Cultivating...like a genius?

After a lengthy story...

"A...chicken?"

"Yes"

"so you're telling me that you tried hunting an oversized chicken and it ended up hunting you all the way up until you managed to squeeze into a small crack in the ground, where you ended up finding a treasure trove of herbs?"

"Exactly, any other questions Lady pavillion lord?"

"Yes, how many of each type of herb are you planning on selling? We can pay you in coins or pills and I guarantee you our prices and products are trustworthy" she replied after composing herself.

Actually Fang Qiu ate over half of them as snacks over the last few months but he felt like he shouldn't mention that. "I still have about twenty-three purple stalks, seven red ones and eighty two yellow ones." He still had most of the yellow ones left since they had a weird aftertaste, and the red ones were most delicious since they tasted like smoked meat.

"The pavillion is willing to buy all of them, and since they are all nearly extinct ninth rank herbs we can get you a very high price for them." She replied after hearing the amount which was more than she expected.

"Most ninth rank herbs are worth one silver on average with rarer herbs being worth up to five silvers, but since these are nearly extinct ninth rank herbs with the purple ones extending lifespan of qi refining tier individuals I can give you twelve gold for these one hundred and twelve stalks altogether.

Of course if you want to we can also give you pills instead of gold at a ten percent discount." She finally said.

"Out of curiosity, how much do other ranks of herbs go for and how much are beast materials worth?" Fang Qiu asked in return.

"Eighth rank herbs go for one to five gold a piece and seventh rank herbs go for hundreds of gold, as for sixth rank...they use a higher form of currency called spirit stones since cultivators at that rank usually have no contact with mortal matters so gold has no more value to them and takes up too much space.

Not that you need to worry about this now, this branch only owns several seventh rank herbs with no one capable of refining them let alone sixth rank herbs."

As for beast materials and flesh, we don't buy that here since we use herbs and natural treasures to make pills, beast materials are used in the treasure tower to make all sorts of weapons and items. As for flesh...it has no use to cultivators since we cannot absorb the foreign qi that is permeated in the meat. Only pure qi from the surroundings or from spirit stones can be used by cultivators to increase our cultivation.

So meat isn't worth all that much except for its culinary value of course, the higher ranked the meat is the more intense of a flavour it has. Foreign qi also adds to that aroma and taste."

This was great news to Fang Qiu since he could directly absorb cultivation from bodies and beasts by consuming their flesh. As for the bones and such, these were useless to Fang Qiu since they held no qi. But they could be sold to be refined into treasures if they were of high enough rank. The dantian was also useless since it only held foreign qi that cultivators couldn't absorb.

The dantian also needed to be crushed in order to access the core which was the most valuable part of a corpse. Cores are also called elemental or nature stones and they are divided into nine tiers just like other materials. Ninth tier treasures are useful to qi refining stage cultivators, eighth tier are useful to foundation realm cultivators etc.

Nature stones being one of the rare few treasures capable of increasing comprehension were worth a lot and Fang Qiu currently possessed three from the cultivators he killed. Besides these he also had their bones, tendons and such but these were not worth much because of their low cultivation. Their flesh on the other hand was long since absorbed and converted into pure qi thanks to his spirit ability star swallowing. Sadly Fang Qiu couldn't do the same for people's dantians which held the most cultivation or he would be able to absorb 100% of cultivators' cultivation and add it to his own.

All of these thoughts passed in a matter of seconds so he quickly accessed his void storage and took out the three cores saying "I know this isn't useful to you or the pavillion but I'm sure no one would say no to nature stones if placed right in front of them, they are very rare after all."

as he guessed her face lit up upon seeing the three cores, but soon dulled again when she realised they were only five percent ninth tier nature stones. Five percent meant the cultivators were only at that amount of comprehension within ninth tier, which was pretty normal for newly ascended cultivators.

One hundred percent rank nine nature stones were worth about ten gold coins for the common elements which was already a crazy amount considering that most ninth tier pills only fetched about one gold maximum with the cheapest ones only costing as much as five silver. But this also meant that these stones were only worth fifty silver a piece. Still Fang Qiu gladly accepted her offer since these stones were useless to him as a light-space element cultivator.

After finishing business and leaving the pill pavillion with his earnings he also stopped by the treasure tower to sell his beast materials. The human skeletons weren't worth anything. as newly ascended their bodies were not strong enough to be treasure materials. And the beast materials he had were all from common beasts but some of them were valuable like certain tendons and some teeth and claws. After Fang Qiu was done emptying his void storage his pockets had seventy silver more and his storage was now empty, aside from some daily necessities and some food. Thinking about food Fang Qiu instantly went to the counter to buy some. Not that the treasure pagoda sold food but since they buy tons of corpses they should have plenty of meat that they probably sell to the different restaurants in town.

"Hello sir, how can I help you?" A lovely blonde clerk asked.

"do you happen to have any beast meat for sale?" The young voice replied

"what kind of meat would sir like? We have meat all the way from first rank up till eighth rank of qi refinement beasts."

"You don't sell meat from ninth rank?"

"only the red crane pagoda has ninth rank meat, they buy it the moment we have any in stock. The red crane pagoda is the best restaurant in the entire city, even the city lord dines there often, so it monopolises our ninth rank meat." The clerk told Fang Qiu.

In the end Fang Qiu bought fourteen eighth rank beasts' worth of meat for a gold coin each leaving him with a couple of silver to his name. This price was pretty normal since the core was the most valuable part at 10 gold coins when at one hundred percent. This might seem cheap but meat was useless to anyone but Fang Qiu so to most people this is just higher class food.

And to Fang Qiu, what was more important than good food and increasing his strength for the entrance exams? Even better food!

Storage was also no issue since Fang Qiu asked for smaller rank eight beasts, they would still have the same amount of Qi in the flesh as a big beast, but it was more concentrated. Most people wanted the larger beasts since every corpse's meat was one gold so that way they would have more meat. The main reason Fang Qiu bought smaller beasts was because he and little black only had one cubic meter each. "There is no way they we can fit fourteen huge corpses in there. And since I'm buying these corpses mainly for the qi I can afford losing out on some meat." He thought internally. Even the small ones just barely fit after Fang Qiu had stuffed both void storages to the brim. Fang Qiu specifically asked the panda not to convert the meat in its storage into cultivation because this was Fang Qiu's food for the next two months until the sect entrance examinations.

Time to do some cultivating and show people how a genius does things!

The next two months were filled with arduous and tedious cultivation. The first few days were spent arduously stir frying and eating a red maned wolf's flesh. The next week was spent cooking and eating a mountain crab.

Over the next month and a half Fang Qiu dedicated his full time to "cultivating" in every way he could think of like a true genius. Stir frying, cooking, broiling, braising, grilling, roasting etc.

By the end of this time period after eating thirteen eighth rank corpses his cultivation had advanced to seventh tier of qi refinement without any side effects! He could have done this in a couple of days with the help of the panda converting meat into cultivation but as a true food lover how could he not enjoy every last piece.

He kept the last corpse for when he got hungry during the examinations, it was an eighth rank flaming hen which he transformed into several beautiful drumsticks like a true cultivation genius.

"Ah, if only the examiners could see how much of a cultivation genius I was they would be fighting over me like there was no tomorrow. But the path of a genius is always lonely" he mused to himself whilst saying his goodbyes to all the patrons that he shared meat and stories with over the last two months.

"Very lonely indeed" he said again to no one in particular whilst looking at the distant sky with his head at a forty-five degree angle.

The day for the entrance examinations had arrived...