A radiant rainbow light overcame Gon for a moment, until it revealed the new announcement in front of Gon.

  Congratutions! You’ve received an S Grade Reward!

  A rush of dopamine hit Gon when he saw the notification with the fshy lights, making him even more excited for the reward. “No way, I’m actually lucky in a lotto for once?!”

  A dark and long charcoal object appeared in his hands, almost looking like a piece of miniature log. “Is this some rare and unique gem?!”

  Then he read the description.

  An Immortal Ingredient! The Three-headed Mythical Dark Cerberus’s Ordure!

  A material from an Immortal Beast, with enough resilience to survive the va of a volcano and a slice from a master swordsman! This esteemed ingredient can be used as compost to make Immortal Grade pnts!

  Then the smell hit Gon.

  Sweat fell off his forehead at the realisation.

  “This is dog shit!” He threw it at the ground, shaking off his hands like a rapid animal to take away the disgusting smell.

  “Are you crazy?! What the hell is the use of this to me?! It’s literal shit!” Gon rubbed his hand on the ground to rub off whatever bits of dog shit was left on it. “Clouds! Can you make it rain?! Give me some rain to clean away this shit on my hands! I’m begging you!” Gon beckoned to the sky, hoping to see if the clouds that had formed in his Inner World could be of any use.

  He waited for a moment, until a single drop of rain fell on his hand.

  And Gon waited for another minute.

  But nothing came.

  “J-just one drop of water?”

  Resigned to his fate of smelling like dog shit, Gon looked towards the Mining Altar Lotto once more.

  Requirements to use the Mining Altar Lotto has doubled. For every usage, continue to double the necessary materials needed.

  “Doubled every time I use it? I guess it makes sense. I figured I could mine tons of coals and just use them to spam the lotto, but I guess it doesn’t work like that. And I’m guessing if I used spiritual jade, I would only require just a bit to activate it.” Gon almost considered using the pile of Immortal grade dog shit, but figured it should be of some use ter on.

  Surely.

  “Alright, use up the rest of the coal I have left. It should be roughly double compared to what I used anyway. I can mine more ter.” Once more Gon used the lotto, though this time his expectations were a lot more dampened.

  This time, grey smoke of lights came out, with the next object appearing.

  A worn out manual fell on his hands, almost falling apart with how old it was. Its bindings were just rotted strings, and Gon thought that if he tried to pull to the next page, it would basically disintegrate.

  “An ancient manual? Could this be some sort of mystical technique written down by some ancient cultivator?” Gon’s anticipation only grew.

  And then he saw the pop up that appeared in front of him/

  Congratutions! You’ve received an FFF Grade Reward!

  Gon was frozen on the spot, with his mouth wide open. Why the hell would it start off with congratutions if it’s that bad? “What the fuck? FFF Grade? How’s there a grade even worse than F?! Is it actually just garbage?!”

  But when he looked at the rotting old manual, he could now see the System’s description of the item.

  Tiger Phoenix Tortoise Dragon Divine Esoteric Arts!

  A garbage low mortal grade manual that is considered worthless. At best, you can reach the peak of the Qi Condensation realm if you master these arts.

  Really, it’s just some basic external body exercises. There isn’t a single qi based technique. Gain the agility of a baby tiger, the flexibility of a dead phoenix, the toughness of a tiny tortoise, and the strength of a rotted dragon. In other words, slightly boosts your body to the most it can get.

  “Hmmmm… Actually, this isn’t too bad.” Gon observed the manual even more, and was gd it was only a dozen pages at most. That meant it was retively easy to understand.

  In fact, this was actually a lot more useful than expected.

  “Oi Tim. Rename this manual to the Tradies Body Manual. I’ve found just the perfect use of this.” After flipping over its contents, Gon was much more satisfied.

  This was far more useful than the literal pile of dog shit he received.

