Picking Up Attributes In Martial World-Chapter 104 - 3000

Ye Jun had expected the seniors to make trouble for him, but not this soon. In just an hour or so, everyone seemed to have heard of him and the seniors were ready to bring down the curse on him.

Word travelled fast in a sect, he supposed, faster than cultivation, faster than gossip in a marketplace, faster than anything useful ever seemed to move.

He stared at the disciple who had gone back to doing his work. Sect Missions included doing services for the sect too, so this disciple must have chosen that path, one of those who lacked the talent to rise through combat rankings and so made himself useful through administration instead.

It wasn’t a bad life, Ye Jun supposed, as long as you didn’t overestimate the authority that came with it.

Ye Jun smiled and tapped on the desk again, making the man snort in displeasure, "I already told you. Expect nothing from me. Now go away."

"Really?" Ye Jun tilted his head slightly and asked. "How about a bet?"

The man stiffened as he remembered what happened with Lin Xuan and waved his hand, "Get out. If you stay here any longer, I can use my authority to kick you out."

"So confident in your authority, yet so scared of accepting a bet from a new recruit?" Ye Jun tried to provoke him.

"I’m saying this last time. Get out!" The man stood up, ready to kick him out.

Realising that his plan wouldn’t work, Ye Jun gave up, ’It was worth a try.’

He took out the jade that Han Yuexin had given him and showed it to him. The man’s voice instantly died down as he leaned closer to inspect it, his eyes widening in surprise and disbelief, the earlier bravado evaporating so completely that it might never have existed at all.

"I’m here to meet the Hall Master on behalf of Elder Han," Ye Jun said before pocketing the jade stone. "But you’re right. I respect my elders and as my senior brother, you’re also my elder in a way. So I’ll get out and tell everything to Elder Han."

He turned to leave but the man quickly grabbed his arm and said, face full of smiles, "What are you saying, Junior brother? It was all a joke. You’re new here so I thought I’d welcome you with something funny. Why are you taking it seriously?"

Inwardly, the man was cursing Ye Jun and his own luck too. If he had known Ye Jun was somehow connected to Elder Han, even in his wildest dreams he wouldn’t have stopped him.

He was just a simple man with mediocre talent, so he did these jobs to sustain himself in this sect.

There was no shame in that, he had long since made his peace with it but it did mean that every relationship, every small favour and every minor grudge, carried a weight that a talented inner disciple would never understand.

That was why he had even agreed to kick Ye Jun out in the first place as he hadn’t wanted to offend the senior disciples, who had the means to make his comfortable little existence very uncomfortable indeed.

But if he ended up offending Elder Han Yuexin in return, he might as well pack his stuff and run off from the sect. He was sweating already, a cold and thoroughly undignified kind of sweat.

Ye Jun saw the fear in his eyes and decided to forget the matter. He was petty, but the man hadn’t done much to him, at least not according to his own accounting of it. It wasn’t worth carrying the weight of a grudge this small.

So, he smiled as well and said, "Then, please, Senior Brother, don’t do these kinds of jokes with me. I’m a sensitive person."

Understanding the meaning behind those quietly spoken words, the man nodded, "Of course, I wouldn’t joke like this from next time."

"Pleasure to meet you then," Ye Jun nodded at him. "So, can I meet the Hall Master now?"

"Of course, but let me inform her first," the man said before rushing off upstairs, moving with considerably more urgency than he had shown for anything else that morning. Before long, he returned and said, "Go upstairs and wait until she calls you in."

"Thank you for the help, Senior brother."

With that, Ye Jun ascended the wooden stairs and reached the first floor. It was a lot quieter here, as only a few disciples were allowed in, and most of the people moving about with purpose and armfuls of documents were administration workers rather than cultivators seeking missions.

The noise of the ground floor, the shuffling, the murmured negotiations, the occasional raised voice, faded to something distant and indistinct, like rain heard from inside a room.

Ye Jun went towards the room which had "Administration Hall Master" written above it.

