Mei felt like she was about to hyperventilate as she held the chestnuts.

How many days worth of cultivation was this even?

She was totally scamming the turtle...

"At what time will you continue reading those book things?" the turtle asked seriously. "I'll be waiting here!"

"Um... around noon I guess."

The turtle nodded solemnly before crawling off.

In her daze, Mei didn't seem to notice Su Qing trying to get her attention.

In her assigned room, Mei munched on one of the chestnuts aggressively while circulating her qi.

Suddenly, she heard a creak from the door as someone peeked in. Su Qing?

Oh, it was actually Wang Wei.

"What's wrong?" Mei asked.

Wang Wei grimmaced.

"Aren't you going to ask?" he said.

Ask what? Mei thought for a bit before it suddenly dawned on her. The torture devices! She completely forgot!

Seeing her look of realisation, Wang Wei started ranting.

"The incense's effect didn't kick in until 5 mins in! I was in so much pain! These monks are crazy!"

Mei sweated a little.

"Sorry..."

"They really left me there because of what you said and I was scared they were going to forget me!"

"So um, why didn't you just eat the painkillers outright beforehand?"

"...dunno. For some reason I was paranoid they were going to have drug tests or something?"

Mei suddenly thought of something.

"Wait, couldn't you have eaten a painkiller the moment they left? Instead of waiting the full 5 minutes."

Wang Wei: ...

"Oh my god! I'm such an idiot! I was so fixated on thinking the incense was my last hope that I..."

Wang Wei turned around and covered his face in shame.

Mei felt a little bad for him.

She hesitated for a little before deciding to hand Wang Wei some of the chestnuts.

"No... I don't want to look at anyone right now... eh?"

Wang Wei finally snapped out of his stupor as she shoved two water chestnuts before him.

"Where'd you get those?"

"Uh, I guess you could say it was a lucky encounter. You can have some of these... thanks for always sharing pills with me."

"You sure? These seem really potent. And you're lagging behind..."

Mei scrunched her face a little from the touchy topic. She really didn't like how he just saw her as someone to be pitied.

"Just take it!"

"Oh, thanks."

...

Wang Wei left shortly. Mei continued her cultivation. When cultivation was this fast, it was actually kind of addictive.

The qi here was pretty sparse, but that didn't really matter too much since she was mainly condensing qi from food.

By the time Mei finished absorbing the qi from all 4 leftover chestnuts, it was already midnight.

She didn't sleep yesterday either, but she wasn't feeling particularly sleepy. The perks of a Foundational cultivator, huh? Vaguely, she recalled Xiuying say something about sleeping still being important to cultivators anyway, because of something related to memory.

Maybe that's why she forgot about Wang Wei's predicament. Or just her being a goof, as usual.

Hopefully this wasn't going to become a bad habit.

Before decided to head to bed, she decided to grab the next few volumes of the Blacksmith novel from the pile as preparation.

She rummaged through it for a moment.

Right... this was one of those books she was on the fence about, and only borrowed two volumes as a "taste test".

Right now, she still had the second volume, but she decided to head back to the sect to borrow every single book of the series in advance.

With a quick flash from the token, she dropped into the library.

A man jumped back at the sight, startled.

"Sorry. Wait, what are you doing here?" Mei asked.

It was Senior Han! Wasn't he supposed to be on a mission or something?

"I was tasked with tracking down Yang Ning and Hong Ling. Well... now only Hong Ling. My soulsense is rather weak, so the elders suggested I revise on spirit art books before pairing up with a stronger spirit."

"What! The shopkeeper went missing too?"

Where was she going to buy cheap candy now?

Senior Han cracked a small smile at her words, but supressed it immediately.

"Honestly, I probably shouldn't be sharing this with you, but this has been rather stressful on me."

"Uh, okay... I'm just here to pick up some books."

"That reminds me actually. The spirits gossip a lot about you..."

"Huh?"

Those bastards! She suspected it all along because of the attitude of Su Qing's teachers... but to think they were actively badmouthing her...

"A good opportunity, actually. What's your soulsense like? Even if they seem to dislike you, for them to pay so much attention to you, your affinity can't be that bad."

Was he... trying to drag her into this mess?

No! She was going to spend the next month reading and eating heaps of chestnuts!

Senior Han must have saw the horrified look on her face.

"Ahem. You still owe me the money for that qi vase. If you help me out, I'll let that pass and even get the elders to help you pay for your debts with the Supreme Foundation Pill."

"It's not going to be that bad, all you need to do is to follow me and look for signs of Hong Ling. I've been given a grade 9 defensive artefact, so there's no danger at all."

Oh that pill. How much was it worth again? 10000? 20000?

Damn, her lack of sleep really was fogging her memory, even if she didn't feel tired.

"Okay, fine. How do I even measure my soulsense?"

"Roughly how far away can you sense someone's soul?"

"Um... Probably at least a kilometre away."

Senior Han laughed. Then he looked at her face, seeing she was completely serious.

"You're kidding me."

"No?"

He grabbed her by the shoulders.

"We're going to have to test this right away!"

Mei screeched as he started dragging her out of the library.

"At least let me borrow the books first!"