  “I’ll have to memorise these contents and write it in a nice and clean small book. Then I’ll teach it to the rest of the miners. With this, all of them can eventually reach at least peak Qi Condensation realm. They won’t have to rely on my strength from now on, and build their own foundation.” Gon began to chuckle, realising his ambitions of making a proper union was coming ever closer.

  And with this, expanding and improving the mines would be piss easy. And fulfilling the quota of the sect would be done even faster.

  Though whenever Gon thought of the Ethereal Life Sect, he couldn’t help but have a disgusted expression. “And they’re considered a righteous sect. Fine, they look after the city which is full of mortals, but they sure treat their own disciples like shit. And even us miners are treated worse than that. Especially when I think back to that incident on why this body was sent to the mines.” Gon naturally had entire access to the memories of this body, alongside his own from Earth.

  But, there was pretty much no way he was ever going back to the sect, so there was no point dwelling on it.

  “And with this, I can finally act on my main pn. When everyone can easily fulfill the spiritual jades quota in a short amount of time, we can make use of our freedom to do a little bit of… Hmm, well, the sect definitely won’t see it coming for sure.” Getting a better idea of the future, Gon was happy with his FFF Grade reward.

  And not even the smell of dog shit on his hands would ruin that.

  Gon came back to reality, sleeping in his dorms. Though he noticed Bom carefully walked out the dorms in the middle of the night to go towards the mines.

  I heard he was a captured thief before coming here. So right now, he’s being put into indentured servitude, without even getting a sary like the rest of us.

  Gon was rexed. It was pretty obvious what the thief Bom was up to.

  And he would first start off with handling Bom.

  Thinking of his future pns, Gon couldn’t help but grin.

  He was completely sure that everyone would agree to them with ease.

  Because the greed of the human heart knows no bounds.

  /////////////

  Old Qiang stood at the front of the mines early morning the next day, handing everyone their monthly wages. “It’s a bit less than st month because of the mine colpse, but should be good enough.” Each small pouch had someone’s name on it.

  There were a few cases of robberies happening between workers in the past. But Old Qiang had always dealt with them swiftly. It was a line no one dared to cross anymore, lest they lose their hands.

  Gon was busy gorging himself on a pte of food, waiting for his call to grab his sary.

  Gradually, the bags on the table in front of Old Qiang got smaller and smaller. Everyone had received their saries from the sect.

  Eventually, there was nothing on the table.

  “Wait. Where’s my sary?” Gon said, getting up and heading towards Old Qiang.

  Old Qiang could only scratch his head, until he realised why. “Gon… We decred you deceased when we thought you died, and sent a report to the sect. They probably sent your st paycheck to your family.” He fidgeted his beard, trying to figure out what to do next.

  “M-my money… So I worked my ass off the past month for the sect for basically free…”

  Old Qiang patted Gon. “Don’t worry, I’ll sort this out.”

  Until Gon realised the advantage he could get out of this.

  If the sect considered him dead… Then he would be able to act a lot more freely ter on.

  Gon patted Old Qiang’s shoulder even harder, this time with a wide smile. “Actually, don’t worry about it. I want them to think I’m dead. Can you do that for me, old man?”

  “Hoho, you sure are happy. You want to use this advantage to leave the mines?”

  With a burst of ughter, Gon almost spilled out some of the food he ate. “No! Not at all! I want to be at the mines. I’ve nowhere else to go. But if I’m considered as a literal ghost by the sect, I can do a few more things.” With a serious expression, he asked Old Qiang a vital question. “Do you trust me, old man?”

  “You brat. I’m smelling a scheme. What do you wanna do?”

  Gon leaned in closer, still holding his hand on Old Qiang’s shoulder. “Don’t you think it’s about time we get a payrise?”

  Hearing the words from Gon, even Old Qiang couldn’t help but be enamoured by the notion.

  There was no harm in letting Gon do his own thing. After all, he was practically the employee of the month, the MVP of the mines.

