Daily life of a cultivation judge Chapter 1459: Warped sense (2)

Bidding on items from Yang Qing, a fourth-stage Palace Realm cultivator known for his pleasant appearance, engaging personality, inquisitive nature, and unfortunately, shallow pockets, was one matter. However, bidding on items from Yang Qing, the Palace Court Judge of the Order, was an entirely different proposition. In the former case, bids were driven by the items themselves. In the latter, the bids were made because of the owner, with the items themselves holding little importance.

If that was indeed the situation, Yang Qing couldn't help but ponder Tang Xiadan's motivations. What could possibly be worth over two hundred thousand lesser dragon jade crystals? Instead of feeling uneasy about the possibility of a hidden agenda behind Tang Xiadan's bid, Yang Qing found a strange sense of calm washing over him.

Earlier, beneath the overwhelming euphoria and excitement of securing over two hundred thousand lesser dragon jade crystals, a quiet, nagging voice had surfaced. It questioned whether Tang Xiadan had overpaid for the Gentle Yang Pineapples and the Silver Ice Tear Guavas. Could he truly afford the offered sum? What if he couldn't, and Yang Qing ended up empty-handed, with the added discomfort of finding Senior Instructor Lu Yuan lounging in his abode, feet casually and arrogantly propped on a table, that dangerously teasing smile plastered on his face?

If the thousand crystals he had initially hoped for felt like a manifestation of slight greed, what then of the thirty-five thousand Tang Xiadan paid for each Silver Ice Tear Guava, or the fifty thousand for the Gentle Yang Pineapple? Yang Qing had every justification for his worry. Were the roles reversed, he wouldn't have offered more than forty thousand high-grade spirit stones for any of those items, which would have translated to approximately four hundred lesser dragon jade crystals.

Tang Xiadan had indeed overpaid, and by no small amount. Thus, it was only natural that a part of Yang Qing had harbored fears that Tang Xiadan might not fulfill his payment. However, with the prevailing assumption that Tang Xiadan’s bids likely stemmed from some ulterior motive, any reservations or anxieties Yang Qing held about the excessive nature of the bids and the potential non-payment vanished entirely.

With that realization, his heart finally found peace. A small part of him even felt a flicker of gratitude towards Fan Jie for potentially playing a role in the transaction, despite the man having betrayed his identity in the process.

The more he considered it, the more Yang Qing became convinced that his deduction was accurate.

Yet, Yang Qing, despite his considerable talents and sharp insights, was oblivious to the fact that he would make a terrible merchant due to his severely skewed perception of value. One couldn't entirely fault him for this, as the very course of his life had forged this distorted sense of worth. For the initial years of his existence, he dwelled in a place so isolated from external influences that in his first thirteen years, a mere single visitor had ever graced the Yang Clan's mountain. Beyond that solitary encounter, he had absolutely no interaction with anyone from the outside world.

Given this profound isolation, it was only logical that he lacked understanding regarding the value of material possessions, considering the company he kept. Did the Yang Clan concern themselves with the market price of blood scale grass in terms of spirit stones? Their sole focus was its efficacy in silver body refinement and ensuring Yang Qing consumed more of it, despite its minor side effects of inducing night fever and temporary blindness during the summer months.

Consequently, Yang Qing absorbed virtually nothing about the value of things from them. The only cost he ever calculated back then was the toll it would take on his sanity by the time his clan concluded their regimen with him.

Subsequently, his arrival at the Order saw his distorted sense of value worsen rather than improve. Again, this was entirely foreseeable. After all, few places would instantly bestow upon a newcomer a top-tier gold-grade art for cultivation upon joining. Shortly thereafter, a benevolent and generous senior would casually present a purple-grade art to cultivate, alongside rare spiritual plants possessing saint-grade potential. As if that were not enough, mere weeks into his tenure, without any request or expenditure of merit points for such a privilege, one finds oneself cultivating in an area blessed by a mature dragon spiritual vein, casually interacting with formidable Domain and Nascent Soul experts, and receiving personal tutelage from seasoned late-stage Palace Realm cultivators.

Daily encountered were rare and irreplaceable treasures, not just any trinkets, but items whose value could have ignited continent-spanning conflicts. Yet, due to membership in the Order, one could casually share tea with two peak-stage domain experts. One of them, a master of countless cultivation arts, including the supreme gold-grade technique bestowed upon him freely, would discuss the Dao. All this would unfold while admiring a natural Dao Ascendant grade Red Amber Scholar Jade Wood Tree, a treasure coveted by even the two holy lands, which here, merely served as shade for leisurely chats and afternoon refreshments.

