Chapter 768: Young People Want a Promotion Right After Coming In?

Chapter 768: Young Talent Wants a Promotion Already?

Eleventh Layer of Kunxu, Zhongji Heaven, Wanfa Sect Territory.

Starfire True Lord stood before the grand gate of Shuntian Hall, his heart swelling with emotion. “At last… I’ve returned to the sect.”

“Who would have thought that my descent below would turn misfortune into fortune—and land me a place inside Shuntian Hall?”

Starfire True Lord knew well that, given his past record and position within the sect, gaining entry into Shuntian Hall had been as unlikely as scaling the heavens. His rank and cultivation had long been stuck in place, his future sealed shut for life.

Yet now, after circling back through the lower realms and rejoining the sect, it felt as though he’d undergone a rebirth—his path ahead flung wide open.

“When I was at Golden Core, you could call me ‘Old Deng’ all you liked—I wouldn’t hold it against you.”

“But now that I’ve ascended to Nascent Soul, at barely over three hundred years old, I’m practically still a youth.”

“A youth who’s just been admitted into Shuntian Hall, with boundless prospects ahead.”

…

Outside the office of the Martial Training Pavilion.

Yu Xinghan, radiating scholarly air from every pore, strode down the corridor.

Thanks to the machinations of his Examination Sect avatar, he’d just completed his onboarding formalities—and now burned with fierce determination.

“Now that I’m in the sect, the mortal world is none of my concern.”

He understood clearly: the first day of official reporting was crucial—it marked the true beginning of his second life.

Here, no one knew of the poverty-stricken deeds he’d committed below, the humiliations he’d suffered, or the embarrassments he’d endured.

To his future colleagues, he was a blank sheet of paper—the very first day offered him the chance to redefine himself entirely.

But there remained one glaring flaw upon him.

“I must sever all ties to my past and erase the label of ‘lower-class’ stamped upon me.”

He knew full well that while sect disciples might not openly scorn him out of malice for being from the lower strata, they would—quite rationally—still brand him as such.

This habit of swiftly defining someone by their origins was efficient, saved time and energy, and minimized the cost of judging character. It was, in fact, the very method he himself employed most often.

Indeed, under the guidance of his Examination Sect avatar, his current friend list had already been neatly divided into four categories: Seniors, Peers, Scum, and Blacklist.

And he was certain his soon-to-be colleagues would apply similar logic.

“Once branded as ‘lower-class,’ once slotted into the ‘Scum’ or even ‘Blacklist’ group in their contacts, I’ll never lift my head again within the department.”

“Any minor mistake I make will inevitably be met with remarks like, ‘Of course—he’s from the lower strata,’ or ‘Ah, no wonder—he’s just a commoner.’ With this notion constantly reinforced, I’ll become the department’s universally acknowledged trash, trampled beneath everyone’s feet.”

“All the dirty, exhausting tasks will fall onto my shoulders; opportunities will never come my way; and promotions? Forget it—they’ll have nothing to do with me.”

“If it ever comes to that, I’ll never see daylight again.”

“To avoid this fate, the first step… is to establish my new persona and utterly shed the ‘lower-class’ label!”

“And it must happen fast—before I even add my colleagues as friends for the first time!”

In his mind, there was a simple solution to achieve this.

“Starfire True Lord!”

“Becoming his son-in-law? Not enough!”

As the office door drew nearer, Yu Xinghan sent Starfire True Lord a direct message: True Lord, I wish to be your son!

He thought to himself, “If I become the son of the venerable Starfire True Lord, I’ll effectively count as half-upper-class by birthright!”

“And if I can also secure Li Xuelian—whose origin lies firmly within the sect’s upper echelons—as my wife, then I’ll cement my status as a full-fledged member of the elite.”

…

While cultivators one by one completed their registration, Zhang Yu had already settled into his own office.

His gaze swept across the room, and one by one, the outsourced workers came into view.

Identifying outsourced staff was simple: everyone who entered the workspace appeared slightly translucent.

Even more so—to Zhang Yu, a mere Grade-1 Sect Administrator—if he wished, he could adjust their transparency to 99%.

In an instant, all outsourced personnel became nearly invisible, leaving only faint, ghostly outlines hanging in the air.

To Zhang Yu’s eyes, unless one paid close attention, the vast office space seemed populated by only a handful of Sect Administrators.

“Outsourced workers,” said Zhanxian, “are like air within the sect—essential for operations yet meant to remain unnoticed. That’s what many disciples expect of them.”

Zhang Yu turned toward the spot where Ye Xingli sat. As he lowered her transparency setting, his senior sister’s form gradually reappeared before him.

