It was afternoon, and members of the Cang Li Tribe temporarily staying at Zao Mei Manor bustled about, packing up and getting ready to leave. In the incident at Burial Immortal Town, nearly a thousand of the tribe were killed or injured, and countless foreign coffins were lost.
Although that group of Buddha-Delivering bandits had retreated, there were many strange and abnormal details about them. This matter was serious, and Cang Li had to hurry back to the tribe to report every detail to the tribal elders, while also worrying that another calamity might arise.
Gao Huan, who suffered from a “congenital speech disorder,” did not speak with anyone and boarded his vehicle early. He was very gifted with languages and was fluent in four foreign tongues, so he was not at all worried about the communication barrier he would face alone.
He was confident that he could learn the language of this world in no time. Cang Li led a group of elite tribe warriors out of the manor. Alongside him were two tall, mysterious women wearing veils.
One of them was actually a Pure Immortal Body; her skin was as smooth and clear as jade, and she carried an air of cold aloofness. Ever since they met in the Departing Spirit Fog Domain, Cang Li hadn’t once heard her speak.
The other woman was dressed in a red garment, with a white-bone wind chime tied around her waist. She was cheerful and very talkative. They were the “lost ones” who had accidentally stumbled into the Fog Domain, named Qi Shanshan and Cai Yutong respectively.
It was Cang Li who had rescued them. Cang Li had seen countless beautiful women with Pure Immortal Bodies before, yet even among them, beauty varied. He would never forget the stunning impression Cai Yutong had made on him at their first meeting.
To have the opportunity to play the part of the hero saving a beauty like her—despite the dangers faced this time retrieving foreign coffins—could be seen as a twist of fate, a blessing in disguise.
“We sisters plan to go to Nine Li City first. If it’s not along your way, we won’t trouble the Young Clan Leader…”
Before Qi Shanshan could finish her sentence, Cang Li chuckled and said, “What a coincidence! I need to return to the Cang Li Tribe as well, and then set off immediately for Nine Li City.
Moreover, since going to Nine Li City naturally requires passing through the Cang Li Tribe’s territory, you two can come as guests to our tribe first.”
“Not many first-rate men can match both an extraordinary heroic bearing and a sense of responsibility when doing what is right. He’s also so hospitable and sincere—I’ve never seen a man like him before,” said Qi Shanshan with a graceful bow as she pulled Cai Yutong up into the foremost, largest, and most splendid carriage in the convoy.
When Gao Huan lifted the carriage curtain and looked ahead, he saw that both women were already on board. Standing next to the carriage, Cang Li tidied his clothes. Despite having faced off against the top experts of the Buddha-Delivering bandits without ever feeling nervous, he now found an unexpected anxiety welling in himself.
“We’re about to set off right away. By the way, where’s that girl Li Ling?” he asked.
From behind, an older martial practitioner replied, “Fourth Sister said she had an urgent matter at the last minute, so we needn’t wait for her.”
“Urgent matter? At Demon Pass, what could she possibly have?”
Cang Li mused. Knowing his sister’s cultivation level and her decisive character, he didn’t press the matter further. Instead, he consciously tried to appear refined and gentle as he boarded the carriage. …
Li Weiyi rode alone, holding the whip to drive his carriage along the firm earthen road by the river. The Beast Li Tribe retrieved foreign coffins several times a year, and they traveled more often along land than by water.
Therefore, this road was built extremely wide and was lined on both sides with ancient thousand-year-old willows and century-old great mulberry trees. Peeking through the quickly retreating gaps between the tree trunks, one could see massive bronze ships—mighty and warlike—sailing along the broad waters of the Sui River.
These ships were loaded with foreign coffins, and tribe warriors carrying blades and weapons patrolled the decks diligently. It was clear that, with a small detachment under his command, Cang Li was paying courtesy to the Beast Li Tribe, so he led the way on land.
The main body of the Cang Li Tribe and their foreign coffins followed by water. The carriage, however, was a bit slower. By the time Li Weiyi could see Burial Immortal Town in the distance, night had already fallen.
The sun had set, leaving behind a fiery red sunset glow on the horizon.
“Old Zhao said that the wilds at night are far from peaceful—Departed Spirits and Evil Spirits become unusually active, and you might even run into vicious insects or cursed monsters. Since we’re still at least two or three hundred miles away from the edge of the Blood Sea, why not spend the night in Burial Immortal Town?”
Li Weiyi didn’t know much about the eerie legends surrounding Burial Immortal Town and felt no special trepidation about them. It was just that too many people had died there yesterday, which had left him with a slight unease. He had already experienced brutal battles and witnessed the terrifying Soul Sea.
Therefore, even if the surroundings of the market town were stained with blood, he wasn’t the least bit afraid. All the corpses had been cleared away. Only a few small creatures—never before seen—scurried through the grass, licking up the blood in the mud.
Upon arriving at Burial Immortal Town, Li Weiyi got off the carriage and led his sturdy horse forward. The sky had grown even darker, the sunset glow having turned into a cold hue.
Light mists drifted out slowly from between the mountains and fields or surged up from the roaring waterfall known as the Killing Dragon Mouth, gradually blurring Li Weiyi’s vision. Every time he turned around warily, Li Weiyi always felt as though something was following him.
“Am I being paranoid? This place is no haven of peace. I surely hope no Bone Demons or Camel Bell Ghost Creatures suddenly show up.”