Life within the Order had completely reshaped Yang Qing’s understanding of value. The experiences and interactions he’d had as a Foundation Establishment cultivator far surpassed what countless others, even domain experts, would witness in their lifetimes. After all, how many domain experts could claim to have a mythical race member as a roommate, with whom they frequently sparred?

Furthermore, the Order’s primary currency of merit points, instead of spirit stones, significantly warped one’s perception of worth. This distortion was compounded by the unique 'Yang Qing factor'.

Yang Qing considered himself a singular individual. He was a self-aware coward, possessing an acute sense of self-preservation and a healthy dose of paranoia, attributes he readily and shamelessly admitted to the world. Consequently, these traits had guided him to remain steadfastly within the protective embrace of the Order, striving to maintain this sanctuary. He preferred facing threats to voluntarily venturing beyond its boundaries. This lifestyle afforded him minimal interaction with the outside world, restricted to the scope of his official duties.

This way of living meant he had limited opportunities to recalibrate his common sense. As such, his understanding remained firmly molded by the influences of both the Yang household and the Order.

The first time he ventured out for leisure, not under duress, was to an auction organized by the White Rose Pavilion. That particular experience served only to further twist his perception of value, and in a decidedly negative manner. Due to its traumatic nature, Yang Qing thereafter exclusively purchased goods from cultivation markets. Not just any markets, but those frequented by cultivators in the Foundation Establishment realm, perhaps with a sprinkling of early-stage Core Formation experts. In these venues, transactions were typically conducted using middle-grade spirit stones; high-grade spirit stones were rarely seen as a unit of exchange. This was the entirety of Yang Qing's experience, save for the regrettable White Rose Pavilion incident.

Forged from these experiences was an exceptionally frugal and parsimonious Yang Qing. For the past decade, he had never exceeded a hundred high-grade spirit stones for any single treasure, all while diligently steering clear of prominent merchant organizations of rank three and above.

Adding to this cheapness, Yang Qing also favored inexpensive hobbies, further reducing his expenditures. Given that cultivators possess minimal appetites, sustenance represented one of the most economical purchases, allowing Yang Qing to indulge in culinary delights far more freely than in other pursuits. Yet, feasting was not his sole inexpensive pastime. He had a passion for collecting tattered cultivation scrolls; the more damaged and incomplete, the greater his desire, with absolutely no consideration for their grade. What would an incomplete, faded red-grade cultivation scroll, more faded than content, even be worth? Acquiring it for free would still feel extravagant.

Therefore, consider someone who had become so inherently cheap that they were a regular at cultivation markets, frequented even by rogue cultivators. Add to this the hobby of enjoying inexpensive food, coupled with a person who seldom left home, yet within that home, regular interaction with rare treasures was more common than not. Would you entrust the valuation of such an individual regarding the priced worth of something, especially if that something grew so effortlessly within their own abode?

His physique, his cultivation manual, and his Dao were not exactly helpful either. Due to the synergy of these three aspects, his residence had transformed into a natural sanctuary brimming with top-tier sky-grade herbs, proliferating as if they were mere weeds simply from his exhalations. These sky-grade herbs, given sufficient time, were more than assured to ascend to monarch grade. Yang Qing possessed hundreds of monarch-grade spiritual herbs and plants. Within this entire estate, excluding the Green Flame Tree, the Tree of Duality, and the Purple Lightning Bamboo, nearly every other monarch-grade plant and herb had spontaneously evolved from the abundant weeds growing there. He might have acquired a few seeds occasionally, often cheaply, and some even gratis, like those he had ingeniously acquired from Chief Song.

Subsequently, his mere act of cultivating, coupled with these seeds and weeds absorbing the spiritual qi he naturally emitted, led to the proliferation of hundreds of monarch-grade plants and herbs within his abode.

The same phenomenon extended to the insects and other fauna residing in his abode. Years of immersion and absorption of his spiritual qi had triggered their mutation and subsequent evolution, mirroring the transformations observed in the creatures and flora within the former domain of the Clear River Sword Sect in the Deer Mountain Range.

Considering all this, could Yang Qing truly be relied upon to ascertain the genuine worth of gentle yang pineapples when he had twelve trees yielding approximately sixty fruits annually with negligible effort, beyond his simple existence within his residence?