Chapter 15: Bunch of Stew

Sects open external sects, recruit disciples, and teach cultivation knowledge and skills. Disciples need to pay tuition fees when they join the sect to cultivate and learn.

Sects of different grades pay different tuition fees. The higher the grade, the more expensive the tuition fees.

Tongxian Sect is only a first-grade sect in the cultivation world, but in Tongxian City, which only has first-grade sects, it is the largest sect. The annual tuition fees require 100 spirit stones, which does not include other miscellaneous charges.

100 spirit stones are not too expensive, but they are definitely not cheap. They are almost the income of an ordinary Qi training casual cultivator in a year, provided that there are no injuries or other places that require a large amount of spirit stones.

Once there is an illness or disaster, or encounters a problem that needs to be solved with spirit stones, it is possible to have no harvest in a year.

I am very happy during the Chinese New Year, but once the Chinese New Year is over, the burden of cultivation life seems to be pressed down again.

Mo Shan put a storage bag on the table and said with some guilt: "I borrowed some spirit stones from a few brothers. Together with the ones I saved before, there are more than 80 spirit stones in total..."

Liu Ruhua comforted: "I will also go to the shopkeeper of the restaurant tomorrow and ask him to advance some spirit stones..."

Mo Shan was about to say something when he found Mo Hua eavesdropping at the crack of the door.

"Hua'er!"

Mo Hua was discovered, so he had to smile awkwardly and ran to sit next to his mother.

Liu Ruhua pinched Mo Hua's ears affectionately and scolded: "You only know how to eavesdrop at such a young age!"

"Dad, Mom, is there still a shortage of spirit stones at home?"

Mo Shan said: "Yes, but your Uncle Ji said yesterday that he would lend it to me, and he also reminded me to let you study hard in the sect."

"Uncle Ji?"

"Yes, your Uncle Ji said you are smart and has been praising you." Liu Ruhua touched Mo Hua's head and said.

"But Uncle Ji's family doesn't have a surplus of spirit stones." Mo Hua said.

Mo Shan sighed softly, "I'll return it to him after the New Year. Who has extra spiritual stones these days?"

"I do!" Mo Hua laughed.

Mo Shan and Liu Ruhua were stunned for a moment.

Mo Hua stepped back into the house with his calves, and then ran back again, holding a storage bag in his hand.

Mo Hua opened the storage bag, and the fifty spiritual stones inside were shining brightly, which was very beautiful. However, the expected scene of his parents being moved to tears and praising him for being sensible did not appear.

Mo Shan looked solemn, and Liu Ruhua also frowned slightly.

Mo Hua asked anxiously, "What's wrong?"

Mo Shan tried to use a calm tone to ask, "Hua'er, who gave you these spirit stones?"

"No one else gave it to me, I earned it myself!"

Mo Shan was stunned for a moment, "I...earned it myself?"

Liu Ruhua's brows relaxed slightly, and she gently hugged Mo Hua to her arms, "Then tell me how you earn it?"

"I draw formations for Youyuanzhai, but they are just the simplest ones. I can earn one spirit stone for every one I draw."

Mo Shan and Liu Ruhua looked at each other, thinking that their son stayed in the house most of the time before and after the New Year, and didn't play much. He came back after a while when he went out. It turned out that he was drawing formations to earn spirit stones.

The two looked at the spirit stones in the bag again. One spirit stone was for one formation. There were nearly fifty in the bag, which meant that at least fifty formations had to be drawn...

Liu Ruhua couldn't help but hug Mo Hua tighter.

Mo Shan wanted to say something several times, but he didn't know what to say. In the end, he just reached out and gently touched Mo Hua's head.

"You earned this spiritual stone with your hard work. You can keep it for your cultivation or to buy some delicious food. Dad will find a way to solve the issue of the Tongxianmen tuition."

Mo Hua knew that his father was reluctant to use these spiritual stones. He turned his eyes and said, "Then Daddy and Mommy keep these spiritual stones for me. I can't use so many of them as a child, and they are easy to be stolen and robbed."

Mo Shan and Liu Ruhua looked at each other in silence, and couldn't think of a way to refuse.

In the end, Liu Ruhua said, "Okay, Daddy and Mommy will keep them for you first."

"Yeah!" Mo Hua nodded vigorously.

"Okay, it's getting late. You'll start school tomorrow. You should go to bed early."

"Yeah, Daddy and Mommy!"

Mo Hua got up and prepared to go back to the house. After thinking for a while, he turned back and said, "Daddy and Mommy, you should use them when you need them. You don't have to save them for me."

Mo Shan and his wife didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Watching Mo Hua return to the house and close the door, Mo Shan sighed and said with a wry smile: "I, as a father, am not as good as the child."

Liu Ruhua comforted: "What are you talking about? Hua'er knows how to understand his parents, which is a good thing. He can earn spirit stones with his own ability, and we should be happy. But..."

