Wang Qiang led the group to the path they walked on yesterday, with dense forests on one side and a tall stone wall on the other. The dirt road was at least over a kilometer long.
Earlier, Wang Qiang received a hint from Yang Xiu, indicating that he had high hopes for Lu Yu. Therefore, he asked Wang Qiang to arrange a good patrol time and location for Lu Yu.
Patrol times and locations are certainly important. Generally, morning and evening patrols are the best, as there's no need to wake up early or stay up late, providing ample time for training.
Secondly is the patrol location. Some places are crowded and complicated, making patrol tiring, while others are spacious and sparsely populated, allowing one to see everything from a single spot, making patrolling incredibly easy.
Under Yang Xiu's instructions, Wang Qiang arranged for Lu Yu's squad to patrol the outer wall section near the side gate of the west yard. This side of the Han family estate is near the forest, where people rarely come, and the patrol team just needs to be wary of wild animals coming out of the forest. There's basically nothing else to do.
Standing at the courtyard gate, you can see the entire patrol route at a glance, making it incredibly easy.
Moreover, the time was set for the morning, between mid-morning and lunch. This way, in the morning, there's time for training, and after tiring training, you can go for a walk, then have lunch. How comfortable!
However, the patrol tasks for others are not very different, since they are only temporary Protectors and not true Han family Protectors and can only patrol the outermost parts of the Han family estate.
Even the mud huts where everyone lives are located in the outermost areas of the Han family estate. Even the martial practice grounds are still in the outer regions. Han family disciples and inner yard guards have other training venues.
Lu Yu and the others remained at their patrol spot, with Wang Qiang telling them that once someone came to take over the shift, they could leave to eat at the canteen, and then he led the others away.
Wang Qiang also gave each of the four a whistle, to be blown in case of emergency or danger, but should not be blown irresponsibly, or they would be severely punished if found out.
The four-person squad, the other three recognized Lu Yu as the one who had never been beaten before. Due to a certain psychology, the three had a noticeably closer bond, excluding Lu Yu from their group.
Lu Yu also had no intention of getting close to them. Following the task requirements, he patrolled on the dirt road while the three whispered behind him, talking about something unknown.
When Lu Yu started to feel a bit hungry, the person taking over the shift finally appeared. There was only one person; he wore a dark green Han-character embroidered outfit and had a short knife at his waist, suggesting he was an official Protector.
The four ran toward the shift-taker with delight, while the three asked if he was here to take over the shift. The person completely ignored them, directly walked to a tree, and jumped four to five meters high, effortlessly landing on a sturdy branch.
Then he lay on the tree, seemingly just finding a place to sleep.
The three saw him not respond to themselves, muttered for a while, and unanimously concluded that this person was the shift-taker, and thus, they collectively left for the canteen to eat.
Lu Yu saw them leave, but didn't follow suit, remaining in place, looking as though he was still waiting for the shift-taker.
After a while, the person in the tree spoke up: "Why aren't you leaving with them?"
"Because the shift-taker hasn't arrived yet, I can't leave."
"I am the shift-taker! You can go now."
"No, you are not the shift-taker."
"I am the shift-taker!"
"Okay, then I'm leaving."
Lu Yu turned and walked away quickly, so fast that the person in the tree hadn't reacted. By the time he did, Lu Yu had already walked quite a distance.
"Hey~ wait, you're quite an interesting lad!" The person jumped down from the tree, landing directly in front of Lu Yu, blocking his way.
"Speak up! What did you mean by your earlier words?"
Seeing him block his path, Lu Yu helplessly explained to him.
"When you said: 'I am the shift-taker,' it was an interrogative sentence that could be understood both ways—as you being the shift-taker or not. So, I directly negated your statement."
"Then you explicitly said you were the shift-taker, revealing your identity to me, so I trusted that you were indeed the shift-taker, not an examiner sent to check if we were seriously patrolling."
"Aren't you afraid that I might be an imposter? Letting me off the hook so easily?" the person asked.
"It was your outfit that told me you were one of the Han family. The circle of delicate dark green embroidery around the Han character on your chest is the mark of the clothing worn by the inner yard guards of the Han family."
"I saw it on Instructor Yang's clothes. If an outsider could obtain clothing only worn by inner yard guards, attempting to impersonate and infiltrate the Han family estate, his strength must vastly surpass mine."
"Just like you were able to jump from eight or nine meters away from the tree and land right in front of me, such a strong individual could easily kill me or sneak into the estate, leaving me no chance to resist or prevent it."
"Hahaha, brilliant deduction, you passed the test! You can go eat now. From now on, I'll be responsible for this route; all others are imposters."
In fact, the most crucial part was when he said, "I am the shift-taker," Lu Yu received confirmation that the task was completed, confirming he was truly the shift-taker.
The subsequent deduction was partly based on his earlier speculation and partly on a process reversed from the answer, or simply explained.
He tossed a wooden token to Lu Yu, and the person returned to the tree to continue sleeping.
When Lu Yu arrived at the canteen with the token, there was already a line of people outside, all being punished for leaving early without completing the patrol shift, unable to eat.
"Those who left their posts without permission, stand to the side for punishment. No lunch for you today," Wang Qiang said at the entrance of the cafeteria.
