Chapter 19: The Craftsman

The large office of the Cyriss Language Department was perpetually filled with the faint, lingering aroma of coffee throughout the year.

Coffee and tea were the preferred beverages of both the Sixth and Seventh Eras. The soil in the underground ruins of Maple Sugar City was well-suited for coffee cultivation; the Academy of Agricultural Sciences had leased a plot of land there to grow a hybrid bean from the Old Era and the Sixth Era, which was fuller and richer than the Arabica beans native to the Bise nation.

Consequently, drinking coffee was a trend in Maple Sugar City’s schools. After all, being at the source meant it was much cheaper than market price; if one chose tea instead, their wallet would struggle, as the higher-quality leaves that offered spiritual power enhancements were truly not inexpensive.

Teacher Liu looked up from her lesson plans, took a sip of coffee, adjusted her glasses, and gazed at Li Xingming.

Her opinion of Li Xingming was actually quite favorable—or rather, the boy wasn’t bad at heart; his thought process was simply a bit unconventional. Middle-aged women in the humanities were always much more lenient toward handsome male students.

"What are you skipping class for?"

"Going back to Sword Pavilion."

Sword Pavilion was the Li family’s stronghold in Maple Sugar City and the permanent residence of the current head of the family, the owner of Maple Sugar Heavy Industries, Li Shunzhe, a Fourth-Tier powerhouse.

Teacher Liu had heard that the Li children were expected to return to Sword Pavilion every week to pay their respects to the patriarch. However, Li Xingming’s father was currently in a state of estrangement from the family and hadn't been back in quite some time, and Li Xingming himself didn’t seem to have a particularly close relationship with his grandparents.

*Oh well,* she thought, *why worry about someone else’s family business?*

Noticing Teacher Liu lost in thought, Li Xingming added, "If you find it difficult to approve, I could recite another ancient folk ballad: 'The British Shorthair Silver Shaded Cat Kept by the Captain of the Demon King Subjugation Squad Takes a Poop in the Coffee Cup of Pulcinella, the Director of the Royal Mint'..."

"Don't!" The coffee cup in Teacher Liu’s hand wobbled violently. "I’m drinking coffee here, for heaven’s sake."

"Fair point."

"What I mean is, I’ll write you a leave slip so there’s an explanation if any administrators ask. There’s a provincial inspector in the city right now."

"Understood, meow."

Li Xingming took the slip and left. The office returned to its tranquil state.

A long while later, a teacher couldn’t help but speak up: "Actually, I was quite intrigued by the folk ballad he mentioned..."

"Don't. I don't want to be unable to drink coffee for the next entire week."

"Fair point."

***

A twelve-year-old Siyue touring edition sedan sped along the outskirts of Maple Sugar City.

After a forty-minute drive, he arrived at Sword Pavilion. After parking in the garage, Li Xingming bypassed the areas where he might encounter annoying relatives and headed straight for the workshop.

The family workshop provided fully equipped facilities for precision craftsmanship, available for free to all family members. Li Xingming intended to process the gravity-attribute pin he had pulled from the back of the mechanical hound’s head into a handy weapon to give to Jiang Qianqian.

The public workshop at Maple Sugar No. 1 High School was a bit of a disaster; the machines were outdated and materials were scarce. Who knew how much the procurement department was skimming off the top each year? The family workshop at Sword Pavilion was not only high-quality but free—it would be a waste not to take advantage of it.

*The perks of a conglomerate, kid!*

When Li Xingming walked into the workshop with his backpack, several people were pacing around a workbench in a state of anxiety, discussing things in a flurry of voices.

"No, this part needs to be messier... the rune circuitry is too dense. How could a middle schooler have this kind of skill?"

"Damn it, I didn't even struggle this much when I was designing spiritual power circuits at FAB back in the day."

"I think we should add some burn marks to make it look like a botched attachment..."

Li Xingming recognized that the ones operating the equipment were the tutors who had just started working at Sword Pavilion this year. In just a few months, they had transformed from high-spirited graduates of prestigious universities into stressed professionals with rapidly receding hairlines. They were responsible for the tutoring of one of Li Xingming’s cousins.

"Busy, Brother Wu?"

"Oh, Xingming, you're here." The tutor smiled helplessly. "It’s a manual labor assignment from school; they have to build a rune-powered automatic table tennis server."

"I recall my cousin... Li Xingbo, is it? That sounds right. He’s only in his first year of middle school." Li Xingming paused. "Has the pressure in the first year of middle school reached this level now?"

"No choice. Xingbo attends the newly built experimental middle school. They’re keeping pace with the big cities, focusing on advanced education. We’ve been at this since this morning..."

"Then why isn't he doing it himself?"

"..."

"Fair enough." Li Xingming leaned in to look at the half-finished product on the workbench. "You’re all engineering graduates from legitimate universities; building a toy shouldn't be this difficult."

"That’s the problem! Because we’ve had professional training, the stuff we make is too neat. If you take this to school and say a middle schooler made it? It’s a dead giveaway."

"Got it, meow."

***

The cousin had limited ability, but the Li family’s strict educational requirements had landed him in a school that exceeded his capacity. To finish his homework and keep up, he had no choice but to trouble his tutors to cheat for him.

Bloodlines can be inherited, but IQ cannot.

The tutors had tried to help Li Xingming’s cousin finish the assignment, but they had encountered the "Curse of Knowledge." This cognitive bias refers to the difficulty of returning to a state of ignorance once you possess certain knowledge; you become blinded by what you already know.

The most typical example is mathematics: it is incredibly difficult for a student with excellent mathematical ability to imitate the way someone who doesn't understand the subject writes out a solution. The same holds true in other fields. A child who hasn't been exposed to basic physics might copy the symbol for "water density" in their notes as "urine," and trying to imitate that level of absurdity is something a grown adult can hardly manage.

As the old saying goes: *Being a novice takes a minute; acting like one takes a lifetime.*

The crux of the problem was that the tutors wanted to fake a middle schooler’s work, but they couldn't capture the authentic "flavor."

It was a melancholy situation. The high salary at the Li household wasn't easy to earn; although there was less overtime than at outside companies, one was prone to encountering all sorts of bizarre, tiresome tasks.

"Let me try."

Li Xingming signaled for them to make space. The tutors nodded and hurriedly cleared a spot. They didn’t have much contact with Li Xingming, but most of their interactions had taken place right here in the Sword Pavilion workshop.

*This kid has talent.*

Manual dexterity is a mysterious and independent dimension of ability. Some people are excellent at taking tests, awaken their transcendent powers smoothly, have great synergy with their magic spirits, and even get into top-tier national universities—yet they would struggle to craft a simple chamber pot.

There was a specific path called the "Artisan" path, suitable for those with exceptional manual talent. The tutor didn't know if that was the path Li Xingming had chosen, but judging by his perspective as a graduate of a top-three national university, if Li Xingming wanted to pursue the "Artisan" path, he would absolutely succeed.

Li Xingming was very seasoned at manual work. Could he really fake the technique of a middle schooler?

*I’ll just have to trust him for now. Maybe this guy has a real knack for being a fraud.*