The snowy night had no moon. The cold wind howled through the pitch-black mountains, whimpering like a mountain ghost. The roof of the ruined village house had a great hole in it. Snowflakes drifted down through the gap, while the light-pattern lamp on the wall and a crackling bonfire lit up the shabby room.
Xu Yuan sat on a blanket, wrapped in a dark brown sable cloak, fiddling with a black porcelain pot about half a foot tall. Inside the pot was tonight’s supper for him and Ran Qingmo.
A white fierce bird, already chopped into pieces. Ran Qingmo had hunted the bird yesterday. It was small, but its strength was no joke.
With Xu Yuan’s current abilities, even ten of him together probably would not be a match for this little bird, which was less than half a foot long.
That, however, did not stop it from being excellent food.
Amid the clinking of bottles and jars, Xu Yuan took all kinds of seasonings from his Sumeru Ring and added them into the black pot one by one. Once that was done, he sealed the pot and placed it on the rack above the bonfire, letting the fierce flames stew and marinate the meat.
The fresh meat of the white fierce bird was firm and tight. Only this method could get the flavor properly into it before roasting.
After finishing all that, Xu Yuan went outside, washed his hands with snow, then immediately scurried back into the blanket and sat down again.
It was deep winter, the twelfth month. It really was freezing. Though he had stepped onto the path of cultivation, anyone below fourth rank was still, for all practical purposes, mortal.
He was starting to miss the flame spirit fluid from before. Sure, it came with an aphrodisiac side effect, but when it came to keeping out the cold, it was first-rate.
Fortunately, with the Sumeru Ring, he could carry all sorts of things. Inside this broken-down house, aside from the bonfire, there was also a furnace engraved with a flame gathering array.
The wait for the meat to stew and marinate was rather long. Gradually, as Xu Yuan looked out at the abandoned mountain village buried beneath the snow, his thoughts began to wander.
After gathering the remains of Gui Qi, burying him, and setting up a gravestone, Xu Yuan and Ran Qingmo had headed north in search of the secret realm.
It took them a month and a half to finally reach the Goddess Peaks, where the secret realm was located. Then a very serious problem appeared before them. They could not find the entrance. In Azure Point, the Goddess Peaks consisted of only twelve small maps. In reality, they stretched five hundred kilometers from west to east, with the tallest peaks rising over 30,000 feet.
Xu Yuan had actually expected this. The cave estate in the Myriad Ascents Mountain Range had been easy to find because the Suspended Heaven Cliff was highly distinctive. But secret realms hidden deep in a mountain range naturally would not be so simple.
Using information from his previous life, Xu Yuan could roughly confirm that the entrance to the secret realm was in the northwest part of the Goddess Peaks, and that there was a river nearby flowing down from the summit.
As for the rest, Xu Yuan’s original plan was to rely on Ran Qingmo’s absurdly high Luck stat and her formidable cultivation to find it.
Following the river, Xu Yuan and Ran Qingmo found this long-abandoned village and settled here temporarily.
This was where the two had stayed for the next two weeks.
Ran Qingmo had come back with something every day. Every night, that iceberg of a woman would bring back a few souvenirs. Sometimes it was a hundred-year-old spiritual herb. Sometimes it was some precious ore. Sometimes it was a rare demonic beast suitable for medicinal cuisine.
Her lucky emperor bloodline truly lived up to its name. The problem was that the Chancellor’s Manor had all those things too. What Xu Yuan wanted was the secret art hidden inside that secret realm.
With that secret art, he would be able to cultivate automatically twenty-four hours a day.
Thinking of this, Xu Yuan sighed and pulled his thoughts back.
Judging by the time, she should be back soon.
As he stewed and marinated the white fierce bird over the fire, he waited for Ran Qingmo to return. Time slipped by quietly.
About half an hour later, a rustling sound suddenly came from outside the house. It was the crisp crunch of boots stepping through snow.
