"As you command," Se Lei replied, having just descended to the arena. "You will be shown to the room, I will return shortly," he said to the quartet, who were recovering from their difficult battle. Then he turned to me, waving his hand. "Let's go."
"Yes, that Asura is simply a monster. One against four of us, and he won so easily. After all, body tempering is a powerful thing," Mo Fan said, stretching, but then suddenly doubled over in pain.
"Yes, Brother Fan, his speed is simply enormous. He wasn't even going to attack me seriously. He was just pretending to attack me," said Xiao Hou, who had approached, holding his stomach and breathing heavily. "His speed is simply enormous; I could barely parry his attacks."
"And his strength is enormous; he pierced my shield with a single dagger," said He Yu, helping Xiao Hou stand. "Xiao Hou could never do that. I wonder what would have happened if Jiaxing Yun had been with us?"
"I don't know for sure, but I think we could have won," Xu Zhaoting replied confidently, watching me leave.
"Really? Why are you so sure?..." Mo Fan immediately asked, but I no longer heard the continuation, as I had entered the room under the stands.
He led me away from the arena, through several courtyards, to a rather large building. A couple of guards stood at the entrance; I felt they were at a high level! And considering that everyone here practices body tempering, perhaps only a master-level mage could get in here. Se Lei showed something to the guards, and they let us inside. Upon entering, we found ourselves in a corridor that then branched off to the right and left. We turned right and went further. On both sides were doors with numbers and inscriptions. It was clear these were various treasuries. Above each door, I felt a powerful prohibition that could burn any mage below the master level.
Seeing all this security, I became curious: who was stronger, the guardians who were looking for me, or this Gong family? Most likely, this family would be stronger. I couldn't feel the head's cultivation, so it must be quite high. But I felt Se Ki's cultivation vaguely, but it was definitely at the master level! I wonder how strong the old man is; he's probably at a high level since his cultivation is sealed, but still, he's quite strong.
We reached the end of the corridor, where there was only one door with a plaque inscribed: "For the best of the young generation." Se Lei stopped, placed some paper on the door, and the prohibition guarding this door seemed to dissipate. After that, he took out a key and opened the door itself. Most likely, all this was handed over to him while I was fighting Mo Fan and his companions.
"Enter. You can choose absolutely any item in this room, but only one," he said, turning to me. "You don't need to rush; we have time."
"Alright," I nodded, entering the room. Inside were shelves on which various vials, bones, herbs, and finished artifacts were placed. I didn't know what to take, so I started examining everything.
Most of it looked like ordinary herbs at first glance, but upon closer inspection, one could understand that they contained immense internal energy. I didn't even look at such trivial things; they were probably there only to distract inexperienced youngsters from truly valuable items. You could say it was a kind of knowledge test.
Most of the animal bones and organs also didn't suit me in terms of magical attributes. I immediately dismissed the artifacts altogether, as there were none that interested me, and I had already decided to make all my artifacts myself. Those I make myself will be stronger, better suited to me, and better compatible with me. After all, a personal artifact made especially for you, and by you, is much better than those made for general use and sold on the market and at auctions.
I was looking for items that would promote the cultivation of lightning and wind to strengthen my innate seeds. Some were too difficult to master, others did not provide the necessary output power. In the far corner of the room, I found a whole shelf lined with boxes depicting two lotuses. Opening it, I indeed found lotuses, though they emanated strong earth energy. Opening another, I found lotuses with water energy, and another, and there were lotuses with ice energy.
Soon, I found two boxes with lightning and wind lotuses. The lightning lotuses were white with a purple tint, and the wind ones were also white, only with a greenish tint. I decided that this was what I needed. But I could only take one box, and all of them contained identical lotuses. Glancing quickly at Se Lei and making sure he wasn't looking, I swapped one wind lotus for a lightning lotus, quickly closed both boxes, and taking one of them, headed for the exit.
"Stop," Se Lei stopped me, raising his hand. "This box contains elemental lotuses; you can only take one."
"But they are in one box. I was allowed to take only one item, right? So the box with its contents can be considered one item," I replied calmly, putting the box into my spatial bracelet.
"Alright, I won't argue with you. If anything, you'll have to deal with the Head yourself," Se Lei said calmly, shrugging indifferently.
When I came out, he closed the door behind me and replaced the prohibition. After that, he led me to some room and left. Left alone, I returned to my cultivation, which had been repeatedly interrupted during the tournament, but I felt that the second stage of space should be reached soon. After a couple of hours of diligent cultivation, the second stage was finally achieved. This place is definitely special.
I was quite exhausted by the end of the day. Fatigue weighed on me, but I wasn't brought to this waiting room for nothing, was I? I hoped the old man would visit me, say something. My expectations were met an hour later. The old man entered the room in a very good mood.
