"Hm! You should throw them in front of the horny demonic boars. Let them taste their own medicine," Duan Mei said cutely.
"Hmm! That's a good idea. I should think about it next time," Shen Xiaoli nodded and said.
Shi Tian looked at Duan Mei in horror. How could such an innocent and lovely fairy have such evil ideas? He then looked at the pure Xiu Ying.
"Young Master, why are you sweating so much? Is your health declining again?" Xiu Ying, who was sitting beside Shi Tian, saw his sweating face and asked worriedly.
"No, I'm just feeling a little hot," Shi Tian lightly shook his head and made an excuse. He secretly said in his heart, "Only my Ying's heart is pure without evil thoughts."
"Hm! The weather is indeed quite hot today," Shi Bingyao nodded. Although this hot weather didn't affect cultivators, Shi Tian was a mortal right now. For mortals, today's weather would feel hot.
"Let me help!" Shen Xiaoli said as she released some of her Ice Qi into the room. Suddenly, the temperature of the room started to drop. Shi Tian felt like someone had placed an air conditioner in his room during a hot summer day.
"Thanks, Sister-in-law!" Shi Tian said.
"Okay! Stop joking around, Xiaoli. Did you bring the ingredients?" Xiangyue waved her hand and said.
"Here!" Shen Xiaoli nodded, and a silver ring appeared in her hand as she gave it to Xiangyue. Shi Bingyao also gave an iron ring to Xiangyue.
Although these rings had an ordinary appearance, he realized that they must be mysterious artifacts called storage rings. These rings had interdimensional space inside them. Cultivators used these storage artifacts to store their belongings. Shi Tian also had a beautiful black ring on his left hand's finger, but he couldn't use it because he didn't have any cultivation right now. One needed spiritual qi to use storage rings.
The interdimensional space inside a storage ring depended on its quality. Storage rings were divided into four grades: low, mid, high, and superior. A low-grade storage ring contained a space of about five cubic meters, a mid-grade one contained about twenty, a high-grade one contained about a hundred, and a superior-grade storage ring contained about five hundred cubic meters.
Shi Tian's storage ring was a high-grade one.
Xiangyue took the rings and checked the ingredients inside them with her divine sense.
"Fortunately, all the main ingredients are here. I can manage the missing secondary ingredients. There shouldn't be a problem refining the Meridian Mending Pill," Hua Xiangyue said with a happy expression after a minute, letting out a sigh of relief.
"Tian'er, Mother is going to refine the pill. Wait a little longer, and you can cultivate again," Xiangyue said gently.
"Thank you, Mother!" Shi Tian nodded.
Xiangyue left the room to refine the pill. All the girls waited with some anticipation.
"Aunt, you went outside. Where are we right now, and what are the levels of the forces in this region?" Shi Tian asked curiously.
"Well, we are currently living in the Red Cloud Kingdom. It's only a second-tier kingdom. The Red Cloud Kingdom is surrounded by three neighboring kingdoms: the Black Sand Kingdom, the White Rock Kingdom, and the Gray Forest Kingdom. One side is bordered by a vast forest filled with demonic beasts. Other than that, there are many small kingdoms in this surrounding area, none of which have a force higher than the third tier. All these small kingdoms are ruled by a big empire, the Vermilion Empire."
Shi Tian listened quietly.
"Let me tell you about the Red Cloud Kingdom. It is ruled by the Li Clan, the ruler of this kingdom for a hundred years. So you could say that the Li Clan is the most powerful in this kingdom. Other than the Li Clan, there are a few more second-tier clans who are next to the Imperial Clan. I never really paid attention to them, as they are too weak to cause us trouble," Shi Bingyao said, shrugging her shoulders.
At this time, Shen Xiaoli's face showed a slight frown. "Big Sister, I think something big might happen in the future. I heard rumors during my travels that the Black Sand Kingdom is showing aggressive behavior towards the Red Cloud Kingdom. There seems to be some history between the two kingdoms, so there's a chance a war might break out in the near future. Although it doesn't matter to us if the Red Cloud Kingdom wins or loses, it might disturb our peace."
Shi Bingyao was lost in thought and said after a few seconds of pondering, "We will wait and see. If the situation becomes chaotic, we will just move to another quiet place. Don't forget, we are currently in hiding. We can't expose ourselves because of a stupid war."
Shen Xiaoli nodded. "That's what I was thinking."
"By the way, Aunt, where is Elder Sister?" Shi Tian asked curiously.
"Hm! She has gone out for training. Don't worry, she knows disguise techniques, so she'll be alright," Aunt replied.
Shi Tian nodded.
The five people once again started chatting, with Shi Tian in the center and four women sitting around him. At this moment, nobody mentioned the name of the Shi Clan, lest it bring up painful memories again.
Mostly, Shi Bingyao and Shen Xiaoli did the talking, telling stories of their travels and what they had encountered in the last two days while searching for the ingredients.
Xiu Ying was telling stories of some young masters who thought with their "dicks rather than their brains." Shi Tian was very familiar with these kinds of cliche plots. He had read many of these scenes in webnovels in his previous life. He didn't expect he would also find these arrogant and lustful young masters here. It looked like other things from the cultivation world shown in novels were also real.
At this time, Shi Tian suddenly remembered something: he hadn't signed in today. His lucky rewards from yesterday were also waiting in the system's inventory to be redeemed.
"System Sign-in!" Shi Tian said in his heart, and he instantly heard the system's mechanical voice.
[Ding, the host signs in the normal room, congratulations to the host for getting a Bone Tempering Pill x 10!]
There was no need to read the introduction of this pill; Shi Tian already knew its effect. It could temper one's entire bone skeleton, making it stronger and steadier.
He did not take the Bone Tempering Pills out, letting them stay in the system's inventory for now. If the women saw him using a spatial artifact without using spiritual qi, it might become suspicious. He didn't know how to explain it to them. He couldn't tell them about the system, and he absolutely couldn't reveal his identity from Earth. If they found out that the real Shi Tian was already dead and a stranger had occupied his body, they might kill him instantly, imprison him for eternity, or torture him.
Just thinking about the consequences sent a chill through his heart.
A few hours later, Xiangyue finally returned. She barged into the room in a hurry with a white, jade-like pill in her fingers. "Ha, finally, it's refined."