area51novel Chapter 96 : Chapter 96
Chapter 96 : Chapter 96
Chapter 96: Dragon-Phoenix Gourd
Li Mu gained some insight from Wang Longcheng’s words, but he soon let it go.
There was no need for him to force himself to feel the same way.
It was enough to simply be himself.
By the time they returned to the city, it was already night.
Whether near the Teleportation Area or the Abyss elevator, there were quite a few people around.
Most of them were reservists.
“Wolf Guard Li!”
“Wolf Guard Li!”
Every reservist who saw Li Mu immediately snapped to attention and saluted.
Their eyes burned with fervor.
Because of the Abyss-Suppression Army’s confidentiality agreement, the reservists could not go around freely talking about Li Mu once they were back aboveground.
A few who simply could not keep things to themselves only mentioned Li Mu to close relatives and trusted friends.
The spread of that information remained extremely limited.
As a result, Li Mu’s name was not especially famous outside. Only a handful of well-informed people knew of him.
But inside the military district, every reservist revered Li Mu like a god.
Especially after today.
They knew that people from the Northern Frontier Cultivation Art Research Bureau had come, and immediately afterward, Li Mu’s rank had become Wolf Guard!
A double promotion in one leap!
And Li Mu was only eighteen years old!
Li Mu currently had 1,700 Merit Points.
He was only one step away from Junior Tiger Marquis.
The Merit Points required for rank promotion were: Junior Wolf Guard: 200. Mid Wolf Guard: 500. Wolf Guard: 1,000.
Junior Tiger Marquis: 2,000. Mid Tiger Marquis: 4,000. Tiger Marquis: 7,000.
Junior Dragon General: 12,000. Mid Dragon General: 20,000. Dragon General: 30,000.
Junior Dragon-Tiger Marshal: special contributions + 50,000.
Grand Dragon-Tiger Marshal: special contributions + 80,000.
They had heard that Wang Longcheng had 3,480 Merit Points.
His single greatest contribution had come from fighting the Heaven Society to the death and protecting that crucial resource.
Now that his injuries had healed, his rank had already been raised to Junior Tiger Marquis.
But Wang Longcheng was already well into his forties.
He had served in the military for more than twenty years.
Only then had he risen to Junior Tiger Marquis.
An eighteen-year-old Wolf Guard like Li Mu was absolutely unprecedented!
Li Mu nodded calmly as he passed through the crowd and stepped onto the Abyss elevator.
The invisible pressure around him made many reservists want to board, yet not dare to.
In the end, a few reservist students from Blackwater High School stepped onto the elevator with proud expressions and rode up alongside Li Mu.
To others, this was an untouchable Wolf Guard.
But in the eyes of Blackwater High School, he also had a far more familiar identity.
He was their senior.
As the elevator rose, one of the Blackwater High School students asked,
“Wolf Guard Li, tomorrow is the Ironhand City Four-District Elite Tournament.”
“Are you participating?”
Li Mu nodded.
“If nothing unexpected happens, then yes.”
“That’s great! As long as you enter, I feel like even that so-called only SS-grade talent martial artist in all of Ironhand City won’t amount to much.”
“Exactly. The media have been praising him to the skies, saying he’s the strongest student the Eastern District has seen in a hundred years.”
“I don’t think so. He only knows how to put on airs at school. If he joined the military, he’d understand just how huge the gap is between him and Wolf Guard Li!”
“This time, our school can finally readjust the resource rankings fair and square. Let’s see what they still have to say then.”
The other students all chimed in in agreement.
Li Mu had heard of this SS-grade talent holder before.
He was from the South District.
He had not joined the military.
But Li Mu was not especially interested in him.
What interested him more was that final remark about the resource rankings, so he asked,
“By the way, I’ve been busy down below this whole time.”
“I haven’t been following the news from the Department of Resources. The last time they ranked us unfairly, what happened afterward?”
The moment they heard Li Mu ask on his own initiative, the few of them became so excited that they practically competed to explain it to him.
“After Lu Chenfeng and Zhang Zhiwei transferred schools, public opinion overwhelmingly demanded that the Department of Resources give an explanation.”
“But with something like resource rankings, the final authority of interpretation belongs to the Department of Resources in the first place.”
“They said they would reorder the rankings after this Elite Tournament, which was basically a vague answer.”
“So the matter gradually died down.”
Li Mu nodded.
It seemed his uncle-in-law, the Saint Dragon Crown Prince, still had some influence after all.
They would see whether Blackwater High School’s ranking could be adjusted after the Elite Tournament.
If those people still dared to pull any tricks again...
Then he would have to find a way to set them straight.
It would be easy enough.
By the time Li Mu got home, waves of wine fragrance were already drifting out from inside the house.
When Li Mu entered the side hall, he found his mother, Yang Suying, leaning over a wine vat and chatting with someone.
And the one chatting with her was none other than the red-faced Wang Yinhuan.
