After leaving the store, Wu Guang did not return to the residence. As he had told Yuan Taotu, he had another place to visit. His objective was 'Blue Treec City' where he intended to find all the tools needed for his experiments. Actually, he could buy them in the Sect store but Wu Guang had reasons to not do so. First, he intended for this matter to remain hidden if possible. And secondly, he did not want to spend contribution points on something he could get with money.

Their leave permit was still active as it was given for 14 full days but still, the Discipline Palace disciple in charge of the gate confirmed Wu Guang's destination. He also asked about the timing, as the permit was valid only until tonight. Wu Guang answered that he simply wanted to buy a few things in the city and so would return in a few hours.

Wu Guang quickly reached the East gate of the city and as he was donned in his inner sect attire was let through without any questioning. Now inside the city, his destination was clear and so after a quarter of an hour, he was knocking on a door.

This store was one that he already had visited a few times before, the Li store.

Initially, he wanted to search for all that he needed by himself. But after judging how much time it would require, he decided to ask for help. In the best case he could contract her for this or if she was not available, at least ask her to introduce him to someone who could do it.

When the door was opened by the same old servant that was present there during all his visits, Wu Guang simply asked

"Is Miss Xi around?"

After receiving a positive answer and explaining the matter of his visit he was asked to wait outside. After waiting for a few minutes, he was invited to come in. Li Xia appeared almost at the same instant as he entered and they greeted each other. The greetings were followed by some small talk. During which he was congratulated for entering the sect and she excused herself for not visiting him in the Manor as they had agreed the last time they spoke.

Only after this, Wu Guang proceeded to explain the motive behind his visit.

Li Xia agreed to help him, although she could not promise the exact time of delivery as several of the tools like the measuring crystal cups could be not in existence and would need to be crafted. As this was not a problem, the matter of the tools was settled.

Wu Guang also gave her another list that was mainly composed of not spirit ingredients that were mentioned in the recipes he found in the book as well a few miscellaneous things and asked her to search, buy and send whatever she could alongside his main order.

"Would that be all Master Wu?"

"Yes. But I think we agreed to don't use honorifics?"

"That was before you became an Inner Disciple of the 'Three Hills Sect'"

"No problem. It was my own proposal after all"

"Okay... Wu Guang. I have my doubts about the costs of several items but the total should not exceed 30 gold coins"

"I will leave 70 gold coins to you. Please use the rest to buy any spirit herbs that you find"

"Understood"

"Oh and about the matter of your commission. I will give you 10 gold coins"

Hearing this Li Xia wanted to refuse, she did not want to treat this as a common business. And even if she did, the commission was still far over the normal amount, but Wu Guang's expression showed that he would not retrieve his words. So in the end, she accepted it while thanking him.

After instructing that the delivery should be made to the Sect and on his name and signing an order paper that would serve to determine his ownership, Wu Guang said his farewells and left the store.

Unbeknownst to him, an argument followed his leave. It was between Li Xia and her servant and could be described as a repetition of a simple but still forceful question from the servant and her answer to it.

"Young Miss, why did you not request his help or at least asked him to hear you out?"

"I could not. We are not friends or anything of the sort... How could I actually involve him in such a matter?"

This exchange followed for several rounds but in truth, the question and answer remained basically the same.

***

Wu Guang returned to the sect almost directly after leaving Li Xia's store. Almost because he did stop once at a restaurant that was extremely recommended to him by Xiao Feng before. At the time he did not have the opportunity to go but now that he could, decided to treat himself.

He could live without such, but a good meal was one of the small weaknesses that most cultivators shared, after all, good restaurants and chefs were sought after even by Sky-realm cultivators. Even though the latter had no need to consume food normally, sustaining themselves solely with qi.

After eating some of the most expensive dishes in his current life, Wu Guang felt completely renewed. He even complimented the qi-infused fish he ordered, it was really delicious and like anything with qi properties, was beneficial for him as a cultivator.

