The Programmer Cultivator

After Dang Xiangjun left, Zhang Deming was lost in thought for a long while before finally snapping out of it.

The conflicts of interest and the issue of securing backing for the shop’s expansion were preliminarily resolved today. He could now consider slowly expanding the business.

However, the method of expansion, as well as the number of Spirit Nurturing Beads allocated to each shop, required careful consideration.

With his current Tier Four Spirit Nurturing Technique, he could produce one Tier One Spirit Nurturing Pearl in about one to two minutes.

This was already close to his limit. Future increases in his Tier would likely not significantly reduce the production time for Tier One Spirit Nurturing Pearls.

Therefore, given his success rate, a maximum output of about twenty per hour was his limit, thirty at the absolute most in the future.

Even at a rate of thirty, if he worked hard every day, producing three to five hundred would already be considered high-intensity labor.

Averaged out over the long term, he could probably only spend three to five hours a day making them nonstop; any more would severely impact his passive cultivation progress.

This meant his monthly production output was also fixed.

So, if he wanted to expand aggressively, he couldn’t keep supplying each store with one hundred units of his flagship product every month.

After a long while, Zhang Deming shook his head and stopped thinking about it. ’Establishing a whole supply chain... that can come later.’

For now, he just needed to lay the groundwork, spread the Spirit Nurturing Beads, and accumulate Merit and Qi Fortune for himself, all while earning Spirit Stones on the side.

’Well... the motes of light in the Spirit Nurturing Space are also a kind of reward, a higher-level resource. But I’m nowhere near being able to develop them yet.’

After thinking for a long while, Zhang Deming finally stood up, tidied his things, and returned to the third floor to begin his passive cultivation.

But just as he sat down, Zhang Deming’s expression shifted.

His Heart Spirit entered the Spirit Nurturing Space, and a scene began to materialize in the sky.

The scene depicted a Cultivation Room. The first thing he saw was Qian Xiaogong’s face—so adorable you couldn’t help but want to pinch his cheeks.

Qian Ruyan stood nervously beside him, a pink, luminous mist swirling around her and emitting a faint, peculiar, and delicate fragrance.

This sensory combination dispelled all of Qian Xiaogong’s nervousness, pulling him into a strange, tranquil state.

He held a Spirit Nurturing Bead and activated it with his Spiritual Power. Countless motes of light spread out, forming a hollow sphere that enveloped him.

From within the motes of light, an emerald vine emerged and sank directly into the center of his forehead.

At that moment, the aura around Qian Ruyan instantly flared but did not affect Qian Xiaogong in the slightest.

A strange pink mist began to emerge from Qian Ruyan’s Spiritual Light. Then, with a hardened expression, she struck her own chest.

Her face instantly turned deathly pale as she spat a mouthful of Essence Blood into the mist.

The pink mist transformed into a faint fragrance that streamed into the sphere of light and was inhaled by Qian Xiaogong.

Qian Ruyan immediately went limp, nearly collapsing. She swayed for a moment before barely managing to stay on her feet. For a Three Talents Great Cultivator to be weakened to this extent showed what an enormous price she had just paid.

Watching this, Zhang Deming’s eye twitched. ’It’s just achieving Enlightenment Dao for a beginner Technique, was all this really necessary?!’

’It’s infuriating to see how easy some people have it! Damn it, I spent eight agonizing years fumbling around on my own! It was impossible to find anyone willing to share their insights or even give a simple lecture. The public squares were just full of posers!’

’But look at you! Starting out with a High-Quality Spirit Nurturing Pearl is one thing, but you’ve also got a Three Talents-level mother putting her own lifeblood on the line to escort you. Seriously... the gap between people can’t be this huge, can it?!’

’Is everyone today lining up just to make me jealous?’

’I just sent off a genius, and now I have to watch a legacy kid with this kind of starting advantage?’

As Zhang Deming’s thoughts wandered, the hollow sphere of light began to flicker. A jade-like seedling sprouted from Qian Xiaogong’s hand.

Unsurprisingly, he had successfully achieved Enlightenment Dao!

’Of course it was a success. The High-Quality Spirit Nurturing Pearl I crafted with all my effort already had a forty to fifty percent success rate on its own.’

’He’d had the pearl for half a year before even trying. Obviously, he spent that time familiarizing himself with the Growth Technique, and he probably had a personal tutor to boot.’

’With all that, his chances of success were already extremely high. And now, with Madam Qian using some unknown method that damaged her own core essence to put her lifeblood on the line for him... if he still failed after all this...’

’...then Qian Xiaogong might as well just give up on the path of cultivation entirely.’

But in the next moment, Zhang Deming was stunned. The scene wasn’t over.

Just as the jade seedling appeared and the hollow sphere of light began to flicker, the fragrant mist that Qian Xiaogong had inhaled started to seep out from all over his body.

Qian Xiaogong now wore a serious expression, but on his adorable face, it looked almost comical.

His hands became a blur, forming an extremely complex Spell. It was fueled by the very same pink, fragrant mist that was now diffusing from him.

Once the Spell was complete, two more Spirit Nurturing Beads flew out from a pocket on his clothes. To his astonishment, they were for the Tier Two and Tier Three Growth Technique.

Seeing this, Zhang Deming was shocked. ’Could it be...?’

The instant the thought surfaced in Zhang Deming’s mind, both Spirit Nurturing Beads activated in unison, releasing countless motes of light.

A second and then a third hollow sphere nested themselves outside the first.

Because of the appearance of the two outer layers, the first layer, instead of disappearing, remained, flickering continuously at a steady frequency.

’Is it really the Technique, *Inheritance*?’

’The legendary Skill from among the Earth Evil Seventy-Two Techniques that is best suited for teaching disciples—a Skill specializing in instruction! A Technique that has a myriad of connections to the Spirit Nurturing Technique!’