Liu Ruhua looked down at the spirit stones in front of her, then looked up at her husband, and said doubtfully: "He is so young, can he really earn spirit stones by drawing formations for others? Can he earn so much... I'm afraid someone sees his young age and wants to..."

"I'll go and see tomorrow."

Mo Shan said, his eyes gradually became sharper.

The next day, Mo Hua got up on time, and after practicing for a while, he went to the outer gate of Tongxianmen with his mother Liu Ruhua to pay the tuition and register for school.

Mo Shan went out early. According to Liu Ruhua, Mo Shan was going to go into the inner mountain with several demon hunters today, so he had to go there early to prepare.

When they arrived at the outer gate of Tongxianmen, Liu Ruhua paid the tuition and completed the enrollment. She couldn't help but look at Mo Hua a few more times.

After entering Tongxianmen to practice, unless the sect was closed during festivals, she would not see her son on weekdays.

Liu Ruhua also told Mo Hua to practice well, get along well with fellow disciples, eat well, dress well, and don't bully others, and then went back reluctantly.

Mo Hua stood outside the mountain gate and waved until Liu Ruhua's figure disappeared at the intersection, then turned around.

He didn't enter the sect, but went to Youyuanzhai on North Street first, and asked the fat steward to get the materials for twenty sets of Minghuo array, and agreed to hand them in half a month at the latest.

The sect has a ten-day break in the first, middle and last ten days of each month, and each time it only takes one day. Mo Hua planned to sneak out during the ten-day break and make a deal with the fat steward.

For the twenty sets of materials, the fat steward only collected a deposit of ten spirit stones. In view of the pleasant cooperation with Mo Hua's...brother before, and the quality of the formations handed in was getting higher and higher, the fat steward was very satisfied, and for Mo Hua's sake, the deposit remained unchanged.

After discussing with the fat steward, Mo Hua left Youyuanzhai with satisfaction.

After Mo Hua left, he did not notice that a burly man outside Youyuanzhai was silently looking at him.

After Mo Hua left, the man walked into the door of Youyuanzhai.

The doorbell rang, and the fat steward looked up and saw a man with simple clothes but handsome and upright, sword-like eyebrows and star-like eyes looking at him with a scrutinizing look, and his eyes were full of urgency.

The fat steward saw at a glance that this man was a demon hunter, a demon hunter who had really seen blood! And his attitude was not good. The way he looked at him was like looking at a demon beast to be slaughtered.

The fat steward believed that he was no worse than the man in terms of cultivation, but it was hard to say if they really fought. After all, demon hunters licked blood on the tip of their knives all year round and had to fight with demon beasts desperately.

He had been sitting in front of the counter for many years and had not touched a sword for a long time. His fighting skills had long been rusty.

The fat steward weighed it and then straightened his attitude and asked carefully: "Fellow Taoist, what kind of formation do you need?"

The burly man was Mo Shan. He spread out a crumpled piece of paper with a copied formation on it. There were a few mistakes in the copying, so there were traces of smearing.

"What formation is this?"

The fat steward took a look and said: "It's the open fire formation."

"Do you accept this kind of formation?"

The man's tone made the fat steward very uncomfortable. On ordinary days, he would not care about him, but today he felt that he was a guest when he walked in, and he should treat the guests politely and attentively.

"Of course I did. This is a commonly used formation, and ordinary monks and their families will use it, so the consumption is relatively large."

Mo Shan said: "The child who just went out also drew the formation for you?"

The fat steward said: "This kind of thing cannot be told to the outside world. Youyuanzhai wants to protect the privacy of customers. This is the principle of our business."

Mo Shan's eyes instantly stared at him like a knife. The fat steward, who felt like a thorn in his back, thought for a while and felt that monks should not be too rigid, and principles can be followed flexibly.

"It's not that child, it's his brother."

Mo Shan frowned, "Brother?"

The fat steward said, "Yes, how old is this child, how can he draw a formation? He just runs errands for his brother, and the formations are all drawn by his brother."

"Did he say that?"

"Of course," the steward replied, "otherwise why would we do business with a child?"

After the steward finished speaking, he stared at Mo Shan vigilantly:

"As for the child's name and where he lives, I can't tell you."

Mo Shan rolled his eyes at the fat steward. The child's name and where he lives, I, as a father, don't know better than you, why do you need to tell me?

However, knowing that Mo Hua was not being used by others, Mo Shan's attitude eased, and he bowed to the fat steward and said, "Sorry for bothering you, goodbye."

The fat steward breathed a sigh of relief and nodded with a little arrogance on his face.

Mo Shan turned and left. Only when his back disappeared behind the door did the fat steward take a deep breath and muttered in dissatisfaction, "You didn't even buy anything..."