Inside the towering great hall.
The elder sitting in the chief position was not angry but dignified. His golden, glittering robe was a bit too long, drooping around the seat.
He gripped the gold dragon sculpture on the armrest tightly, with narrowed, tense eyes. He shouted,
"Don't tell me that so many of you can't handle a single probationary disciple?!"
The formal disciples standing below kept their heads lowered and did not respond. No matter what you say, they would just keep silent.
Some formal elders were also sitting around, not speaking either. They tilted their heads slightly, each having their own thoughts.
"Wastes!" The Fourth Law Elder squeezed the armrest until it creaked, shouting even more furiously,
"You really are a bunch of wastes! You don't miss a single spiritual stone when it's time to split the money, but when it's time to get things done, none of you goes. Wastes, real wastes!"
The Fourth Law Elder was somewhat exasperated. He scolded with pointing fingers in the great hall. The formal disciples did not dare to talk back. Their eyes were focused inward.
The elders had higher status. They glanced at each other, pondered for a moment, and still someone could not help but say,
"Chen Xia is just a probationary disciple. We don't need to care about him at all."
The Fourth Law Elder turned to look at him with the corners of his mouth tilted, his whiskers sticking up, looking dignified but with a gloomy expression. He shouted,
"He has taken all of this old man's business, and you say do not do anything about it? Should I just let it be, and hand over the position of Law Elder to him as well, before you are satisfied?!"
The formal elder who spoke earlier calmly sipped his tea, with a faint smile on his expressionless face. He put down the teacup and slowly said,
"We don't need to do anything about Chen Xia, just control the other probationary disciples. They all think that paying Chen Xia will allow them to be safe. We only need to break this illusion of theirs."
The Fourth Law Elder furrowed his thick brows, and asked loudly again,
"What do you mean, say it directly!"
The elder smiled lightly, putting one hand flat on the table and the other propping up his thigh. He appeared confident and continued,
"We don't care about Chen Xia. The probationary disciples will still give us spiritual stones. If not, we beat them. After beating, we run. When Chen Xia comes, he can only see the beaten probationary disciples."
"This way, we still get the spiritual stones. As for the beaten probationary disciples, that is something Chen Xia has to consider since he said it was protection fees."
"In the end, either Chen Xia stops collecting spiritual stones, or we collect together with him. The ones being exploited are definitely the probationary disciples. When things get big, Chen Xia daring to collect so many spiritual stones alone will also bring the greatest punishment to him!"
"Good!" The Fourth Law Elder at the head seat clapped heavily and stood up, clapping again and shouting,
"This is really great!"
Pu Suan slightly smiled, speaking steadily, "If he really gets anxious and dares to make trouble at the formal disciples' area, that would be even better. We elders can also rightly take action to teach him a lesson."
"If we accidentally use too much force and beat him to death, then it can only be an accident. Even if the Elder Guardian comes, he cannot blame us."
This sentence was indeed not wrong. Old Fisherman definitely would not blame them, because he might directly beat Chen Xia to death on the spot.
Pu Suan still did not know how dangerous this idea was.
The Fourth Law Elder at the head seat was already extremely delighted. He kept slapping the table and yelled down,
"Good, discuss it and go collect spiritual stones again immediately. Deal with those who don't give as usual. Don't drag it out for too long, run after collecting. I want to see what else this Chen Xia can do!"
The elders should not take action, so they will not. Letting the formal disciples engage in guerrilla warfare is enough.
Still, the same saying: Don't give, beat them. After beating, run!
The meeting ended quickly, and the formal disciples and elders left one after another, ready to take action.
Chen Xia was still lying in his own cave dwelling, with four spiritual energy beads hanging from the top, worth twelve thousand spiritual stones.
The seven-colored rays kept flashing with the swaying of the spiritual energy beads.
Chen Xia's face also flashed through the seven colors of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet in succession.
Simply too handsome.
The entire cave dwelling was even more amazing, with intersecting flashing lights all around, just lacking speakers to go all out.
But Chen Xia felt it was not enough. He planned to add six more spiritual energy beads, so there would be ten beads swaying together. It might not look handsome, but would definitely seem devilish.
If someone came to visit Chen Xia's cave dwelling, those who knew would understand there were ten expensive spiritual energy beads swaying.
Those who did not know would think they had arrived at the netherworld.
This was the atmosphere he wanted.
Chen Xia stretched lazily, and his half-reclining body against the wall shifted again. Recently he had been reading books about artifact forging.
Artifact forging emphasized fierceness - using fierce fire, fierce materials, and fierce strength!
Only this way could fierce artifacts be forged.
If any part of the process was weak, the forged artifact would be somewhat disappointing.
The entire artifact forging process was very quick, at most sixty days, completely different from pill concocting.
People who forged artifacts fiercely were generally also fierce fighters, because they were fierce people to begin with.
There was much more detailed knowledge in the books about artifact forging, such as quenching with fierce fire for three days then hammering, forging the form first then the spirit.
Chen Xia summarized the content of this book in five words -
Miracles come from great exertion.
Just go all out and leave the rest to miracles.
Chen Xia shook his head, feeling it was still too simple, because it was almost the same as pill concocting.
If pill concocting was careless frying, then this was careless hammering.
Chen Xia threw aside the artifact forging book, feeling he had already mastered it and needed no more learning, only practice.
He got up slightly, about to go brew a pot of tea, when his figure suddenly paused and he looked towards the cave entrance.
Someone had come.
The moment the knock sounded, the cave door opened.
Chen Xia leaned against the door frame, holding a teacup with thick steaming fog still rising from it. He took a sip and asked,
"What is it?"
Pan Dadao stood at the entrance, his anxious face stunned as he blankly looked inside at the fantastical cave dwelling.
After a long while, he gave himself a slap, and wondered aloud in confusion,
"Which netherworld gate to hell is this?"