From Ye Xingli’s perspective, Zhang Yu—a Grade-1 Sect Administrator—shone like a blazing fireball, radiating light just like the other administrators, all clearly marked and illuminated by the Dharma Realm.

When Zhang Yu looked upon each outsourced worker, he could instantly see, via the Dharma Realm, their name, superior, cultivation level, outsourced rank, and the exact task they were performing at that moment.

Most of these tasks involved studying, practicing, testing, and verifying martial cultivation techniques; only a minority concerned document processing.

In short, the outsourced staff of Martial Arts Team Three spent every month endlessly reading, learning, and analyzing various martial arts manuals.

If they failed to meet requirements—or worse, fell short of expectations—they had to spend spirit coins to purchase experience, memories, or even rent temporary cultivation power from the Dharma Realm, all just to assist their work and boost efficiency and accuracy.

“This,” Zhanxian remarked coolly, “is the hardest part of being outsourced. To stay above, you must keep spending and working.”

“Add to that the fact that outsourced wages are lower than those of Sect Administrators—equal work, unequal pay—and most of their monthly earnings end up poured right back into their jobs. Some underperforming cultivators even take on debt just to complete their assignments.”

“Bit by bit… they’re squeezed dry of every ounce of potential, all for the faintest hope of ascending the Immortal Path.”

“And yet, in the end, all they accomplish is completing one task after another assigned from above—making the sect ever stronger and more rigid, and deepening the unfathomable legacy of the Immortals.”

As Zhang Yu reviewed the data of these outsourced workers, he realized this information wasn’t voluntarily broadcast by them—it was simply visible to him by virtue of his Grade-1 Sect Administrator privileges.

Even Ye Xingli now displayed such details in his vision.

A glaring red alert even popped up: “Your outsourced employee is idle. Please assign a task immediately.”

Seeing this, Ye Xingli tensed instantly. Her eyes, filled with desperate eagerness for work, locked onto Zhang Yu.

“Junior brother, please assign me a task quickly.”

Having gone through the Examination Sect’s training and onboarding process, Ye Xingli understood perfectly: work was the lifeline of an outsourced employee.

An outsourced worker without tasks was like a stray dog—unwanted, unable to survive within the sect.

She thought inwardly, “I can no longer serve as junior brother’s dual-cultivation partner. If I lose this chance at work too, I’ll be expelled from the sect… Sigh. Compared to Le Mulan, what exactly am I lacking?”

Her yearning for the Dao blazed fiercely within her, intensifying her hunger for the work ahead.

Zhang Yu knew that ever since Ye Xingli had followed him into the Yufa Pavilion, she’d officially onboarded alongside him, earning a post-tax salary of 400 spirit coins per month.

As a formal outsourced employee, prolonged idleness would soon trigger higher-level warnings—which would reflect poorly on Zhang Yu himself and be reported upward.

After a moment’s thought, he said to Ye Xingli, “Senior sister, for now, please handle preliminary reviews for me. Among these twenty-four documents, check whether all files are complete, whether formatting is correct, and whether any illegal content is present…”

Ye Xingli had researched the Yufa Pavilion’s duties beforehand and knew initial reviews were mostly clerical.

Hearing this, however, she blinked in slight surprise. “Junior brother… you only need me for paperwork?”

She’d come fully prepared to assist him in verifying martial techniques of all kinds.

She already had a plan in her heart—how much to borrow in loans to purchase knowledge memories, cultivation memories, work memories, even to lease spiritual cultivation itself…

Especially after seeing Zhang Yu instantly accept the task of reviewing twenty-four manuals, Ye Xingli became even more convinced that Zhang Yu needed her support.

But at this very moment, Zhang Yu merely gave her a faint smile. “Senior sister, from now on, you only need to handle the paperwork.”

“Are you kidding? Just twenty-four manuals? I don’t even have enough time to practice them all myself—do you really think I’d share any with you?” Zhang Yu thought inwardly. “Besides, senior sister, you’re only at the Golden Core stage. I can’t possibly ask you to buy knowledge memories or lease cultivation power to help me out.”

Ye Xingli gazed at Zhang Yu, touched. In her heart, she murmured, “Junior brother… he’s always like this, silently shouldering every burden himself.” At that instant, Ye Xingli made a decision that went against her personal principles—namely…

She resolved inwardly, “If junior brother can’t finish his tasks in time, I’ll take out a loan to help him.”

While assigning the preliminary review duties to Ye Xingli, Zhang Yu lightly tapped his fingertip, instantly posting a preliminary review task to her through the work platform.

