125 Small World
With an anime pin on his chest, Xu Miao entered the portal and teleported to another location. When he could see everything clearly again, he found himself inside a grand hall with several long counters and clerks. The three cauldron sign of Myriad Cauldron Sect on the ceiling told Xu Miao that he was inside one of their official buildings.
Hundreds of cultivators and alchemists attended to their businesses. A dozen white-robed elders were sitting on lounge sofas, having a loud conversation. More than half of alchemist disciples in green robes were queueing in front of the long counters, waiting to submit their assignment report. A hundred CP hall staff were busy handling paper documents and sorting countless bottles of unknown pills.
Everyone was busy. It reminded Xu Miao about a modern bank office during peak time. Fortunately, no random telephone sound rang here, or it would have been more chaotic.
While Xu Miao was confused about where he should start first, a fat middle-aged man noticed the pin on the former's chest. He smiled and approach Xu Miao, "Greetings, comrade. Are you new here?"
Xu Miao blinked in confusion and nodded, "Yes."
"Then, you should report yourself at our garden's counter if you're in trouble. We should stick together, or those Han bitches will bully you."
Again, these nerds hated women from the Han Garden for some reason.
Although Xu Miao wasn't compatible with nerds since he was from thug communities in the modern world, he pretended to be gullible, "My master has told me to come here for a farm job. Could you teach me how this sect works?"
"Of course! Come, come!"
The fat man led Xu Miao to a fancy counter, decorated with colorful anime posters, nendoroids, and figures. Even the worker behind the counter was wearing a mascot costume of … a moist banana.
On the counter, there was a nameplate.
Wet Banana Garden
Everything was clear. Goddess Yuan Hua was the owner of these men.
Still curious about the bananas, Xu Miao muttered, "Say, do you receive magical wet bananas every day?"
The fat man and the clerk were surprised. They laughed, "Of course not! Only the selected the top contributors of our garden can enjoy a piece of wet banana. But if you're rich, you can buy it from the sect."
"How much is it?"
"An essence crystal for one wet banana!"
Essence crystals were a rare currency and one of the top cultivation resources for cultivators under the Essence Foundation Realm. Xu Miao hadn't seen one of them yet, but Jia Shan and Qi Hong used to teach him that a crystal carried enough energy to boost one's strength from an initial 4th-stage to a peak 4th-stage, who developed a sea of essence. Its market value was a million of refined Yin or Yang stone, and one Yin or Yang stone could be exchanged for 1,000 raw spirit stones.
_
Wet Banana (1) – 1,000,000 Yin Essence
_
As expected, a juicy dildo treasure of Yuan Hua was expensive. No matter which channel Xu Miao chose to buy from, it would cost his arms and legs.
"Haiya! Too expensive!"
"I know right? Hahaha!"
"Fellow comrades, let's get to business or we'll trouble the others," The service clerk coughed and changed the topic.
"Very well. I'll excuse myself. Good luck, comrade!" The fat man had something else to do. He left Xu Miao with the clerk.
Seeing that the fat man left, the clerk gave Xu Miao a small jade pallet with a magic circle on it.
"Er… What do I do with it?"
"Please drop your blood on the paper, so we can register you to the contribution hall."
"Okay."
Xu Miao cut his fingertip and dropped his blood on the green jade. The pallet flash in green light.
The clerk continued, "I'll ask a few questions. Please answer them in your mind. First, what's your name?"
"…"
"What's your current status in Myriad Cauldron Sect?"
"…"
"What's your true cultivation base?"
"…"
*WHOOSH*
The jade pallet transformed into a small business card with Xu Miao's true name and his face.
_
Name: Mao Miaomiao
Status: Guest
Affiliated Garden: None
Cultivation Rank: Bone Refining, Stage 4
Contribution Points: 0
_
The service clerk looked at the green card. He nodded and smiled, "Junior Mao Miaomiao, welcome to Myriad Cauldron Sect! If you're looking for work, you can bring this card with you and show it to the staff at the freelance counter. You can also pick a mission from the freelance bulletin boards, but you can't accept missions from any garden until your status has become an official guest disciple."
The clerk explained how the CP hall worked.
This sect's system was similar to Silver Phoenix Sect's CP hall. However, 90% of the missions here focused on either concocting specific pills or processing herbs. The rest of the missions were combat tasks, such as hunting for rare beasts or bandits while the minority was odd jobs.
But what surprised Xu Miao was the technology behind this jade card. It revealed his true name, which he wanted to forget.
'No one has called me by this name for a long time…'
It felt nostalgia to see his modern world's name here.
"Any question, comrade?" The clerk finished explaining.
"Err, no. Thank you very much, comrade."
"No problem. Unfortunately, you're not a formal disciple, so you can't accept our garden's missions. But don't hesitate to ask us if you run into problems, okay?"