  “You rascal, fine. Even I’m sick of how stingy the sect is.” Old Qiang reached for his pouch. “Here, I’ll give you some money.” Old Qiang brought out 100 grey spiritual coins, the lowest grade, to Gon. He also gave a single refined spiritual jade, not in the raw ore form, but in the shape of a crystal.

  Gon held the coin up in his fingers, observing it. He realised it was quite simir to the coins back from earth, with ridges on the side, and a perfect circle.

  Then he grabbed the spiritual jade, used as a currency between cultivators, while also having qi stored in it. He rotated it around, observing every single angle.

  “It’s only been a month, yet you look like you’ve never seen money. Stop overreacting so much, or are you just that greedy? You’re even drooling, you brat,” Old Qiang raised an eyebrow at Gon’s antics.

  He couldn’t get used to them. Everytime Gon would always pull something new and ridiculous.

  “Thanks old man. You really are the best boss!” Gon said, walking away while still staring at the spiritual jade crystal as if he were holding a phone, unable to pry his eyes away.

  Oi Tim. You reckon you got an analysing feature? You were able to describe that Onyx Shadow gem on the spot as well, right? And the altar instantly refined it into a suitable gem to be slotted in.

  The vivid grey UI appeared in front of Gon, this time with colourful illustrations of rocks as its borders.

  System analysing…

  Analysis of this world’s spiritual jade currency complete.

  The Inner World is now capable of refining spiritual jade ore’s into the specific currency type of this region.

  Perfect. I’m starting to count on you some more, Old Mate Tim. See, this is how you have a good harmonious retionship without non stop bickering.

  With the ability of the System to refine spiritual jade ores into the currency of this world, Gon had managed to deal with the biggest hurdle.

  Now, all he had to do was rope in the rest of the team.

  For the rest of the day, he worked with his team, and made sure to continue getting to know everyone else.

  And soon, he was back in bed in the dorms, though midnight has passed.

  Waiting for someone to leave.

  He held his arms behind his head, rexed on his bunker bed.

  Once he felt the shuffling of the beds, Gon remained still. Pretending to be asleep.

  And when the night’s cool breeze came in momentarily as the door quietly opened and closed, Gon sprung to action.

  Bom had left this night once more!

  Now, thanks to the effects of the Onyx Shadow Gem, I can act with ease at night.

  Gon walked out the dorms, keeping a distance from the scurrying Bom, the ex-thief of the team.

  He trailed him to the mines, managing to stay undetected even as Bom did his routine checks.

  I was worried things might be a bit harder, but the effects of the Onyx Shadow Gem is quite potent, at least against just a regur person. I could probably be a master thief if I really wanted money, at least if I lived amongst just normal towns and cities with no cultivators.

  Gon entered the mine, following as Bom went deeper in the mines. He opened up a hole, taking out a rge and heavy bag.

  Bom then went through one of the closed off paths of the mines, and reached the end. Then he stopped around midway before he reached the dead end, this time wearing another bag that covered his entire body.

  And then he crawled into a tiny hole that was covered up.

  Well, that’s all I need. I’ll just wait for the guy to leave, then investigate for myself.

  Within five minutes, Bom had already left the scene, making it as quick as possible.

  Smart. Since he covered himself with that bag, there won’t be any signs of dirt on him, making it less suspicious. He truly is a seasoned thief.

  Gon had entered the tiny hole, and though he barely fit, he just used his brute force to open up the path by flexing his muscles.

  Until the ceiling became slightly higher, as he entered a tiny cave.

  “Nothing’s here… There must be another hidden crawl way here.” It didn’t take Gon much time to find it, as he noticed a hollow echo as he knocked around the cave walls. Focusing on that spot, he found another hidden hole.

  This time, it led to an even bigger cave.

  And Gon could finally stand up.

  Seeing the illuminating radiance in front of him amongst the dreary brown walls, he could only grin.

  “As I expected. Bom, you son of a gun. You’re the perfect accomplice I need for my next pn.”