Therefore, no one would have crooked thoughts about this - the gains wouldn't be worth the losses.
The quotas for the civilian area were relatively less generous. The civilian area always had only ten spots, regardless of good or bad - only ten.
This was perhaps differential treatment between noble families and commoners, or perhaps simply because it wasn't easy to find strong people in the civilian area. Ten per city was already quite good, and if there were heaven-defying geniuses, ten spots would be enough - talent wouldn't be buried.
It was impossible for more than ten heaven-defying geniuses to appear in one city at once. Having one would already be very good, two would be the absolute limit.
After completing the preliminaries for both levels, Qingyun City held another exhibition match, mixing the civilian group with noble families, dividing them into several teams for a cooperative competition.
As a result, the group led by Nangong Suxin easily won, while Mo family's Third Young Master Mo Mo, Lin Yi, and the commoner Zhan Bai all performed excellently in their respective teams, attracting many people's attention and making people feel that Qingyun City had hope this time.
No one commented on Young Miss and Guxing because neither of them participated.
Young Miss was too lazy to participate. On the day of the exhibition match, she was drinking Xiaoyao's stored wine at Guxing's place. As for Guxing, it wasn't because she was accompanying Young Miss that she didn't go - she felt the exhibition match was meaningless and would rather practice sword at home.
...
Another day...
"Seventh Sister, where's Xiaoyao?" Young Miss asked while drinking wine.
"Don't know. I haven't seen him for fifty days." Guxing replied casually while practicing sword.
"Is this guy still at the sword forging workshop?" Young Miss asked herself, somewhat puzzled. She had last seen Xiaoyao forty days ago, but Guxing hadn't seen him for fifty days. Had he separated from Guxing even earlier?
"Perhaps." Guxing said indifferently.
"Does he often disappear for such long periods?"
"Yes. The longest was three months without seeing him, but whenever I have any situation, he appears immediately, as if he's always been by my side."
"..."
This guy was too distinctive as a servant, leaving his master aside. But thinking carefully, whenever he was needed, he was there. It seemed he had already fulfilled his responsibilities.
Some people were always by your side, but when you needed them they weren't there or were useless. That was worse than him being away all the time.
Also, why after forty days was his sword still not finished forging? This was too strange. Hehe, I need to go see what that guy is up to.
"Seventh Sister, let's go see what that guy is doing..."
"No, he doesn't like being disturbed. When he finishes his work, he'll naturally appear. Also, if he needs anything, he'll naturally call for people." Guxing shook her head. She understood Xiaoyao very well. Generally, she wouldn't do such meaningless things. She would just desperately cultivate - this was the best repayment to Xiaoyao and what Xiaoyao most wanted.
"Then I'll go. Don't worry, I won't disturb his work. I'll just watch from the side." Seeing Guxing about to say something, Young Miss quickly cut her off.
Guxing continued practicing sword, Young Miss disappeared...
"Clang clang..."
"Ding ding..."
Young Miss found Xiaoyao, and this place was full of such clanging sounds. Xiaoyao was hammering the sword in his hands, with many other people nearby doing the same thing, making the sound very noisy.
After Young Miss found Xiaoyao, she stood to the side and watched for a long time, but Xiaoyao didn't acknowledge her, just continued working hard, rhythmically striking the sword body with his hammer.
Young Miss really didn't disturb him, until Xiaoyao threw the sword body into the furnace again, preparing for the next round of hammering.
"Young Miss, what are you doing here? It's hot and stuffy here. Don't torture yourself." Xiaoyao said to Young Miss. The Young Miss before him was sweating all over and looked somewhat uncomfortable, but she was persisting.
"I like it. Is that any of your business?" Young Miss replied irritably. If I hadn't promised Seventh Sister not to disturb you, I wouldn't have waited until now.
"I indeed can't control that. Then continue." Xiaoyao said calmly.
"Continue then." Young Miss said. Wait, I seem to have forgotten - what did I come here for?
When Young Miss remembered and wanted to ask Xiaoyao, Xiaoyao had already picked up the red-hot sword body and continued hammering.
Young Miss could only remain silent again. However, at this moment, she discovered something strange - only the edge parts of Xiaoyao's sword body were red, while the middle seemed unchanged.
How could this be? It should all be heated red. Why would this situation occur?
"Circulate energy and qi, absorb the heat..."
Just as Young Miss was getting irritated by the heat, Xiaoyao's voice reached her ears. There weren't many words, but she knew what she should do.
