Chapter 276 Great Difficulty
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Ten Thousand Cultivators City is undoubtedly the city of Loose Cultivators, with tens of thousands of them settled both inside and outside the city.
Adding outsiders like Wang Chen, the number of Cultivators becomes even more substantial.
Moreover, the majority of these Cultivators are at the Qi Cultivation Tier.
Due to the large base, there are many who have reached Qi Cultivation Perfection; aside from a very few with exceptional talent, the vast majority needs Aperture Opening Pills to break through to the Purple Mansion.
Having an Aperture Opening Pill doesn't guarantee a successful Breaking Threshold, but without one, not only is the probability of failure higher, there's also a risk of death and soul destruction.
Under such circumstances, one can imagine how popular Aperture Opening Pills are!
A half-year wait just to place an order!
Wang Chen couldn't help asking, "How many Spirit Stones for one?"
Steward Jin smiled and held up three fingers, "Three hundred Middle Spirit."
凸(艹皿艹)
Wang Chen really felt like giving the middle finger.
That's daylight robbery!
Although one Middle Spirit Stone is equivalent to one hundred Low Spirit Stones, three hundred Middle Spirit Stones simply convert to thirty thousand Low Spirit Stones; yet it's impossible to exchange thirty thousand Low Spirit Stones for three hundred Middle Spirit Stones.
At least a ten percent surcharge is required!
That means the actual price for an Aperture Opening Pill sold by the Four Seas Commerce Association is thirty-three thousand Low Spirit Stones.
This price truly shattered Wang Chen's understanding.
"If I order two, can I get a discount?"
Steward Jin contemplated for a moment before answering, "If you place your order right now, I can authorize a price of sixty thousand Low Spirit Stones for two Aperture Opening Pills."
Sixty thousand Low Spirit Stones...
Wang Chen gritted his teeth, "Done!"
He had already reached Qi Cultivation Perfection and was just a bit of accumulation away from attempting to Break the Threshold Mansion.
Wang Chen had long planned to advance to the Purple Mansion before crossing Jade Dragon Mountain.
Thus, the Aperture Opening Pill was an urgent need.
And after passing Ten Thousand Cultivators City, it's feared there may be no shops selling Aperture Opening Pills!
As for shopping around, with the reputation and strength of the Four Seas Commerce Association, Wang Chen didn't think he could find a cheaper option in this city unless there was some catch.
With an advancement of such importance, Wang Chen would of course choose the Four Seas Commerce Association first.
The twenty-three thousand and forty-five Low Spirit Stones he had just gotten his hands on had hardly warmed up before he transferred them all back.
He even had to add nearly seven thousand Low Spirit Stones from his own pocket!
It couldn't be helped, as the Four Seas Commerce Association required a fifty percent deposit first, followed by delivery within half a year.
When Wang Chen stepped out of the doors of the Four Seas Commerce Association, he felt utterly hollowed out.
The wealth he had painstakingly amassed, the spoils of war from slaying dozens of Cultivators, didn't all go in, but the majority of it did, and it was just enough to pay the half deposit for two Aperture Opening Pills.
No wonder high-tier Pill Masters are all rolling in wealth!
Wang Chen even started to regret not choosing alchemy as a sideline; if he had taken up being an Alchemist…
Forget it!
He pushed down this unrealistic thought and pondered where to find the other thirty thousand Low Spirit Stones.
After much thought, Wang Chen came up with a plan.
Ten Thousand Cultivators City has a special Array that exerts a suppressive force on all Cultivators within it, making it unsuitable for cultivation, but undoubtedly an excellent place for conducting business.
All kinds of shops, wine houses, inns, workshops, and galleries abound: Artifact Shops, Pill Shops, Talisman Shops, Pet Beast Shops, Tailors, Grocery Stores, and so on, are peppered across every street and alley, creating a thick commercial atmosphere.
Even as a newcomer, Wang Chen could deeply sense the unique atmosphere of this Immortal City.
