Mana stones are unique resources for the cultivation world. Like any other type of energy stone in novels such as Qi stone or spirit stone, Mana stone holds the world mana on a crystallized form. Mana stone is shaped like a droplet, nobody knows why it shaped like that but that has been always how the mana stone shapes. There also different quality for the stone, a basic low-quality stone are somewhere around a half-inch in size. For standard quality are somewhere around an inch in size. The size keep increasing for half an inch each time.

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Mana Stone size:

Low Q - 1/2 inch

Standard Q - 1 inch

Medium Q - 1 1/2 inch

high Q - 2 inch

Greater Q - 2 1/2 inch

Epic Q - 3 inch

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All of the stones are naturally occurring phenomena, even the size and its shape are form naturally. Nobody knows how it came to be, but some researchers have a conjuncture about how they are forming. Some hypotheses that the stone form when the world mana become heavily concentrated in the localized area resulting in the mana condensation process to occur. It took thousands of years for them to happen, but it happened.

They proposed that the initial condensation process occurs on the surface, but as time changes. The area covered in dirt and soil, and thousands of years later, the stone was mined underground. The conjuncture is sound, however, the mine is too deep underground argued other researchers. The debate when on and on about their origins but personally, I think the Mana stone are like oils, they are abundant, but not renewable, and they are made like oils too. From dead plants and animals dying a hundred thousand years ago.

Who knows, I already found the information that I want to know on the intranet. The selling price of the stone. One low-quality mana stone can sell around 2000 to 2500 each. The mana stone culture in this world is a little bit different from how other novels portrayed them to be. Here, the stone never used as the currencies. There are fix selling and buying prices for those commodities base on supply and demand of the day. All transactions use sect contribution points or as locals call it the Rivs. From my perspective, it made some sense for the sect to use the Rivs as money exchange platform. How do they be able to tax the transaction between vendor and cultivators if both of them only use bartering changing stone with artifact. So using a mana stone as a currency is stupid and idiotic. Maybe they made sense on the outside when there is no value for Rivs but in the sect influence, using other fiat money are more logical and economical.

I post my request to sells two of the low-quality mana stone on the online market board on the intranet. I hope to try selling the stone directly to get a higher price instead of selling them at the store. By the look of the mana stone advertisement, many sellers put the highest price they can put, 2500 Rivs. Since I pressed for money, I put the price at 2300 with the condition of self pick up. The post only went up for several minutes, then someone snatches the deals. A private message between us, then we agree to meet at the island tower in several hours.

Since the money is not an issue anymore, I decide to go to the tower and found out about the timber and land rental for my chicken coop. I got six days left to enjoy. it's my last free time, so I'm gonna fill it preparing the coop and my backyard garden. I have some ideas on what to do, but gathering the information about the land came first. I also need to know in and out of how to hire the natives too. I know there are also several natives villages around the island made to accommodate the servant and worker that was hired around the island. Not everyone is powerful and wealthy enough to hired cultivators as their servant or workers. Even sect only hired natives to do the mundane works because of the cost-effectiveness from hiring the cultivators.

I head straight to the tower after having some breakfast at one of the island diners. The best part of having a mish-mash eastern western fantasy world is, I can eat both of the world cuisines without going far from home. Having a Japanese omelet fried rice is a divine experience. I'll never get tired to taste all the food in this world. The eggs are so fatty and mellow, I wondered what type of birds it came from. It made me wonders too about what my chicken eggs will taste like too.

The Hakka tower, a near circle tower of five stories tall becoming a center of administration for the island. I don't know what they do, maybe becoming a supplier hub for the main island. Supplying the main island and the sect with resources from the island surrounding.

I walk toward the receptionist to ask about my plan since I have zero knowledge about what to do to accomplish the task. The receptionist then asked me to go to the second floor and meet another guy in human resources. I found his room and give a knock asking permission to meet him.

"Hi... I'm Mobs from the newest batch of outer disciples recruit." I introduce myself toward the HR guy.

"Hi, I'm Endo, your senior. You can call me Mr Endo. What can I help you with?"

