Ye Tong and the others came over to help, handing out tableware to everyone present.
Xu Mu lifted the lid of the clay pot, and the fragrance that wafted out immediately stimulated everyone’s senses.
“Wow, that smells amazing!”
Luo Fengchan raised her eyebrows in surprise. She had originally thought Xu Mu was merely making a simple meal, but she hadn’t expected him to be so skilled.
[Favorability +10]
Xu Ningbing also savored the aroma. It really did smell wonderful.
[Favorability +10]
The others already knew how good Xu Mu was at cooking, but even so, the fragrance still raised their favorability toward him.
Ye Tong then doubled all of it.
“There are quite a few of us this time, and there’s another chicken stewing over there. I’ll bring it over once we finish this one.”
Seeing all those shining points of Justice, Xu Mu grinned.
“I think one should be enough. There are only women here, after all.”
Luo Fengchan spoke from the side.
“Don’t worry. We have a master of clearing the table right here.”
Xu Mu smiled and glanced at Ying Weiyang. With this woman around, even five chickens would be nothing.
“Hmph! I’m dieting lately. I don’t eat much.”
Ying Weiyang rolled her eyes at Xu Mu.
Over the past few days, she had not only learned a great deal of knowledge about the outside world while following Ye Tong, but had also achieved the freedom to eat whenever she wanted.
As a result, she hadn’t stored excessive amounts of energy.
She had mainly been terrified of hunger after suffering in the Inner World, which was why she had been so eager to stockpile energy. After one meal, she could go without eating for a month or two.
“All right, let’s eat.”
Xu Mu had everyone sit in a circle and first served each of them half a bowl of chicken soup.
“It’s been so long since I last had my brother-in-law’s cooking.”
Ye Yu took a sip. Her eyes immediately widened.
“It’s delicious… Wait, what’s going on?”
All of a sudden, the qi within Ye Yu began to surge outward of its own accord.
Originally, only several large patches of blue light had appeared, without completely enveloping her body.
In the next moment, blue qi completely surrounded her.
“Brother-in-law! I’ve reached the Grandmaster Realm?”
Ye Yu said excitedly.
[Favorability +30]
Mu Qingying also took a sip of the chicken soup.
Whoosh!
She felt an enormous force surging back and forth within her body. To her surprise, she advanced as well.
Although her cultivation level was considerably lower, breaking through after drinking just one mouthful of soup was still far too terrifying.
[Favorability +30]
Whoosh!
Whoosh!
…
As the chicken soup went down their throats, it wasn’t only Ye Yu and Mu Qingying who advanced. Feng Yue, Bai Yi, and Ye Tong broke through one after another.
Their favorability toward him rose as well, then Ye Tong doubled it.
Luo Fengchan was completely dumbfounded.
What was going on? Since when had breakthroughs become this easy? Was drinking a bowl of chicken soup really enough?
If that was the case, what were the disciples in her sect working so hard for every day? Why didn’t they simply come to Xu Mu’s house and line up for chicken soup?
With that thought in mind, she also took a sip.
The flavor was rich and incredibly delicious.
But as soon as she swallowed it, a powerful force began surging through her body.
“This…”
Luo Fengchan stared at Xu Mu in disbelief.
Even as a sixth-level Worldbreaker, she could still feel her cultivation improving.
“Xu Mu, an eighth-grade… No, did you put ninth-grade heavenly treasures in this chicken soup?”
At her level, ordinary sixth- or seventh-grade treasures would hardly have any effect on her.
“Heh, perhaps my alchemy skills are simply superb enough to bring out the medicinal effects to their fullest.”
Xu Mu gave an ambiguous answer instead of directly revealing the grade.
He had used three sixth-grade treasures, along with two seventh-grade ones.
To ordinary people, they were certainly treasures, but to Luo Fengchan, they weren’t particularly precious.
Since he wanted her to develop a favorable impression of him, he might as well let her guess.
[Favorability +20]
Luo Fengchan was utterly stunned. Xu Mu was far too extravagant.
He had actually used ninth-grade heavenly treasures to stew a chicken.
Xu Ningbing had already finished her bowl. Having only recently entered the Grandmaster Realm, she could still clearly feel the tremendous boost.
As for Ying Weiyang and Song Nuanyang, both of whom were in the Mortal-Transcending Realm, the chicken soup did not improve them by much. Even so, they could still distinctly sense their strength increasing.
“It’s delicious, and it can even make you stronger.”
Ying Weiyang hadn’t expected that following Xu Mu would allow her to live such a comfortable life.
Chop, chop, chop…
In the next moment, everyone began reaching for the food with their chopsticks. The chicken visibly turned into a skeleton at an astonishing speed.
Not only was the chicken soup consumed completely, but even the heavenly treasures inside were eaten without leaving a trace.
“Honey, you barely ate anything.”
Ye Tong placed her bowl in front of Xu Mu.
“Have mine.”
Feng Yue sighed inwardly. As expected of the official wife. How could anyone else possibly compete with Ye Tong?
“Don’t worry. This is what I usually eat. This time, I mainly made it to improve your strength.”
