Li Yi, after dealing with the mutant beast, returned to the downtown area, planning to go ho and have a good rest.
However, just as he arrived near the intersection close to Pingan Building, a man with tattered clothes, reeking of a foul odor, and covered in gri suddenly burst out of an alley and knelt down with a thud, trying to grab Li Yi’s hand.
Li Yi, quick to react and thinking it was a scam, dodged instinctively.
"A beggar?"
What era is it that Tianchang City still has beggars? He hadn’t seen one in many years.
But he didn’t have any money on him either.
Li Yi subconsciously felt his pockets and then thought about the Golden Coffin in his storage Magic Artifact. Should he break off a piece?
While he was pondering this, the beggar spoke up: "No, not a beggar, Li, Mr. Li, it’s , Fan Zhizhou, don’t you recognize anymore?"
"Fan Zhizhou?"
Li Yi was startled, then quickly helped him up: "Fan? It’s been a while, how did you end up like this?"
As soon as he said this, the originally strong-willed Fan Zhizhou burst into tears, seemingly overwheld with injustice like a child, and started crying heavily.
"Fan, what’s wrong with you? Are you alright? You look completely fine, no illness or disaster, just a bit low on Qi-Blood..."
Li Yi inspected him and found that not only had Fan Zhizhou’s strength not improved in this period, but his Qi-Blood had significantly depleted, and even his Martial Arts Realm seed to have regressed.
"Mr. Li, I’m in such misery," Fan Zhizhou howled, drawing frequent glances from passersby.
"It’s okay, it’s okay, there isn’t a hurdle in the world that can’t be overco, aren’t you still alive and well?" While trying to console him, Li Yi was very puzzled.
Having not seen each other for a while, how did Fan Zhizhou end up in such a state?
He rembered when he had parted with Fan Zhizhou, he had given him several million yuan, and with the potent dicines he brought back from the Four Seas and Eight Continents, it should have been enough for a prospering life in Tianchang City. At worst, it shouldn’t have led him to beco the only beggar in Tianchang City.
Fan Zhizhou wanted to speak but his stomach growled instead, and then with trembling palms he clutched Li Yi’s arm: "Mr. Li, do you, do you have any food? I haven’t eaten for several days, I’m about to faint from hunger."
"Hm?" Li Yi’s silver eyes narrowed slightly upon hearing this.
So your depletion of Qi-Blood was caused by hunger?
This is absurd.
In such a short ti, you spent several million yuan and ate a backpack full of potent dicines?
Li Yi didn’t think much further and imdiately took out a bottle of Transcendent Nutrient Fluid from his storage Magic Artifact and handed it to Fan Zhizhou.
Fan Zhizhou had undergone so changes, at least he was quite familiar with modern society’s items. After receiving the Transcendent Nutrient Fluid, he opened it and gulped it down like a starving ghost reincarnated, emptying the bottle in just a few seconds.
As the Transcendent Nutrient Fluid took effect, the feeling of hunger in Fan Zhizhou began to rapidly disappear.
He set down the bottle, looked up at the sky with tears swirling in his eyes, and finally took a deep breath: "At last, I’ve co back to life, with this al I can last for another ten days."
"..."
Seeing him like this, Li Yi didn’t know what to say for a mont.
But it was clear that Fan Zhizhou had been living a very hard life recently.
"Fan, let’s go back to my place first. You can take a bath, rest up, and we can talk later," Li Yi said.
Fan Zhizhou, with tears in his eyes, nodded: "Thank you, Mr. Li. Without your help, I, Fan, would have surely starved to death on the streets today."
Li Yi took Fan Zhizhou back to the Peace Finance Building, then asked him to take a bath, and called for Zheng Lan to prepare a set of clean clothes for Fan Zhizhou to change into.
"Li Yi, who is he? Why does he look like a beggar? Is he a Cultivator who ca back from the dangerous zone?" Zheng Lan curiously asked while handing over the clothes, in her mind, only those who ventured into the dangerous zones could be so ragged.