Along the earthen road at the entrance of the town, many huge stone statues stood in a row stretching for several kilometers. Their heads were enormous—some weighing tens of thousands of pounds, even up to several hundred thousand—and all gazed in the same direction. Li Weiyi thought they looked a bit like those giant stone statues on Easter Island.
He paused and looked in the direction they faced. In the distance, a towering mountain resembling a pyramid had a flock of birds circling around it, with low-hanging clouds making the dark bluish night sky appear extraordinarily majestic and magnificent.
Not only along the roadside but even on the banks of the Sui River far off, countless stone statues could be seen.
“Burial Immortal Town… Could it really be the resting place of an immortal?”
Li Weiyi muttered to himself with a laugh, then led the carriage into the desolate market town, which had been stained a dark red by blood. Without wandering too far, he found an intact courtyard in one of the better-preserved houses and went straight inside. Soon, a fire was lit in the courtyard.
Amid the dark night surrounded by mountains, it shone like a solitary lamp. Li Weiyi transferred one bag of food after another from his carriage into the space contained within the Evil Camel Bell. Ever since he opened the third spring eye, he had been able to drive the Evil Camel Bell to expand further.
“I wonder if I can summon that three- or four-meter-tall camel— it seems strong enough to carry objects. Who knows, maybe that bell even holds an entire camel caravan inside…” he mused.
“Perhaps I should wait until my cultivation level is a bit higher before attempting it.”
After transferring all the food, Li Weiyi picked up the Evil Camel Bell. Noticing that its weight hadn’t obviously changed only reinforced his sense that this object was extraordinary. Whoever mastered such an object must have been an astonishing existence in life—just imagine how formidable Yutuo Nan must have been.
So why isn’t he as famous as those who observed the mist of the Chan Sea? Sitting by the fire, Li Weiyi took out a can of Golden Crow Blood and took a sip. Suddenly, it struck him that his rapid breakthrough in cultivation might very well be thanks to the Golden Crow Blood.
The Golden Crow was far from an ordinary bird; its blood was precious beyond measure. In this world, even a talented martial cultivator would only manage to open four spring eyes after ten years of grueling practice. Even if Zhao Zhizhuo exaggerated the difficulty, it probably wasn’t that far off.
And here he was—a mere mortal, not even a freak or a Pure Immortal Body—wondering why his progress was so rapid. It might very well be because of the Golden Crow Blood! Li Weiyi finally pieced everything together and decided that on the return trip to the Bronze Ship, he would insist on taking extra Golden Crow Blood.
It might even be worth trying to slice off several dozen jin of Golden Crow Meat and Black Flood Dragon Meat. He then took out the cultivation manual given to him by Cang Li titled Nine Springs Outline and began to study it carefully.
The method for cultivating into the Spring Surge Realm wasn’t particularly mysterious; with enough money, one could buy such techniques in many places. But what made the Nine Springs Outline so valuable was that it recorded the unique insights and experiences of several martial experts of the Nine Li Tribe.
By studying it closely, young cultivators could more easily awaken their spring eyes. Cang Li himself understood that a mere manual like the Nine Springs Outline could never repay the great favor he had received. He had only promised Li Weiyi that in the future, if needed, he would provide him with cultivation techniques beyond the Spring Surge Realm.
The Nine Springs Outline was simply a gift among friends, not a matter of repaying a debt or favor.
“Law—inner life force that grows within and then materializes as spirit.”
“The Way, results, and Nirvana are all manifestations of the Law, present everywhere, permeating the entire universe.” …
As Li Weiyi read and pondered these passages, he worked to understand them. He had learned some of the characters of this world’s written language from his senior sister, and he could comprehend about 30 or 40 percent of it. He had to rely on the diagrams to understand the text—more obscure than reading Classical Chinese.
Essentially, the outline explained that the Law was the energy of heaven and earth, filling every matter in the world; yet low-level cultivators couldn’t see or feel it. The Law was like water in the soil.
By using a breathing technique, a cultivator could draw the Law closer, then open their spring eye to allow the Law to pour into their body, transforming their physical flesh into a material form to be used as personal power. The stronger one’s breathing technique, the more Law one could draw in at the same level of cultivation.
With intense consumption, this power lasted longer—enough to fight all day without depleting one’s life force. The more spring eyes opened, the more robust the body became and the greater the amount of Law that could be used.
“Jade Void Breathing Technique must be very powerful. Even on that night when I was pursued by the Thousand-Headed Dragon Vine, I was only physically exhausted—the Law within me never ran dry.”
That thought settled in Li Weiyi’s mind as he skipped over the section on the breathing technique recorded in the Nine Springs Outline, moving directly to the diagram of trace meridians. The diagram had a man on the left page and a woman on the right page.
Both images were crisscrossed with countless fine lines in white, red, silver, and gold—lines that extended from the nine major acupoints of the human body.
“Does everyone have a different color and number of trace meridians in their body?”
Li Weiyi mused that he likely didn’t need a trace meridian diagram, because every time he opened a spring eye, he would inadvertently let a dozen or so silver trace meridians emerge. It wasn’t that troublesome after all. What piqued his interest in the Nine Springs Outline even more were the nine spring eyes mentioned in the text.
He was eager to know exactly where they were located and how to activate them. So far, the three spring eyes he had opened were all achieved by mere chance, completely accidental and without any method.
Without the aid of precious ingredients like Golden Crow Blood, even opening one spring eye would have been an incredible stroke of luck for a common mortal like him.
(End of Chapter)