"I just bought 50 pair of chicks and just found out that their size is not quite normal. The woman at the front desk sends me here to talk to you about renting or leasing some land for my chicken coop."

"Come in, you came to the right place." Mr Endo said. He stands up from his desk and rummages the cupboard behind him. A while later, he took out a wooden plate then puts it on the table. With a wave of his hand, a holographic projection of an island shows up. A red dot shown on the map blinking periodically at the lower side of the island indicating our current position on the island.

Mr. Endo then uses his hand gesture to zoom in on our village. Compared to the initial view that shows the whole island as a satellite view, we can see how the individual houses of our village including the land surrounding the village. Another hand gesture, several patch of land around the village highlighted including the land behind my house.

"Choose what you want, kid. The highlighted land already belong to someone else." Explained Mr. Endo. The holographic maps colored with various color highlights. Some of the color for several patches of land is the same indicating it belongs to the same owner I suspected.

I took some time to think about the land I want to use. Looking at the land near my house, a patch of land located directly beside my backyard already belong to someone else. However, several patch of land beside the occupied patch is free.

I decided to take several patches of land nearest to my house. Granted I need to walk two to three kilometers to reach my land but it's still the nearest.

"I'm staying at this house. The land beside it already belong to someone else but it was undeveloped. Do they still want to use it? If not, Can I rent it?" I asked Mr Endo.

"Ahh...How do I say this. That land belongs to a group of the opportunist. We opened the land for auction every in the first week every year. They pool their resources and bid the premium land. If others want it, they need to pay the rent to them. I can give you their contact numbers, but the price will be steep." Mr Endo explained.

There is a 90% possibility that he also belongs to that group. The opportunity my ass, they act like cartels and triad. I'm lucky because my home located far from other people's houses so the land not adjacent with the house property already classified as a non-premium land. So the seem to waste of money to buy the right to the land that far from the village center. Their trash seems to be my treasure. I guess I will be happy enough to get slightly far patch of land to be developed.

"No, nevermind. I don't think I can meet their rent demand. So, how much do I owe the sect?"

"You can have two options, first paying 150 contribution point per land patch upfront for a year rental or 250 contribution point per land patch pays at the end of the year." Mr. Endo stated the fact.

Even with 100 Rivs differences, the option of paying after the harvest is still appealing to me. After some thought, I decided to defer the payment at the end of the year. I don't know what will happen, but I'm planning to stay away from the spotlight after exploiting the Lie Jie scheme of course. Just studying, cultivating, cooking new ingredients, gardening new herbs and spices, some enchanting perhaps, some blacksmithing if I have the time and activating the orb as soon as possible for future exploits. No more gallivanting with Lie Jie or other main characters if they exist. I'm just extras, a mob's extras.

I finalize the deals and asked Mr. Endo how to hire the natives too. He send me a link for a request board but strictly for native request. He warned me about exploiting the natives' goodwill, they are valuable resources for the sect and protected by the sect. Any act of violence against them is an attack against the sect itself.

I can see the point in his arguments and intend to follow it religiously. I also asked him if I'm allowed to build a permanent structure such as a warehouse on the land. Surprisingly, as long as the structure is made of wood, it is allowed.

The timbers can be found at the general store on the first floor. Last night, before falling asleep, I thought about the chicken coop design. What came to mind is the design for a cow pen. It will be big enough to accommodate one hundred chicken and wide enough to not be overcrowding. The coop will be similar to a closed cow pen design and several window openings at the top for ventilation purposes.

I also plan to build a barn that can act as a warehouse beside the chicken coop. The first level will be used as a base and the factory for the Lei Jie schemes if Lei Jie accepts my proposal. The second level will be used as a dorm and resting area for workers and maybe some kitchen for their use and the basement area will be used as a storage area.

A tool shed and a small forge for smithing will be built too in the future. I don't know if the money will be enough for the forge, but the tool shed is a must. Even without an official forge, I plan to brush up my blacksmithing with a small charcoal fire mobile forge. I don't know if someone already created it, if not maybe I can invent and patent it for the foreseeable future.

