Chapter 23 - Panning for Gold in Dung

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

Lu Yu returned to Windmill Town as fast as he could. He was in a bad mood, “Why did I run into Yang Xiu everywhere?”

He saw Yang Xiu in the mining area. That was why he was in such a hurry to bid farewell to Zhang Lun. He wanted to avoid Yang Xiu.

Never in his wildest dreams that he would run into Yang Xiu in such a place at this time. Lu Yu was now worried that Zhang Lun would tell Yang Xiu about the excuse that he had made up.

If it backfired, he would be done for.

Back in the small courtyard behind the Ji Min Hall, Little Tail sat on the stone chair in the courtyard. Her hands were placed on the stone table, and she was hugging her face. Her eyes were lifeless, and no one knew what she was thinking about.

It was probably because Lu Yu had restricted her personal freedom. She was not used to it.

Lu Yu drank a few mouthfuls of tea to calm his mood. He felt that cultivation was more important now. However, when he looked at his backpack and saw that there was only one qi-blood pill left, his mood became bad again.

“Sigh, money! Cultivation really burns money!” Lu Yu placed the teapot on the table, stood up, and walked around, trying to find a way to get money.

Little Tail walked in and took the teapot to add water.

Lu Yu had already raised his qi-blood to 70 points, reaching the limit of the third level of the body refining realm, which was the entry level of the fifth level of the body refining realm.

In the past few days, he had consumed qi-blood pills to speed up his cultivation. He had also accumulated quite a lot of experience points to level up his realm. When the qi-blood pills were used up, his cultivation speed would drop drastically.

After experiencing the joy of speeding up his cultivation, how could Lu Yu still be willing to cultivate slowly.

After a long time, Lu Yu made a decision. He walked out of the small courtyard with a solemn expression, as if he had made a difficult resolution.

He had decided — for the sake of money, he would sacrifice himself.

He returned to the place where he met the Wind Rock Demon. After identifying the direction, Lu Yu walked in the opposite direction from the mining area.

After passing through a dense forest, the surrounding trees became sparse. Lu Yu raised his vigilance and moved forward lightly.

After moving forward for some distance, he saw a huge cave. In front of the cave was a flat ground. The ground was covered with gravel, as if it had been repeatedly crushed by a bulldozer. The ground was very flat.

There were many Wind Rock Demons lying on the flat ground basking in the sun. They nestled on the ground like pieces of rocks, but each rock had an obvious stalagmite (single horn).

Lu Yu hid at the junction of the forest and the gravel ground, quietly observing the habits of the Wind Rock Demons.

From time to time, Wind Rock Demons would come out of the dark cave with a rock in their mouth. Then, they lay on the gravel ground and ate the rock.

Suddenly, one of the Wind Rock Demons raised its butt slightly, and then Lu Yu heard a loud noise. He saw yellow sand spurting out from the back of the Wind Rock Demon.

There were some tiny black particles in the yellow sand shinning under the sunlight.

Lu Yu was slightly stunned. Then, he realized that the tiny black particles in the yellow sand were the iron essence that he wanted.

After realizing this, he felt much more relaxed. He had already made up his mind to sacrifice himself and become a gong farmer.

But now, it seemed that the situation was a little different from what he had imagined. The Wind Rock Demon’s feces were more like yellow sand. It was not the wet, sticky, and strange-shaped things that he had imagined.

After knowing this, Lu Yu felt much better.

After careful observation, Lu Yu found that the gravel ground was filled with the Wind Rock Demon’s yellow sand feces, and the fine black iron essence was mixed in it. He needed to look carefully to find it.

Taking out a cloth bag from his backpack, Lu Yu quietly moved to a place where the yellow sand was piled up into a mountain. He even crawled forward on his stomach.

Although he knew that this place was filled with the Wind Rock Demons’ excrement, when he thought that they were eating rocks and excreting sand, he did not feel uncomfortable anymore.

It was just sand.

After changing his position several times, he finally approached the sand pile. With a wave of his right hand, a cloth bag containing gold coins appeared in his hand. He quickly filled the bag with yellow sand, but unfortunately, the cloth bag was too small and could not hold much.

Boom! Boom! Boom! The Wind Rock Demons were alarmed and quickly got up. A few Wind Rock Demons noticed Lu Yu and rushed toward him. The other Wind Rock Demons were also alarmed and quickly gathered in a group and charged toward Lu Yu.

Seeing this situation, Lu Yu did not dare to delay for even a moment. He hurriedly got up and fled. Before he left, he waved his hand, wanting to use his backpack to carry the yellow sand, but he failed.

Without saying a word, he continuously cast Eight Steps Chasing Cicada and disappeared from the gravel ground. Even the Wind Rock Demons who were charging at him were somewhat dumbfounded. Where was the human? Why did that human suddenly disappear?

After a period of chaos, the Wind Rock Demons turned back into rock-like forms and lay on the ground to bask in the sun.

“Hu~ this is too exciting!”

The qi-blood in Lu Yu’s body boiled for a long time and could not calm down. Looking at the attribute panel, there were only 21 points of qi-blood left. He himself did not know how many times he had used Eight Steps Chasing Cicada.

Right now, both of his legs were a little weak. This was the sequela of a large amount of qi-blood erupting within a short period of time, especially after using the Eight Steps Chasing Cicada consecutively.