"What has made you so happy, Teacher?" I asked, standing up from the sofa and bowing.
"Everything went as well as it could have. You did an excellent job with the task. I have been appointed to the post of second elder, so now you have a chance to get something else that will help you in your development," the old man said, sitting on the sofa opposite me. "What did you take from the treasury?"
"Two elemental lotuses, lightning and wind," I replied calmly, returning to my seat.
"Not bad. It's good that Se Lei went with you; someone else might not have let you take two lotuses at once. But, well, that's not important," he said, waving his hand. "Now you must return to training. I will stay here, regaining my former strength, and also strengthen my position as second elder. The stronger you are, the stronger and more stable my position will be," he said cheerfully. Yes, I knew from the very beginning that he was quite an egoistic person, just like me, so it was even more convenient for me to deal with him.
"Teacher, may I ask what happened to those four I fought at the end?" I asked, as this concerned me.
"They were given the steel body tempering technique; it's nothing special, the effect will not appear soon. Se Lei has been appointed their teacher," the old man replied calmly, then added with slight interest. "Are they your acquaintances?"
"Yes, in a sense, we communicate closely with them, but I don't want them to know about my connection with the Gong family," I replied calmly, adding after a short pause. "I hope you understand me, Teacher."
"Yes, of course, I will not reveal your connection with me if you yourself do not reveal it," the teacher replied. "Do you have any other questions?"
"I'm interested, what body tempering technique did I use?" I asked the last question that interested me.
"The Dragon Body Tempering technique. It is one of the strongest techniques, but also the most dangerous; it requires great risk and can lead to unpleasant consequences in case of unsuccessful practice," the old man said calmly. For some reason, it didn't seem strange to me that he had given me a dangerous technique, not at all. "When you came to me as a disciple, I didn't arrange a test for you for nothing. If you hadn't succeeded, you wouldn't have been able to practice this technique successfully."
"I see. Thank you for your concern for me, Teacher. I request permission to return to secluded training," I said, standing up and bowing.
"Yes, as I said, how many resources you get from me depends only on you. The stronger you are, the more I can get for you," the old man replied calmly. "Ah, and one more thing, you are going to enroll in Mingzhu. Many offspring of rich and influential clans are enrolling there this year. Try to make friends with them. If someone stands in your way, sweep them aside, but you are forbidden to show the level of your body tempering. This will also add a couple of points to your resource allocation."
"Yes, teacher," I replied briefly, leaving the room.
Soon, I left the entire mansion of the Gong family. This day was very productive, but also exhausting. So I hurried to find myself a place to sleep, and the next day I would move on. I had absolutely no desire to stay in the mansion; I had a feeling it was simply dangerous.
I found a place to sleep quickly. After taking a shower, I fell asleep almost immediately. The next day, I headed to Guangzhou. I wanted to visit a scholar who lived there. After a couple of hours, I was already at the Guangzhou Tower of the Mage Association. After going up to the appropriate floor, I headed to the office I was already familiar with. Just before the door, an unpleasant old woman's voice called out to me, which made me shiver slightly.
"Stop, young man. The respected head of the research department is not here. Did you make an appointment?" asked the secretary, Pin Zhoulun. I remembered how she annoyed me last time and wrinkled my nose, she was so unpleasant.
"No, but I have personal permission from the respected Pin Zhoulun to come to him at any time," I tried to answer as calmly as possible.
"Do you have documentary proof of your words? You know, if everyone comes to the head's office like this, without an appointment and not tied to reception hours, he won't have any time left for his main occupation, namely research!" she said, enunciating each word and wagging her outstretched index finger up and down, reminding me of my elementary school teacher from my past life. She was a disgusting person, I still hate her. If I find her in this life, I definitely won't hold back and will kill her!
"No, but can't we wait for Pin Zhoulun himself and clarify everything with him, can't we?" I said, trying to calm myself mentally.
"As you wish, young man, but the respected one may not return to his office today," the secretary replied calmly.
"Maybe I should just kill her right now?" Asura's thoughtful voice echoed in my head. In general, I even agreed with him.
"Unfortunately, if we kill her, we'll have a lot of problems," I replied sadly, turning to the sofas and sitting in a comfortable spot.
"That's understandable, but she's still incredibly annoying," Asura grumbled and fell silent.
Time dragged on endlessly. I had so many important things to do, but because of this old hag, I couldn't meet with Pin Zhoulun properly. I wanted to ask him about the leakage of magical energy, naturally without revealing the existence of internal energy, for which I definitely wouldn't be thanked. Perhaps, as a scholar, he could answer this question and tell me what to do so that it wouldn't leak. I also wanted to share my knowledge about star combinations with him and find out what he had discovered; it could greatly increase my strength. But alas, I could only hope that he would drop by his office today.