As she saw Ray and Lily standing in the garden and looking at her, she immediately tensed and went outside to check if she had entered the garden of the wrong house.
After confirming she had entered her house, she cautiously approached Ray and asked: "Hello, who are you? What are you doing at my house? And where is my son?"
Ray felt her tense speech and waited for her to calm down and answer but then Jay skipped out of his house happily while shouting "Mom" and jumped in her arms with tears which interrupted Ray's chance to introduce himself.
Ray waited until the woman picked up her son and coaxed Jay to stop crying and asked him the reason for crying.
Jay said that he heard from the aunt who comes to the house daily to water the plants that you won't return as your ship which you left on was attacked and you might have been killed during the attack, so she said she won't come to work here again and asked me to prepare to move out of the inner city after the rent of the house expires.
The food that used to be delivered also stopped coming to the house yesterday, so I went outside to eat and heard a ship come with a large number of injured people, and a lot of people entered the inner city, so I went outside to look for you at the boat stop taking the House key with me but a bad uncle stopped me and took all the money in my pocket and I haven't eaten anything yesterday night.
This morning, I went back again but I met this uncle, and he scolded the bad uncle and drove him away, he also bought me food at the stall to eat with them and we shopped all in the morning now we have come back to check if you have returned.
The women patiently listened to Jay's talk without interrupting him and waited until he finished.
She then put Jay down and thanked Ray for his help.
She then invited them into the house and asked them to be seated in the hall, she then went inside the kitchen to make some tea and brought some snacks along with her.
After serving them tea and snacks, she sat on a chair, thanked them once again for helping Jay, and assured them she would pay compensation along with the original amount they spent on Jay.
Ray smiled and accepted her thanks but refused to accept any compensation.
After a back-and-forth discussion, Ray finally accepted her help to clear some doubt of his as compensation.
The woman then introduced herself as Jesica, she is a late qi training level cultivator who has 3 spirit roots fire, wood, and water spirit root while drinking tea with Ray.
Ray then sat up straight as he completed drinking the tea and began telling her about him.
"Hello, I'm Ray, and the girl that is sitting beside me is my sister, her name is Lily.
We have come far from here and I want your help to know the information about the city and its surrounding area as I have come here to settle down.
My cultivation is about the same as yours in the late stage of qi training and I have five elemental roots. Ray concluded while lying about his cultivation.
"Fellow Daoist, I will tell you as much as I know please ask me the information you want to know," Jesicca promised.
"Well, first I want to know more about the surroundings of this city and the composition of top families in the city," Ray asked.
Jessica thought for a few moments and spoke.
"You probably already know that the Black Rock family built this city after discovering the Black Rock mine."
"But before they built the city, Black Rock was a qi training realm family, and the ancestor of the black rock family was a "First level top grade" formation master."
"Later he discovered a second-level spirit vein after stumbling in the wilderness and reached the foundation establishment realm and returned to the city then sold his property to others and took his family with him and reached here to build this current city 100 years ago," Jessica explained.
"Now he is a second-level formation and mid-level foundation realm master aged at 160 years and still has a chance to reach the peak of the foundation realm."
"11 qi families are residing in the city, these families have surrendered to the Black Rock family and worked for him from 100 years ago and helped in black rock city.'
"There is a rumor in the outside world that the city lord was grateful for the contribution they made to build the city, so he has divided the city into twelve parts, and the 11 qi families will manage them for him and earn the share money from the shops and other business for their mortal families, the last part of the place will be actioned every ten years and those who bid most will get the place and managed by them. According to time, it has been 5 years since the auction concluded and the next auction will be in another 5 years."
"Only the security of the city will be in the hands of the city lord's mansion, as mandated by the top powerhouses in these wild lands. The city lords are responsible for training mortal martial artists and maintaining basic order," Jesica concluded.
"So, if I have to buy a property to set up a business in the inner and outer city should I contact the lord's mansion and buy them, or they will rent them every year," asked Ray
"Setting up a business in the inner city is easy, as long as you have spirit stones you can rent a shop, whether you can operate it or not depends entirely on your connections and survival ability in the competitive market, but the outer city is tightly controlled by the qi training families in the city, any business you set up will be additionally taxed and they will sabotage the shop reputation if they don't like them." Jessica cautioned him not to have hope in the outer city and become enemies with the Qi families by rashly setting up business.