Hearing it, Xu Yuan smiled faintly, but the next moment, he frowned. There was more than one set of footsteps. Had that iceberg of a woman picked up a living person today?
Just as he was wondering, a strange female voice sounded outside. It was very young, so young it still carried a hint of childishness.
“Hey, Blockhead, why did you stop? The snow is so heavy tonight. Hurry up and get inside.”
Then came a man’s voice from outside.
“There’s someone inside.”
“So what if there’s someone inside? In all of Li Family Village, this is the only house still mostly intact. Senior Brother Qi and the others usually spend the night here.” The young woman clearly did not care.
“If there’s someone inside, we need his permission first,” the man said.
The woman fell silent for a moment, then asked tentatively, “And if he doesn’t agree, where exactly are you planning to sleep tonight?”
The man pondered briefly, then answered, “There’s a cave ten miles ahead.”
“Ten miles?!”
The woman’s voice rose slightly. “Go if you want. I’m not walking anymore. Not in snow this heavy.”
As the young woman spoke, her voice drew closer to the ruined house.
After a second of silence, her embarrassed and annoyed voice rang out again. “Li Erzhu, why are you pulling me?”
Li Erzhu said stubbornly, “We need his permission first.”
After a brief tug-of-war, the woman seemed unable to break free. Huffing in anger, she shouted toward the firelit interior of the house.
“Hey, you inside. Stop pretending to be dead. This blockhead said it so loudly, you must have heard him, right?”
All right. So they probably had not been picked up by that iceberg of a woman.
Still, Xu Yuan did not answer right away. Judging from their conversation, the two seemed rather familiar with this place. And anyone able to travel mountain roads on a snowy night like this was most likely a cultivator. Their cultivation probably was not weak either.
After a brief pause, Xu Yuan said slowly, “Come in.”
As soon as his voice rang out, Li Erzhu immediately released the woman’s wrist and replied, “Thank you.”
The creak of boots crunching through snow sounded again, and two figures appeared outside the door.
Xu Yuan finally got a clear look at them.
The man wore a clean blue, close-fitting martial outfit, thin and unlined. On his back were a sword and a bulging cloth sack. He looked to be just over twenty, with an ordinary face and an honest, simple air about him.
The woman wore a red outfit resembling a qipao, with a thick fur cloak draped over her shoulders. She also carried a sword. Her features looked extremely young and pure, but the qipao on her body was very not small.
After entering the house, she patted the snow off herself, setting off a rather tempting sway.
Xu Yuan watched the pair. His soul intent flickered out slightly, and a moment later, he began muttering to himself inwardly.
To avoid unnecessary trouble, he did not use his soul intent to probe their cultivation deeply. He only gave the surrounding source qi fluctuations a quick check. Casually examining someone’s cultivation out in the wilderness was basically the same as telling them, “Draw your weapon. I’m about to fight you.”
But even that light check revealed something odd.
The woman was normal. Her body gave off waves of aura from circulating her cultivation art to ward off the cold. Judging by the fluctuations, her cultivation should be about the same as his.
The man, however, was strange. In weather this cold, he wore only a single thin layer, yet there were no source qi fluctuations from any cultivation method being used to keep warm.
Was he in the Body Integration Realm? Only those who had reached fourth rank and beyond could ignore bitter cold and scorching heat. Ran Qingmo was like that.
After setting out on this journey, Xu Yuan had encountered many things. Travelers asking for shelter in the middle of the night. Refugees fleeing across the land. He had even run into mountain bandits who blocked the road at night to rob people, together with Ran Qingmo. But a high-level cultivator? This was the first one he had met since leaving Stillwater.
A fourth rank cultivator around twenty years old. He was probably a genius from some sect. And near the Goddess Peaks, there did happen to be a sect called the Myriad Manifestations Sect.
While Xu Yuan was studying the two of them, they were studying him as well.
