Chuckling subtly, Long Hua remarks—
"In the practitioner circle, Nian beasts of such caliber would make for fine mounts. Although, depending on one's needs, anything that can be carved off their bodies could become great materials for crafting magic treasures."
Ignoring Long Hua's crude remark, Zhen Qing Huai asks—
"Lao Bai, what cultivation realm do you think those Nian beasts had reached during their prime?"
"Hmm."
Towards the question, Bai Wen ponders for a brief instance, prior to replying—
"Heaven Manifestation realm equivalent perhaps? If it was anything less, they couldn't possibly still possess their bestial traits—even if their souls are much stronger than average."
As Zhen Qing Huai refills her cup with tea, Long Hua asks—
"So then, what does this make of those Moon Guards?"
"Those Moon Guards, I suspect them to need adjustments every now and then, don't they?"
"Un."
Receiving a nod from Long Hua, Bai Wen goes on to say—
"The laws of this world, they craft a body—that is tailor-made for the weapon spirits; meaning each body is designed to fit a unique soul. You can consider the non-Moon Guard bodies to be order-made goods, while the Moon Guard bodies are basically a one-size may not fit all sort of item."
In response to the examples that Bai Wen had made, Long Hua laughs aloud.
"Still, there's no denying that those one-size may not fit all items are powerful—if the soul in them is able to adjust to it, instead of the other way around."
Thinking from Bai Wen's proposed angle, Long Hua suddenly realizes something, and remarks—
"I see. So that's why the Moon Guards have a difficult time living through the various phases of their birth."
Adding to this, Bai Wen says—
"Light case scenario, the soul that inhabits the Moon Guard body gets damaged, but can be reused. Worse scenario, however, is that the soul gets damaged beyond repair."
Sipping a cup of tea, Zhen Qing Huai remarks—
"Lao Long, the eyes you were using to look at that Nian beast are far from kind."
"…"
In response to this remark, Long Hua doesn't say anything, and merely puts on a venomous smile.
Knowing what Long Hua's true personality is like, Zhen Qing Huai isn't surprised, as she shakes her head.
(Ai, poor girl really.)
The reason Zhen Qing Huai puts so much distance between the denizens of this world and herself is because they are weapon spirits—so long as they are trapped in this world, they are forever destined to die, and start their lives anew; that is until the day they are taken out of this world by a practitioner of the Ling Yuan family to be used as a tool.
Making friends with someone like that—only to lose them; once or twice may be fine, but anything more than that, the pain of parting would be far too much to handle.
As Long Hua fills his cup with wine, he asks—
"Lao Zhen, how goes your spirit herb cigar project?"
"Sales officially begin tomorrow."
"Oh? Congratulations then."
With a conflicted look on her face, Zhen Qing Huai says—
"This isn't the only thing I want to sell, dammit… Even if it makes me a lot of money, a merchant should have more variety…"
Hearing this remark, Bai Wen can't help but turn to Zhen Qing Huai like she's just a picky eater, and replies—
"Well, what can you do? Practitioners are able to fly, while motorized vehicles require gasoline, or electricity to move. It's a no-brainer which of the two is more efficient—if a practitioner simply wants to get around."
Out of boredom, Long Hua asks—
"Can't you just simply ban flight in the city, and force the practitioners to take motorized transport instead?"
"That's incredibly difficult to enforce without a powerful group of practitioners… Ai, in the end, motorized vehicles in the Everlasting Spirit Realm just aren't doable. You can't expect me to build a massive number of gas and recharge stations everywhere. …Our world simply isn't built to accept them. Also… That's just one city—on a single planet, there's more than 50,000 planets in the entirety of the star region. No one has the capital to pull something like that off, and even if they did, they'd only bleed. They can't possibly recoup their losses."
As Zhen Qing Huai talks in a rapid manner, Bai Wen and Long Hua can easily guess how much thought she had put into this.
(Ai, would be a different story in the Earthborn Elementals' Realm.)
Ignoring the Tai Xuan Emperor's remark, Long Hua asks—
"I assume, you're at least able to sell household furniture items with ease?"
"To a certain degree, I can."
Downing her cup of tea, Zhen Qing Huai adds—
"But you can only make so much off of those. My customers are mainly mortals, I need to set the price to be an amount that the mortals are able to afford with their meager spirit stone income. However, doing so means I won't be able to make as much off practitioners. It would be unfair to charge a practitioner 100 spirit stones for one table, while a mortal simply needs to pay ten, right?"
Feeling rather impressed for some odd reason, Long Hua remarks—
"The fact that you're still able to keep yourself afloat in such a shitty situation is quite impressive to me."
"That's because I don't just sell items from the Leng Bing Realm. Also, there's a few eccentrics out there who adores the aesthetics of the Leng Bing Realm, so I charge them plenty for custom pieces of furniture, or miscellaneous orders. …One time, there was this practitioner who wanted a transportation vessel that was modeled after sports car. Attempting to reconfigure the vehicle into something that can run on spirit stones, the task itself wasn't too difficult, and I thought that I might be able to make the notion a trend, but the demographics for such vehicles were still on the low side. …Would be a different story if I were to get a powerful expert to help with promotions."
Judging by the light in Zhen Qing Huai's eyes, it's quite clear that she hasn't given up on the idea yet.
"Ai, the development of this city… I could consider it to be a hobby—at least, for the time being."
Towards Zhen Qing Huai's final remark, Long Hua shakes his head.
The fact that they're able to consider the development of a city to be just a hobby, this person definitely has far too much disposable income from whatever else they're selling. That being the case—
"Lao Zhen, give me some advance payment."
"Hm? What do you intend to do?"
"Ai, the thing is…"