Lin Donglai was one to take good advice, and chose the Five Elements Qi-Gathering Method. For the transcription, he only copied down the Jiayin Life-Gathering Method.
As for the methods of the other four elements, Lin Donglai forced himself to memorize them.
Lin Donglai hadn't originally possessed such good memory, but after gaining inner vision, it seemed his spirit soul had been tempered. Though it couldn't be called photographic memory or the ability to recite anything backward, he could at least remember something after reading it carefully four or five times.
The cultivation methods for the early Qi Refining stage weren't difficult—memorizing the circulation routes was just a few hundred characters of essential principles. What mattered were the annotations and tricks of the trade.
But the Lecture Hall should teach those things anyway.
When leaving the Scripture Pavilion, he simply noted the method he had selected using his outer disciple token. There wasn't even a procedure of swearing an oath not to pass it on—the pavilion attendant just let Lin Donglai through.
After leaving the Scripture Pavilion, Lin Donglai went to collect his monthly stipend. At Qi Refining first layer, the stipend was two spirit stones a month—at least it counted as an income.
As for the Hundred Arts of Cultivation, he directly chose the Way of Spirit Plants. After all, the Earth Immortal lineage was best suited for farming.
Entering the Spirit Plant Hall, he saw that everyone coming and going were dark-skinned disciples who looked like old farmers, dressed extremely plainly.
Following the direction signs, Lin Donglai arrived at the registration desk.
The one in charge of registration was a female disciple, presumably also an outer disciple, dressed just as plainly, and looking rather approachable.
"Senior Sister, I'm one of this cohort's immortal seedlings. I'd like to learn the Way of Spirit Plants among the Hundred Arts. Could you tell me how the Spirit Plant instruction works?"
Huang Yue looked over this barefoot youth. His frame looked sturdy—he was surely a good hand at farming—so she nodded. "Register first, then take a copy of the Farming Essentials back with you."
"At the Lecture Hall, on the third day of every month, an outer sect Spirit Plant Elder gives lessons."
"The Way of Spirit Plants has no other tricks—it's all about hands-on practice in the fields. Just follow the Farming Essentials, find a plot of land to reclaim, and plant something."
"Once you reach Qi Refining second layer and master one Spirit Plant spell, you can apply for a plot of spirit field on Tengshe Peak and start growing spirit rice."
"If you can grow low-grade spirit rice with a yield of three hundred jin per mu, you'll be a low-grade Spirit Plant Farmer."
"Senior Sister, I have Five Elements spirit roots and a lower-grade Jiawood physique. What Spirit Plant spells can I learn?"
"A lower-grade Jiawood physique?" Huang Yue's eyes lit up. "You really do have talent. Oh right, I remember Senior Sister Jiang Biling once recommended someone to our Spirit Plant Hall—that must be you. Why did you take so long to come?"
"My aptitude was too poor. I dawdled for a long time at the stage of drawing qi into the body, and only managed to succeed by luck yesterday."
"So that's it!" Huang Yue dug out Lin Donglai's records, then asked for his token and left an imprint on it. "When the two-year immortal seedling period on Immortal Seedling Peak ends, come report to the Spirit Plant Hall. You are a key-cultivation outer disciple of our Spirit Plant Hall, understood?"
"A key-cultivation outer disciple?" Lin Donglai voiced his confusion.
"There's no way around it. Those who only know how to grow spirit rice are really just spirit farmers—that group is quite numerous, and all they need to know is farming."
"A true Spirit Plant Farmer needs to know how to grow several different kinds of spirit herbs, and master seed breeding, grafting seedlings, soil mixing, and other such skills."
"As for Spirit Plant spells, they need at least one brought to the Great Mastery realm."
"There are five most basic Spirit Plant spells: the Sweet Dew Rain-Bestowing Charm, the Sprout Gestation Technique, the Spirit-Forging Earth-Shaking Technique, the Fiery Light Sun-Gathering Technique, and the Golden Sickle Reaping Technique."
"With your lower-grade Jiawood physique, the most suitable for you to cultivate is the Sprout Gestation Technique, which awakens the vitality of seeds. Later you can cultivate the Spring Wind Seedling-Quickening Art, which accelerates the growth of spirit plants."
"Next best is cultivating the Sweet Dew Rain-Bestowing Charm. Rain conjured by you will carry some of the vitality of vegetation, which is also suitable for tending seedlings."
"As for the remaining three spells, you can learn them when these two stop progressing easily. You are a five-element spirit root, after all."
"Oh right, becoming an outer disciple of our Spirit Plant Hall comes with some benefits. For instance, with these Spirit Plant spells, you won't need to waste your Qi Refining second layer spell-exchange opportunity—you can learn them directly at the Spirit Plant Hall."