He waited there, thinking of random things, the layout of the sect he had yet to fully explore, the jade stone sitting warm and weighty in his pocket, etc. Fortunately, the Hall Master didn’t make him wait long as he heard a soft voice from inside.

"Please come inside."

He slid open the door and entered the room. Inside, he found a neatly kept chamber filled with scrolls, strange glowing stones, and many more things he didn’t yet have the vocabulary to name.

The room had the particular quality of a space that had been organised by someone who understood information as a form of power, nothing was carelessly placed, nothing was there without reason.

At the centre, on a low table, sat a mature woman in her mid thirties, her black hair done in a bun and her deep black eyes focused on the work spread across her desk. She didn’t look up immediately.

The kind of person who finished what she was doing before she acknowledged you, which Ye Jun found he respected rather than resented.

Ye Jun clasped his hands and said, "Greetings, Hall Master. Elder Han sent me to you."

She finally put down her brush and looked up, "Yes, I’m aware, and also curious why she sent a new recruit for her work."

"Actually, it’s my work, so she told me I should meet you myself," Ye Jun said respectfully.

"I see," The Hall Master frowned and said. "Come and sit. Let’s discuss what grabbed her interest this time. I’m Yelena, by the way."

"Greetings, Elder Yelena, from Junior Ye Jun," Ye Jun said, clasping his hands again.

"Calm. Observant. Good manners," Yelena nodded in understanding, as though ticking off items on an internal list. "I see. So, what is it?"

Without wasting any time, Ye Jun took out the cultivation manual and handed it over to her. Curious, she immediately began to study it, and for a few minutes there was silence in the room.

Then, Yelena looked up at him and asked, "Can I ask for its origin?"

Ye Jun didn’t mind sharing it, so he nodded and told her about the inheritance tomb, while leaving out the parts about his dream. After all, inheritance tombs were rare, but still common enough within the world of sects that the explanation would raise no particular eyebrows.

"Interesting." Yelena looked back at the scroll and said. "You did right in asking for her help. This will be valuable to the sect. I’ll give you 3000 contribution points for it."

Ye Jun remained calm hearing that, though mostly it was because he didn’t yet know whether it was a lot or very little. Numbers without context were just numbers. He would have to check later, and if he had been scammed... well, then he would simply have occasion to visit Han Yuexin again.

"I’ll take it," he nodded. "I trust Elder Han’s judgement."

"Good. Then give me your jade stone."

He handed it to her and watched as she produced a similarly made stone and pressed the two together. The faint warmth that passed between them was barely perceptible, but it was there.

Afterwards, she handed him his stone back and said, "This is how the transfer is done. If you’re curious, you can send your Qi into it to check the amount."

"And pay the same way, too," Ye Jun nodded in understanding and put the jade stone away, deciding to check it later, somewhere less observed.

"By the way, do you have something better?" Yelena asked, her eyes shining with a particular brightness. "Otherwise, I don’t see why you would give up a Peak-Grade Profound Rank Cultivation Manual."

"Who said anything about giving up on that?" Ye Jun smiled at her. "Perhaps I made a copy of it already, and I’m already cultivating it."

Yelena chuckled, understanding that he didn’t want to talk about it. She had, in her long career, learned to recognise which doors were not worth pressing on. So she simply said, "Then, is there anything else you got from the inheritance tomb?"

"A few Beast Cores," Ye Jun replied honestly. "But I plan to keep them for emergencies. If I went on a mission and had no money, I can always sell them then."

Yelena smiled, a little impressed in spite of herself. She said, "Alright then. I’m glad for your contribution. You can leave if there’s nothing else."

Ye Jun quickly bid her farewell and descended the stairs, where he found the senior disciple tapping his desk rapidly, the rhythm of a man trying very hard to look busy. Their eyes met. Ye Jun smiled at him and left the administration hall without another word.

Now that he had contribution points, he decided to first find out about their value. After all, he had to know whether he was wealthy or not before he began spending, there was no wisdom in reaching into a purse without first understanding how deep it ran.