Chapter 384: Schemes and Tricks
“What do you mean work together?” Bai Xiaochun said, looking down at Zhou Tao from his position atop the crocodile.
Zhou Tao was not very pleased that Bai Xiaochun hadn’t dismounted from the crocodile, but his tone of voice didn’t reveal that as he said, “Your humble servant wishes to purchase the precious pill formula for the Ultra Fasting Aid Pill. Would you be willing to part with it for 100,000 merit points, Brother Bai?”
“It’s not for sale,” Bai Xiaochun said, rolling his eyes. With that, he flew off of the crocodile, then swished his sleeve, causing it to fly into his spirit beast bag. Just as he was about to step into his spirit abode, Zhou Tao moved to block his way.
“Brother Bai, if you don’t want to sell the formula, that’s fine. But would you be willing to let the Celestial Sky Society be the exclusive dealer for your pill?”
“Exclusive dealer?” Bai Xiaochun looked at Zhou Tao for a moment. The truth was that going out to sell the pills on his own over the past few days had been a bit troublesome. If this Zhou Tao could do that for him, it would definitely save some effort.
“The Celestial Sky Society virtually runs Sky City,” Zhou Tao said with a smile. “Therefore, I am very confident that within a few short months, we could get your Ultra Fasting Aid Pill to every corner of the city. By that point, you would be able to make a huge profit without having to do any of the grunt work yourself.”
Bai Xiaochun thought about it for a moment, and then began to discuss the particulars with Zhou Tao. Two hours passed, and they finally agreed that the Celestial Sky Society would buy the pills for 300 merit points, resell them at a higher price, and then split any subsequent profits 50/50. Bai Xiaochun almost felt like he was taking advantage of them, but Zhou Tao seemed quite pleased. Smiling, they swore a Dao oath and recorded it on a jade slip, which they then sent to the Justice Bureau of the Starry Sky Dao Polarity Sect to make the deal official.
Before leaving, Zhou Tao smiled and asked, “Brother Bai, might I know your illustrious given name? Since we’re partners now, I’d like to know a bit more about you.”
Bai Xiaochun stuck his chin up, waved his sleeve and loftily said, “You can just call me Apothecary Bai.”
After a brief moment of hesitation, Zhou Tao smiled again and then took his leave.
In the following days, Bai Xiaochun went crazy concocting medicine. Furthermore, he increased his daily quota from 50 pills to 100.
That was his limit. Every time Zhou Tao came to collect the pills, he would simply hand over 30,000 merit points. As for the extra money from the profits, that would come later, after all sales were finalized.
Another seven days went by in a flash. During that time, the Celestial Sky Society’s hard work ensured that the Ultra Fasting Aid Pill created a huge stir in the east district. The entire place was thrown into an uproar, and the cultivators there were going crazy. Although the prices were quite high, many cultivators bought them, and soon, the spirit food market began to drop.
Before long, virtually all of the cultivators in the east district were talking about Ultra Fasting Aid Pills. Furthermore, the Celestial Sky Society made a point of crediting Apothecary Bai. As a result, virtually everyone in east district knew that the Ultra Fasting Aid Pills were concocted by Apothecary Bai, with the Celestial Sky Society cultivators being nothing more than dealers representing him.
Bai Xiaochun found something odd about that, but didn’t do anything to stop them from spreading his name. Eventually, Zhou Tao came to share the merit point profits, which was a sum of tens of thousands. When he said that such profits would only continue to increase, Bai Xiaochun got more excited than ever.
Of course, what Bai Xiaochun didn’t know was that after the Celestial Sky Society got the Ultra Fasting Aid Pills, their apothecary spared absolutely no cost or effort to turn the 100 pills into 3,000. Because of that, the negative side effects grew even more extreme!
Over the course of the past week, Bai Xiaochun had given them 700 pills, but they had turned that into over 20,000 pills to sell. Furthermore, they didn’t just sell them in the east district, they also sent them to the west, south, and north districts. As for Bai Xiaochun, there was no way for him to catch wind of that in the short time which had passed.
For the first time, Bai Xiaochun had more than 200,000 merit points saved up. Excited, he finally decided to spend 100,000 of them to become an orange-robed disciple.
The new clothing was very comfortable, and as he went around on his battle beast, he felt extremely grand. With his Ultra Fasting Aid Pill, he could easily dominate everything under heaven. However, even as he proceeded along down the street looking down upon all creation with haughtiness, he suddenly heard someone scream. Shocked, he stood up on his battle beast and craned his neck to see a cultivator off in the distance, writhing on the ground as his flesh rapidly withered up.
