plumnovel Chapter 4 Market Turmoil
Chapter 4 Market Turmoil
Sun He's eyes lit up, and he nodded repeatedly: "Of course, of course. I will be waiting for you at the shop tomorrow, young friend."
He glanced at Zhang Lin's Taoist robe again and asked, "Young fellow Taoist, are you a disciple of Shangqing Temple?"
"Exactly."
"Shangqing Temple..." Sun He pondered for a moment, "There are quite a few old friends in the temple, but I have never heard of any disciple who can cultivate a twenty-year-old spirit orchid."
"Young friend, this medicine of yours, it seems, has another source?"
Zhang Lin's heart skipped a beat, but his face remained calm: "I was lucky; I found it in the mountains."
Sun He smiled and didn't ask any further questions.
In the cultivation world, everyone's opportunities are secrets, and asking too many questions is impolite.
"I'll be waiting for you tomorrow." Sun He cupped his hands in greeting, turned and left with a composed gait, his white hair fluttering slightly in the morning breeze.
Zhang Lin watched him walk away before finally letting out a sigh of relief.
This conversation with Sun He, though seemingly ordinary, was actually fraught with danger.
If Sun He harbored malicious intentions and made a move directly in this market, with his late-stage Qi Refining cultivation, Zhang Lin wouldn't even have a chance to escape.
Fortunately, the cultivation world has its own rules, and fighting is strictly prohibited in the market. This is the bottom line that all forces uphold, and no one dares to break it easily.
Even so, Zhang Lin still felt a slight chill down his back.
This cultivation world is far more cruel than the novels he had read in his previous life.
He quickened his pace, searching for Qi Yuntian and the others in the crowd, intending to return to the mountain as soon as possible.
After walking a few steps, they suddenly heard a commotion coming from the east end of the market.
Zhang Lin looked in the direction of the sound and saw a group of people gathered there, with faint sounds of arguing coming from them.
He didn't want to join in the fun, but a voice in the crowd sounded familiar, like a junior disciple from the temple.
After hesitating for a moment, he still went over.
Pushing through the crowd, Zhang Lin saw a scene that made him frown.
Zhao Yuanqing, the junior disciple of the temple, was being blocked in front of a stall by two middle-aged men. Zhao Yuanqing was only fifteen or sixteen years old and had the cultivation level of the early stage of Qi Refining. At this moment, his face was flushed and his lips were trembling, clearly showing that he was both anxious and angry.
The two middle-aged men were both at the mid-stage of Qi Refining; one wore a black robe and the other a gray robe, and neither had a friendly appearance.
The man in the black robe was holding a medicinal herb, which Zhao Yuanqing had brought down the mountain to sell that day.
"Boy, this three-leaf clover you have is fake." The man in black robes waved the herb in his hand and sneered, "Real three-leaf clover has serrated edges on its leaves. Yours is all smooth; it's clearly a roadside weed masquerading as one."
"You've dared to try and fool me. You've got some nerve."
Zhao Yuanqing said urgently, "I'm not lying. I picked this three-leafed green plant myself in the mountains. My fellow disciples in the temple have all seen it; it's genuine!"
The gray-robed man scoffed, "Senior brothers from the temple? Those few from your Shangqing Temple, they think they're qualified to recognize medicine?"
The surrounding crowd chuckled softly, clearly disapproving of the Shangqing Temple.
Zhao Yuanqing's eyes reddened, and he was almost crying.
Zhang Lin couldn't stand it anymore.
He squeezed through the crowd, walked to Zhao Yuanqing's side, patted him on the shoulder, and gestured for him to calm down.
The man in black robes glanced at him sideways: "And who are you?"
"Zhang Lin, a disciple of Shangqing Temple." Zhang Lin looked at him calmly, extended his hand, and said, "May I take a look at that three-leafed green plant?"
Seeing Zhang Lin's composed demeanor and extraordinary bearing, the man in black hesitated for a moment before handing over the herbs.
Zhang Lin took it and examined it carefully.
