Chapter 168: Quest (Part 1)
This voice, Xie Qing would recognize out of a thousand. He smiled.
“Master, didn’t you say that I should be more diligent?”
Tilting his head to the side, Xie Qing allowed Xu Mei to rest her chin on his shoulder. Her pouty face looked very cute.
“You give me so little time… Sigh… Master is so lonely~…”
“Is that so?” The young man gently smiled and stroked Xu Mei’s cheek, then whispered in her ear: “Or maybe… the disciple will show his filial piety to you today?”
“That would be nice…” Xu Mei replied in a dreamy voice.
“Heh”
***
The banquet was indeed luxurious. Being cultivators with important backgrounds, they only ate high-quality food.
Spiritual wine, spiritual meat, fruits… The servants’ hearts bled. After all, the price for this one banquet could easily feed their families for seven generations.
And for Xie Qing… This was an ordinary dinner. Nevertheless, such banquets were rare, as for cultivators, food was purely aesthetic and gustatory pleasure.
And, it must be said, it was very delicious. Xie Qing was full.
***
A week later, after Xie Qing contacted Zhang Mei, she arrived as promised.
“Weren’t you ashamed when you built this mansion, huh?” She said first, narrowing her eyes: “Hm… You know, setting up formations on all this with your requirements… It will be expensive”
“I understand, so I would like to pay the rest with something else” Xie Qing said bitterly: “Something like completing tasks, preparing pills…”
“Mm-hmm. You’re just like your foolish Master, you love to spend money, but when it comes time to pay, you only realize the problem” She said with a sigh, shaking her head: “You’re lucky. In normal times, I wouldn’t even lift a finger for such a thing, but recently I needed help with a certain question. Complete one task and we’re even”
“I’m all ears” Xie Qing nodded.
“Let’s discuss this in a private conversation” Zhang Mei casually replied, ending the conversation.
Now in the mansion, there were servants, the other girls were in the sect for various matters.
So, Zhang Mei and Xie Qing were mostly alone.
Preparing the necessary materials, Zhang Mei waved her hand. On the walls of the mansion, various geometric shapes appeared, connected by mysterious characters.
Xie Qing, watching this, was genuinely amazed – he had never seen anything so beautiful.
It took five hours to cover the entire mansion with protective formations, which in principle was considered a very short period of time.
In the end, using his vision, he was able to discern the formation applied to the walls of the mansion.
Countless geometric shapes were combined into complex patterns. If you look at them for a long time, your head starts to hurt.
“Done. The outer protection can block ten attacks from a cultivator at the Divine Transformation level, and there’s no need to talk about cultivators below that level” Zhang Mei said, brushing her hair off her shoulders. She indifferently looked at Xie Qing: “I won’t take payment for applying the outer protection, consider it my repayment to you for being friends with my disciple”
“Sect Master Zhang is indeed kind” Xie Qing shamelessly nodded, brightly smiling.
If something is given to you for free and there are no hidden catches, then why not? It would be foolish to refuse free food, wouldn’t it?
“Also, you asked me to help you create an alchemy room and provide an internal management system for the mansion” Zhang Mei said, not changing her facial expression.
“That’s right” Xie Qing nodded, then waved his hand to the servant girls: “Prepare us some tea”
“There was no need to trouble yourself” Zhang Mei said, casually glancing at the interior decoration.
“I insist. After all, you are a guest. It would be rude not to offer you tea”
“Then I humbly accept your hospitality”
Xie Qing smiled. Although he couldn’t understand what emotions she had (Zhang Mei’s face doesn’t change at all), he still wanted to provide the highest hospitality to his Master’s friends.
After all, he remained a disciple of Xu Mei. It wouldn’t be right to put her in an awkward position.
Sitting in the living room, the servant girls very quickly brewed tea and brought sweets.
“Please, Sect Master Zhang, try it. Although I cannot claim that this will be able to fully satisfy you, I guarantee the taste” Xie Qing said.
“Hm…” Zhang Mei nodded and took a chocolate cookie, then bit off a small piece and tried it. After a few seconds, she nodded again: “Indeed, it’s delicious. By the way, your manners are good. In this, you surpass your Master”
“…”
Xie Qing decided not to comment on this. And although he did not see any emotions appear on Zhang Mei’s face, he felt that she liked everything.