After continuously using this skill, the consumption of qi-blood would increase, and it would cause great pressure on the body.

Lu Yu first rested for a while. After calming down the boiling qi-blood, he broke a tree branch as a crutch to prevent himself from falling because of his weak legs.

After walking for a while, Lu Yu heard the sound of running water. He threw away the crutch in his hand and sped up to the side of the stream.

A two-meter-wide clear stream flowed across the forest. There were small fish swimming around in the stream.

Lu Yu held a few mouthfuls of water and drank it. Then, he took out a cloth bag containing yellow sand and put it into the water to shake gently.

The fine sand was carried away by the stream, dyeing the stream yellow. The water mixed with yellow sand only flowed for a few meters before it became clear again.

Looking at the stream water that became muddy and clear again, Lu Yu felt like he was panning for gold.

The bag became lighter and lighter, and there were fewer and fewer things in it. When there was no obvious yellow sand flowing out of the bag, Lu Yu lifted the cloth bag.

He opened the cloth bag, and there were some small grains of sand lying inside. Around the grains of sand were even finer pieces of iron essence.

The sand with the size of a fist was washed out from the cloth bag. There was only finger-sized residue. Iron essence only accounted for a very small part of it, and it was hard to say if there was even a fifth of it.

Lu Yu did not want to pick the sand one by one, so he planned to bring it back and let Little Tail pick it. She had nothing to do anyway, so he wanted to find something for her to do so that she would not cause trouble for him.

Looking at the sun in the sky, Lu Yu identified the direction and walked towards the direction with his back facing the sun. When he walked from Windmill Town to the Wind Rock Demon’s nest, he was facing the sun. So, he needed to walk in the opposite direction of the sun to get back to Windmill Town

On the way, Lu Yu went to the Wind Rock Demon’s nest again. He found Wind Rock Demons had not calmed down yet, so he directly returned to Windmill Town. He wanted to verify some things.

When he returned to the small house in the backyard of the Ji Min Hall, he threw the cloth bag to Little Tail and asked her to pick out the iron essence. He took some objects and tried to find the mechanism of the backpack system.

When he was escaping, he suddenly thought of directly put the yellow sand into his backpack, but he couldn’t. He didn’t even put a grain of sand into his backpack.

He found many things and tried various situations. After a period of exploration, Lu Yu found the system’s general mechanism to determine how he could put the item into his backpack.

He was not entirely sure about the mechanism of the backpack because there were some experiments that he couldn’t do. For example, he tried to touch the other party’s weapon during battle and try to see if he could directly put it into his backpack.

First, the system would determine whether the ownership of the item belonged to the player. If it belonged to the player, then it had the highest storage authority and could be put into the backpack within a certain range. Lu Yu’s initial judgment was that the range was one meter.

If it did not belong to the player, then the player needed to touch the object and there was no other force to stop the player. That was to say, the item was an ownerless item, no matter how weak the blocking force was, it could not be put into the backpack.

This was the conclusion Lu Yu came to using a rabbit. He gave a carrot to the rabbit and tried to put the carrot into the backpack while the rabbit was eating it, but he failed.

Later, without Little Tail’s knowledge, he proved his guess.

Then, he tested the object that was in a whole or scattered. The whole object met the requirement, it could be put into the backpack. Scattered objects like a pile of sand could not be put into the backpack. But if the scattered object was turned into a whole object, it could be put into the backpack.

For example, a handful of soil could not be put into the backpack, but if the soil was wrapped in paper, it could be put into the backpack.

Finally, he tested living things. Living things could not be put into the backpack, but dead things could be put into the backpack. Intact plants could also be put into the backpack, and animals could be put into the backpack after they died.

At present, Lu Yu had summed up these mechanisms.

Lu Yu had not tested out the storage limit of the backpack. However, when there were too many things in the backpack, Lu Yu could feel an invisible pressure on his body, making it difficult for him to move around.

He guessed that the capacity of the backpack might be related to his strength.

“I have picked out all the black stones. I have not missed a single one.” Little Tail took the bag and walked in front of Lu Yu.

Lu Yu opened the bag and took a look. Indeed, there were no extra grains of sand in it. It was filled with iron essence. He couldn’t feel its weight at all. It was probably only a few grams.

If he wanted to sell it, he would have to trade in teal. One teal was equivalent to 50 grams. This was far from enough.

According to his thoughts, he couldn’t do it alone. Lu Yu looked at Little Tail, who was standing in front of him and looking at the bag in his hand. Her eyes were filled with curiosity.

“Isn’t she the best candidate?” Lu Yu’s eyes were shining.

Little Tail was weak. If she wanted to escape and something happened to her, he would be able to get rid of her as quickly as possible. Otherwise, he couldn’t get rid of her by himself.

Thinking of this, Lu Yu asked, “When I was away, you didn’t tell anyone about the mysterious person, did you?”

Little Tail shook her head like a rattle-drum and quickly said, “No. Other than begging for food, I haven’t said a word to anyone.”

“Do you like money?”

“Yes… I do.” Little Tail whispered, “Money can buy a lot of food. With money, you won’t go hungry.”

“You’ll go out with me. You’ll do whatever I say. I’ll give you money when I come back. Whatever you want to buy, I’ll take you out to buy.”

After saying that, Lu Yu felt a sense of guilt, “Was this considered child labor?”

“Okay.” Little Tail answered..