"You can also choose one farming magical tool for free."
"After the two-year immortal seedling period ends, you can also choose in advance an outer sect cave abode with a spirit field, and when taking missions you get priority selection of Spirit Plant missions—you won't be sent out to hunt demon beasts or the like."
"In our Spirit Plant Hall, everything is oriented toward farming. There are none of those crooked schemes."
"Moreover, the sect encourages disciples to farm and reclaim land as much as possible. As long as you take a spirit field mission and farm it, there's a subsidy of one spirit stone per mu of spirit field per year."
"Good." Lin Donglai listened, dumbfounded, to all these benefits, then asked, "Is Tengshe Peak under the administration of our Spirit Plant Hall?"
Huang Yue nodded. "More or less. But our Spirit Plant Hall has no fixed mountain—it only concerns itself with farming."
"However, Spirit Plant Hall Elders have the right of recommendation. If you farm well, even if your cultivation doesn't meet the standard, you can still be recommended by a Spirit Plant Hall Elder to become an inner disciple."
"Our Green Wood Sect's founding ancestor, the Green Wood Patriarch—before he reached Foundation Establishment, he was a farmhand for others too. The sect's third-grade Zi Mansion spirit wood, the Qiongxiao Green Gang Treasure Tree, is currently tended by our Spirit Plant Hall's Hall Master! The Foundation Establishment cultivation method of our sect, the Qionglin Green Jade Treasure Tree Art, was created from scratch by that Zi Mansion True Person using that very tree as its basis."
Lin Donglai listened to her paint a dazzling picture, but he knew only one truth: back in Lin Family Town, farmers held the lowest status. During the earlier disciple recruitment, Li Yunze had also shown disdain for farming disciples.
Yet with his spirit root aptitude, merely because of a lower-grade Jiawood physique—and with cultivation at only Qi Refining first layer, not even having begun learning spells—he had been directly enrolled as a registered disciple of the Spirit Plant Hall.
This was a bit too "thirsty" for recruits.
Even accounting for Senior Sister Jiang Biling's recommendation, Lin Donglai had already guessed: this Spirit Plant Hall was simply a place that endlessly produced old farmers for the sect.
The mortal world also took agriculture as its foundation. It seemed this spirit rice and these spirit herbs were likewise the bedrock of the immortal sects.
"Then if I join the Spirit Plant Hall and have questions about spirit plants, whom should I ask? Even the books in the Scripture Pavilion require merit points."
"Our Spirit Plant Hall has its own library, and most of it is free."
"In the Spirit Plant Hall, only the seedlings of rare spirit plants, superior Spirit Plant techniques, and high-grade spirit field resources are more expensive. Everything else is cheap."
"Farming knowledge, out there among those loose cultivator clans, would count as some kind of inheritance. But here, we're only afraid you won't learn it! Why would we hide anything?"
"How about this—any questions you don't understand, you can ask me directly. Outer disciple tokens can also transmit messages; you just need to leave a spirit imprint. I'll leave one on yours right now. From now on, if you have any questions, just leave me a message."
"First, I'll get you a Spirit Plant magical tool and a jade slip of a spell. You're still living on Immortal Seedling Peak, right? Not far from the foot of Immortal Seedling Peak there's a valley—there, our Spirit Plant Hall has prepared spirit land specifically for newly initiated Spirit Plant disciples like you to work with."
"I'll also give you some spirit rice seeds. You still have a year and a half of your immortal seedling period—if you hurry, that's enough for three seasons of spirit rice."
There were five types of Spirit Plant magical tools, corresponding to the five Spirit Plant spells.
The Earth-Shaking Spirit Hoe, the Fiery Sun Array Flags, the Sweet Dew Gourd, the Crescent Moon Sickle, and the Vitality-Gathering Jade Vase.
Lin Donglai had originally wanted to choose the Earth-Shaking Spirit Hoe—the standard equipment of old farmers.
But Huang Yue recommended that Lin Donglai choose the Sweet Dew Gourd, saying that using the Sweet Dew Gourd frequently would help him better learn the Sweet Dew Rain-Bestowing Charm.
As for the Earth-Shaking Spirit Hoe, he could find a way to get a secondhand one—seven or eight spirit stones would buy one. If that really didn't work, he could find an artifact-crafting apprentice to make a hoe. It didn't necessarily have to be a magical tool; anything that could break ground would do. Lin Donglai certainly looked like he had strength to spare.
For the Spirit Plant spell, he chose the Sprout Gestation Technique, making full use of the lower-grade Jiawood physique.
Then he heard Huang Yue say: "If you nurture your seedlings well, your farming is half a success already."