Chapter 31

“I didn’t get much for the vegetables. Only sixteen full silver and three silver tenths.” I told elder Yui.

Elder Yui didn’t look surprised. “The energy content is too low. We need to upgrade your space before we will start to earn a lot of money. If we were still at clan Ashton I’d suggest trading some more grade three pills to the clan and slaughtering more magic beasts.”

“Do you have more pills? Can we trade them for magic beasts?” I asked.

“I managed to bring a few pills with me. However, buying magic beasts is expensive. Last time we paid clan Ashton to kill magic beasts that they were already planning on killing, and clan Ashton kept the body. If we wanted to buy magic beasts it would cost at least twenty times as much. Even if we sold the corpse we wouldn’t recoup all of that. With the pills I have I’d be surprised if we could get more than a dozen magic beasts.” Elder Yui explained.

Even if all the beasts we bought were at the peak of level six that would only give me two or three days worth of passive energy gain. In that case I’d rather keep the pills. Or sell them and buy various items. Such as some mattresses.

“You could try getting near one of the slaughterhouses.” Elder Yui suggested.

I shook my head. I had already tried that while I was at the market. There were two different slaughterhouses in the city. Unfortunately when I got close enough I discovered that they weren’t killing high level beasts.

“I think almost everything they kill is farm raised. I tried staying near them for nearly an hour and everything was level four or lower.” I said.

Elder Yui grimaced. “I suppose farmers aren’t likely to keep any dangerous animals. It’s not like the border clans where they can capture animals from the wild lands. It’s too bad that this city doesn’t have an arena.”

I nodded. “Usually gladiator arenas are only in the center cities. I’m tempted to head towards the center cities.”

“Unfortunately that would make our financial situation even worse. The central cities are rich enough that even the civilians eat low grade magic vegetables, which means none of the merchants will purchase anything we produce.” Elder Yui said.

“So what is the plan then? Do we just wait for the space to grow larger?” I asked.

“I can’t think of any other options. It’s too bad you aren’t stronger. If you were, you could join a mercenary company. If you found yourself in the middle of a battlefield you could collect massive amounts of death energy.” Elder Yui said.

I couldn’t help but wince at that idea. The energy would be nice. Being in the middle of a battlefield wouldn’t. I had gotten plenty close enough when elder Yui had been killing clan Hill soldiers. That did give me a bit of an idea though.

“Maybe I can get a job at the training grounds. Can you think of anywhere else that would have a higher concentration of powerful cultivators?” I asked.

Elder Yui seemed to think about it for a moment and then nodded. “The only other place would be the meditation grounds for the city nobles. However, getting a job at either of those places will be difficult. I doubt they would hire anyone that isn’t a native to the city. Also the competition for those jobs is fierce since the servants are allowed to meditate when they aren’t working.”

“There is another option though. Most cities rent out meditation rooms, we could use the pills to rent one of them. It will still be expensive but I think we will get more energy than we would trading them for magic beasts.” Elder Yui said.

I nodded in agreement. Just spending a day in range of a level eight cultivator would give me as much energy as killing a level six magic beast. If enough cultivators were in range it would easily be worthwhile.

With that decision made I first did a bit of homework about the meditation rooms. Fortunately the innkeeper knew all about how mediation room rentals were priced. In addition to the base price for the room, there was also a price based on how much energy the occupants absorbed.

In the end I decided not to head to the mediation room alone. It would be suspicious if someone rented a room and didn’t absorb any energy. I considered having elder Yui accompany me also. However, he pointed out that he couldn’t fully hide his level. It would raise just as many questions if a level eight cultivator was in the room but wasn’t absorbing energy. If he did absorb energy then the price of the room would skyrocket.

In the end I left the inn with Emma and Kristen. Neither of them would absorb enough energy to drastically change the price of the room. At the same time Emma was a life mage and I was confident in Kristen’s drive to become a better cultivator. Both would benefit greatly from meditating in such a high energy environment.

Half an hour later I was standing at the entrance of a tower in the center of the city. I handed a receptionist a small bottle with a grade three pill in it. “Based on your levels a grade three pill should be enough for half a day of meditation. After you finish meditating please see me for your change. Change is based on the local market price for grade three pills. Here is your receipt, the room number you have been assigned is on the receipt.” The receptionist said and handed me a piece of paper.

“What happens if I stay too long?” I couldn’t help but ask.

The receptionist shrugged. “One of the workers will inform you once you need to leave. If you want to purchase additional time you can pay them. If you refuse to pay them, or leave, then the guards will be called.”

That all sounded reasonable to me so the three of us headed into the meditation tower. As I walked through the tower I could feel numerous powerful sources of life energy. None of them were from level nine cultivators. Most were only level seven cultivators, but I could feel that there were nearly a dozen low level eight cultivators in the tower.

I was disappointed when I calculated how much energy I was gaining. It wasn’t terrible. It also wasn’t nearly enough to quickly solve our problems. I was passively gaining more energy than I did from the dryad grove universe, but a little bit less than I did from the drake universe.

On the positive side both Emma and Kristen were also receiving some benefit. Elder Yui had provided them both with grade two pills so that they could take full advantage of the meditation room. By using those pills they could absorb energy twenty times faster. Which meant that in this half a day they could gain energy equivalent to cultivating for a hundred days inside my universe.

Unfortunately cultivation wasn’t a quick process. It would take around a decade for Emma to reach level seven. Since Kristen was only a mid level five cultivator she could probably reach level six in just a year or two. Of course elder Yui would run out of grade two and three pills long before that.

While Emma and Kristen spent time cultivating I thought about what to do. So far the meditation tower was the best choice. At the current rate it would take around three month to quadruple the size of the dryad universe. After that it would take years to reach five times the energy density.

The increased size of the dryad universe would provide more space for growing plants, which would provide a bit more energy. At the same time once elder Yui ran out of grade three pills I’d lose access to the meditation tower, which would drastically reduce my daily energy gain.

Over the course of twelve hours I couldn’t think of any safe alternatives. The only fast solution I could think of was risking my life in a battle somewhere. Of course first I’d have to find a battle, one with a lot of high level cultivators, and then get within two hundred feet of where those cultivators were dying. I had no confidence in being able to survive a situation like that. As a level four cultivator I’d be killed almost instantly by any high level mage cultivator that targeted me.

Finally we decided to call it a day, head back to the hotel, and get some sleep. I’d have to discuss with elder Yui more and decide if we should go ahead and use all our grade three pills. I couldn’t help but hope he had thought of a better idea over the past half a day.

As we stepped out of the room I couldn’t help but feel concerned. There were around a dozen men standing outside the door waiting for us. All of them were level seven cultivators. At first I thought they were a bunch of thugs. Their clothes were too nice though. Also I was sure the guards would have been notified if a group of thugs had broken into the meditation tower.

“Finally decided to come out of my meditation room.” One of the men said. Based on the body language of the group I suspected he was the ringleader. I could tell that he was a mid level seven cultivator. He looked like he was in his mid twenties.

“I’ll have to apologize if this is your room. The receptionist gave me a receipt directing me to go to this room. If they mixed things up I’m sure they would be willing to give you a refund.” I said with a bit of a grimace. If at all possible I didn’t want to get into a fight with these men.

The man shook his head. “Of course they will give me a refund. However, my time is valuable and you also owe me for wasting my time.” He said with a grin.

When I didn’t say anything the man’s grin widened. “I know, how about you give me the two girls that are with you. I promise we won’t break them, much.” He said while leering at Emma.