Lu Yu handed over his wooden plaque. Wang Qiang was somewhat surprised upon seeing it, "I didn't expect anyone to pass the trial this year. Last year, only Protector Yang made it through, but this year there's you, kid."
"No wonder you were favored by Protector Yang. Alright, go in and eat! As a reward for passing the trial, you can have a roast chicken." Wang Qiang took the plaque and gestured for Lu Yu to enter.
When they heard that Lu Yu had completed the trial and could eat a delicious roast chicken, everyone's emotions were mixed; envy, jealousy, and resentment...
"What are you looking at? Stand straight!" Seeing the others craning their necks to look over, Wang Qiang shouted.
Practicing martial arts, cultivating fist techniques, and enhancing Qi blood require a lot of meat as an essential food. Every martial cultivator needs to eat a significant amount of meat daily to maintain the nutritional expenditure during cultivation.
The roast chicken is just an ordinary roast chicken, but it has the advantage of being large in quantity and meat.
No matter how wealthy the Han Residence is, they can't provide medicinal meals to enhance Qi blood for everyone in every meal. It's only during the first month for newcomers, at the beginning of cultivation, that medicinal meals are provided for free.
Since most of the newcomers are poor children who have been in a state of not getting enough to eat for a long time and have insufficient Qi blood, eating medicinal meals at this time enhances the absorption effect and helps replenish their years of Qi blood deficiency.
Moreover, the children are still in their developmental stage, and a month of medicinal meals can greatly stimulate their Qi blood, improve their physical condition, promote development, and make the cultivation effect twice as effective with half the effort.
As for after a month, when they become formal protectors, if they still want to use medicinal meals to accelerate their cultivation, they won't be so lucky. They'll need to spend their own money to buy medicinal meals or herbs in the cafeteria.
Lu Yu ate a roast chicken and drank two bowls of porridge. He stopped only when he began to feel a bit nauseous, then left the cafeteria.
Before he left, he was told by his successor, "If you want to become a formal protector sooner, eat more medicinal porridge."
Supporting himself against the wall, he returned to his room, lay on the bed, and immediately logged out of the game, as the feeling of being too full was uncomfortable.
After logging out, the feeling of fullness disappeared without a trace. Moreover, since he only had a little something earlier in the morning, he began to feel a bit hungry again.
He took a steak out of the fridge, turned on the induction cooker, and grilled a few steaks, initially planning to save two pieces for the evening.
For some reason, he felt particularly hungry, so after devouring all the steaks and finishing off a bottle of juice, he finally felt full.
Beep~ He glanced at his phone; it was a bank notification of a deposit. With a simple scan, he knew that the royalty payment for the follow-up of his recently completed novel had arrived.
Lu Yu was a professional novelist, also known as a freelancer. He started writing novels in college and had written several that were neither hugely successful nor completely obscure. The royalties he earned usually covered his daily expenses, with some left over.
Just as Lu Yu had finished a novel and planned to take a month's rest, Su Peng brought him a game helmet.
With nothing to do, plenty of time, and strong persuasion from his long-time good friend, Lu Yu entered the game.
After having a meal, reading some information, using the restroom, and fulfilling his personal needs, he lay back on the bed and continued gaming.
As he put on the helmet, Lu Yu wondered to himself, if I keep eating and sleeping like this for a month, will I end up a fat guy?
There was no time to think further. In a blink of an eye, he was back in the game world.
Ring, ring~ The sound of a gong resonated, and Lu Yu leisurely walked toward the martial arts field to start his afternoon training (AFK).
Among everyone in the martial arts field, only Lu Yu had eaten at noon. The others, during their afternoon training, all seemed listless and weak in their punches. For some unknown reason, a space had formed around Lu Yu, leaving him alone.
Everyone looked at Lu Yu with eyes filled with complicated emotions.
While idling, Lu Yu didn't notice this situation because he was busy checking his 50 experience points earned.
Opening his personal attributes, he found that experience could be allocated to improve his realm, Qi blood, cultivation technique, or skills.
Raising the realm from a mortal to Body Refinement level one required 100 experience points. The fist technique he had been practicing seemed to have no effect on improving the realm.
Improving Qi blood required 100 experience points per point, while the experience bar for the cultivation technique and skills increased equally, with 1 experience point equating to 1 point in the experience bar.
In Lu Yu's understanding, the realm seemed to correspond to levels in traditional games, the cultivation technique might be the skill tree, and upgrading the cultivation technique could unlock more skills. As for the skills themselves, they didn't seem to be of much use now since there was no opportunity for battle.
With not enough experience points to upgrade levels, no rush to upgrade skills, and the cultivation technique being just a little bit short of upgrading, it seemed wise to spend the experience points early to enhance his strength.
After some thought, Lu Yu allocated the experience points to the cultivation technique.
[After the player's diligent cultivation, Fierce Tiger Fist has broken through to the second layer, Qi blood +5]
[New skill acquired—Fierce Tiger Fist - Fierce Tiger Descending the Mountain (Novice)]
Then, Lu Yu heard the system prompt again.
[After the player's diligent cultivation, broke through the mortal realm, reaching Body Refinement level one, Qi blood +2]
Does leveling up the cultivation technique also upgrade the realm? Lu Yu pondered.