Zhang Yang looked at the people on the square and was a bit surprised that the chubby little guy had arrived first.
What a nimble fat guy!
He took out a piece of paper and a pen, handed them to the little fat guy, and ordered, "I'll give you a task. Register the names of everyone according to the order in which they arrived at the square. When everyone is here, I'll explain the matters about entering the sect. By the way, what's your name?"
The little fat guy grinned. "Reporting to Senior Brother, my name is Wang Baole! And I'm the first one to arrive!"
"Very good!" Zhang Yang nodded and handed the paper and pen to Wang Baole.
Then, he picked up the account book of Qingyun Sect and started looking through it.
The top priority, of course, was to figure out how many assets Qingyun Sect still had.
Wang Baole, on the other hand, took the paper and pen, asked everyone's names in the order of their arrival, and began to register.
The moment Zhang Yang opened the account book, his expression changed at once.
"The ancestors of past generations were really useless!" Zhang Yang muttered in his heart, shaking his head repeatedly.
He had always thought that Qingyun Sect was so poor that all it had left were a few mountains.
Unexpectedly, the first sentence at the beginning of the account book shocked him.
"With Qingyun Peak as the center, an area within a radius of three hundred miles belongs to Qingyun Sect."
What did a radius of three hundred miles mean? Zhang Yang knew it best in the past.
That was the scope of an entire large province!
With such a large territory, how could it have no money? So poor that it didn't even dare to recruit disciples? How incompetent did one have to be to make it like this?
Most importantly, there was no record of the industries within this three-hundred-mile radius at all.
Zhang Yang clearly remembered that Qingyun Market was just a few miles away from Qingyun Sect and was also within the scope of Qingyun Sect. It was an industry of Qingyun Sect.
Even more outrageous was that he had been to Qingyun Market, and the restaurants, pharmacies and other businesses there were paying taxes.
Where did these taxes go?
The more Zhang Yang looked at the account book, the angrier he got. Were these cultivators' minds all focused on cultivation and they knew nothing else?
When he saw the end of the account book and found that there were only 103 lonely spirit stones left in the account, Zhang Yang couldn't hold it in anymore.
The magnificent Qingyun Sect, a sect with a history of five thousand years, was left with only 103 spirit stones in the end...
No wonder every time he wanted to buy pills to take, Seventh Aunt would persuade him earnestly, "Zhang Yang, using pills to cultivate is a low-level method. Moreover, the spiritual energy cultivated in that way is impure and will also lead to impurities in the body, which is very disadvantageous for us cultivators. The best way to cultivate is to refine the spiritual energy of heaven and earth..."
What low-level method! It was simply because there was no money!
After all, even the cheapest Qi-nourishing pill cost two hundred spirit stones!
Apart from spirit stones, there were no materials for refining weapons, no spirit herbs for alchemy... There was nothing!
On the entire Qingyun Peak, the seven senior brothers and sisters of Qingyunzi often went into seclusion.
As for Zhang Yang himself, he could indeed look for medicinal herbs on the Seven Peaks of Qingyun to sell, but how many could he find by himself?
Would he still have time to cultivate?
So, in the past ten years, Zhang Yang had been very distressed and had long wanted to reform.
However, to be fair, the several elders had been quite nice to him.
Since taking him up the mountain ten years ago, they had immediately prepared a set of outfits for him, and even high-end items like spatial rings.
It would have cost hundreds of thousands of spirit stones to buy all these things.
From this point of view, the Seven Disciples of Qingyun really did their best to cultivate their disciple and were several responsible and good elders.
Of course, this also led to Qingyunzi and the others feeling as if it were the end of the world when they heard that Zhang Yang had recruited dozens of disciples.
"Senior Brother, I've finished registering. There are eighty-seven people in total!" Wang Baole showed the list to Zhang Yang. "Please give instructions, Senior Brother. What should we do next?"
Zhang Yang closed the account book, took the list from Wang Baole, glanced at it, and put it away.
He stood up and looked at the eighty-seven teenagers on the square.
The teenagers subconsciously straightened their bodies, waiting for Zhang Yang to announce something.