A trace of surprise flashed through the young woman’s eyes.
Li Erzhu’s eyes, on the other hand, were full of vigilance.
The scene before them was truly strange.
Half the room was ruined. The other half was luxurious.
The light-pattern lamp on the wall, the tiger-skin rug that covered almost half the floor, the incense slowly releasing wisps of green smoke, the tea tray made of redwood, the expensive porcelain cups, and the person seated calmly on a meditation cushion.
The Li Family Village had been slaughtered ten years ago.
Seeing such extravagant furnishings in this abandoned village was very wrong.
Li Erzhu shifted sideways, putting himself in front of the woman. His hand moved back to grip the sword hilt behind him. He stared at Xu Yuan in silence for two seconds.
Then he asked, “Are you human?”
Silence lasted for several breaths.
“You think I’m a ghost?” Xu Yuan raised a finger and pointed at himself, his expression turning rather strange.
Even with Ran Qingmo absent, he was not particularly panicked. After all, he still had his old grandpa in the ring.
Though ever since their trip through the ghost fog, that old grandpa had spent most of his time shutting himself away inside the soul ring, only occasionally popping out to say a few words.
Still, he was definitely there.
Li Erzhu nodded. “Mhm.”
Xu Yuan asked, “Why?”
“You can’t possibly be carrying this many things on you.” Li Erzhu held his sword in a reverse grip, his gaze deadly serious. “A high rank ghost’s illusion is hard to distinguish from reality.”
Xu Yuan fell silent.
“You’re the ghost here, Li Erzhu!” The young woman in a qipao poked her head out from behind Li Erzhu, took a look, then shoved the man from behind and scolded him in a sweet, annoyed voice. “Put your sword away. That’s a Sumeru Ring!”
Li Erzhu glanced at her, looking somewhat puzzled. “Sumeru Ring?”
The young woman rolled her eyes and ignored him. She walked around Li Erzhu and stopped a few meters in front of Xu Yuan, then cupped her fists with a bright, straightforward air.
“Myriad Manifestations Sect, Zhou Xiaohe. We were rude just now. Please don’t take offense, Young Master. My senior brother has always been a little wooden.”
Xu Yuan raised an eyebrow. Some information flashed through his mind, and then he smiled and waved it off. “No harm done. When you’re out in the world, a little caution is never a bad thing.”
After a pause, he added, “Listening Wind Tower, Zhou Chen.”
Lady Lou Ji’s Listening Wind Tower had quite a good reputation as an intelligence organization, and it was suitably mysterious.
When Zhou Xiaohe heard this, surprise flickered through her eyes. Then she smiled gracefully. “So the young master is from the Zhou Clan as well. What a coincidence.”
Xu Yuan took out two meditation cushions from his Sumeru Ring and sent them floating over with source qi. “It is quite a coincidence. I’m only borrowing this place for the night myself, so I won’t play host. You two can sit wherever you like.”
Seeing the cushions appear out of thin air, Zhou Xiaohe’s dark, bright eyes shifted slightly. She thanked him. “After traveling all this way, if not for you, my senior brother and I might not even have had a place to sit once we got here. Thank you, truly.”
Xu Yuan had no intention of continuing the conversation.
This girl could recognize a Sumeru Ring, and her surname was Zhou. She was probably connected to the Sect Master of the Myriad Manifestations Sect somehow. Right now, he and Ran Qingmo were searching for a secret realm on someone else’s turf, so getting too familiar with the locals was not ideal.
Seeing this, Zhou Xiaohe’s pretty eyes flashed. She did not rashly keep talking either. Instead, she cupped her fists again. “Then my senior brother and I will be disturbing you and your younger sister tonight.”
Xu Yuan froze inwardly. Younger sister? Is Ran Qingmo already back?
While he was wondering, Zhou Xiaohe’s eyes curved into smiling crescents, and she waved behind him. “Little sister, you’re so adorable.”
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