***
After the tea party (Xie Qing drank through force, as he didn’t like tea), Zhang Mei began to apply the formation.
“What you asked for is very expensive even for me. Moreover, considering the complexity, it will take me until night” Zhang Mei said, assessing the situation: “I will deduct the cost of my services only because you are Xu Mei’s disciple. However, the cost of materials will be covered from your own pocket”.
“It couldn’t be better. Thank you”
Xie Qing was grateful. He had already prepared a total of 2 million Spiritual Stones.
The internal management system of the mansion was an extremely complex formation. It helped to establish surveillance over every corner of the mansion, as well as provided protection for the mansion.
The main core of the formation was an artificial soul-assistant. There were teleportation functions within the mansion, so one could only imagine how difficult it was to create this formation.
Only two people in this world were capable of this – Zhang Mei and Master Yao.
Although to an outside observer like Xie Qing, it looked as if she simply waved her hand and drew something on the materials…
A knowledgeable person would have become like a traveler in the desert looking for water, eagerly watching every little action of Zhang Mei.
Xie Qing did not stare at the girl’s work and decided to spend time on his own development.
***
Thus, night fell. The girls had already returned and were somewhat surprised to see Zhang Mei casually drinking tea.
“Hey… what are you doing here?” Xu Mei asked, frowning and plopping down next to Xie Qing, pressing herself against him with her hips, as if trying to say: “He’s mine!”
Zhang Mei only rolled her eyes at her friend’s childish behavior.
“Do your brains ever work?” She casually asked a rhetorical question: “One way or another, it’s your disciple who invited me. And we didn’t do anything like what your dirty mind might imagine”.
“How rude! I’m pure and innocent!”
“Yes, yes…” Zhang Mei nodded with a serious face, adding: “Innocent as the devil”.
“…”
The bickering of these two had become so commonplace that Xie Qing didn’t even react. He just immersed himself in meditation, not particularly wanting to get involved in their dialogue.
Xu Mei and Zhang Mei argued for another half hour. And when they finally finished, Xie Qing opened his eyes and looked at the head of the Starry Stream Sect.
“Sect Master Zhang… as you requested, I have collected two million Spiritual Stones” Xie Qing said and took out a spatial ring from the inner pocket of his hanfu: “And as for the rest of the part… hm… I agree”.
“That’s wonderful. I don’t want to force you to rush, but the sooner you go, the better, right?” Zhang Mei said, getting up from her seat. She brushed her hair off her shoulders: “Then I’ll leave you, I still have a lot of business to attend to”.
“I’ll see you out”.
“I’d appreciate it”.
Xu Mei watched as Xie Qing and Zhang Mei walked away down the hallways. Her face became strange.
“For some reason, I have a strange feeling…”
***
Two days later, after Xie Qing had rested enough, he set off for the Northern Continent.
The reason for such a quick departure was Zhang Mei’s task.
“Li Yuilan went to study the ruins… hm…”
Zhang Mei was worried about her disciple, but she didn’t want to impose too much and thus interfere with Li Yuilan’s development.
So, she sent Xie Qing to her, as the two of them were quite close.
Xie Qing didn’t object. He himself was worried about Li Yuilan, as they were friends and got along well.
Fortunately, after he showed his main disciple token of the Heavenly Sword Sect, many guards let him in without question.
Using the teleportation formations, he quickly reached the Northern Continent.
“I need to check on the Xie family at the same time” Xie Qing thought.
He was probably the worst of the main family. After all, the only thing he did was finance his family. And although he received messages that the family was developing and had already become almost a monopolist in Yuguang.
Such news couldn’t help but make Xie Qing happy. In any case, he had to be in leading positions, if not the first.
And while he was busy with his thoughts, his carriage arrived at the desired location.
“The ruins of the cultivator nicknamed ‘King of Hunting’… hm, they say he could destroy mountains with one blow. Is that true?”
The young man didn’t know, and he didn’t care. His goal was to find Li Yuilan.
