Intermediate Spirit Gathering Array

Other sects were busy, but the Lingxian Sect was busy on top of busy.

They had plenty of plans for the year.

However, these plans were not drawn up and carried out by a single person. Rather, many people each had plans of their own.

The first matter was their trade with the cultivation world.

Some time ago, after Lin Xiao and Qin Jianghe had discussed the matter, Lin Xiao made a trip to the cultivation world to negotiate a partnership with Su’s General Store.

Previously, because the Yuan Family already handled business in Yuanling City and many of the surrounding cities, their demand for all kinds of goods was considerable. As a result, the Lingxian Sect’s products had been supplied directly to the Yuan Family and to the Duobao Pavilion in Yuanling City, the first establishment Lin Xiao had dealt with.

But those were ultimately someone else’s channels, leaving them with no more than the role of a supplier.

Lin Xiao felt that, no matter what, it would be better for them to develop a sales channel of their own.

It had nothing to do with trust. The crucial points were initiative and decision-making power.

They were willing to remain in the supply business, but they also wanted to have room to choose other types of business.

Thus, after discussing the matter, Lin Xiao decided that Su’s General Store would make a suitable breakthrough point for their development.

Su’s General Store belonged to Su Yaoguang, an old friend of Liu Chun’s.

The Su Family was small and simple, an established minor household that had taken root in Yuanling City long ago. It was not as large and powerful as the Yuan Family, but it had its own connections and channels.

As long as the Lingxian Sect offered enough benefits, turning the Su Family into an affiliated outlet of the sect should not be difficult.

Moreover, Su Yaoguang was a close friend of Elder Liu Chun and had helped Liu Chun greatly over the years. His good character was plain to see.

As it turned out, negotiations with the Su Family proceeded very smoothly.

Liu Chun had gone together with Lin Xiao and Qin Jianghe.

With Liu Chun acting as the intermediary, Su Yaoguang was very easy to deal with. After examining the samples, he was also highly impressed by the quality and variety of the Lingxian Sect’s goods.

But the main attraction was that Lin Xiao was willing to provide them with cultivation resources.

Of course, these were not the common pills and formations sold everywhere in Yuanling City. They were unique formations produced by the Lingxian Sect, such as the mid-grade Spirit-Gathering Formation.

There was a considerable difference between a low-grade Spirit-Gathering Formation and a mid-grade one. During the previous two years, practically everyone in the Lingxian Sect had used low-grade Spirit-Gathering Formations. Combined with the sect’s first-grade spirit vein, those formations had already been more than sufficient for their cultivation.

The effects of a mid-grade Spirit-Gathering Formation, however, far surpassed those of a low-grade formation. Put simply, a mid-grade formation placed in an area without a spirit vein could roughly match the effects of a low-grade formation placed on a first-grade spirit vein.

For the many unaffiliated cultivators without a sect or family backing, this was undeniably attractive.

They had no way to take advantage of places with dense spiritual energy near spirit veins.

Even if they saved for years and spent a fortune on a Spirit-Gathering Formation, its cultivation effects would still be mediocre without sufficient spiritual energy.

The mid-grade Spirit-Gathering Formation was different.

It was a treasure that was difficult to buy even if one had spirit stones in the market for unaffiliated cultivators!

As early as a year ago, Mo Yuanjiao had already become proficient at making mid-grade Spirit-Gathering Formations. In fact, he could now produce high-grade Spirit-Gathering Formations as well.

However, setting aside the fact that high-grade formations consumed a great deal of material, even if they were given to the Su Family, the family would be unable to protect them once word got out. Su Yaoguang, the most powerful member of the Su Family, was only at the mid-stage of Foundation Establishment.

Besides, a high-grade Spirit-Gathering Formation covered a vast area. Naturally, that referred to the maximum area it could cover when fully adjusted, as it could also be configured to cover a smaller range.

Several of the Lingxian Sect’s cultivation areas were now preparing to replace their formations with high-grade ones.

Thus, this benefit was precisely what the Su Family had been hoping for. In exchange for helping the Lingxian Sect expand its sales channels in the future and secretly selling some high-value rarities, Su Yaoguang felt that the deal was extremely worthwhile.

Selling rare goods would inevitably attract attention and might even bring danger, but the Su Family had been doing business for many years. They had encountered such situations countless times and had their own ways of handling them.

In this way, the Lingxian Sect now effectively controlled three distribution channels. At present, these channels could easily absorb not only the output of the Lingxian Sect and the more than twenty sects and the imperial family involved with the trading center, but even twice that amount.

After all, their total production was not particularly high.

The sects and imperial family outside were responsible for producing large quantities of low-grade goods, while the Lingxian Sect itself produced smaller quantities of items that required greater technical expertise.

As a result, the disciples and members of the Lingxian Sect were all busy beyond measure. Compared with the disciples of other sects in the mortal world, they had far more to learn, practice, and produce.

The only one in the entire sect who was free was Beast-Park Keeper Xiao Luan.

That was because, although the Beast Park’s output was fairly good, it was nowhere near the point where supply exceeded demand.

Under the meticulous care of Beast-Park Keeper Xiao Luan, the spirit beasts grew very well, and most of their meat was tender and delicious.

Xiao Luan adhered to the principles of selective breeding and healthy reproduction, carefully controlling the spirit beasts’ birth rate. It would never let them reproduce recklessly just to increase their numbers.

There were even a few spirit beasts in the Beast Park that showed signs of developing intelligence.

Xiao Luan had already separated those beasts and begun raising them individually. It wanted to see whether they could truly awaken their intelligence and, if so, how far they could develop afterward. It had even kept each one in a separate enclosure and recorded and observed them under different controlled conditions.

It had actually begun conducting comparative experiments.

The spirit beasts bred in the Beast Park were all varieties commonly eaten as meat in the cultivation world. This was not only because they tasted good, but also because they were extremely unlikely to develop intelligence.

Although they were called spirit beasts because they were naturally rich in spiritual energy, much like many spirit plants, they were entirely different from Little Luan and Da Tao. They had no intelligence and could only eat, drink, relieve themselves, and act according to instinct.

This was something Lin Xiao had only learned after the Beast Park had been operating for some time.

At first, he had worried that seeing so many of the spirit beasts slaughtered would make Xiao Luan feel sympathy for its own kind. Later, when he saw that Xiao Luan remained completely unfazed, he even asked about it.

In response, he received a disdainful look from Xiao Luan.

“How can those mindless, walking pieces of meat compare with Cluck-Cluck?” Little Luan said, deeply displeased.

After that, Lin Xiao stopped worrying about it. He even told Jiang Youfu not to hold back either and to demand as much meat from Little Luan as he could!

However, Little Luan kept an extremely tight rein on the number of spirit beasts sent out for slaughter. No one could hope to get even one extra beast from it.

Therefore, the Lingxian Sect’s Beast Park was very high-quality, but its output could not be considered large.

After supplying the sect’s daily meat needs, there was very little left to sell outside. Lin Xiao did not dwell on the matter and simply sold all of it to the Yuan Family.

And so, the entire sect was busy.

The only exception was Little Luan, who was very idle.

As for its first disciple, Da Tao, it was currently busy helping out in the Beast Park by keeping all kinds of records.

Little Luan was also quite skilled at delegating miscellaneous tasks. Naturally, the tedious daily work of recording the spirit beasts’ growth and changes was left to its disciple. After all, Little Luan now had more important things to do.