Chapter 173: Way to earn Runes
“Rearing worms?”
Hearing Baldy Qin’s analogy, the young heroes felt disgruntled. They were all outstanding figures from their own lands, but the first thing they encountered in the Divine wilderness City was for them to be fodder.
To gather all of them, it was only to make them fight against each other, eliminating the weak to decide who was the King worm!
Baldy Qin said, “Only the strongest from a circle of mighty warriors is the real king. Your circle decides your future. Hence, all of you are competitors! Human peerless experts come from stepping on numerous geniuses to reach the pinnacle of martial arts!”
“Not a single sage from a million people. How many young heroes have to be stepped on for a sage to be born in the Tai Ah Divine City? The Tai Ah Divine City gives everyone the same conditions. It all depends on you, whether you become a peerless expert or a stepping stone that will be trampled on.” Baldy Qin said with no holds barred.
Upon hearing this, the young heroes were filled with mixed emotions.
Success was built on a foundation of thousands of skeletons. No one wanted to become a stepping stone for others to trample on them.
Immediately, many of the youths felt a crushing sense of danger.
Whether it was the Wilderness Divine Hall’s temptation, the thirst to accomplish great achievements, or the strong sense of danger, they were all spurred on to continue climbing higher.
Humans were never satisfied. Many of the young heroes present were from good family clans and they came to this mysterious sacred land, the Tai Ah Divine City, for cultivation, which was brilliant in and of itself.
But they knew that they were now being saddled with pressures.
Some of them had to face fierce competition within the family for resources and stature. Some had to shoulder the heavy burden of the family’s prosperity. How could they become fodder? The pressure that they faced was not any better than the pressure Lian Chengyu faced before the Kingdom’s selection.
Most of the young heroes from every corner of the Divine Kingdom had to settle for miscellaneous jobs to earn dragon scale runes. The experiences they had in the Tai Ah Divine City made them understand that, however perfect people may be, someone better will always appear. By not exceeding others, they had to begin from zero.
“There are about ten types of miscellaneous jobs. There is no fixed compensation. However much you make depends on your own skill! But generally speaking, there are some errands that are more profitable than others. I’ll begin from the highest!”
“The highest is to be a sparring partner! Some veteran cultivators will need someone to spar with them during their cultivation. After wearing protective gear, you will spar with them. Upon enduring a certain amount of time, you will receive a corresponding amount of dragon scale runes. If you have some skill, you can take on sparring missions with rich people and the corresponding compensation will be significantly more. Of course, it is also easy to get injured. Additionally, it is highly likely that you might end up bedridden for half a month.”
Sparring? Isn’t that just being a punching bag for others?
These young heroes were prideful people. If it was in the past, they would find it unacceptable to do such shameful jobs. But after hearing Baldy Qin’s words and after undergoing the training, their pride had received repeated blows. They did not mind anymore, because without strength, how were they qualified to speak about dignity? Besides, being a punching bag was better than being fodder.
To become an expert, one had to bear the weight, and they had to learn how to take a beating!
“The second highest is forging! None of you have the ability to refine weapons, but it’s alright. Parts of the weapon refining process requires the forging of some special metals. Using a forging hammer, you need to forge it a million times and up! If you think you have the exceptional strength needed, then you can take on this mission!”
“The third is to patrol the walls and maintain the ballistae on the walls! This is a demanding job that requires you to know arrays.”
“These three are the highest paying jobs. Following that there are more relatively common ones, like standing guard in the school ground or the city entrance.”
“Or taking care of the spirit beasts reared in the Tai Ah Divine City’s beast pens, picking herbs, managing the distribution of daily necessities, etc. The last few are usually done by females.”
Baldy Qin finished introducing the various jobs. Upon hearing them, many of the youths felt that the first three were much more reliable.
The first one, which was to be a punching bag, didn’t sound good, but by sparring with an expert, they could learn the offensive skills of the other. By dodging and getting beaten, they could gain the experience of fighting with an expert. Besides, the pay was good, which made it the most suitable job.
“I’ll apply for the first!”
“I’ll apply for the first too, as a sparring partner!”
The youths present immediately expressed their wishes. Baldy Qin’s memory was good, and he remembered everyone’s application.
“I’ll apply for the second one, forging! My strength is pretty good. By hitting a few hundred thousand times, it can also train my strength! By then, I refuse to believe that I cannot pierce this purple tungsten wall 40-50 times with the Primal Arrows!” Zhou Kui rolled up his sleeves and said with a low muffled voice. He too wanted to stretch himself to obtain good results. He had received too much shock in just a day!
“I’ll apply for the first… sparring.” Song Zijun said. Among the group of people, he could feel the pressure. Although they were said to be weak by Baldy Qin, compared to them, Song Zijun was weaker than more than half of them!
