A Blazing Fire Ape, an Ironhide Bear, two Earth Mud Wolves, and a Thunderhorn Deer.
Even Constanze had to admit that Qu Weichen’s luck was something else.
She’d only been adventuring for a few days and already collected so many magical beast corpses.
Those mercenary teams who came to Beastcall Mountain to hunt would stay for ten days or half a month, and might not even get as much as Qu Weichen did.
Both the Blazing Fire Ape and the Ironhide Bear were second-tier magical beasts—their hides and bones could fetch a good amount of source coins.
Even if Qu Weichen didn’t sell them, she could use the bear hide to make a set of leather armor for protection.
After that battle, maybe because the fight between the two second-tier beasts was so intense, all the nearby magical beasts had scattered.
Qu Weichen didn’t get any more spoils.
She found a patch of fruit trees and picked a bunch of small red-purple fruits.
The red fruits had thin skins and lots of juice, sweet and sour, perfect for snacking.
Qu Weichen dug out a few clean burlap sacks from her spatial ring and spent the afternoon picking fruit, ending up with a full haul.
On the third day, when she was heading back, Qu Weichen handed all the magical beast corpses to Constanze.
“Captain, I don’t really know if I should sell these or what, so I’ll just give them all to you.”
“You could sell them to the Warrior Association and earn some contribution points.” Constanze ruffled Qu Weichen’s hair.
“I can go with you.
That Blazing Fire Ape has a fire-element magic core, and with its bones, I can forge you a pair of bone daggers.
If you channel your qi into them, they’ll deal fire damage.
As for the bear hide, I’ll make you a set of leather armor and boots to your measurements, and throw in a pair of leather gloves.
The Thunderhorn Deer is only first-tier, and while its antlers have lightning properties, they’re not very hard.
If you really want, I can make you a pair of daggers for fun.
The rest isn’t really useful, so you can just sell it.”
“Then I’ll just take the fire-element bone daggers and the leather armor.” Qu Weichen went with Constanze to the Warrior Association, got the forging done, and sold the rest of the magical beast corpses.
After deducting the forging costs, she still had 310 contribution points left.
The second-tier beast corpses sold for thirteen thousand source coins each, and the first-tier ones for five thousand, so she made forty-one thousand source coins in total.
Of course, if she didn’t need the beast materials for forging, the second-tier beasts would’ve sold for even more.
After selling everything and returning to the Inquisition Sanctuary, the first thing Constanze did was call a priest to give Qu Weichen a full healing spell, fixing up all the injuries from her three days of adventuring.
Constanze told her to rest for a bit, then kicked her out of the training grounds.
Qu Weichen had no choice but to practice standing meditation in the courtyard.
As she stood and circulated her “qi,” thinking about the money she made from selling magical beasts, she couldn’t help but sigh inwardly, “Nine, selling grilled meat and wild herb soup outside Beastcall Mountain is way too profitable.
The margins are insane.”
[That income isn’t stable, though.
You just grab a sucker when you can.] Number Nine didn’t care.
[And it’s not that easy to set up shop there.
Look at that camp—everyone’s a muscle-bound warrior, all strong as hell.
Beastcall Mountain is far from Uvino, with nothing around for miles.
Running a stall there is exhausting.] Qu Weichen thought that was true.
If it was really that profitable, the area outside Beastcall Mountain would be packed with camps.
“My five viscera and six bowels just can’t balance out, and the cycle won’t run on its own.
What do you think is the reason?” Qu Weichen got bored standing there, so she started chatting with Number Nine.
It was just a thought away, anyway.
[You should use your qi to nourish your organs and strengthen them first.
Also, since the big cycle is a cycle, your upper and lower limbs need to be equally strong, so you have to catch up there.] Number Nine thought for a bit, then added, [I think Constanze’s full-body strengthening is really impressive—she’s basically got iron bones and copper skin.
You need to toughen up your bones too.]
“…That’s hard.” Qu Weichen sighed.
Of course she wanted to get stronger, but using “qi” to nourish her body burned through it too fast, and the effects were just so-so.
It was obviously something that only worked with long-term persistence.
Who knew how many years Constanze had been tempering herself to get to that level? Luckily, after nine rounds of body tempering, Qu Weichen’s body was already stronger than most warriors, which made up for a lot.
“What’s my potential as a warrior? Why can’t I see it displayed anywhere?”
[After you completed nine rounds of body tempering, your potential as a warrior became an unknown.] Number Nine said, [Unknown is good—it means infinite possibilities.
Host, you’re amazing!]
Qu Weichen’s vision blurred, and she suddenly saw a big red flower appear in front of her eyes.
Luckily, it disappeared right away.
She stood there stunned for a while, then shouted in her mind, “No sound effects! And I don’t want these visual effects either!!!”
[This is a new feature I worked so hard to develop.
Don’t worry, I’ll only use it at times like this, just to make you happy.] Number Nine said, then slapped a “/smile” and “/grin” emoji onto her vision, which appeared and disappeared.
Qu Weichen: “Can’t you develop some actually useful new features?”
[Don’t worry, I’m already applying for a BGM function.
Next time you’re in a fight, I’ll prepare some blood-pumping background music for you!] Number Nine’s voice was full of excitement, clearly looking forward to it.
Qu Weichen: “…Do other systems slack off like you?”
[Hey, I’m working really hard to help you grow! Those overpowered template systems won’t let me load them, so I have to make it up to you in other ways.] Number Nine said, then slapped a “/pout” emoji on.
“Fine, I really appreciate your company and help all this time.
But you don’t need to bother with sound effects, visual effects, or BGM.