"No, he’s a friend I brought back from the Otherworld," Li Yi said.
Zheng Lan imdiately beca interested: "That person is from the Otherworld? Which world did you bring him from?"
She also knew about cross-world matters and was very curious about people from the Otherworld.
"I’ll tell you later, better not to ask too much now," Li Yi said.
"Fine, I won’t ask now, but you must tell the stories of the Otherworld later, I’ll go make you guys so tea," Zheng Lan didn’t press further and left imdiately.
A little while later.
Fan Zhizhou finished his bath, erged from the bathroom in clean clothes, and regained so of the deanor of soone born into a prominent family. However, for reasons unknown, his eyes were always brimming with tears, his face the picture of aggrievent, and a sense of despair colored his brows, similar to the state Li Yi was in when he first returned from World 36.
"Fan, take a seat. Tell , what on earth has happened recently that reduced you to begging on the streets of Tianchang City?" Li Yi said from his sofa, gesturing invitingly.
Fan Zhizhou sat down, he had cut his hair to better integrate into this world; his long hair that once reached his shoulders was now cropped short. As Li Yi posed the question, Fan seed to lose himself in thought, apparently reliving so distressing mories.
Li Yi didn’t rush him, rely waiting patiently. It wasn’t until Zheng Lan passed over a cup of freshly brewed black tea that Fan Zhizhou seed to snap back to reality.
Holding the steaming cup of tea, Fan Zhizhou saw his own haggard reflection in the liquid and, unable to help it, his tears fell once again. After wiping his tears and downing the tea in one gulp, he let out a deep sigh and said, "Mr. Li, it’s a long story."
"After we parted ways in the deserted district last ti, I stepped into Tianchang City full of confidence, carrying the four million you gifted and various great dicines and elixirs prepared by my family. I was acutely aware of the vastness of the universe and my own insignificance and decided to start over from scratch, setting aside the pride of a Family Disciple."
Li Yi nodded, "That’s sensible, no issues there."
Fan Zhizhou continued, "Following your advice, I sought out a ditation room to learn the ways of cultivation and evolution. With that and dual cultivation in Martial Arts, I believed I would surely accomplish sothing."
"That’s the right approach," Li Yi nodded again.
"But that’s when the nightmare began..." Fan Zhizhou’s expression turned to one of agony: "I found a place called the Skywalker ditation Room. Although the cultures between the worlds differ, normal communication wasn’t a problem. The owner of the ditation room charged ten thousand yuan for mbership."
Thinking the price was incredibly affordable, I didn’t hesitate to pay, eager to learn and better assimilate into this world."
Li Yi comnted, "That sounds reasonable, your plan was sound."
If it were him, he would do the sa, considering Fan Zhizhou was an intelligent person. It wasn’t feasible to transform into Long Aotian and reign supre over the city right away. Only by understanding the rules of this world and mastering its cultivation thods for slow exploration and establishing a footing could one survive and thrive.
Fan Zhizhou went on to say, "I thought everything would proceed smoothly, but when I went to the ditation room for a lesson the next day, they inford that the day’s session was for silver mbers to learn, and with the ten thousand yuan I paid, I was only a regular mber with no right to attend the class. To be able to listen, I had to beco a silver mber, which cost a hundred thousand yuan."
"Considering the amount wasn’t much, I paid a hundred thousand yuan and beca a silver mber, but they told to co back tomorrow as today’s class had already started, and as a new mber, I had missed a lot of information which would affect the quality of my future cultivation. They insisted it was for everyone’s benefit."
"At the ti, I felt it was worth becoming a silver mber as the service improved significantly, so I went back to the hotel to rest for the day, and returned for the class on the third day. Indeed, the teacher shared so knowledge that day, from the Sky Tipping incident to cultivation and evolution, and talked about how to ditate and absorb cosmic energy... I was delighted, feeling like I had grasped the thod of cultivating with cosmic energy."