The flashing warning that had just been blinking before vanished abruptly, allowing Ye Xingli to exhale in quiet relief.

Aside from outsourced cultivators, Zhang Yu also knew that within the sect, Soul Cultivators had various applications—reminding him of Zhao Tianxing and the others who had ascended alongside him.

Unlike outsourced labor, however, Soul Cultivators were more akin to personal equipment carried by cultivators themselves. All maintenance, upkeep, usage, and enhancement costs had to be borne by the cultivator personally. With his current funds still tight, Zhang Yu could only let Zhao Tianxing and the others remain dormant for now.

Only when his supply of spirit coins grew sufficiently abundant could he consider leasing the sect’s computation pools for them.

Just then, a message appeared before Zhang Yu.

Chu Wangji: Are you the new Zhang Yu?

Chu Wangji was a veteran employee of the Yufa Pavilion. Years of experience as a Level 2 Sect Affairs Officer had given him intimate knowledge of every nook and cranny of the pavilion.

Yet this newcomer, Zhang Yu, still filled him with intense curiosity.

After all, Zhang Yu was the first ever to rise through the inaugural Lower Sect Affairs Officer Selection Exam—an achievement that left Chu Wangji uncertain about his true background.

“By conventional standards,” Chu Wangji mused inwardly, “mortals from the lower realms are uniformly bleak in background, finances, and prospects. They belong squarely in my ‘Incompetent’ contact group—people unworthy of any social investment.”

“But…” he continued in thought, “to have clawed his way up through the Jade Court’s heavily promoted inaugural exam… perhaps this fellow has some hidden backing.”

At that moment, Chu Wangji wanted to learn more about Zhang Yu—to decide whether his future social strategy toward him should be Ignore, Stranger, Rival, Friend, Family, or even Bootlicker Mode.

Meanwhile, following Chu Wangji’s lead, other members of Martial Dao Team Three also greeted Zhang Yu one by one, displaying polite warmth and promptly adding him to their team chat.

Upon entering the group, the first thing Zhang Yu saw was Team Three’s performance ranking for the month.

He knew that the Martial Dao Teams One, Two, and Three under the Yufa Pavilion’s Review Department primarily handled reviews of foundational, intermediate, and expert-level manuals up to the Nascent Soul realm.

As for techniques beyond Nascent Soul level—including military-grade and sect-grade manuals—they couldn’t be reviewed by a single team alone. Such tasks usually required leadership to assemble personnel across teams or departments for full-scale collaborative review.

The current intra-team performance ranking Zhang Yu saw was calculated based on points assigned per manual reviewed, listing members accordingly.

Naturally, this ranking excluded team leaders.

Although team leaders also participated in reviews, they didn’t compete directly with members; instead, their evaluations were based on the overall performance of the teams they led.

He Yiwen ranked first this month with 89 points.

Chu Wangji came second with 72 points.

As for the newly joined Zhang Yu, having completed zero martial manuals so far, he naturally occupied last place.

Glancing at the scoring system, Zhang Yu thought to himself, “Each of those twenty-four foundational Nascent Soul manuals I took is worth four points. If I finish reviewing them all within the month, that’s ninety-six points.”

“In that case, with senior sister Ye Xingli and me working together, we should easily surpass the other members—and their outsourced helpers—and claim first place in the team.”

With that in mind, Zhang Yu turned curiously to Chu Wangji and asked, “Is there any reward tied to this performance ranking?”

Chu Wangji replied, “Of course there is! What kind of performance ranking would it be without rewards?”

“To boost efficiency across the Yufa Pavilion,” he explained while continuing his work, sparing a sliver of attention to enlighten Zhang Yu, “we’ve deepened our performance evaluation system across all departments and teams.”

“Our Martial Dao Team Three awards five hundred spirit coins and ten Dao Merits to whoever tops the monthly ranking.”

“And if you rank first across all three Martial Dao teams combined, you get an additional fifteen hundred spirit coins and twenty Dao Merits.”

Zhang Yu pressed further, “This ranking must also help with rank promotion, right?”

Chu Wangji chuckled. “Naturally. The better your performance and the more tasks you complete each year, the higher your chances of promotion…”

Zhang Yu asked again, “When does the higher-ups usually arrange promotions?”

Chu Wangji smiled. “Setting aside special circumstances, there’s typically an annual evaluation in March. But since it’s already late December, you’ve missed this year’s window. Just work hard next year.”

Seeing Zhang Yu’s eager curiosity about advancement, Chu Wangji thought inwardly, “He’s only just arrived, yet already thinking about promotions? Could this kid really have some hidden connections?”