I don’t care about that stuff, so don’t trouble yourself.” Qu Weichen was very sincere.
“Just stop with all the flashy stuff!”
[Sweetie, this is my job!] Number Nine was all dramatic, and threw in a “Woman, I don’t believe you’re mad.jpg” meme.
Qu Weichen went completely silent.
She took a deep breath, blocked out Number Nine’s voice, and focused on her standing meditation.
She’d definitely noticed that her relationship with Number Nine was getting better and better, but as their intimacy increased… what kind of “surprises” was this thing unlocking for her? Was the Necromancer Growth System really a proper system?
For the next while, Qu Weichen’s academy training went really smoothly.
No one bothered her, so she could devote all her time to cultivation.
After eating magical beast meat for a few months, Qu Weichen suddenly realized she’d grown five centimeters taller in half a year!
Not only that, she had muscles now.
Tu Weierxi had always hung out with Qu Weichen and hadn’t noticed, but it was Gexifei who, after getting blasted in the face by another failed magic lesson with Qu Weichen, looked up and was shocked by the height difference between Tu Weierxi and Qu Weichen.
“Qu Weichen, you’re taller than Tu Weierxi now!”
“She’s got muscles too—she actually has abs?!” Orona squeezed Qu Weichen’s arm, just as surprised.
She grabbed Tu Weierxi and gave her a squeeze too, then couldn’t help but say, “You’re in the warrior class too, so why aren’t you growing taller or getting any muscle?”
Tu Weierxi immediately bristled.
“Humans come of age at sixteen, but elves don’t mature until two hundred.
I’ve still got decades of development left! And I do have muscles!” Tu Weierxi rolled up her sleeve and struggled to show off her little bit of muscle, but before she could show it off for long, An Xiaonan poked it and it went soft.
“You might as well transfer back to our magic class.
You come to me for notes every day anyway.
Dual training in magic and martial arts isn’t that easy.” Orona messed up Tu Weierxi’s golden hair.
“You’re probably the best at magic in the warrior class, right?”
“As long as I keep training, I’ll become an excellent warrior.
Dual training in magic and martial arts—I can totally do it.” Tu Weierxi pushed Orona’s hand away and carefully smoothed her hair.
She huffed, then added, “You guys get tired after running five laps, but I can run ten now!”
The four little elves started chattering again.
Qu Weichen let out a sigh of relief, took a towel from her spatial ring, and wiped the dust off her face, thinking that magic training was pure torture.
Tu Weierxi had promised it would only be a month, but she kept blowing things up and failing, making the four elves both hopeful and desperate.
Now, even when they were working out together, they’d still urge her to try again—even if it meant another explosion.
But Qu Weichen didn’t get to relax for long before the four little elves remembered her again and dragged her over to watch another explosion.
Qu Weichen had no choice but to go along, then practiced a set of martial arts with Tu Weierxi on the field.
After four months at the academy, the mage classes started picking teams to play “magic basketball,” while the warrior class got into “tug-of-war competitions.” It was a way to relax outside of training.
Qu Weichen wasn’t interested, but the giants and beastfolk in Class Seven were super excited about the tug-of-war.
Every day after class, they’d run to the training grounds to practice their strength, muttering about “crushing the whole grade” and insisting they had to win first place.
Tu Weierxi wasn’t interested in tug-of-war either, since she definitely couldn’t compete.
But she dragged Qu Weichen over to the mage class every day to watch Orona and the others train, and the magic flying everywhere was dizzying.
The ball was specially made, and any magic attack would make it bounce.
The mage class’s game was to get the ball into the other team’s basket, but no one could touch the ball or each other—only magic was allowed.
The elves were definitely the main force in the games, since their little spells didn’t need chanting or charging—just a thought and they’d fire off.
But since the number of players was limited, each team could only have three elves, so it was still fair.
A white ball was tossed into the air, and Qu Weichen saw Orona hit it even higher with a fireball, making the other team’s wind blade miss.
Before the ball could fall, three water balls shot up and missed.
Gexifei waved her staff, and three fireballs instantly hit the air near the ball! The other side’s magic poured in too, brushing past the ball and leaving a trail of electricity in the air—
Red, blue, green, purple.
All kinds of magic flew through the sky.
The “basketball” court wasn’t big, and the ball was small, but all the magic flying around managed to avoid it, desperately attacking the air around the ball, as if that would get it into the basket.
Qu Weichen’s eyes hurt from watching.
She rubbed her eyes and saw Gexifei shamelessly use a “wall of fire” to push the ball, finally hitting it and sending it flying toward the other side, but it wasn’t high enough and got blown back by a “wind gust.”
Qu Weichen looked at Tu Weierxi.
“Next time we watch this, remind me to grab some food from the cafeteria first.”
This was just too good to eat with.
Since she couldn’t learn magic, Qu Weichen just watched.
After the academy’s entertainment activities ended, life went back to normal.
She kept up her strict routine of studying and training, and no one in the academy dared bother her anymore.
As for He Muman? Qu Weichen hadn’t seen her in a long time.
She remembered the faces of the people she fought on the arena that time, but they remembered her too, so whenever they saw her from afar, they’d go the other way.
Whether it was the cafeteria or the training hall, they never crossed paths.
Sometimes, Qu Weichen couldn’t help but think: this peaceful training life… is really nice.
With friends by her side, no worries about food, clothing, or shelter, and all she had to do was study and train hard every day.
She even got a source coin stipend every month.
Every time she thought about it, Qu Weichen felt grateful to the temple master who saved her.
“What’s up? You seem to be in a really good mood today.” Tu Weierxi asked curiously as they walked to the cafeteria after class.
“Yeah, because it’s a beautiful day.”
