Zhang Deming gritted his teeth and cheered himself on. "Just a little more effort, and I can rest this afternoon."
Because of the sweltering heat, as a veteran rice farmer, Zhang Deming started his work in the early hours of the morning.
This meant that by the scorching afternoon, he usually only had fifteen or sixteen plants left to tend to—less than two hours of work. This was a routine honed by ten years of experience farming rice.
Over the past ten years, he had gone from being scolded daily for his unsatisfactory harvests each season to now, where with two harvests a year, he could even manage to save a Spirit Stone or two from his bonus.
With this bit of self-motivation, Zhang Deming got back to work.
After watering another seven or eight plants, just as he was about to finish, a young man approached from the nearby Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard.
He wore the same grayish-blue clothes as Zhang Deming and was about the same age. But this one held his hands clasped behind his back, chin slightly raised, a smug look plastered on his face.
"Well now, Brother Ming, still watering, are we? Tsk, tsk. Keep it up, only two more to go. Then you can take another half-day off."
The young man said smugly, clearly teasing Zhang Deming.
The young man's name was Zong En. He was a servant, just like Zhang Deming, and they had known each other for several years.
Not only were their rice paddies adjacent, but even their rooms in the servants' quarters were next to each other.
However, Zong En's Spirit Root was rated at twenty-eight, a testament to his far superior Talent compared to Zhang Deming.
Those seven extra points of Talent had created the vast gap that now existed between them.
Zhang Deming knew Zong En's personality well. He didn't respond, simply lowering his head to pour the last two buckets of water. If he took the bait, Zong En would be gloating all afternoon.
That was a pattern Zhang Deming had observed firsthand over the past six months.
Once he finished pouring the last two buckets, he looked up. Zong En, in the adjacent paddy, had already completed his preparations.
At either end of his rice paddy sat two buckets, both full of water.
With his preparations complete, he began forming hand seals for a Spell, muttering an incantation. Perhaps sensing Zhang Deming's gaze,
he put even more energy into it, his muttered incantation turning into a loud chant.
'That damn brat... he's getting more and more smug. It's just the Little Cloud Rain Skill!
Who gives a damn!
One day, I'll master it too!'
Zhang Deming muttered to himself, his tone dripping with sour grapes.
The Little Cloud Rain Skill was a type of Planting Technique, one of the most basic, low-level Techniques available. As long as one developed Qi Sensing, became a Junior Apprentice, and possessed a certain amount of Spiritual Power, they could learn to cast it.
The catch was, you had to actually be able to learn it.
And the vast difference in workload between Zhang Deming and Zong En all came down to this single, minor Technique.
Without the Technique, he had to haul a hundred buckets of Spirit Water a day. Twelve hours of back-breaking labor, working himself half to death just to barely meet the minimum requirements for the Spirit Rice.
But if you learned the Little Cloud Rain Skill, all it took were two buckets of water—one in the morning, one in the evening—to cast the Cloud Rain Skill. This fulfilled the Spirit Rice's need for Spiritual Qi, and the effect was even better than manual watering.
This was because Spirit Rice craved not water, but Spiritual Qi. The rain from the Little Cloud Rain Skill was richer in Spiritual Qi than water from the Spirit Well. The only reason a special water pit was dug next to the paddies was to make watering convenient.
And if someone was diligent, like Zong En, and performed the Casting three times a day, the Spirit Rice would flourish even more.
As a result, there was a stark difference between the Spirit Rice in their two paddies.
After all, Zong En had learned this Magic six months ago, right when the current crop of rice was being planted. The advantage he'd accumulated over half a year was now plain to see.
As Zong En's hands danced through the seals, Magical Power surged.
He wore a look of ecstasy and pride as his Spiritual Power gushed forth.
His modest reserves of Spiritual Power flew out. In the paddy, the Spirit Water from the two buckets rose into the air, coalescing into a small cloud five or six meters above the field.
Then, a fine drizzle began to fall upon the rice paddy. The stalks of Spirit Rice swayed gently, as if cheering in delight.
A moment later, the cloud had dispersed all its moisture. Zong En clapped his hands with a smile and said, "All done."
He turned his head and saw Zhang Deming's undisguised look of envy. Wiping imaginary sweat from his brow, he sighed dramatically. "Ah, such hard work!"
'Dark lines formed on Zhang Deming's forehead. 'You've been gloating for six months straight! Isn't it enough?!''
His lips twitched, but in the end, Zhang Deming took a deep breath. He decided not to stoop to this little punk's level. Besides, he'd heard the guy was about to break through from Junior Apprentice and advance to the intermediate stage.
'It was better to be pragmatic at a time like this. No point in ruining years of acquaintance over it. Let him gloat. He's earned the right to.'