Xu Mu nodded and gently tapped Ye Tong between the eyebrows.
[Favorability +10]
[Favorability +15]
…
Hearing Xu Mu’s words, everyone around him was touched once again.
Luo Fengchan especially believed that Xu Mu had deliberately brought out ninth-grade heavenly treasures to entertain her.
After all, Xu Mu owed her nothing. On the contrary, he had even helped her find a Heaven-grade cultivation technique for the Cold Immortal Sect.
[Favorability +20]
Another pot was brought over, and just like before, it was emptied in the blink of an eye.
Xu Ningbing was somewhat dazed. She had only recently reached the early stage of the Grandmaster Realm, yet after eating Xu Mu’s food, she felt as if she were about to break through again.
No one would believe her if she told them.
“All right, now we’ll begin the second round.”
Xu Mu first took out more than a dozen pills and handed them to Xu Ningbing.
“Big Sis, keep these pills. Take one every three days. They should be enough to help you reach the late stage of the Grandmaster Realm.”
[Favorability +40]
Xu Ningbing drew in a sharp breath.
“Xiao Mu, I’m already a Grandmaster. These pills… They aren’t divine medicines, are they?”
“Don’t worry about that. Come back and see me after you’ve finished them.”
As Xu Mu spoke, he distributed the remaining pills among the people beside him.
Finally, he gave Song Nuanyang several powerful tonic pills.
“Senior, everyone gets a share. Here, have one.”
Xu Mu handed one to Luo Fengchan as well.
“At my level, taking pills would only be a waste. You should use it to improve them instead.”
“What if there’s a divine medicine inside this pill?”
Xu Mu countered.
“What?”
Luo Fengchan’s expression turned serious.
“Xu Mu, in that case, I won’t stand on ceremony. If you ever need anything in the future, just let me know.”
Xu Mu nodded.
…
After the meal ended, everyone returned to their respective homes.
Ye Yu, Bai Yi, and the others said they were going back to school.
Xu Mu knew very well that they must have had something else to do, but he didn’t expose them.
As for Xu Ningbing and Luo Fengchan, they would be staying at Xu Mu’s villa for the time being.
Xu Mu hadn’t expected that a simple chicken soup would earn him so much favorability from them—so much that he hadn’t even needed to bring out the cultivation techniques.
Within a single day, the amount of favorability he could gain would only decrease more and more.
That night.
Luo Fengchan pulled the quilt over her head. She should never have agreed to sleep here.
After reaching the fifth level, one’s restrictions on the five senses had already been broken. Ye Tong’s moans sounded as if they were coming from right beside her.
“This Xu Mu… The last time I came here, he was doing this kind of thing with his wife too. Does he really have that much of a desire?”
Luo Fengchan murmured softly.
“Come to think of it… Is it really that pleasurable?”
She curled up beneath the covers. Ever since she was young, her master had raised her as the future sect master. She had devoted herself to cultivation from childhood, and even at her age, she had never been touched by a man.
Sometimes, she couldn’t help yearning for the love between a man and a woman.
…
Early the next morning.
Luo Fengchan and Xu Ningbing left early. Xu Mu had to go to Jiang Huihui’s house today, so he asked Ye Tong to take Ying Weiyang to work.
Jiang Huihui’s home was in a mountain village west of Yang City.
It took only an hour or two before Xu Mu’s car pulled up in front of the rural restaurant called “Jiang Family Stir-Fried Chicken.”
When he entered the restaurant, Xu Mu saw Jiang Sheng sitting by the window, with Jiang Huihui seated across from him.
“Senior, Huihui… Wow!”
This was the first time Xu Mu had ever seen Jiang Huihui wearing a dress.
“Xu Mu, you’re finally here. When are you going to marry my granddaughter?”
The moment Jiang Sheng saw Xu Mu walk in, he asked him outright.
g Yu was preparing for retirement when her organization decided to eliminate her. She transmigrated to a zombie apocalypse world. However, a tiny unexpected situation occurred: She somehow transformed into an adorable little girl?!
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
s the Eldest Princess, renowned for her cold and aloof detachment, became the most docile of lambs, obeying his every command without question. But when the final move was played on the chessboard, as Gu Chenghan seized everything and ascended on the verge of apotheosis, that very Princess suddenly embraced him from behind, her tone carrying a dependence never heard before: "Wait... you haven't yet... commanded me to love you forever." Gu Chenghan froze abruptly. She... hadn't been hypnotized?! ... [The Eldest Princess's Diary] [When my soul was extracted, becoming the sole spectator outside my own shell] [At first, there was overwhelming fury, until I saw] [How he used my sword to effortlessly shatter my inescapable doom] [How he wielded my authority to eradicate fatal conspiracies I had never even detected] [Like a deity, he rescued me from the deep mire I was trapped in] [If not for those annoying vixens, he and I would be a match made in heaven] [I think I am ill, gravely ill] [My deity should belong to me alone] ... "Hypnosis? Oh, it succeeded, my dear Master." "Only this time, it's my turn to hypnotize you."
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
