I Have More Than One Plan

Since the streets and alleys were packed solid with people who had come to watch the excitement, the bride’s family feared something might go wrong. They had no choice but to skip the matchmaking games meant to make the groom demonstrate his sincerity, and hurriedly had the bride’s younger brother carry her outside and deliver her to the wedding boat waiting by the entrance.

Lin Lei had also invited the bride’s entire family aboard, so they could all make the journey together.

The bride’s family had never imagined they would get to ride this flying immortal vessel as well, and every one of them wore a delighted expression.

Thus, the countless onlookers who had followed them and blocked the alley entrance until not even a drop of water could pass witnessed the wedding boat—which had only just landed—suddenly float into the air as though supported by clouds.

Then, just as it had when it arrived, it steadily passed over everyone’s heads and flew eastward at a constant speed.

Everyone watching was filled with envy.

If only their own family could one day marry into an immortal’s household—what an impressive wedding procession that would be!

That day, the entire county seat of Songyang County was abuzz with talk of this extraordinary wedding procession.

After the wedding boat left Songyang County, and the bride and her relatives had been settled aboard with everyone else, Qin Jianghe grabbed Lin Xiao and pulled him toward the stern.

“Brother Xiao, I finally managed to track you down. The things you’ve been sending to the Finance Hall every month are getting ridiculous—there are too many of them, and they’re far too expensive! If this keeps up, we’ll be spending more than we earn every month. Hurry up and tell me what all these supplies are for and roughly when this will end. I need to know what to expect.”

Heaven knew how anxious Qin Jianghe had become during this period. Every now and then, Lin Xiao would send him a huge list of items for the Finance Hall to purchase. Watching spirit stones pour out like running water had shaken Qin Jianghe’s long-held confidence that their sect’s reserves were growing larger by the day.

Unfortunately, their Sect Master Lin was constantly vanishing without a trace, while Qin Jianghe himself was busy as well. Several months had passed, yet he still hadn’t found a chance to ask about it.

Seeing Qin Jianghe’s worried, money-stricken expression, Lin Xiao hesitated for a moment. He had originally planned to surprise everyone in the sect, but then he raised an arm, draped it around Qin Jianghe’s shoulders, and lowered his voice.

“Actually, I have a new plan.”

“Actually, more than one. I’ve got several plans in the works.”

Hearing this, Qin Jianghe followed up immediately.

“What plans?”

Lin Xiao scratched his cheek and pulled a stack of books from his private treasury for Qin Jianghe to see.

“One of them is this… Didn’t I previously ask you to scour the cultivation world for all kinds of techniques and materials? That was so I could research these techniques…”

Qin Jianghe took the dozens of books and skimmed through them. There was The Profound Netherfire Art, The Kōnghóu Musical Scores, The Sleeve of Ten Thousand Blossoms, The Flying Moon Silverfrost Spear, The Azure Water Record, Sack You and Beat You, The Spirit-Escape Art…

Techniques of every conceivable type flashed before his eyes. The collection was nothing if not wildly varied.

Qin Jianghe looked at Lin Xiao in confusion.

“Doesn’t our sect already have quite a lot of techniques?”

There were dozens, even hundreds, of books in the Scripture Repository, most of which had been provided by Brother Xiao.

However, there weren’t many that were strictly focused on combat. The purest example was probably Cloud-Sword Technique.

Even so, not many people in the sect practiced it.

For one thing, not everyone liked using swords or was interested in swordsmanship. For another, everyone really did have little need for combat. Compared to learning techniques that increased their fighting power, they might as well spend more time studying their own interests and hobbies.

Qin Jianghe was one of the few exceptions, since he often had to travel outside and would make time to practice.

Lin Xiao naturally knew all this.

“The techniques our sect already has are too limited in variety. They can’t accommodate everyone’s interests, nor are they comprehensive enough. After all, when you’re traveling outside, having a few extra skills can sometimes be the difference between life and death.”

Once he put it that way, Qin Jianghe caught the implication and looked rather surprised.

“Is the sect going to start sending more people out on assignments?”

Lin Xiao nodded.

“Senior Liao reminded me of something before. Although our sect has the Path of Heart-Questioning, which can ensure that everyone remains true of heart and doesn’t stray down an evil path, cultivation isn’t just about having a pure heart. Experience and the improvement of one’s state of mind are indispensable too.”

“So the people in our sect can’t keep hiding at home without ever going out. That won’t do anything for their state of mind.”

As he spoke, he let out a somewhat troubled sigh.

“Although I’m worried that everyone might run into danger while gaining experience outside, people still have to step out into the world if they want to grow. But if we keep everyone confined to the sect as we are now, I don’t know when they might suddenly run into a bottleneck and be unable to make any further progress. By the time we think of a way to resolve it, it’ll already be too late.”

At that, Qin Jianghe opened his mouth, then closed it again.

Actually… he felt that he had already encountered a bottleneck.

Previously, he had felt that although his cultivation speed couldn’t compare with Brother Xiao’s and the others’, he was still making steady progress, so he hadn’t thought much of it.

But over the past six months, he had begun to feel strained.

He couldn’t clearly describe the sensation, and he had no way to monitor his cultivation level with numbers or anything of the sort. He could only rely on his own feelings. It seemed as though something was pressing down on him. Whenever he tried to cultivate further, an invisible force appeared to obstruct him in silence.

At first, he had assumed that he simply wasn’t working hard enough or lacked talent.

But after hearing Brother Xiao say this, he realized that his current situation might actually be a bottleneck.

Qin Jianghe glanced at the techniques in his hands, then returned them to Lin Xiao and asked in confusion, “Can this problem really be solved with these techniques?”

Lin Xiao took the stack back and gave him a mysterious smile.

“These alone obviously won’t solve it… But I’ve prepared many, many more techniques like these.”

“My plan is to arrange technique classes for everyone in the sect who’s willing to go out and gain experience. Once they’ve finished studying the courses they choose, we’ll begin putting the training program into practice.”

For the sake of everyone’s safety when they went out to gain experience in the future, he had taken great pains to prepare a huge number of techniques.

Of course, since Sect Master Lin himself simply didn’t have enough time to do everything, all these techniques had been generously sponsored by the system’s technique-synthesis function.

It was precisely because he needed to synthesize these techniques that Lin Xiao had asked Qin Jianghe to purchase such a large assortment of strange and miscellaneous materials during this period.

Moreover, it wasn’t enough for the techniques to merely be diverse. They also had to be genuinely useful—ideally, every single one had to be a powerful, high-quality masterpiece.

To that end, Lin Xiao had spent a great deal of time sorting through them, selecting and discarding various options. He had also categorized every technique and made comprehensive plans for arranging them into courses of study.

Fortunately, he had already reached the Nascent Soul realm. Otherwise, handling that much work alone would have been truly exhausting.

But there was no helping it. There were simply too many techniques, and at present, he was the only one capable of doing this.

After all, once a technique was successfully synthesized, he mastered it instantly…