There was fierce competition, even for doing miscellaneous jobs!
After making his decision, Song Zijun looked at Yi Yun, along with Baldy Qin.
Up to this point, Yi Yun’s performance was the most outstanding.
Although it had not amazed Baldy Qin, he believed that with six years of training, Yi Yun would definitely shine. Although it was impossible for Yi Yun to enter the top 1000 in the first year, he had great promise to enter the top 1000 within three years.
Baldy Qin also wished he could develop a talent.
Yi Yun thought for a while and smiled, “I’ll apply for… uhm, herb-picking…”
Yi Yun’s simple sentence shocked the young heroes present.
Herb-picking?
Baldy Qin also slightly raised his eyebrow. Very few of the students he had taken in had applied for picking herbs, and they were all female.
After all, females could only be sparring partners for other females. If there were too many sparring partners, men could still do other jobs like forging. Females were not suitable for forging. Similarly, patrolling and maintaining the ballistae was typically not something girls did.
Hence, those girls, who couldn’t be sparring partners, ended up at jobs like picking herbs, taking care of the spirit beasts, and distributing materials.
But Yi Yun, who Baldy Qin felt had good prospects, wanted to pick herbs?
As such, the other young heroes looked at Yi Yun weirdly.
Isn’t this guy pretty strong?
With his abilities, he would do well either in sparring or forging. Why would he pick herbs?
It can’t be for him to get to know girls while picking herbs, and then trick them into giving their bodies to him? Or to push them down in the herb mountain and do it in the wild?
Many people thought negatively of Yi Yun, for they could see no reason for him to enter the female bunch.
“Herb-picking? Are you sure?” Baldy Qin looked Yi Yun in the eye, hoping to see Yi Yun change his decision.
“Yes! I am sure.” Yi Yun nodded.
Baldy Qin pinched his eyes, as if he saw something from Yi Yun’s body.
“Today I’ll submit the name list. Once it is submitted, there can be no more changes in the next three months. Not only is picking herbs slow at making dragon scale runes, it also does not help much in training your strength. I’ll ask you one more time, are you sure you want to pick herbs?”
“I am sure!” Yi Yun replied calmly and firmly.
The surrounding people were speechless. It was clear that Baldy Qin was appreciative of Yi Yun for him to say that much, but Yi Yun was not appreciative.
Instructor Qin frowned. Finally, he shook his head. The decision was up to the trainee and he would not interfere. Since Yi Yun had made the decision, it was not up to him.
“Alright! I’ll apply for the herb-picking job for you. I’ll give you a word of advice. In the Tai Ah Divine City, slightly exceptional people aren’t that great. It is very easy for them to drown in the vast sea of people, never to be seen again.”
“Among the 2000 rookies this time, there were several good seedlings. The 100 people, that is you who came from the Jing state or the southeastern states near the Jing state. Compared to the Zhong state or the Imperial City, or those that were directly referred from the reclusive families, you are greatly lacking.”
“You probably do not know this. A day ago, in this school ground, a genius youth rookie by the nickname of ‘Qiuniu’ pierced this purple tungsten wall seven times. He was from a reclusive family clan!”
“And two days ago, a girl from the Imperial City managed to gain some nomological insight from the primordial species sculpture in the Wilderness Divine Hall! This girl’s name is Chu Xiaoran and she is the beloved daughter of the Defender Duke of the Tai Ah Imperial Dynasty!”
Instructor Qin’s words made all of their eyelids twitch.
The Defender Duke’s beloved daughter…
Genius youth from a reclusive family clan…
A Defender Duke was a duke of the Tai Ah Divine Kingdom. A duke together with the words “Defender” in his title made him an official of the highest level!
As for the reclusive family clan, that was even more terrifying.
In the Tai Ah Divine Kingdom, some of the large family clans had family heritages that were unfathomably deep, and they might even be comparable to the royal family.
Some of these family clans had a longer history than the Tai Ah Divine Kingdom. Some of them existed before the Tai Ah Divine Kingdom was built, or even a few dynasties before, as they passed down one generation after the other.
Some family clans had helped the founding divine emperor of the Tai Ah Divine Kingdom gain its territories. As such, they were given nine big states of the Divine Kingdom’s territories by the founding divine emperor as their eternal fiefdoms.
These family clans had marriages with the Tai Ah Divine Kingdom royal family for generations, creating an integral relationship between the two. It could be said that these family clans were the reason why the Tai Ah Divine Kingdom could last for so many years!
Due to the detachment of these family clans, ordinary people had no access to them. Hence, they were called reclusive family clans, not because they were really hidden.
As for Zhou Kui and company, they came from large families, but their families were from the Jing state or the surrounding small states. Those kind of families just occupied a small province of a state.
A provincial family clan had no way to compare with the reclusive family clans at the Divine Kingdom level.