Cultivation Struggles of a Lowly Fox

Now that Moon Aiko had her Spirit Stones and the rehabilitation centre was lively, she could now resume her duties as the central melter.

There were too many Treasures, but fortunately, now she had a large Cauldron to speed the whole process up.

Nodding her head gently. Only work in front of her, so she would have to do her best!

...

After a month, Moon Aiko was able to smelt half of the broken Treasures in here. She was throwing like 20 Treasures at a time and letting her Divine Sense separate those pieces.

Her Divine Sense was more powerful and more precise than before, so she was having an easy time with the help of her Grandpa Flame.

With his help not only did she speed the whole process up, but nothing was burned or undercooked.

They still had to be careful about the middle layer, which was from that strange flux or something. It was kind of a pain in the ass, since every newer Treasure had it.

Moon Aiko couldn’t understand their reasoning for using this, since not only did it make a mess when it came to Qi paths inside the Treasure, but it also greatly reduced the durability!

If one bought such armour or weapon and it broke mid-fight, then one would absolutely die without realising what happened.

Moon Aiko kept groaning, but she would just have to go through the rest...

...

A month more and Mei paid Moon Aiko a visit.

”We will have to pack up.” Mei came with a frown on her face.

”What’s up?” Moon Aiko glanced at Mei, but still mostly focused on her Cauldron.

”There is another wave coming, it will still take them some time, but by that time I would like us to be already away from this place.” Mei sighed, shaking her head. She wanted to stay here a bit longer until everyone stabilised.

But at least they now dealt with all the bad actors and they were all locked in Aiko’s Treasure!

”Oh and here.” Mei returned Aiko’s Treasure to her.

”Oh, was it useful?” Moon Aiko hummed, realising there were more Souls being roasted in the Cauldron inside her Treasure.

”We have dealt with them and we also dug up a lot of Treasures, but we won’t be able to sort through them right now, since everyone is packing things.” Mei sighed softly.

”Everyone is in disarray, you know.” The girl from the Delegation, who previously helped ’Aiko’ and co, popped up behind Mei.

”And this lazy girl is also a bother, so it would be better if you handled her.” Mei sighed, shaking her head.

”Why?” Moon Aiko blinked in confusion. Why should she deal with her?

”She is also a Shadow Fox, so you will get along.” Mei honestly didn’t want to deal with her, since she sometimes couldn’t detect her presence, making it quite unnerving.

”More work for me, huh.” Moon Aiko groaned unhappily.

”Not really, I will start packing the ’library’, if you can call it that.” The girl shook her head before disappearing.

”So...” Moon Aiko pursed her lips. ”What’s her deal?”

”She wants to sleep, so she is packing things that would take too long in order to sleep even longer.” Mei gave Aiko a summary before getting to the point.

”That’s... a lot of metal.” Mei didn’t know if it would all fit onto the continental flying ship.

”What about the deal with the Southern Sect?” Moon Aiko cracked her shoulders, since they hurt a bit from constantly slouching like a slug.

She was simply too bored to keep straight back and now she was paying for it.

”The deal is not closed yet, if they can’t make it here soon we will have to start moving and then just let them borrow the ship later.” Mei didn’t want to wait for them, since most of their fighting prowess were unusable inside Aiko’s tails.

”Will there be any issues with that?” Moon Aiko was concerned that the Southern Sect might turn on them because of this.

”That shouldn’t be the case, since the Southern Sect sends people over to tell us the news.” Mei chuckled. She never expected the Southern Sect to be so good at gathering information.

”Where did they get that news?” Moon Aiko was startled, since she believed that the Shadows Peak operated normally again.

”We have withdrawn most Foxes already, so that might be why.” Mei shook her head. She didn’t want to leave any good Fox behind, especially those hard-working ones!

”Ah, that makes sense, but that leaves us vulnerable, are you sure it will be fine?” Moon Aiko blinked suspiciously at Mei.

”You got me. I will soon refine the Pill that will restore the Grandmaster to her peak, so we will have quite the force behind us.” Mei smiled from ear to ear. It took quite a lot of time to obtain, prepare and clean all the Herbs for this Pill.

They had to be perfect, since she must reach the Heavenly Quality on the Pill at all cost!

This would not only recover Grandmaster’s tails, but it would also allow her to gain more energy, possibly helping her advance in her mastery.

This in turn would help everyone since she would be able to push invaders back more strongly than before!

”Oh.” Moon Aiko didn’t expect that and chuckled. ”So we will have an energetic Grandmaster soon~?”

