The little girl in the bamboo basket was incredibly surprised, wondering how Li Muyang could so easily trust her.

    Li Muyang, who was running swiftly through the mountains, smirked to himself.

    I’ve potentially died at the hands of that monster hundreds of times, how could I not believe it?

    But of course, there was no need to say such things to the little girl.

    As he sprinted through the forest toward the cave entrance they had come from, he said,

    “I’m not stupid. You hate Black Cloud Village and don’t want to leave, yet you’re urging me to go back... what you said must be true.”

    “Why would you want to go back if you’ve already left Black Cloud Village? Do you really want to be a lost soul blood donor in the village?”

    Most of the magic practiced in Black Cloud Village requires demon blood as an essential ingredient.

    And the blood of the lost soul is one type of demon blood.

    So if the little girl went back to the village, she would have to be a blood cow, regularly having her blood drawn.

    If there was a chance to escape Black Cloud Village, the little girl would definitely take it.

    Li Muyang’s reasoning was sound, and the little girl in the basket paused, then gave a dejected smile.

    “Yeah... who would want to go back to the village if they could leave?”

    The little girl’s tone was somewhat bleak.

    This Elder Brother was really smart, figuring out so much all at once.

    The way she had tried to act clever in front of him before must have seemed quite amusing to him...

    The little girl in the basket curled up, covering her face, feeling a burning sensation on her cheeks.

    After the little girl fell silent, Li Muyang looked up at the favorability bar in the upper right corner of his field of vision.

    【Xiao Yecao: 23 (She thinks you’re very smart)】

    It actually went up by three points...

    This little girl really is strange.

    The favorability that was so hard to increase before is now rising effortlessly. Just a few words and it went up by three points.

    It seems I shouldn’t have followed the usual interactive game script for the plot.

    If I had let go of myself earlier, not constrained by the system’s choices, maybe I would be in the third stage by now.

    Li Muyang ran through the woods while carrying the little girl on his back and quickly returned to the dark cave.

    Deep inside the cave, there was a tunnel that led directly into the village.

    Following the same path they took earlier, Li Muyang and the girl made their way through the dim underground for a while, eventually emerging back into the moonlit Black Cloud Village.

    By this time, it was already the second half of the night.

    Only the rustling sounds of insects could be heard in the quiet village. All the stilted houses had their doors tightly shut. The villagers were asleep.

    Li Muyang took a deep breath and stood up on the ridge of the field.

    “Suddenly, it feels like this favorability isn’t so hard to grind after all...”

    Li Muyang stroked his chin, pondering for a moment.

    Could it be that this Xiao Yecao is the type who seems cold on the outside but warm on the inside and becomes easy to deal with once you get to know them?

    But that’s not important now. What’s important is the ‘Remnant Clouds Movement Technique’!

    He carefully studied the secret manual and found that the difficulty of cultivation was quite low. The only thing needed was an ample supply of demon blood.

    With enough demon blood to sustain it, the technique could be successfully cultivated in just three to five days.

    Standing on the ridge, Li Muyang stretched his body after finishing reading the manual and picked up the huge water jar placed beside him.

    The jar was filled with cool mountain spring water, and as Li Muyang stood on the ridge and performed the ‘Minor Cloud and Rain Technique’, the water in the jar slowly rose and turned into a misty white fog.

    This white fog drifted out, sporadically dropping light rain.

    The rain, imbued with spiritual energy, fell onto the spiritual field, continuously nourishing the seeds within.

    The work of a Spiritual Planter was quite relaxed. It only required performing the rain technique once in the morning and once in the afternoon.

    Li Muyang was not like Guan Xiaoshun, who was a workaholic, performing the rain technique several times more than the average person every day.

    He had no particular demand for the growth of the spiritual grains.

    After completing the basic two rain techniques, Li Muyang tossed the huge water jar into the neatly arranged tile-roofed house and went down the mountain with a pottery jar.

    Outside the gathering place of the Demon Refining Sect’s Outer Sect was a market.

    Today happened to be the market day, and disciples from all seventeen settlements of the Demon Refining Sect’s Outer Sect who had needs would come to the market.

    In addition to the usual spending places like brothels and restaurants, the market also had many low-level cultivators setting up stalls.

    Some sold talismans and magical instruments they had crafted themselves, while others sold surplus spiritual rice... There was a dazzling array of items, everything one could want.

    The environment of the Demon Refining Sect was relatively closed off.

    Once people entered as Outer Sect disciples, it was very difficult for them to leave easily, thus they formed their own market ecosystem.

    As Li Muyang walked towards the market, he flipped through the ‘Remnant Clouds Movement Technique’ manual in his mind.

    This ‘Remnant Clouds Movement Technique’ was a standard demonic cultivation method—powerful, quick to learn, but harsh on the body.

    Apart from the side effects after use, the cultivation process could also cause damage to the body.

    However, Li Muyang could ignore it. All the costs were waived by the system.

    As long as he could buy the necessary demon blood in the market, he would be able to quickly master this ‘Remnant Clouds Movement Technique.’

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