They were already disciples of Qingyun Sect, so of course they had to act according to the rules of Qingyun Sect in the future.
Zhang Yang swept his eyes over everyone and said, "First of all, congratulations to all of you for being able to enter Qingyun Sect!
Our Qingyun Sect was founded more than five thousand years ago, and as many as seventeen people have successfully ascended to the Immortal Realm in history. So, it's an honor for all of you to be able to join Qingyun Sect.
However, have you noticed a problem?
Where will you live in the future?"
Everyone couldn't help but look around. Besides the main hall in front of them, there were also a few towers.
As for the rest, it was all mountain forests, and there were no houses at all.
But since they had already joined the sect, shouldn't the sect solve the problem of accommodation?
Zhang Yang's expression became serious, and he continued, "You should have heard that in the past few decades, our Qingyun Sect has only recruited one person, that is, me. According to the usual practice, we would have strictly selected disciples this time as well.
However, this time our sect has encountered a once-in-a-hundred-year major change.
This major change is closely related to each and every one of us here.
That's why I opened the door wide and guided all of you fellow disciples up the mountain to jointly deal with this once-in-a-hundred-year major change.
If we handle it well, there will be a place for us in the future world, and even among those who ascend to the Immortal Realm, there will be some of us.
If we don't handle it well, we'll be doomed.
Fellow disciples, don't think about escaping. This is something you can't escape from at all.
I want to ask you, are you willing to face it together with me?"
The people on the square looked at each other in dismay.
They sensed the seriousness of the situation from Zhang Yang's words.
But what exactly had happened?
Wang Baole swallowed and asked, "Senior Brother, what should we do?"
Zhang Yang said slowly, "The question of what to do, we'll discuss it slowly later. What you need to do first now is to quickly build a place to live. The seven peaks behind the main hall already have sect elders on their peaks. Except for the peaks, you can choose suitable locations on the mountains to build houses. Everyone, get to work quickly and solve the accommodation problem as soon as possible. You have two days. After two days, gather here again, and I'll teach you the cultivation methods."
After a pause, Zhang Yang's tone turned cold. "Remember, you're already fellow disciples. Fellow disciples should love and help each other.
"If you dare to bully others, the consequences are not something you can bear."
After saying that, he leaped into the air and flew away.
The people on the square were a bit confused.
They felt that something was wrong, but after all, it was their first time to join a sect, and they didn't know what other sects were like.
After being confused for a while, everyone still decided to build a place to live.
After all, since they were already here, they couldn't sleep on the ground, could they?
On the peak of Qingyun Peak, Qingyunzi, who claimed to be going into seclusion, and the other six people were sitting together.
They were watching the situation in front of the main hall through a magic mirror.
"Senior Brother, what should we do now?" Dan Chenzi, the third disciple, frowned tightly and looked at Qingyunzi. "I'm sure that among these eighty-seven disciples, most of them are spies sent by other sects. Now that Zhang Yang has taken all these people in, how should we deal with it?"
Qingyunzi said angrily, "If it hadn't been for your laziness, would this situation have occurred?"
Dan Chenzi smiled bitterly and said, "I didn't expect Zhang Yang to do this either... We couldn't leave the sect casually anyway, and all the sect's spirit stones were used on the grand formation... It's already a problem to support these disciples, let alone the fact that there are spies among them. Why don't we just find an excuse and drive them all down the mountain!"
"Nonsense! Taking them up the mountain and then driving them down immediately. Does Qingyun Sect want any face?" Qingyunzi glared at Dan Chenzi. "Even if we want to do that, we should wait for a while at least!"
Qingyunzi was full of worry. Now that the people had already been taken up the mountain, if Qingyun Sect couldn't support the disciples and let them starve to death, the reputation built up over thousands of years would be completely ruined!
What should be done?
Suddenly, Second Uncle Ling Yunzi's face changed. "Oh no! That kid Zhang Yang is coming to find me!"
Could anything good happen when he came to find someone at this time?
The others all looked at Second Uncle, with a look of schadenfreude on their faces.
"Go quickly! Don't get us into trouble!" Everyone urged.
Second Senior Brother flew back to his peak with a bitter face.