So, Wang Chen decided to follow the local customs.
In the six months waiting for the Aperture Opening Pills to arrive, he would earn thirty thousand Low Spirit Stones in Ten Thousand Cultivators City!
He found a Real Estate Agency.
Half a year is neither long nor short, but if he wanted to earn Spirit Stones in the city, he definitely needed a place to settle down.
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Wang Chen prepared to rent an apartment.
However, he soon discovered that renting a place in Ten Thousand Cultivators City was no easy task.
Firstly, whether for rent or sale, properties in the city were in high demand. Often, as soon as a listing became available, it was instantly snatched up.
Whether one could rent a satisfactory apartment was entirely a matter of luck!
Wang Chen was somewhat baffled by this.
Given that Ten Thousand Cultivators City was not conducive to cultivation, why were properties there so expensive?
Surely, it couldn't be the Wenzhou property speculation group that had time-travelled here, right?
In response to Wang Chen's confusion, the real estate agent just smiled and said, "If you just live here for some time, you'll naturally understand."
Although the agent was very polite and respectful in demeanor,
Wang Chen felt that this Qi Cultivation Tier 4 real estate agent did not truly take him seriously.
There was an inexplicable sense of arrogance in his bones.
Spirit Heavenly Dragon Beings!
Without betraying his emotions, Wang Chen passed a Messenger Crane to the other party, "Contact me if there's a listing available."
The crane carried a trace of Wang Chen's qi, which, once activated with mana, could send messages to him.
The condition being that the distance couldn't be too far away.
After leaving the real estate agency and noticing it was getting dark, Wang Chen found a nearby inn to stay for the night.
The high cost of rooms meant staying at the inn wasn't cheap either.
This ordinary inn charged five Low Spirit Stones per night for a dorm room that slept ten people.
Wang Chen, of course, would not share a room with others, so he rented the cheapest single room available for twenty Low Spirit Stones a night.
It was, indeed, the cheapest single room!
The room was so small that after fitting in a bed and a set of tables and chairs, there wasn't much space left for movement.
However, the walls of the room were solid, lending an excellent soundproofing effect.
Interestingly, when the inn's attendant showed Wang Chen the room, he specifically instructed him not to set up any arrays in the room, such as a Spirit Gathering Array.
Otherwise, it would cause big trouble!
Moreover, if guests violated the rules, the inn would not take any responsibility, and instead, the violators would be pursued for accountability!
If you want to cultivate, then rent a Cave Mansion in the Inner City.
Although the attendant didn't say so, Wang Chen was sure the rental price for a Cave Mansion would be extremely high.
Damn it, a shabby single room in a small inn costs twenty Low Spirit Stones a night, so how much would it cost to rent a cultivation Cave Mansion for a day?
Wang Chen felt that the few thousand Spirit Stones he had on him were nowhere near sufficient in this place.
The Ten Thousand Cultivators Residence, truly a hard place to live in!
After some thought, he decided that if he really couldn't find a place to rent or if the rent was too high to afford, he might as well find a spot near Ten Thousand Cultivators City to dig a tunnel and build a secret chamber to live in like a hermit.
As long as he had a Flying Artifact, even a hundred miles' distance to and from the city outskirts would be a simple matter.
This way, he would save money and not be suppressed by the city's large arrays.
Wouldn't this be killing two birds with one stone?
The problem was, the other Cultivators weren't fools, so why didn't they do this?
Wang Chen felt sure there must be a reason for this.
After pondering back and forth, he eventually decided to stay in the inn for a few days to become familiar with the situation before making any plans. Stay connected with mvl
The next morning, Wang Chen got up early and went out.
Then, he wandered around Ten Thousand Cultivators City for the entire day and even spent some time sitting in two tea houses and taverns.
On the third and fourth days after arriving in this city of Loose Cultivators, his routine was much the same.
After three days, Wang Chen had a pretty good understanding of things.
At the same time, he finally received a Crane Message from the real estate agency!
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The first update is here.
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