Cultivation Struggles of a Lowly Fox

Aiko finished nailing all of the Human Elders.

She cleaned her hands of their filth and returned to Mei.

"They don't have anything on them other than those ropes." Aiko felt upset as it was a lot of work punishing all those Elders, not to mention...

[Backdoor Destroyer]
[You are proficient in destroying the backdoors, your enemies will shit their pants from your intimidation]

She even got this shitty title! She didn't want this! What if her enemies had some fancy clothing she could sell for a lot of money?! Now she couldn't because she would have to clean it!

Mei noticed the upset Aiko and soothed her. "You can just extort that Elder." Mei was talking about the Father of Tao Xuefeng.

Aiko frowned but didn't reject that notion, since they dared to attack them she would extort the ever-living shit out of them and with a smile!

Aiko returned with Mei back to their place. The Blood Fox was frowning as she had her legs still tied up, but it didn't seem like they remembered her, they just left, leaving her in that sorry state.

What was even worse was that only perverts wanted to help, so she had no other option than to jump back with tied legs. She would rather suffer a blow to her pride than be touched by those filthy horny Foxes.

Mei glanced at Blood Fox from the corner of her eye and smiled. 'Serves you right! Who told you to placate my servant!' She had a very gleeful smile on her lips as she guided Aiko towards their blueprints.

They sat down completely forgetting about the Blood Fox.

"If you would like a flying artefact what would it be?" Mei suddenly asked when she watched Aiko carefully go through the blueprints.

"Feather." Aiko nodded seriously, surprising Mei.

"Why that?" Mei couldn't understand why she would pick that kind of thing.

"It is soft, light and can be very pretty." Aiko answered passively.

"And the real reason?" Mei narrowed her eyes.

"You can tickle people to death once I tie them..." There was no point for Aiko to conceal anything as it wouldn't be beneficial for her.

She realized that Mei was as mischievous as she was, so it was a good idea to talk about mischief since it would allow Aiko to sway Mei to her side and help with her projects.

Mei also had much more knowledge than Aiko, that was another reason why she didn't conceal anything as she needed someone knowledgeable to teach her about those kinds of things.

"Also." Aiko paused going through the blueprints.

"Mm?" Mei looked at the cute Aiko.

"I'm hungry." Aiko almost salivated but was able to restrain herself.

"..." Mei couldn't believe her ears and pretended not to hear.

"I would also want to recover my Beast Core, I'm pretty much running on an empty tank." Aiko frowned seeing her Beast Core have only 100 Energy to spend on things.

"......" Mei sighed but gave Aiko a few Neutral Beast Cores. Her heart ached at that since she planned to use those on her Pill Refining, but now she couldn't.

Aiko smiled from ear to ear and sat on Mei's lap, making her stiff all over.

Aiko bit into the Beast Core letting it release its Energy and waited for Mei to do her magic.

Mei shook her head and separated the impurities from the Beast Core, letting Aiko consume the Energy.

The Blood Fox arrived just now and frowned. She glared at the Jade Fox who stared at her with pity, but with a gleeful smile.

They battled through gaze, but eventually, Blood Fox gave up and went to her place.

She was unable to use her Energy to form those claws as the ropes now restrained her circulation of Beast Core. She would have to use a knife to cut those ropes, fortunately, her brother gave her quite a few goodies and the knife was one of them.

If Mei saw this knife being used as a cutting tool she would cough up buckets of blood. This knife was used to harvest Spiritual Herbs, which were different from normal Herbs as they had a Spiritual Sense, they were alive. This tool was used to deal as little damage as possible to them, while not causing them any pain.

If you couldn't properly harvest Spiritual Herbs then they could degrade or even detonate themselves, injuring everyone around. Of course that was only the case for novice Alchemists, the more powerful ones could directly suppress the Spiritual Herbs, but even then it would cause those Spiritual Herbs to degrade.

The Blood Fox cut those ropes and threw the knife back into her Pouch. She didn't have a Storage Ring, because if she went berserk or had restrained Energy she wouldn't be able to open it, so her brother bought her this special Pouch that only she could open as it was tied to her Soul.

Once she was powerful enough she could even store this Pouch inside her body and leave it near her Soul.

...

Meanwhile, Aiko was recovering her Energy. Her consumption was so brutal that Mei was unable to keep up. Aiko was like a bottomless pit that no matter how much you threw inside the pit would adjust itself and swallow everything.

Mei wanted to cry when she saw those dozens of Beast Cores vanish into her fluffball.

Beast Cores(50%): 100 -> 1,100 (33,130)

Aiko stared at Mei, she went through all of the Beast Cores her chef gave her, but was unable to restore much.

"I don't have more!" Mei cried out.

"Oh..." Aiko's ears dropped down and Mei suffered a critical hit, but she really couldn't afford to give her any more Beast Cores as she was running low herself.

She still needed to finish a few Pills for the Grandmaster since they would be leaving soon...

...

The Patriarch visited the Foxes and immediately noticed those Elders who ran away from their confinement.

He pinched his nose bridge, more paperwork to come, but also he had to give them treasures.

