Zhi looks around the table, everyone has finished eating and only a handful of dishes have anything left over. Most are content, just drinking tea while they let their meal settle. Breaking the silence, Zhi says, "Well it seems like we are done with dinner, I am not really sure on the time. But I think we should call it a night, since me and Zhao will need to get up early for work and training."

"Yes we should call it a night here. I still need to finish the night and close down the restaurant." Picking up the bell and ringing it, Yongzheng speaks as soon as Ye Bojing opens the door. "Bojing, we are done, you can begin to clean up." Saying that, he stands up and begins to start collecting plates. Meifeng joins him as well as Xiulan in the cleanup process. Zhao and his relatives also stand up to help clean up. Seeing everyone helping, Bojing walks around the table next to Zhi and begins to stack up plates.

Zhi stands up himself and then swipes his arm over all the dishes around him, making them disappear. Meifeng is slightly shocked at the display, but Bojing, who was close to him, actually drops the dishes in his hands. Zhi reacts immediately and before the dishes hit the ground he touches them and they disappear also. Laughing, Zhi puts his arm around the other man's shoulders in a friendly manner. "Don't be so shocked Bojing, I am not stealing anything I promise."

Xiulan can be heard giggling at the statement, but Bojing stays completely stiff, his eyes wide, while he looks at Zhi. Zhi removes his arm and continues to collect dishes while speaking, "It seems everyone here has had some bad experiences with cultivators, would anyone like to explain what happened?" Everyone one looks at the frozen Bojing, before Yongzheng says.

"Mostly it is from cultivators who pass through the city. While it is rare, every few years we will have one or two pass through going somewhere else. For the most part they might go to the city lord in the west side of the city and stay for a day before leaving. But sometimes they will just roam around the city and take whatever or whoever they want. The people who don't give in to their demands end up dead or worse."

Zhi frowns as he listens to Yongzheng, and sees that most people nod their head in quiet agreement. The edge of Xiulan's eyes look slightly wet, but she blinks and they are back to normal. Only a slight frown is on her face. Zhi asks, "The city lord doesn't help?"

With a scoff, Hai Ya replies "That man is too weak to help anyone. From what people know of him, he is only at the middle of Qi Distillation. While his guards are only in the starting stages of the Qi Distillation stage. Most of the west city's guards are just normal people, with matching armor and weapons. Also there are some rumors that the cultivators that do whatever they want, give the city lord gifts to do as they please. Nothing confirmed, but a lot of people think it is true."

Zhi continues to frown while shaking his head. He looks over to Bojing who still hasn't moved and speaks, "Bojing snap out of it, I am not like those trash who do whatever they want." The man physically jumps in the air when Zhi says his name. Causing everyone to start laughing at him. Looking around at everyone else laughing at him and being so calm around Zhi. His face flushes red, without saying a word he goes over to the cart, turns it towards the door and leaves the room.

Everyone begins to laugh even harder at his reaction. After they stop, Zhao says "He took the cart." Everyone looks around at all the plates still left in the room. Then they look at Zhi and the empty table around him. Zhi smiles and shakes his head before saying. “I will collect everything for you, just show me where I need to take it.”

Yongzheng grins slightly, while saying “Sorry for the inconvenience.”

Zhi walks around the table and collects all the dishes into his storage space. Once there is nothing left, Yongzheng leads everyone out of the room and down the hallway. At the end of the hallway he takes a right and walks down the stairs into a busy kitchen. Pointing to the area where the dishwashers are, Yongzheng says to Zhi. “You can set them over there, they will take care of the rest.”

Walking over to the dishwashing station, Zhi goes to an empty space and waves his hand over it. All the dishes appear, stacked up neatly in rows. Mostly cleaned of the food that was on them. The noisy atmosphere in the kitchen quiets down. Zhi turns around to see pretty much the whole kitchen looking at him. “Do you have a spot for the leftover food or does it just get thrown out?”

Pointing to a bin next to the station Yongzheng says, “You can put it in there. We actually work with a local farm, we give it to them and they use it for a compost heap. They give us a discount on their produce.” Zhi steps over next to the bin and with a hand wave he dumps the leftover food into it. Turning around he walks back over to the group.