”And young if nothing goes wrong, since her energies will naturally flow again.” Mei chuckled darkly.

”Wait, so the ’young’ effect on Foxes is because of tails?” Moon Aiko was startled by this discovery.

”Yeah, you didn’t know?” Mei teased Aiko, but she should’ve probably explained a few things.

”I know now, but it’s really cool that something like that exists. I won’t have to care about my image when I’m working hard.” Moon Aiko marvelled at the idea of never ageing and forever indulging in her research~!

”No, you should definitely rest.” Mei immediately scolded Aiko before leaving the place for more paperwork.

They were now gathering all resources, so Mei had to be around to measure the size and weight.

Then they would have to weigh what to take and what not to take.

What they couldn’t take would be temporarily stored inside Aiko’s tails, but that was not the best idea if they wanted to make open deals.

Moon Aiko saw Mei walk away, so she returned to her work.

There was one last batch before this whole thing was finished, so she would then move all the metals through her tails into the storage facility that Mei was currently using.

That way she would be able to measure it and everything, which would mean less work for Aiko~!

...

A few moments later, Moon Aiko took out the watery liquid and shaped it into even more ingots, before placing it on their respective piles.

”It’s impressive when you look at it closely.” Moon Aiko blinked at the mountains of metals, feeling impressed by her work.

”It took damn long to get here.” Grandpa Flame was wheezing unhappily, since Aiko was pushing him quite a lot.

Well, he knew that they had to leave this place, so it would be better if they prepared everything, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t bitch about it!

”Yep.” Moon Aiko shared that sentiment, since she was also very tired of constantly melting things down.

Moon Aiko smiled softly. ”But now it’s behind us, so we just need to-”

”No, no, no. No. No.” Grandpa Flame immediately rejected everything, even Aiko breathing, since he was bothered by the fact that she wanted to work right after finishing this huge task.

Moon Aiko pouted. ”I didn’t say any-”

”No. Don’t even try it. You will rest and then move everything over to Mei. You will not touch this until everything is accounted for, so that we can leave this place safely.” Grandpa Flame had another chance in life in this form, so he wouldn’t try to jeopardise it now!

”Fine.” Moon Aiko pouted, but still listened to him, since he was a great help during this time.

”I swear. I want at least a few years of vacation...” Grandpa Flame sniffled, since he knew that was impossible.

”Not happening. I will definitely need you later.” Moon Aiko said seriously before standing up and walking into her temporary corner, which had a big soft bed and everything that Aiko might need.

”Figured.” Grandpa Flame clicked his tongue. He was considering getting another Spiritual Flame for Aiko, so that he could rest when a more intricate work was not being worked on, but thinking about Aiko’s eccentric nature, that just might be impossible.

”I will let you rest for some time, so don’t be like that.” Moon Aiko yawned and almost immediately fell asleep.

-----

”We have the main continental flying ship filled with Storage Rings, which are then filled with Spirit Stones. Then we have Treasures that are too useful to leave behind. We were almost able to store all of them in that single ship, but some of them will have to be moved.”

Mei was receiving a report from nearby Fox.

She had to work with so many Foxes these days, that everyone looked the same to her. She could no longer distinguish if they were a Shadow Fox or Dream Fox.

The only reason she was able to distinguish some of them was because they were either very cool or very hot.

”How about Herbs?” Mei glanced at the Foxes, asking them.

”They are being carefully stored inside the Storage Pouches. We can’t guarantee that they will be able to maintain their current quality, but it shouldn’t drop too much for the time being.”

Another Fox answered her questions, making her turn around at them.

”Good, we can’t allow any mishaps, since we might need to use those Herbs for the deal.” Mei nodded her head seriously, gesturing and commanding them to do even more stuff.

”Yes ma’am!” The Foxes immediately straightened their backs and ran to their respective ships to check them again.

”If we weren’t allies, I would have thought that you were trying to kill me.” Chen Shi was looking like a pale ghost, and that was all thanks to the Fox in front of him.

”Thank you for fixing those ships. How were they?” Mei showed her appreciation, since she knew how hard it was to fix things after other people.

”It was a mess and well, it still is. I was able to repair most things, but there are still some rooms that just won’t budge. Moreover, I don’t have time to just rip the walls and redo them, so I just patched it up for now.” Chen Shi shook his head. ”It will hold, but you should not expect anything from it.”

”Thank you.” Mei nodded her head and turned around. There were still some things that she needed to do before moving those metals over...