Li Yi replied, "Even though you spent a hundred thousand yuan, it was worth it if you learned sothing valuable, right?"
Fan Zhizhou offered a bitter smile: "But my aptitude is too poor; no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t channel the cosmic energy into my body to begin the path of cultivation. So suggested I give up cultivating and find a job to make money instead, but how could I accept that? So, I asked the teacher if there was any way to change this."
"The ditation room teacher offered to act as a Guiding Skill instructor to direct the cosmic energy into my body and help open the door to cultivation, but the price was steep—a whopping ten thousand yuan per hour."
Hearing this, Li Yi didn’t see any problem with it either.
The ditation room’s instructor, seeing that Fan Zhizhou could not make any progress, acted as a guide quite normally. The price was also industry standard; there was no intention of ripping off custors, after all, the ditation room was running a business.
"For a full ten days, I spent a million yuan, and that instructor kept trying to guide universal energy for , but I still didn’t make any breakthrough." Fan Zhizhou said painfully while clutching his head.
"Uh..."
At this mont, Li Yi rembered sothing.
It seed that in the Four Seas and Eight Continents, the universal energy was thin, and the bodies of the people there had degenerated. They were not sensitive to the universal energy and found it very difficult to beco Evolvers. This was just like Earth in the beginning; universal energy had just appeared, and cultivation had not started. As ti passed and bodies were soaked in universal energy, they began to adapt to the energy, which marked the beginning of the path of cultivation.
When Li Yi first helped his junior fellow disciple Zhao Qian start on the path of cultivation, he mobilized the energy of Sword Coins, combined with the application of the White Bone Temple Cultivation Skill, gathering a large amount of universal energy. Finally, with the help of the Guiding Skill, he infused these energies into Zhao Qian’s body, forcibly breaking through the threshold and achieving success.
In Tianchang City, if Fan Zhizhou wanted to succeed, the only possibility was to enter the Mysterious Object Cultivation Room and stay for a few days to begin the cultivation journey, or he could simply live in Tianchang City for a while until his body adapted to the environnt, and then cultivate.
An ordinary ditation room’s instructor had, at best, the strength of a Spirit dium or psychic. Thinking they could help people from the Four Seas and Eight Continents start their cultivation was simply wishful dreaming.
"Afterward, since the instructor saw how determined I was about cultivation, he introduced to another thod: buying a few bottles of their ditation room’s unique Cultivation Water. They claid that by drinking it, an ordinary person could imdiately start on the path of cultivation. However, the price was a bit steep, one million per bottle," Fan Zhizhou said.
"Pff~!"
Hearing this, Li Yi couldn’t help but spit out his tea.
It seed that the ditation room’s instructor had already figured out that Fan Zhizhou was wealthy but naive, and had begun fleecing him.
"I thought, one million isn’t expensive. As long as it opens up the path of cultivation, it’s worth it, so I bought one bottle. But after using the Cultivation Water, there was still no effect, although I did feel much more energized," Fan Zhizhou said, "The instructor told my physique was very poor, as if I hadn’t evolved at all. One bottle was probably not enough; I would need two."
"However, silver mbers can only buy one bottle. To purchase two, you need to obtain a gold mbership, and to beco a gold mber, you need to pay five hundred thousand all at once."
"..." Li Yi looked at Fan Zhizhou with a strange expression.
The ditation room’s people had their calculations regarding the money on Fan Zhizhou down to a science.
He had a total of just four million yuan.
If he bought three bottles of whatever Cultivation Water, and added a silver and gold mbership on top of that, three million six hundred thousand would be gone. Adding everyday expenses, Fan Zhizhou would nearly be cleaned out.
Fan Zhizhou, not understanding the cultivation of this world and being eager to start his cultivation journey, coupled with his background as a Family Disciple who didn’t really care about money, was bound to fall for the trap.
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