Xiaoyao was too lazy to put on airs and say some incantation - that would be completely unnecessary for Young Miss.
After Young Miss circulated her cultivation method, she found this was indeed good. She immediately couldn't feel the heat and instead felt comfortable. She now understood why Xiaoyao wasn't sweating - it was because of this.
Hmph, since you knew this, why didn't you say so earlier? You made me sweat and suffer for nothing.
Regarding this question, in the next round of hammering, Young Miss asked and got an answer.
"This is a small application. If you skillfully use cultivation methods and martial arts, you'll discover that life everywhere is cultivation, everywhere you can comprehend new things."
"..."
Young Miss, having received the answer, fell silent. Watching Xiaoyao hammer, she suddenly seemed to understand. She seemed to see that each of Xiaoyao's hammer strikes had a pattern, yet seemed to have no pattern.
She was puzzled, contemplating. Like this, she actually stared at Xiaoyao for a whole day, until Xiaoyao finished.
This made many people feel strange, but Young Miss's behavior was originally strange anyway, so they didn't interfere. After work hours arrived, they each finished up and went to rest.
Finally, after Xiaoyao finished, Young Miss was still in a daze...
Xiaoyao looked at the dazed Young Miss and simply continued with the next task - quenching. He had just completed the final step of hammering.
The quenching procedure was actually quite fast, requiring only a moment - at least compared to hammering, this was just a moment.
Control the sword body at a certain high temperature, continue for a period of time, then immerse it in a quenching medium for rapid cooling - this was quenching. Though simple, mastering it required much knowledge, but for Xiaoyao, this was as simple as daily routine.
The quenching medium Xiaoyao used was also his own mixture. No one knew what he put in it, but the effect was very good. Some weapons, after being quenched with Xiaoyao's leftover materials, were found to have improved in quality by a grade, making those people both delighted and puzzled.
Delighted to have forged good weapons, but puzzled that they seemed the same as before, and this effect didn't happen afterward.
Well, this was believed to be another stroke of good luck under fortunate circumstances.
After completing the quenching, it was already late at night, but Xiaoyao didn't stop work. He continued with the final process - polishing and sharpening.
This wasn't because Xiaoyao wanted to complete this sword in one go. He had originally planned to do it tomorrow. The reason he continued was simply because Young Miss was still standing there.
He didn't want to disturb Young Miss because he knew she was in comprehension. If successful, it would elevate her martial arts by a level.
However, he couldn't leave Young Miss alone because during comprehension, sometimes situations could occur, such as qi deviation.
"Haha... I understand, I understand..."
Young Miss suddenly shouted, looking somewhat manic...
Qi deviation?
Didn't seem like it. Young Miss was originally like this. Xiaoyao could sense that Young Miss's mind was very clear - she was just a bit excited.
She should have achieved enlightenment. Don't know what she comprehended.
Young Miss soon told Xiaoyao this answer. She casually picked up a sword and began dancing with it. Where did the sword come from? Need you ask - the sword forging workshop was full of swords.
Watching Young Miss's sword moves, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, and repeating, but each repetition seemed to have a change - the kind of change all martial artists wanted to see.
The sword techniques became more and more exquisite, more and more untraceable.
After seeing this situation, Xiaoyao continued polishing. It was almost at the end anyway - might as well finish. As for Young Miss, he didn't need to worry about her anymore. She was now stabilizing what she had comprehended. No accidents would occur from here.
However, when the sword forging workshop people came to start work, they would probably curse loudly about who had been messing around here. Sword marks were everywhere, even on the anvils. Also, the swords forged yesterday were all broken or had nicks and rolled edges.
One could imagine how long Young Miss had danced with swords and with considerable power - those sword marks were proof.
Later, those sword forging workers didn't dare curse because everyone thought of one possibility - Young Miss. Hadn't Young Miss been here yesterday?
After Young Miss completed her comprehension and fully came to her senses, looking at the mess before her, she threw the sword in her hand aside and pretended she had done nothing. That appearance was very amusing.
Fortunately, only Xiaoyao was present, and Xiaoyao didn't pay attention to Young Miss, continuing to polish his sword.
"Xiaoyao, why did your hammering let me comprehend these things?" Young Miss squatted beside Xiaoyao, speaking softly, as if asking Xiaoyao but also asking herself.
"Didn't I say before - in life, you can comprehend things everywhere. This happened because your level was about right, then with a little stimulation, you achieved enlightenment." Xiaoyao replied while polishing his sword.
(End of Chapter)