That rich wine aroma was drifting out from the huge vat.
The moment Wang Yinhuan saw Li Mu return, she took only one glance at him before immediately saying to Yang Suying,
“Auntie, I should go now.”
“Oh, what’s the rush? Stay a little longer.”
Yang Suying tried to stop her, but failed.
As Wang Yinhuan passed by Li Mu, she did not forget to greet him.
“Good evening.”
Li Mu honestly had no idea how he was supposed to respond to a greeting like that.
Yang Suying followed her all the way to the doorway. Watching Wang Yinhuan’s departing back, she turned around and shot Li Mu an annoyed look.
“You little brat. Your timing couldn’t have been worse.”
“Hey! Mom, it’s not like you gave me a set return time!” Li Mu protested in grievance.
“I’m telling you, this girl is actually especially interested in winemaking!”
“Ever since she found out I was brewing wine, she’s practically been coming here every day.”
Yang Suying looked at Li Mu with a half-smile.
“You’re taking on an apprentice?” Li Mu asked.
“Tch. Your childhood nickname, Blockhead, really wasn’t wrong! Go on, get lost. Go play somewhere else.”
After shooing Li Mu away, Yang Suying immediately leaned back over the wine vat again with shining eyes, as though studying something.
But seeing how serious his mother looked, Li Mu felt deeply gratified.
He could tell that Yang Suying truly loved brewing wine.
When a person was doing something she genuinely loved, her entire spirit became different.
Li Mu did not disturb her. He returned to his own room.
He opened the system.
Then entered the Blessing Field.
Breathing in the medicinal fragrance that filled the courtyard, Li Mu finally stretched lazily and contentedly.
After twelve days, the herbs had finally matured.
Actually, these herbs could have been cultivated for a while longer.
The longer they were raised, the stronger their medicinal effects became.
But Li Mu did not need that right now.
At present, the Spiritual Spring could only irrigate such a small patch of land. Pursuing perfectly optimized medicinal effects simply was not cost-effective enough.
What Li Mu needed was to improve his strength and obtain more Triumph Points.
He could use Triumph Points to expand the Blessing Field, increase the Spiritual Spring, enhance the growth-acceleration effects of both the field and the spring on medicinal herbs, and so on.
As those things improved, Li Mu could sow more seeds and refine even stronger pills.
Li Mu harvested all the herbs.
Using Alchemy Art, he refined four ‘High-Grade Body-Fortifying Pills.’
Li Mu was now at the strength of the Fourth Grade.
Setting medicinal tolerance aside, once he finished these four pills on top of his current Fourth Grade cultivation, Li Mu felt there should be no problem at all in raising Divine Weapon Art to 3,000 jin.
This time, Li Mu had learned his lesson.
He first swallowed one Body-Fortifying Pill and quietly felt the transformation it brought within his body.
But after sensing it for only a short while, Li Mu realized that he had still underestimated it.
This High-Grade Body-Fortifying Pill was not just a little stronger than the low-grade version.
With just this single pill, Li Mu already felt as though he had been reborn.
Every part of his body had been fiercely reinforced once over.
Li Mu felt that even if Divine Weapon Art were raised to 3,000 jin right now, his body would be able to handle it completely.
Unfortunately, he did not have any Triumph Points for the moment.
That made his heart itch with impatience, to the point that he almost wanted to head straight into the Abyss and kill a few monsters right now.
Just as he was about to swallow the second Body-Fortifying Pill, Chen Jiafeng’s shout rang out from the first floor:
“Cousin! Someone’s here for you!”
Li Mu immediately got up and went downstairs.
Chen Jiafeng pointed toward the door.
Standing outside was Adjutant Zhang.
Li Mu quickly stepped forward, went outside, closed the door behind him, and asked in a low voice, “Adjutant Zhang, is something the matter?”
Adjutant Zhang took out a beautiful wine gourd.
Its surface was a seamless blend of crimson and black, with a dragon and a phoenix spiraling upward, carved all across the body of the gourd.
Around its narrow middle hung a handmade safety knot woven from red cord.
The entire gourd looked exceptionally beautiful.
“This is a Spirit Treasure. Yinhuan sent it for you.”
When Adjutant Zhang spoke, the corners of his mouth still held a faint smile.
“Huh? For me?”
Li Mu took it in surprise at once, turning it over carefully in his hands, unable to put it down.
There was also a small tag attached to the gourd, serving as an instruction card.
【Dragon-Phoenix Gourd · Premium Spirit Treasure.】
【Drink the wine inside the gourd to stop bleeding, relieve pain, and accelerate the recovery of True Qi.】
Stopping bleeding and relieving pain were already very good attributes.
And it even had an effect that restored True Qi?
This Spirit Treasure really was an excellent one.
Although Li Mu had bought himself a wine gourd before, it had not been a Spirit Treasure. It had only been an ordinary object.
“She exchanged all of her Contribution Points for it at the Quartermaster Department.”