There were few people in the place and so no one really took note of him, so he ate with no worries. Not forgetting about Yuan Taotu, he asked the waiter to prepare a large take-out dinner, intending to share it with the former.

After leaving the restaurant and having become seven and half gold coins poorer Wu Guang did not make any other stops and proceeded back to the residence.

There were a pair of hours still left in the day and so Wu Guang dedicated them to meditate in the room where they decided to place the orb while analyzing the results of the expedition.

If described shortly it went very well even if he did not reach two of the objectives he wanted to. These objectives were real combat experience and gaining at least a clue into the world before the cataclysm. The former was because they indeed did not discover any really dangerous beast. And the latter was simply because the only source of information of times before he managed to find in the ruins was the diary of a treasurer. From which except for the name of the school, nothing else could be considered useful.

Still, it could not be denied that this was compensated by the fact of him meeting Kass Shaa'r and finding the potion manuals.

As for the main objective of gaining contribution points... it was overreached even by selling only a part of the spoils.

There was also the matter of the orb. Right now Wu Guang could not exactly determine if it was good or bad. Still, the effect was too beneficial, so even if danger came from it, it should be worth it.

Overall, Wu Guang considered that the expedition went well, especially in the resources part.

The next part was his cultivation, as he had reached the3rd Spirit level without using the wood essence. As for his combat strength, it was about the same level. This was mainly because he lacked an adequate amount of qi techniques and good weapons. Thankfully, these two matters were far easier to solve now that he had points and gold.

In reality, his combat strength should be said to be far over a common 3rd level of the Spirit realm. But Wu Guang tried to analyze everything without adding the things that he was could not use freely, like his soul and consciousness.

During his last breakthrough, he had sensed that the consciousness was slowly becoming more and more natural to him. This could only mean that when he reached the 5th level, in place of awakening one, he would in turn connect to his original one. Such would grant him enormous benefits, and so Wu Guang decided to not use it at all, leaving it to rest naturally. Mainly because he feared that overtaxing it right now could lead to a mishap during its full fusion.

Considering the tournament and the pending mission from Elder Mo, for now, he should work on his combat strength. Especially in obtaining several qi techniques and if time allowed train with a few instructors to help his progress in weapons. The latter would be extremely beneficial and he as well wanted to get some combat experience from there.

Only with that done and when he felt that his combat strength exceeded his cultivation he would advance.

Still, they now had the orb and so he should cultivate near it anyway. Although not working towards the breakthrough, but simply consolidating his current cultivation. As for breaking from his current level, it should be fairly easy, after all, the 'Expansion' level only required enough qi and energy. And both were easily available to him thanks to the wood essence.

The expansion stage as the name said was meant to expand the dantian. Especially its capacity to store qi. A common misunderstanding of mortals was that the dantian was only physical, in truth the newly solidified organ was simply a connection.

The astral or spiritual side of the dantian was akin to a holding pouch that was accessed via the physical side.

Normally when cultivators said dantian, they would mean the former, which was where one's qi was stored.

As a cultivator advanced more another such space would be formed, which would slowly be expanded as well. But in place of storing qi, it would be able to store qi treasures, items, weapons. This would be the so-called Dantian's void space.

After finishing the analysis, Wu Guang thought about the next day.

"Tomorrow I will take part in the tournament that Elder Mo mentioned and even made me participate in. From what I have learned it's basically a melee between a hundred disciples of similar levels. Everyone will fight at the same time until one remains, and this last disciple standing will be the winner. Although I have no area techniques, everyone most probably will fight against one or two opponents at the time. My strength is comparable to a peak 3rd level Spirit cultivator while my qi capacity is almost at peak of the realm. So I should have no trouble remaining until the end. As for winning, well, it will mostly depend on the techniques and opponents I will meet".

Reaching this conclusion Wu Guang ended his meditation and moved to the main room of their residence. From there, after eating the luxurious dinner he brought and even getting praise from Yuan Taotu for such a present, he proceeded to take a bath and go to sleep.

He would need to be in peak condition for tomorrow and good food and a good rest would help him with it.