I plan to have the whole land fenced with barbed wires. However, because of budget restrictions, the fence will covered only the chicken coop area for the first phase. The chicken will be release to wander around my rental land during the day and will be trained to return during dusk.

I spend several hours discussing the coop, the barn, the shed and the forge design with a native master builders. It start when I became clueless about which type of timber to order for building my chicken coop and other related building. So, I accept the store owner offered to call up his brother who also works as a master builder in farm building. Surprisingly, it was a good move. I just found out several flaws in my design pointing out by the master builder, Robert aka Bob the builder.

After some arguments back and forth about the design and the layout. Bob and I finally finalize and agree to build four building and a well on that land. The closed up chicken pen and the storehouse can be used as a barn, the tool shed and an underground storage building. The third building is a forge and another workshop area that can be upgraded in the future if there is a need arises. Lastly, the dorm building. There will be two levels, the first will be a kitchen, a dining area, and a lounge for the recreational and socializing area, and a bar. For the second floor, there will be four-room, the first room is mine complete with my bathroom and fireplace, the second and third are belong to men and women dorm respectively, and the last room is the guest room if Lei Peng came to visit.

After some discussion between Bob and his brother Bob the grocer. Both of them agreed on the cost of material and labor for this project around 50,000 Rivs. After some haggling back and forth, we agree on the price of 42,500 Rivs or equivalent with 17 pieces of Low-Quality Mana Stone. The price went down greatly because I agree to pay them using the stones itself. The stone between the natives are more valuable than among cultivators.

After we shake hand on the deals, Bob the builder and Bob the grocer starts to take out their phones and began to calling others to start the project immediately. We say our goodbye and I depart from the general store heading toward a diner for lunch, I'm famished because of all the discussion and arguments. I'm not departing without leaving half from the price of what we agree as a deposit for the project. Both of them are so overjoyed, they just wave the payment for seeds and supplies that I took out to bring back the house. My motto is never to refuse the gift, so I took it with me as fast as possible. I said my goodbye and went out from the store.

I went out of the tower and find a free sitting area in front of the tower to wait for the guy that supposed to buy my mana stone. Even though I end up not using any Rivs, I still need to use it to stock up the farm later on. I wait just for several minutes and suddenly, a girl flying around using an umbrella-like a Mary Poppins land in front of me. She looked a little bit like a young Emily Blunt. Wearing a gothic french maid custom and a dark frilly umbrella.

"Are you username kingasas33 of island 831?" she asked. I nodded answering her question. "Been waiting long?"

"Not really, just came out from the tower." ai answered. "Are you GirlPoppins16 of island 697?" Ahh, I see the puns play there.

"Here 46 hundred Rivs." she holds up her pendant to directly transfer the Rivs. I react by holding my pendant closer toward her's. After the transfer completed, I hand over two low-quality mana stones in a satchel. We check the deals once again and shake our hand to seal it.

"Pleasure doing business with you, Miss Poppins," I said just right before she flies away with her gothic umbrella.

"To you too, Mr. King," she replied with a nod and a beautiful charming smile. "May we meet again, Mr. King."

I nod once more in response and watch her fly away. By the look of the notification that I got, she is not a normal characters. However, I already got my hand full. Better to settle the Lie Jie scheme first before involving with another. I promise to avoid entangling my self with their world also. So, I should distance my self from it.

I woke up from my stupor with a pat on my shoulder. When I turn around, I found Lie Peng grinning like there is no tomorrow.

"Damn! Mr. Extra. You got game!" He prattled like a child having a sugar rush.

I only facepalmed my self in response. "Let get something to eat first, I'm really hungry. It's been a long several hours."

"Sure does Mr. King." Lie Peng answered mimicking the gesture what that Poppins girl has done before. Arghh...it gonna be another long evening. "I'm buying, how about something more expensive and private, Mr King?"

"Lead on, Peng" I sigh while answering his jokes. I guess the response is good since their side finally asked for a private meeting. This will be an expensive lunch. Luckily I'm not the one buying it.