"… Okay."
Xu Miao bid farewell to the friendly clerk and walked toward the freelance bulletin board with his new jade card.
Over a thousand papers were pinned on multiple bulletin boards. However, there were only five mission papers in the freelance section. Even the disciples ignored this place.
Xu Miao skimmed through the mission descriptions.
- Please clean my shop's latrine.
- Take care of the pigs for me.
- Please fix my horse stable.
- The latrine pipe under my courtyard is broken. Please help me.
"Ah, the odd jobs."
Xu Miao sighed and shook his head. He understood why nobody cared for these tasks.
Looking at the rewards, they were meagerly one or two raw spirit stones and a few CP points. Alchemists, whose time was money, wouldn't bother looking at these requests.
Still, one of the tasks was different. It was more like an announcement or an advertisement.
Due to the crisis in Mountain Goose City, we will cancel the annual examination for new alchemists this year. However, we have opened a training course for rookie alchemists and herbalists at Ju Garden. Any alchemists or aspiring alchemists can attend our weekly seminar for free.
Requirement: Authorized guests, visitors, and MCS disciples only. You don't need to have experience in the subjects to participate.
Garden Master, Ju Shoufen
"Oho?"
Without hesitation, Xu Miao strolled toward the Ju Garden's counter.
This organization's counter seemed to be a powerhouse among the sect since their signboards were 2-time bigger than the others. The next largest garden was the Han Garden, whose counter was next to the Ju Garden's.
Both Ju and Han Garden had something similar. Their members were mostly women of all ages. There were male members, but they were too feminine as these men dressed in women's clothes.
Undaunted by the environment, Xu Miao approached Ju Garden's service clerk.
"I would like to attend a weekly seminar."
The clerk gazed at Xu Miao in astonishment. None of them expected a new participant other than fellow disciples of the same sect. Still, the clerk gave him a schedule paper.
"The next seminar will be held at the usual place in the next three days. Please prepare your own cauldron and basic herbs on the list."
"Cool."
Xu Miao read the brochure with interest. It seemed that the garden master, Ju Shoufen, would teach everyone herself. This workshop seminar should be interesting.
Without taking any other quest or request, Xu Miao left the CP hall via the same portal he came in. He returned to his courtyard.
…
Three days later, Xu Miao went out again. He followed the direction of the brochure toward the inner disciple area, where Ju Garden was located.
The security in this sect was almost non-existence. Xu Miao strolled into the inner sect without being stopped. All checkpoint guards only glanced at his anime pin and allowed him to roam free.
However, it took Xu Miao 3 hours of walking from the courtyard in the outer district to the inner district. After all, there was no teleportation portal between the inner zone and the outer zone.
The "Garden" was as its name, a huge institution with 50 acres of medical herb farms. That did not include the sub-dimensional farms of high-ranking alchemists. Each garden was protected by high fences and a long water moat.
When Xu Miao got to the front gate of Ju Garden, two sentry female sentry guards stopped him.
"This is the Ju Garden. Please state your business."
Xu Miao showed them a brochure, which he had received from the contribution hall, "I'm here to attend the weekly seminar. Can I go inside?"
"…"
The guards looked at each other, not knowing if they should allow Xu Miao inside. They still opened the path for him nonetheless.
The institution was nice. As Xu Miao strolled inside, many signboards gave a direction where the seminar was held.
Following the path and the directions, Xu Miao reached a stone plain. When he arrived, several hundred women of all ages were there, standing before their 1-meter-tall cauldrons. They stared at Xu Miao as if he were an alien.
At the center of the stone plain, a thin hunchback old lady, who could hardly stand straight, was smiling at Xu Miao. Her braided long white hair was dangling under her neck. From a glance, she was as short as Xu Miao's waist.
Yet, her voice was similar to that of a child.
"Welcome, young man. You must be new here."
Xu Miao cupped his fist and bowed. He didn't dare to offend this old lady, who exuded the air of a 6th-stage cultivator.
"Junior Xu Miao greets elder."
The old lady widened her eye a bit, "That's strange. I checked your record. Isn't your name Mao Miaomiao?"
Upon hearing his true name, the young women giggled while the mature women only smiled.
"That's the old name that I have discarded. Currently, I go by the name, Xu Miao."
"I see. Then, are you Xu Miao, the adopted son of Xu Xiuying?"
"What!?" Xu Miao's heart sank. He didn't expect that she was aware of his background to this extend.
"Relax, young man. I've been paying attention to Mountain Goose City recently because we have other guests from there."
The old lady laughed and turned toward a group of women, who were without a cauldron.
As soon as Xu Miao's eyes followed toward where the old lady looked, he recognized a few familiar faces.
"Oh, it's you!"
It was the girl that accompanied Xie Tian in the underground sewer.
Xiong Zhenzhen
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