While yes Humans hunted Foxes for their... uses... They also cherished if those Foxes were 'skilled', so if the word spread that the Foxes were bullied and their Skills were rejected even though they were more skilled than most Humans...

'We would lose our standing as an Inscription Association...' He sighed, he would have to part with his treasures to appease the Foxes.

'But first thing first.' The Patriarch stared at Inky Head. "Good day, fellow Taoist." He would have to negotiate the terms...

...

Aiko arrived at the main courtyard of this place. There was the stupid Elder with his Storage Rings.

The Patriarch and some Fox Elders beckoned her inside so she dragged the Jade Fox with her. She had no idea of the price of those treasures and seeing the previous time and how stingy this bastard was... she would rather use Mei as an appraisal machine.

The room was spacious and the Fox Elders took their seats, waiting for the Human Elder to show his treasures so Aiko could pick her share.

Aiko stared at the strangely shaped treasures and tried to use Appraisal...

[Sword]
[Shield]
[Toothpick]
[Stick]
...

Aiko almost spat blood when she looked at her useless Ability. Not to mention she was unable to level it up, so she couldn't guess if the Ability was completely useless or somewhat useful...

The Elder watched her with glee, while he couldn't bring everything trash, he could mix and match things and if she picked something that was trash it was not his fault.

He watched her how she struggled frowned and looked upset, relishing in the fact he was able to inflict emotional damage on her.

Aiko frowned for the last time and turned around, confusing the Elder.

She grabbed Mei by the hand and dragged her in front of the treasures smiling.

"But I'm only a chef." Mei coquettishly glanced at Aiko, teasing her.

"Now you are also an Appraisal." Aiko nodded as if it was a matter of fact.

Mei's lips twitched. "But I will need something in return~" She teased Aiko, she never intended to take her treasures, but Aiko stunned her.

"Sure, you can have two and I will have the rest." Aiko nodded readily, she was unable to identify those treasures, but since she would get 6 of them she didn't mind. She would properly extort this bastard since that previous fight upset her as those Elders were completely broke.

"This one is good, this one is useless and this-" Mei started to throw things around.

Things that were almost completely depleted of their Spiritual Energy, damaged or useless were thrown away. She identified about 10 Treasures for Aiko to pick.

"This one is a Defensive Artefact. It is still in somewhat good shape, although the quality is low, it can block Nascent Soul Cultivators." Mei pointed at the first one. It was a small badge that looked like a shield. "You would put it under your robes or on your belt..." Mei stared at Aiko who didn't have any belts.

"Let's create a belt for you later." Mei nodded to herself.

Another one was a spear, while it was useless as a weapon, it was very useful as a throwing weapon, this spear would continuously speed up until it ran out of internal Spiritual Energy.

The third one was a fan. This one caused large winds to form and could cause hurricanes if infused properly.

The fourth one was another Defensive Artefact, but this one was against low-tier poisons. It was again in the shape of a badge with a snake on it.

The fifth one was a rock formation that could gather Spiritual Energy, while it was not as good as classic Arrays, this one was portable and easy to store so it was considered quite a good Artefact.

The sixth one was a nightgown- A defensive Artefact that protected the body from slashes. It was very light and see-through, so it was hard to see if one had this under their robes.

The seventh was a dagger. It was strangely shaped and damaged, but the Inscription craftsmanship was exceptional and it was great learning material for Aiko.

The eighth was an armour. Like the dagger it was damaged, but the Inscription was very dense and strange, so once again good learning material.

The ninth was what looked like a broken relic, but this could lessen the impact of Human Cultivators when they formed their Nascent Soul, it could block part of the Heavenly lightning. It had last use, but the Inscription could be possibly copied given enough time.

The tenth was a flying sword. This sword didn't use sword-kinesis like others would, but if you infused it with Qi it could fly, so it was marked as Flying Artefact, not all that good, but better than the rest of the trash that Mei threw away.

"What do you want?" Aiko asked Mei first.

Mei smiled and picked the fan and nightg- Defensive Artefact.

"Are you sure?" Aiko looked at the see-through shirt and stared at Mei strangely.

"You... what are you thinking about?!" Mei ruffled Aiko's hair roughly, 'glaring' at her.

"I have nothing against kinks." Aiko shook her head protecting it from Mei.

"You little!" Mei tickled Aiko causing her to laugh like a maniac and plead for her dear life.

"Hmpf! That's what you get for teasing me." Mei huffed, satisfied with the messy servant.

...

Aiko took some time to recover and picked her four choices.

Defensive Artefact against Poisons.
The Dagger with exceptional Inscription craftsmanship.
The Armour with the dense, yet strange Inscription.
The Broken Relic.

The Human Elder glared at her. "You are supposed to take only 3!"

Aiko stared at him like he was an idiot. "Of course, I only took my share, you bastard tried to guide the other Elders here while staying put, a coward like you doesn't deserve any treasure so I'm lessening the burden on your shoulders!" Aiko said righteously.

"Bullshit! I didn't do anything!" The Elder sweated. 'How does she know I instigated those spineless, useless bastards?!'

'With this, there is a good reason to take those treasures without others stopping me~.' Aiko hummed, she was unaware that she hit the bullseye with her lie.