Before he could even react, more people in the crowd suddenly fell to the ground, screaming as their bodies began to wither. Bai Xiaochun instantly started to get nervous.
“What’s going on? Is the city under attack!?” He immediately sent his battle beast rushing back toward his spirit abode. Along the way, he was astonished to discover that dozens of people were falling to the ground and withering up. In fact, he even noticed that one of them was a cultivator who had bought his pill in the past. More than ever, he now felt that something strange was going on.
Unfortunately, things were only getting started. The next day, even more people in the east district were suddenly struck with incredible, explosive levels of hunger. More than a hundred people were affected, and already, the news was spreading like wildfire.
Although no one had died yet, all of them ended up with damaged vital energy. Some could recover after a bit of rest, but for others, the injuries were more serious.
Of course, the wrath of the cultivators was aroused, and as people began to look into the situation, it quickly became apparent that everyone who had been struck with sudden hunger and gauntness, without a single exception, had consumed an Ultra Fasting Aid Pill.
In terms of how serious the injuries to vital energy were, nobody paid much attention. As far as everyone was concerned, that didn’t matter. Furthermore, thanks to the whisperings of certain individuals, people quickly began to lay the blame on Bai Xiaochun.
“These Ultra Fasting Aid Pills are fake!”
“Apothecary Bai is a swindler!!”
“Dammit! Things are already bad enough here, I can’t believe someone would stoop to conning us! If there weren’t strict rules here, I’d personally go and kill Apothecary Bai!!”
More and more people began to fall to the symptoms. As for the friends and family of the victims, as well as they other cultivators who weren’t affected, they all began to simmer with rage. Of course, there were people egging them on secretly, attempting to sway public opinion and stoke the fury which was building in the east district.
The anger quickly began to transform into killing intent, and despite Bai Xiaochun being a Gold Core cultivator, this wasn’t the River-Defying Sect. This was the Starry Sky Dao Polarity Sect, a place where he was a stranger. Furthermore, he had nobody to protect him, and as such, the rising anger being directed toward him filled him with a sensation of deadly crisis!
It soon reached the point where he was nearly scared out of his mind. Thankfully, he had experienced similar situations in the Spirit Stream Sect and the Blood Stream Sect, so before anything could actually happen, he packed his bags and fled into the night.
Now that he was descending from the high of suddenly having so many merit points, it occurred to him that he had been well played by the Celestial Sky Society.
“Damn you, Celestial Sky Society!! I didn’t do anything to offend you people!” Gritting his teeth, he sped along under the cover of darkness, feeling very sorry for himself, and at the same time, extremely irritated.
To have been schemed against and then toyed with in such a matter was a huge loss of face, and the anger in his eyes soon began to burn brightly. Of course, he couldn’t bring himself to just flee without getting to the bottom of the situation. Not daring to go confront anyone from the Celestial Sky Society, he found some of the people who had been struck by side effects, and did a bit of research of his own. Soon, he understood the truth.
“The Ultra Fasting Aid Pills these people consumed were altered. They weren’t the pills I gave to the Celestial Sky Society! My pills might have some impurities, but the side effects should have been limited to minor damage to vital energy. Nothing that a bit of rest couldn’t fix! Something that minor would be worth it in exchange for half a month without being hungry and having your energy drained!
“But the Celestial Sky Society changed my spirit medicine and made it far more harmful. They even reduced the effectiveness!!
“Why would they do something like that!?” Gritting his teeth, he drew upon the power of his cultivation base to flee the east district and go to the north district. However, after arriving, it was to his shock that he found that there were also people there who had been harmed by consuming Ultra Fasting Aid Pills. By this point, a thought struck him like lightning.
“I get it. The Celestial Sky Society is the most powerful organization in Sky City, and they control most of the shops and stores. The biggest profits in the city come from spirit food, and the Ultra Fasting Aid Pill struck a huge blow to the spirit food industry!
“They came to me, not to work together to sell pills, but to completely destroy the reputation of my Ultra Fasting Aid Pill!!” The more he came to understand what had occurred, the angrier he got.
“Well isn’t this interesting. They didn’t use magic or try to assassinate me, they schemed their way to victory! Well, Bai Xiaochun can play that game too! You just wait, Celestial Sky Society. You just wait!!” Gritting his teeth, he settled down in the north district.
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Translator: Deathblade. Chinese language consultant: ASI a.k.a. Beerblade. Editor: GNE. Memes: Logan. Tocsin. Transcendent Patrons: Daoist Elder N, BLE, ttre208. . .