Three-leaf green has a mild medicinal property and is often used to refine the Qi-Nourishing Pill, which is a commonly used auxiliary cultivation pill for Qi Refining cultivators.
This three-leafed clover has lush green leaves, with three leaves arranged in a triangular pattern. The edges of the leaves are smooth and without serrations, and at first glance, it does indeed resemble roadside weeds.
But Zhang Lin knew that the true three-leaf ginseng does not always have serrated edges on its leaves.
The edges of leaves of *Trifolium repens* that are less than ten years old are smooth. Fine teeth will gradually grow on leaves that are more than ten years old. In contrast, the teeth marks on leaves of plants that are more than fifty years old will disappear and the leaves will become smooth again.
This is the "Three Transformations of Three-Leaf Green" recorded in the pharmacopoeia, which ordinary cultivators have no idea about.
Zhang Lin turned the leaf over and looked at the back of the leaf. He saw three silvery-white lines extending outward from the petiole, like three dragons coiling around.
He raised his head, looked at the man in black robes, and said calmly, "This three-leafed green plant is at least sixty years old. The smooth edges of its leaves indicate that it is an old medicinal plant."
The man in the black robe's expression changed.
Zhang Lin continued, "The Three-Leaf Green undergoes three transformations: it grows teeth in ten years and loses them in fifty years. This is clearly written in the pharmacopoeia. If you don't believe me, you can check it out."
Several older, independent cultivators nearby nodded in agreement, and one of them whispered, "What this young man said is correct; there is indeed such a provision in the pharmacopoeia."
The man in the black robe looked even more displeased.
Zhang Lin handed the three-leaf green medicine back to him, his tone calm but unquestionable: "If you still insist that this is a fake medicine, then go and ask the market steward to judge this matter."
"Perfect timing. I was just wondering if it's against the rules in Qingyun Town's market to bully a junior brother who's only at the early stage of Qi Refining with a mid-stage Qi Refining cultivation level."
The man in black robes and the man in gray robes exchanged a glance, both seeing a hint of retreat in each other's eyes.
There are stewards in charge of the market; if things really escalate, the young man might not be the one to suffer.
"Hmph, you're good at talking." The man in black robes stuffed the herbs into Zhao Yuanqing's arms, turned and left. The man in gray robes quickly followed, and the two soon disappeared into the crowd.
Holding the three-leafed green tea in his arms, Zhao Yuanqing finally shed tears, choking out, "Senior Brother Zhang, thank you..."
Zhang Lin shook his head: "Next time you come to the market, don't set up a stall alone. Find your senior brother Qi to guide you."
Zhao Yuanqing nodded vigorously.
As the crowd gradually dispersed, Zhang Lin led Zhao Yuanqing to find Qi Yuntian and the others, and the group returned to the mountain together.
On the way back, Qi Yuntian heard about what had happened in the market.
Walking beside Zhang Lin, he remained silent for a while before suddenly speaking, "Junior Brother Zhang, where did you learn those words from?"
Zhang Lin casually replied, "I saw it in the Chinese Pharmacopoeia."
Qi Yuntian nodded and said nothing more.
It was already afternoon when we returned to the temple.
Zhang Lin locked himself in his room and poured the forty spirit stones onto the bed. The milky white spiritual light shone like a small galaxy in the dimly lit room.
He sat down cross-legged and began to plan his next move.
Forty spirit stones, plus the one left over from before, make a total of forty-one.
Tomorrow, I will sell a Spirit Orchid to Sun He, and I will get about forty more, bringing my total to over eighty.
Zhang Lin picked up the spirit stones one by one, put them back into his cloth bag, and ran his fingertips over the smooth edges, already having made up his mind.
Eighty low-grade spirit stones—not a lot, but not a little either.
If used to buy pills, it would only yield a few bottles of ordinary Qi-cultivating pills, enough for a little over a month of cultivation in the early stages of Qi Refining.
If he were to use the money to buy magical artifacts, he could at most find a low-grade artifact of ordinary quality, which might not be much better than his iron sword.
But if used to enhance...