – Quite delicate, they could be easily damaged, spilling all their contents.
Third: Formation Limitations – They couldn't shrink living beings or extremely powerful items. They were only useful for low-level cultivators.
Fourth: Restricted Space – The shrinking had a limit, preventing the storage of large quantities of items.
Despite all these drawbacks, for low-level cultivators who didn't have access to storage rings, they were still quite useful. Another advantage was that if a pouch was empty, it could be stored inside another one.
Unfortunately, before setting off, the avatars ran into an unexpected "happy" problem… they had simply stolen too much and couldn't walk around overloaded with pouches.
Aware of this, the three avatars separated the less valuable items into a few pouches and buried them, while keeping mainly money and jade slips. This way, if someone found and took the buried pouches, the loss wouldn't be too significant.
With less weight to carry, they moved swiftly toward the thieves' den.