Chapter Ninety-Seven: A Pact of Cooperation

"In ordinary circumstances, a regular student would have no way to come into contact with the academic materials of these city lord students," Ye Mo said. "But you can assist me as a supporting cultivator and help me review them! A city lord cannot complete the task of founding a village alone; he needs many followers to help carry out a great many of the duties. In that way, even if the Azure Cloud Immortal Academy learns of it, I will still have an explanation."

"Assist you?" Lin Zhi's expression changed, and he said in a low voice, "You mean you want me to follow you? Then what meaning would there be in our transaction? Besides, if I were to follow anyone, the academy has many city lord students far stronger than you."

"Heh. Of course the academy has many city lord students stronger than I am. But those people would never trade with you; they would only try to turn you into their subordinate. I have no intention of making you my subordinate."

Ye Mo shook his head, entirely unconcerned by the change in Lin Zhi's expression.

"Then what do you mean?" Lin Zhi's face darkened. He had no fondness for those city lord students, or he would not have come to Ye Mo to discuss a trade.

"My terms are simple. If, in the graduation assessment, I win one of the ten city lord quotas and establish an immortal village on my own, then you will assist me wholeheartedly for three years. After three years, if you wish to stay, you may stay; if you intend to go found your own immortal village, that is fine as well. By assisting me for three years, you can earn a great many spirit stones and learn how to build an immortal village. It will be of benefit to you, with no harm at all.

"If I fail to obtain an official city lord quota in the academy assessment, then I can only go establish a wilderness city. You and I can go to the Eastern Sea to find an island of immortals and build two wilderness villages, supporting one another. That would make our chances of survival even stronger."

After some thought, Ye Mo set out his conditions, then added one last remark.

"You've also prepared yourself to found a wilderness city?"

Lin Zhi was taken aback.

"Of course. My ranking among the more than one hundred city lord students in the academy is too low, and my chances of making the top ten are not high. Naturally I have to prepare for the worst; otherwise, why would I work so hard?"

Ye Mo smiled.

"Fine, I accept your terms. I will assist you for three years."

Lin Zhi laughed heartily and nodded. This was the best arrangement he could fight for, and there was nothing to be dissatisfied about.

"I trust your word. In three days, come and take the academic materials for the city lord students."

Ye Mo smiled.

"Very well. Farewell."

Lin Zhi rose to his feet and left Ye Mo's spirit residence.

"Brother Ye, why not make him follow you? After all, he has no better path to take."

Wang Hu had been listening from the side all along. Only after Lin Zhi had gone did he ask, somewhat puzzled.

"My strength isn't enough to make him follow me. Forcing the matter would only lead to a falling-out. Besides, having one more ally is not a bad thing."

Ye Mo shook his head and looked toward the distant figure of the black-robed cultivator beyond the pavilion.

The atmosphere within the Azure Cloud Immortal Academy had always been tense.

Competition among the city lord students was brutally fierce. Those who passed the assessment would soar to become official city lords of the Immortal City Alliance, standing high above all others. Those who failed would fall into the dust, becoming one of the tens of thousands of supporting cultivators.

Any student with aspirations of becoming a city lord had no choice but to give everything they had in order to fight for one of the ten slots in the graduation assessment.

Ye Mo attended nearly every lecture in the academy, steadily accumulating strength in every area, inch by inch.

Everything went smoothly. The only thing that left Ye Mo somewhat dissatisfied was the slow improvement of his qi refining cultivation.

Restricted by his spirit root potential, which had a little over ten points in each attribute, and by the cultivation technique he practiced, the attribute-less mid-grade technique Vast Origin Art, he could rely on cultivation alone to advance only slightly faster than most ordinary city lord students, and there was no comparison at all with true cultivation prodigies.

Not long after arriving at the Azure Cloud Immortal Academy, Ye Mo realized that his qi refining cultivation was already lower than that of many city lord students.

In order not to be left far behind by the others, Ye Mo, besides cultivating Vast Origin Art each day, had no choice but to rely on daily consumption of first-rank vital energy pills to force a rapid increase in cultivation and make up for that shortcoming.

But taking a first-rank vital energy pill that cost one spirit stone apiece was no different from burning spirit stones.

One had to know that a mere apprentice artificer earned only one spirit stone a month.

Only the children of cultivation families, with their deep pockets, dared to consume great quantities of vital energy pills every day.

In order to raise his primordial spirit cultivation, Ye Mo had no choice but to rely on vital energy pills.

Thus, the rapid depletion of spirit stones became a tremendous problem he had to face.

Earning spirit stones by selling Black Iron spirit swords could solve an emergency, but it was not a long-term solution. The supply of first-rank Black Iron ore stored in his ancient painting was already running low, with only a thousand or two thousand catties left, enough to last only a short while.

Ye Mo also had no way to buy the blueprints for the Five Elements spirit swords.

This was true not only of artificing schematics, but of corresponding alchemical formulas as well. The major and minor powers of Azure Cloud Immortal City all treated such resources as strategic core assets and would not sell them lightly.

The immortal village ancient painting contained both artificing workshops and alchemy workshops, but without the proper schematics and formulas, Ye Mo could do nothing but stare helplessly.

Only the city lords of the Immortal City Alliance were qualified to purchase such strategic core resources from the main immortal city, and this only strengthened Ye Mo's resolve to fight for a place in the top ten.

Ye Mo took one vital energy pill every day to accelerate his cultivation. In the short span of one month after entering the Azure Cloud Immortal Academy, his cultivation had already surged to the peak of the first level of qi refinement.

During this period, Ye Mo could clearly sense that his primordial spirit seemed constrained by an invisible barrier.

With each day of cultivation, that barrier weakened a little, and had already reached the point where it could break through at any moment.

The second month in the academy.

Deep into the night, Ye Mo swallowed a vital energy pill in his quiet chamber and devoted all his strength to breaking into the second level of qi refinement.

After the pill entered his body, it melted rapidly, transforming into strands of vital energy that flowed into his meridians and tempered his physical frame.

Suddenly, a faint halo began to shimmer at Ye Mo's brow, a sign that vital energy was leaking outward.

When a vital energy pill is refined, traces of vital energy rush into the cerebral palace. If the primordial spirit is already saturated and cannot absorb it, the vital energy will overflow.

Within the cerebral palace, Ye Mo's primordial spirit, a wisp of pale smoke no larger than a soybean, floated there. Around it swirled a great many dense filaments of vital energy, all transformed from the vital energy pill he had taken.

The primordial spirit contracted and expanded like breathing, relentlessly striking at the invisible membrane binding it from outside. Each swelling and shrinking consumed more of the surrounding vital energy, and the barrier impeding his advancement weakened in turn.

With a soft, soundless crack, that soybean-sized primordial spirit expanded at astonishing speed, growing to fully twice its former size before finally stopping.

"Second level of qi refinement!"

Ye Mo was overjoyed. At that instant, he could clearly feel an enormous change in his primordial spirit. His spiritual sense surged dramatically, and his perception became sharper as well. His entire body seemed to let out a delighted sigh, radiating a vitality it had never possessed before.

"If my spiritual sense has doubled, then the range of my spell attacks should have doubled as well. No wonder it is so difficult for low-level cultivators to challenge higher-level ones in the cultivation world. With the advantage of spiritual sense alone, high-level cultivators can suppress most low-level cultivators."

Ye Mo quickly calmed his excited mood and continued to meditate in order to consolidate and strengthen his cultivation.