Author’s Note:

Surprise Chapter!

When I went to schedule Friday’s chapter, I saw that my novel was trending…  which made me speechless as I never imagined this would happen. As a writer, I just feel so happy and this just made my stressful weekend with finals coming better. Enjoy!

Returning to Soba City, there was still 2 weeks until he would meet with Elder Zhang. Having nothing to do, Qian Yu decided to roam around the city looking for something to do. It couldn’t hurt to always make some money when there was nothing else to do. To be honest however, Qian Yu had been itching for a fight ever since he ascended to the 4th stage of qi gathering. He had been mentally prepared to fight with Tao Wei to see how much stronger he became but that didn’t happen so Qian Yu decided to head towards the underground meetings for rogue cultivators. 

Swiftly, Qian Yu arrived at another small area where rogue cultivators gathered with a mask covering his face as he was still paranoid and as such, decided to be cautious. 

“Looking for a Blue Lotus Petal!”

“Recruiting a hunting squad for an early stage uncommon beast!”

A few shouts rang throughout from the underground meeting. Yet none of them managed to capture his attention until he heard the following. 

“Recruiting a hunting squad for a Demonic Wild Boar” a voice yelled out.

‘!!!’ Qian Yu thought of something when he heard of this. Back then, he had attended a hunting squad with Zhong Chun who he hadn’t seen since the start of Liu Wang’s inheritance realm. Towards this guy, he had always been grateful for what he did for Qian Yu over the 2 to 3 weeks they had been interacting for. Essentially, it was also him that allowed Qian Yu to meet Sun Hong as well. 

Yet what made him excited was that he remembered that Zhong Chun had wanted to kill it for materials to make a weapon. 

From his prior experience, a mortal grade weapon was sold for around 10 spirit stones or 1,000 gold coins. Although a weapon for him hadn’t been useful recently due to Lightning Spasm, it didn’t mean that Qian Yu didn’t need one. 

‘Sigh, a regular spear like the one in the ring is worth a couple gold coins while the lowest tier spear at the mortal rank is at least hundreds of times more expensive,’ Qian Yu sighed at the exponential growth in resources of the cultivation world. 

‘However, I have about two weeks to focus on getting materials for a new spear, or maybe a halberd or glaive? That should be fine if the spiritual beasts are nearby,’ Qian Yu thought about the options of spears he could use as he walked out of the gathering. 

A spear of course, was the weapon Qian Yu was currently using. Of the three, it had the strongest penetrating power with the head being a pointy tip while the rest of the body was a straight and long staff. Overall, it was probably the easiest to use and as such, probably had the best defensive capabilities due to its ease of maneuvering.

Meanwhile, a halberd was like a combination of an axe and a spear. It had a pointy tip yet also had two blades coming out of it from the top. Without a doubt, it was a dangerous weapon that had great offensive abilities to slash and poke. However, it was the shortest weapon and as such was harder to use defensively. Due to that reason, Qian Yu decided to avoid this choice as he didn’t need a strong and offensive melee weapon to use when he had Lightning Spasm.

Lastly, there was the glaive which was long like the regular spear. However, what made it different was that unlike the pointy edge of a spear, there was a sharp blade instead. In a way, it was like a sword that was sharp and had higher slashing power instead of the penetrating power of the spear.

Still, Qian Yu couldn’t make up his mind between the spear and the glaive as he walked towards the inn. Entering the room, he removed his black clothing as a white gown with a snowflake on the back appeared. 

Leaving the inn, Qian Yu in the attire of an official sect headed out in search of a smith and weapon crafter to make him his weapon. For something like this, it would be easier to use his normal identity as he would likely have to have a few interactions with the crafter anyways. 

Half an hour later, Qian Yu entered a large building titled “Soba Craftsman’s Association”. Entering inside, Qian Yu saw a luxurious interior with countless people. A couple seconds passed and an employee headed his way as he respectably said, “Hello honorable guest. May I inquire what you need today?”

“I’m looking to find someone to craft a weapon for me,” Qian Yu said. 

“Alright, please follow me,” the attendant said as he led Qian Yu towards other rooms. Soon, Qian Yu was brought towards a less luxurious area as the temperature started increasing notably. Looking around, he saw lots of closed-door rooms where the heat came from. 

“Valuable guest, may I inquire what kind of weapon you would like crafted?” The regular and mortal attendant said as beads of sweat dropped from his face. 

“Some kind of polearm weapon,” Qian Yu replied vaguely. 

Seeing his response, the attendant pointed at a room saying, “Please head towards that room. Master Xia should be waiting inside”.

“Thank you,” Qian Yu said as he approached the door before knocking on it.

“Come in,” an aged voice resounded from inside. 

Qian Yu opened the door as he entered the large room. Inside, he saw a spacious area with a couple furnaces and many tables. Littered everywhere, were all sorts of tools and molds of various shapes.

Working on one of the tables, an old man with white hair was currently smelting a new weapon. 

Seeing that he was working, Qian Yu just waited and a couple minutes later, the aged voice sounded again. 

“What kind of polearm do you want?” Master Xia asked. 

“I’m not sure yet between the spear and glaive. I was wondering if the materials would be different,” Qian Yu replied hesitantly. 

“Sigh, that’s fine then. The materials used don’t really matter if it’s a low tier weapon,” he said as he took out a piece of paper and messily wrote on it before giving it to Qian Yu. “I will need one of the materials from each of the three categories on the list. The crafting cost of the spear or whatever will be 500 gold coins,” Master Xia explained to Qian Yu as he got back to work on the halberd he was crafting.

‘Hmm, 5 spirit stones then? That’s fine,’ Qian Yu thought as he heard the price which was around what he was expecting.  

Walking out of the hot and burning room, Qian Yu looked at the messy piece of paper as he read it. 

‘There’s a lot of beasts I don't know about,’ Qian Yu instantly frowned as he realized he needed to go buy some information. Entering a random general store, Qian Yu paid a gold coin as he started reading a pamphlet. 

‘Hmm, this one’s no good, it’s too far away,’ Qian Yu narrowed down his targets that were easy for him to kill while also being nearby. 

An hour later, Qian Yu made a plan to hunt the spiritual beasts. Two of these uncommon ranked beasts were pretty weak according to the pamphlet and were classified as early stage. Meanwhile the last one was moderately stronger and classified in the middle stage.

After making preparations, Qian Yu was headed off to hunt a Silverhorned Rhino.