Chapter 146: A Gift

“Master Li, how come you’ve come to a place like this?”

At the table in the noodle restaurant, the storyteller asked curiously.

Li Tan, playing with his teacup, replied, “I came here on some personal business.”

“Oh, I see.”

The storyteller wisely refrained from asking further questions.

Li Tan, looking at the little girl nearby, asked on a whim, “How old is this young girl this year?”

“She’ll be thirteen in two months.”

“Thirteen already, old man? Do you plan to keep taking her along with you as you wander around?”

The storyteller was silent for a moment before answering somewhat despondently, “What else can I do?

We, grandfather and grandson, have no family or relatives. We make a living by telling stories, and even surviving is difficult. If it weren’t for your generosity that day, we might have starved to death in some wilderness by now.”

Li Tan fell silent. After a while, he asked again, “Then, do you have any plans for the girl to cultivate?”

The old man hesitated before answering, “I do have the thought, but we have no connections. Cultivation can only remain a dream; actually doing it is something we can’t even dare to imagine.” The resources consumed by a cultivator in a single day would be enough to support an ordinary family for a month. Even the gold coin Li Tan had given them before was merely a drop in the bucket.

One must understand that even the most basic requirement for entering a sect—the preliminary assessment for new disciples—was the lowest level of the Innate Realm. Although it seemed low, for someone like the storyteller, it was already an impossible dream.

Perhaps moved by a sudden surge of compassion, or perhaps reminded of his own tragic experiences after his family’s destruction before his rebirth, Li Tan felt a pang of shared sorrow. He then retrieved a purple gold coin and a spirit stone from the Desolate Pagoda and placed them on the table.

The storyteller was stunned and asked, puzzled, “What… what is this?”

Spirit stones and purple gold coins had always been nothing more than distant, intangible concepts to the storyteller. He had never seen such things before, so naturally, he didn’t know what they looked like, hence his reaction.

“Spirit stones and purple gold coins,” Li Tan explained.

Upon hearing this simple explanation, the storyteller nearly fainted.

The shock brought by these few words was simply too great.

The little girl, somewhat worried, supported the old man.

Li Tan said slowly, “Old man, please accept these things.”

The old man stood up in front of him, trembling all over as he shook his head, “This is too precious; I cannot accept it.”

Li Tan said, “It’s fine, don’t worry about it. These things aren’t particularly rare to me. Consider this a reward for the story just now. If you don’t accept it, it would be an insult to me.”

“But… but…” the storyteller was very flustered.

Li Tan smiled gently, picked up the purple gold coin and spirit stone, placed them on the tray the little girl was holding, covered them with a piece of red cloth, and softly said, “Little girl, do you want to become a cultivator?”

The little girl wore a somewhat confused expression.

She probably doesn’t even know what a cultivator is, Li Tan thought. After all, normally she’s only concerned about where their next meal is coming from. So he patiently explained, “A cultivator is someone who can fly through the sky, hide underground, and do anything.”

The little girl asked, “Are cultivators like the immortals in grandpa’s stories?”

Li Tan nodded.

“Then can they help grandpa?”

Li Tan nodded again.

The little girl’s expression became filled with yearning, somewhat excited.

But the old man looked worried.

Understanding what the old man was thinking, Li Tan said to him, “Old man, do you really want this girl to wander with you for the rest of her life, without a home?”

The old man was instantly stunned. After a moment, his hesitant expression disappeared, and his eyes became firm. “I fear I can only repay your great kindness in my next life, Master.”

Li Tan smiled lightly. “There’s no need for repayment. But there is one thing I must ask you to remember.”

“What is it?”

“Whatever I’ve given you, under no circumstances should you let others discover it easily.”

“I understand.”

“Good. Time is about right; I should be going now. Old man, this place will soon become unstable. Take the girl and go to Fancheng, a hundred miles away. Here, take this; if you encounter any trouble there, seek help from the Dan Pavilion.”

As he spoke, Li Tan handed the old man a wooden token representing his status as a second-star alchemist.

The old man clearly had no idea what this small piece of wood represented. He accepted it with a nod, treating it merely as a token from his benefactor. Not long after arriving in Fancheng, he would come to understand the immense significance of this token, which far exceeded that of the purple gold coin and spirit stone combined countless times over.

After bidding farewell to the old man, Li Tan walked back onto the street, feeling very refreshed.

Soon, he arrived at the northern part of Chize, easily identifying the location where the recruitment was taking place by following the crowd.

Unlike Feiyu Gate’s tall tower, Tianlang Gate was much more straightforward, simply setting up in a wide open space.

Using his physical advantages, Li Tan pushed to the very front of the crowd and roughly figured out the current situation.

Like Feiyu Gate’s recruitment, most of those who came to participate were from various families around Chize, and there were almost no solitary cultivators. Each family was led by an elder, clustered together.

The people from Tianlang Gate were divided into several groups, each handling different tasks.

For example, the first thing for those participating in the assessment was registration, followed by a test of talent using a pitch-black stone, and then other various tests, such as strength.

Compared to the truly prestigious sects throughout the Nine Provinces, these tests were completely trivial. Li Tan had little intention of taking them seriously and had originally planned to just go through the motions.

After completing registration, Li Tan moved a bit closer to the center of the square. This area was now filled with those participating in the assessment, so the space wasn’t as crowded.

Li Tan scanned the area with his eyes and, to his surprise, spotted a somewhat familiar figure.

At the entrance to the assessment grounds, the mercenary he had casually chatted with during the previous evening—someone who had used money to buy a servant disciple position for his son—was now hugging a little chubby boy with tears and snot running down his face.

That fat little boy was probably his son.

Li Tan merely glanced at them without deliberately going over to greet. He walked to the end of a long line ahead.

This was the line for the talent test. Judging from the clothing, it was very obvious that each family occupied a section of the line.

Li Tan stood at the very back, waiting idly. Suddenly, someone tapped his shoulder. He turned around and saw the little chubby boy grinning at him: “Hehe, brother, are you here alone too?”