He sighed quietly to himself, “Promotion from Rank 1 to Rank 2 can still be achieved through performance alone. But reaching Rank 3? That requires an opening—and even then, the queue ahead is endless… Who knows if I’ll ever make it to Rank 3 within thirty years.”

As for Ranks 4 and 5, Chu Wangji didn’t even dare dream of them in the short term.

After all, within the sect, the higher one’s rank, the wealthier and longer-lived one became—and thus, the less likely anyone was to vacate their position.

“Those old bastards probably plan to cling to their posts for thousands, even tens of thousands of years.”

Meanwhile, Zhang Yu glanced at the overall Martial Dao Review Team rankings and found that the top spot belonged to a Level 2 Sect Affairs Officer from Team One, who had already amassed 108 points this month.

Zhang Yu mused inwardly, “One hundred and eight points? If I cultivate a few more martial arts this month—or use Infinite Martial Simulation to model additional techniques for review—I should be able to surpass that score.”

“Whether for spirit coins, Dao Merits, or rank advancement, I absolutely must push for the top spot in this performance ranking.”

As a newcomer to the sect, Zhang Yu knew he desperately lacked both spirit coins and Dao Merits.

Though the sect offered cultivators extraordinarily generous cultivation conditions, everything—from resources to opportunities—had to be exchanged for spirit coins and Dao Merits.

Sect-grade treasures, artifact frames, elixirs… and especially sect-grade manuals—were all avenues through which Zhang Yu could continue advancing once his foundational stats reached peak Nascent Soul.

Particularly sect-grade manuals…

“If I can complete a Chain Manual Diagram composed entirely of sect-grade techniques, it would greatly enhance both my work capabilities and my competitiveness within the sect.”

Ever since connecting to the Dharma Realm and gaining access to the catalog of purchasable sect-grade manuals, Zhang Yu had felt like a mouse tumbling into a rice jar—constantly browsing, clicking “favorite” on one manual after another.

Now, with a mere shift of his gaze, his collection of favored sect-grade manuals materialized before his eyes.

Some could supplement “Kunlun Overturned,” others could enhance “Infinite Martial Simulation,” and one entire set could even integrate into “Great Sage’s Heir.” Others promised to form formidable Chain Manual Diagrams with names like “Primordial Unity,” “Desire Heaven Demon Lord,” and “Empress Nüwa’s Creation”—titles that sounded undeniably powerful.

Without exception, however, every manual Zhang Yu had selected belonged to the sect-grade tier, with even the cheapest costing over a hundred thousand spirit coins and several hundred Dao Merits.

Zhang Yu thought grimly, “My monthly salary is more than enough to survive—but utterly insufficient if I want to climb higher.”

After ending his conversation with Chu Wangji, Zhang Yu returned to studying the foundational manuals in his possession.

Regardless of how Ye Xingli’s paperwork progressed, Zhang Yu had already decided—he would cultivate all twenty-four foundational manuals himself, transforming each into nourishment for his Nascent Soul Saint Body.

…

Just then, Qu Yizhi, leader of Martial Dao Team Three, unexpectedly approached Zhang Yu’s side.

The other team members watched in surprise, thinking, “The team leader came in person? This Zhang Yu must have some influence.”

Thanks to the powerful Dharma Realm, nearly all tasks and communications could be handled remotely. It had been ages since Chu Wangji and the others had seen their leader visit them physically.

Chu Wangji inwardly resolved, “Looks like it’s time to switch to Friend Mode.”

At that moment, Team Leader Qu Yizhi wore a faint smile as he looked calmly at Zhang Yu and said, “Xiao Yu, I have another small favor to ask…”

With that, he sent Zhang Yu the review materials for an intermediate-level martial art and added, “Before you leave work today, give me a preliminary report on this manual.”

Watching Zhang Yu obediently accept the task, Qu Yizhi nodded slightly and walked away without looking back—leaving Chu Wangji and the others utterly baffled.

Chu Wangji thought to himself, “If it was just about assigning a task… why come all the way here in person?”

But over the next few days, as Qu Yizhi kept piling more and more responsibilities onto Zhang Yu, Chu Wangji and the others gradually began to understand what was happening.

“With this much work dumped on him, will Zhang Yu even finish his own tasks?”

“Is this targeting Zhang Yu? Are they trying to exhaust him into ruin?”

Yet no one dared speak up for Zhang Yu in front of their superiors.

In fact, once they sensed Qu Yizhi’s maneuvering, nobody approached Zhang Yu voluntarily anymore. Chu Wangji, in particular, stopped sending him any messages at all. Under Qu Yizhi’s influence, they had unknowingly begun to isolate Zhang Yu.

(End of chapter)