Chapter 40: The Official Institution
Ever since Yun Jiao realized how much money it took to cultivate, she felt a looming financial crisis like never before. Magical tools, array flags, spirit herbs—every single one was priced in tens of taels. Even the cheapest, most common weapon for novice disciples, the peachwood sword, cost over a hundred taels of silver. High-grade artifacts? Even worse. And don’t even mention pills—luxuries reserved for the wealthy. With Qingyang Temple’s threadbare finances, they couldn’t even sniff a medicinal fragrance.
Yun Jiao herself was a spiritual physician without a cultivation meridian, so she didn’t really need these things. But the trouble was—her temple housed two money-eating beasts: an old man whose cultivation had hit a bottleneck and required resources to break through, and that gluttonous bamboo tube spirit. She couldn’t just ignore them.
Sometimes she wondered if she had stolen old people’s wallets in a past life. Why else would she always end up financially ruined whenever she crossed paths with elderly men?
Fortunately, Shao Xian was far more reliable than his father, quickly paying them with a bank note. As night fell, they stayed temporarily at Old Zhou’s home, planning to return to their temple the next day.
But lately, the Ancestor Spirit had been in some strange mood. He shut himself inside the bamboo tube and refused to emerge. Normally he would show up at least at mealtimes—sometimes to eat, sometimes to lecture them, mostly to drill Bai Yu. Now, however, he was silent and motionless, acting like an ordinary bamboo tube. Meals were tossed in by the disciples themselves, or else the food would levitate off the table and fly into the tube. That eerie sight would have shocked outsiders, so they had to invent excuses.
“Brother Bai, your bamboo tube is quite peculiar. Is it perhaps some kind of artifact?” Old Zhou finally noticed the oddity as Bai Yu poured in his third large bowl of soup. A palm-sized bamboo tube—where on earth was it all going?
Bai Yu stiffened. Damn, he’d forgotten they were at Old Zhou’s house. His face paled as he hastily deflected. “This… this is the girl’s bamboo tube.”
Yun Jiao’s hand holding her chopsticks froze. MMP!
But outwardly, her expression never changed. She nodded gravely. “Yes, it is indeed an artifact—only for storage. Since we’ll return to our temple tomorrow and the journey is long, we’re stocking up on dry rations.” She lied with perfect solemnity.