Everyone else in the kitchen is still quiet, most people haven’t even moved. Yongzheng's voice bellows through the kitchen, “What is wrong with you, you act like you’ve never seen someone help with the dishes before? Get back to work, and you better not have ruined anything or you are gonna eat it yourself and that is your meal for the night!” The kitchen bursts back into life, everyone checking to make sure nothing was burnt in the minute that they all froze.

Yongzheng walks everyone to a door at the back of the kitchen and out of it. They are led out into a courtyard area to a gate. Unlocking the bolt on the gate and opening it some he says, “Come to this gate in the morning, the farm brings in a load of produce for us at an hour past sunrise and collects the leftover food from the night before. I will see both of you then.”

Zhi cups his hands and bows low to Yongzheng while saying, “Thank you for the meal and the opportunity to train Zhao here in your restaurant. We will see you in the morning.”

Zhao and his relatives also bow low and Zhao says, “Thank you for the meal, senior. I look forward to learning in your restaurant.” Qiang says nothing, but Hai Ya says, “Thank you for the meal and giving our little Zhao the opportunity to learn in your restaurant.”

“It is nothing, I am also curious about his talent after watching what happened tonight. But only if Zhi here can pass my test tomorrow. Otherwise he will have to find another place to train the boy.”

Zhi bows towards Xiulan slightly, “Thanks for the interesting night, I look forward to hearing you sing again.” Zhi ribs Zhao with his elbow a little. “Although I think little Zhao here would love to hear you sing again, he was in a trance the last time.” Zhao’s face goes red and he turns around, starting to walk away. Making Zhi laugh at the boy's embarrassment. Xiulan herself only blushes slightly at Zhi’s words. “Have a good night, Xiulan, Meifeng and Yongzheng.”

With that he turns and begins to follow Zhao, the boy's aunt and uncle follow behind him. Zhi keeps the boy in his vision as he slightly zones out to ask a question.

Alright Buddha, I have to ask about this ability. I've seen weird or vague descriptions for people's talents. But Sun Meifeng’s talent is knife throwing, her father is accounting, and Qiang’s is the bamboo flute? So what if he tries a normal flute he won’t be good at it?

[Everyone has something they are good at, even I am not sure why some people have the talent that they have. Now as for the flute issue, if he masters his talent with a bamboo flute, he should be able to play other flute’s. He just won’t be as skilled with them.]

Fair enough I guess. Actually, do I have talent or did Zhi have one? I don’t see one on my stat page thing.

[While Ming Zhi did have a talent. Host soul transference removed it, so you currently don’t have a talent. But you could purchase one from the system if you would like. Would you like to pull up the system store now?]

No, I will check that out later tonight. Once I am settled into Hai's home.

Zhi walks a little faster and catches up to Zhao, putting his hand over the boy's shoulder. As they walk along, Zhi begins to speak. “No need to be embarrassed about liking a girl. Especially one with a singing voice like that.” The boy’s face becomes red again, but he asks Zhi, “Was it that obvious?”

“Well if it wasn’t before, the way you ran away like that might have given it away.” Zhi laughs as the boy's face flushes an even darker shade of red. Patting the boy on the shoulder he says, “Don’t worry, she didn’t seem to dislike you either, so you might actually have a chance. If you can get past her over protective uncle and cousin that is.”

As they are walking through a smaller side street, they come upon a small slightly run down home. As they come in view of the front of the house, Zhao’s walking speed slows and then he stops. In front of the door are a few men, one is dressed in slightly better clothes. While the two men behind him are in typical labor clothing, each with a billy club on their hip.

Seeing me and Zhao walk up. The nicer dressed man speaks up, “Zhao where is your uncle? He was supposed to pay off his debt today, but he never showed.” A message pops up in front of Zhi’s face.

[Limited quest is activated]

[Quest: So you think you know kung fu?]

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Hai Qiang owes some people money. How much and why is unknown, but the people look like they are here to collect one way or another.

Quest Objective: Solve the issue and teach these hoodlums a lesson.

Bonus Objective: Solve the issue without the use of force.

Reward: Random Martial Arts Manual, 30 Mystifying Diviner Points, 100 experience

Bonus: 30 Mystifying Diviner Points, 100 experience

Failure: Lose 30 Mystifying Diviner Points.

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