"Let's head back and cultivate together," Zhang Deming said, picking up his heavy water buckets. "I hear you're about to have a breakthrough. When you get promoted to the Outer Sect, don't forget about us old-timers."
'The bucket used for fetching Spirit Water was a semi-Artifact and weighed a ton. He spent most of his energy just lugging it around. Who knows what the Sect was thinking,' he grumbled internally.
"Haha, of course! I'll never forget my roots. I'll never forget how everyone has looked after me all these years."
Zhang Deming heard his words but didn't say anything more.
'He'd been here for ten years; he was an old-timer now. He had seen more than a handful of people get promoted to the Outer Sect.
But fewer than three had ever come back to visit.
And not a single one had actually come back to help them.
Besides, the status of an Outer Disciple was only considered amazing here in the Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard. In reality, they were just the lowest-ranking disciples of the Celestial Spirit Sect.
Even though he knew all this, it was still necessary to maintain good relationships. After all, knowing a senior brother in the Outer Sect gave you a little more clout.
It might not sound like much, but in the Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard, connections like that carried weight.'
This was why Zhang Deming was able to live a relatively peaceful and stable life in the Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard, free from the worst of the exploitation.
Wherever there are people, there is conflict.
As one of the few veterans in the Little Qing Mountain Rice Field Servants' Courtyard with over ten years of service, he hadn't sunk to the level of exploiting others himself.
However, his web of connections was enough to deter those who did from targeting him.
In truth, with his current standing and relationships, he could have easily joined the ranks of the exploiters.
But he was keenly aware of the principle that what goes around, comes around.
With the soul of an adult and no special advantage to his name, he preferred to just live an honest life.
There was no need to take such petty shortcuts. After all, who knew if the person you were exploiting wasn't some 'trash' who was actually a hidden genius?
They didn't even have to be a genius. They just needed to get into the Outer Sect. After some time, they would naturally have the power to come back and deal with the servants who had wronged them.
In his ten years, Zhang Deming had seen such a thing happen more than once.
If the extra time gained could be spent on Cultivation, Zhang Deming might have been willing to take the risk for the sake of advancing his own Cultivation.
But the Spiritual Qi in the Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard was thin. After running for a full day, the Cultivation Disc in his room would only gather enough Spiritual Qi to practice circulation for a single hour.
And after that? Trying to cultivate using just the ambient air in the Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard?
Ten days of that would not equal the effect of that single hour. This just showed the importance of cultivation resources.
As for the Cultivation Discs, it was an iron-clad rule of the Sect that they could not be seized or monopolized for any reason, in any form.
It was one of the few iron-clad rules that was actually enforced, and almost no one dared to cross that Red Line.
Therefore, anyone who could persist in cultivating with only the ambient air of the Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard was a truly formidable individual.
Zhang Deming, in any case, was not one of them. He only cultivated for three hours a day: the standard two hours using the Cultivation Disc, and one additional hour for his own peace of mind.
This extra hour was purely for self-reassurance, a way to convince himself that he hadn't become a completely useless slacker.
Over ten years, the cumulative effect was equivalent to only a few extra sessions with the Cultivation Disc. It was better than nothing, but the improvement to his Cultivation was almost imperceptible.
The two returned to the courtyard. The sun was still high in the sky, and most of the servants were just finishing their afternoon naps and beginning their Cultivation.
Due to the heat, many people, like Zhang Deming, chose to work early in the morning. As a result, they were usually exhausted after lunch and needed some rest.
Zhang Deming would normally have been one of them, but because today was his eighteenth birthday, his mind was unusually restless.
That was why he hadn't napped for long, choosing instead to go and finish his afternoon tasks ahead of schedule.
The two of them made small talk on the way back. After so many years, Zhang Deming had become adept at finding topics for conversation.
This was one of the reasons he'd been able to build a network of acquaintances; he had no desire to be the quiet, withdrawn person he was in his past life.
Back in the courtyard, they parted ways and entered their respective rooms. Zong En needed to begin recovering his Spiritual Power in preparation for his evening Casting.
Unlike Cultivating with a full Dantian, after a Technique exhausted one's Dantian Spiritual Power,
one could still cultivate to slowly recover their Spiritual Power, even with the thin Spiritual Qi of the Miscellaneous Affairs Courtyard.
As for why, Zhang Deming wasn't sure. He vaguely guessed it might have something to do with a difference in Spiritual Qi pressure, but who really knew?
In the process of recovering this lost Spiritual Power, one's Cultivation would also increase slightly.
Doing this three times a day provided a boost to one's Cultivation roughly equivalent to a full day's session with a Cultivation Disc.
Compared to someone who couldn't use a Technique, this was equivalent to having double the Cultivation time. This was why Zong En worked so hard, insisting on casting the Technique three times a day.