Chapter 5: The Strange Uncle [Thanks to the Ally Xiao Hehe]

“I don’t know either!” Ji Wenyue looked around and said.

“What? You don’t know either? How can you not know? If you didn’t know, why didn’t you leave a survivor?” Xia Daoming was stunned, his mouth firing off reprimands like a machine gun.

“I, I…” Ji Wenyue hadn’t expected Xia Daoming to be so friendly earlier, his gaze so “kind,” yet now he was berating her nonstop—she was startled and lowered her head, feeling wronged.

“You, what?” Xia Daoming snapped.

He had been lost all by himself, fine and dandy—now he had to babysit a rich girl.

What good is a weapon if it terrifies people? Better to have an extra sack of water.

Thinking of water, Xia Daoming sprinted up the hillock.

“When I was being chased, I panicked and ran blindly, so I had no idea where I ended up. And just now, I was worried you couldn’t beat Liao Min, so I struck hard without thinking,” Ji Wenyue said, lifting her head, her eyes glistening, trying to win some sympathy.

There was no choice—the desert stretched endlessly, the sun was about to set, and if this strange uncle flew off in a rage and abandoned her, she’d be doomed.

Having survived over thirty days in the desert, living off the wind and sleeping under the open sky, Xia Daoming’s hair was wild and his beard unkempt; though his voice sounded young, he looked thoroughly worn and aged.

Especially his gaze—shrewd and seasoned.

As Ji Wenyue lifted her head, the weapon suddenly surged violently.

It turned out Xia Daoming hadn’t been listening to her at all—he was rummaging through Liao Min’s body.

After searching Liao Min, he went through the other five corpses.

Finally, Xia Daoming led over all six horses.

At this point, Ji Wenyue had calmed herself and went to retrieve the saddlebags hanging from her dead horse.

“Big brother, which way do we go now?” Ji Wenyue asked.

“How old are you?” Xia Daoming replied with a counter-question.

“Ah, uh, I’m seventeen this year,” Ji Wenyue paused, then answered honestly.

“Only seventeen? No wonder rich families raise their kids so well!” Xia Daoming was startled, his eyes swept over the weapon again, deeply impressed.

“Big brother, the sun’s almost down—where exactly should we go?” Ji Wenyue gave Xia Daoming a weary glance and asked again.

She was slowly getting used to his erratic speech and his seasoned gaze.

“Miss Ji, I’m twenty-four this year!” Xia Daoming dodged the question.

“What? You’re only twenty-four?” This time it was Ji Wenyue’s turn to be stunned.

Aside from his young voice, she couldn’t see a single sign he was twenty-four.

“Does it make sense to call a twenty-four-year-old man ‘big uncle’?” Xia Daoming was speechless at her sluggish reaction.

“Ah!” Ji Wenyue finally caught on, quickly saying: “Oh, then I’ll call you big brother.”

“Sigh, honestly, it’s been years since a young, beautiful girl like you called me big brother,” Xia Daoming suddenly grew melancholic.

“Ah!” Even though Ji Wenyue came from a prominent family and had seen many scenes, being told she was young and beautiful by a man like him made her cheeks flush crimson.

Under the setting sun, Ji Wenyue’s cheeks glowed, her legs long and slender, the weapon upright—Xia Daoming’s heart surged.

Youth is wonderful!

The setting sun glowed like blood.

A young man and a young woman each rode a horse, heading toward the distant, faintly visible outline of mountains.

The man held another horse by the reins.

The horse carried several saddlebags.

The man and woman were naturally Xia Daoming and Ji Wenyue.

Horses need fodder and water.

With the road ahead uncertain, Xia Daoming kept only two horses for riding, one to carry supplies, and released the other three to roam free.

Whether they lived or died now depended entirely on their fate.

Along the way, Xia Daoming had learned Ji Wenyue’s background.

She came from the Ji family of Licheng, major herbal merchants.

Though merely a woman, she had shown astonishing talent in herbal preparation since childhood.

Many incomplete ancient formulas left by the Ji family were revived through her hands.

Because of her, Ji Family’s Changchun Hall had seen booming business.

Thus, though only seventeen, her status within the family was pivotal.

Recently, the Ji family received word from their branch store in Eya City in the north: someone had come to sell a five-hundred-year-old Fengyao herb.

A five-hundred-year-old Fengyao herb was no trivial matter; the storekeeper’s ability to identify herbs was limited, he feared being fooled, and the herb’s price was exorbitant—he couldn’t make the decision himself, so he sent a messenger to report to the proprietor.

The Ji family took the five-hundred-year-old Fengyao herb seriously and immediately dispatched a fifth-rank Wu Shi elder to accompany Ji Wenyue to Eya City.

But halfway there, they were ambushed and attacked by the northern rival, Baiyao Hall.

Ji Wenyue escaped thanks to the elder’s desperate distraction, but was eventually caught—had she not met Xia Daoming, not only would many of the Ji family’s herbal secrets have fallen into Baiyao Hall’s hands, but Ji Wenyue herself would have been imprisoned and forced into unpaid labor for them.

“Where did you get this miraculous talisman?” Xia Daoming pulled out the paper-like talisman, his expression grave.

“This talisman was passed down by our Ji family ancestors; there are only a few left. Because of my special status in the family, I was granted two,” Ji Wenyue said, her eyes fixed on the talisman in Xia Daoming’s hand.

Xia Daoming swiftly tucked the talisman away, hidden against his body, and asked: “Where did your Ji family get this talisman? Does that mean gods and demons still exist in this world?”

“I don’t know for sure, but cultivators definitely exist.”

“Cultivators?” Xia Daoming’s heart jolted, his mood sinking heavily.

Once, he had longed for the legendary freedom of immortals who “journeyed to the Northern Sea by morning and the Western Mountains by evening.”

But this world was already dangerous enough; he’d finally gained some self-preservation power, and had the system on his side. As long as he didn’t act recklessly or court death, and steadily built up his strength, becoming a Great Wu Shi wasn’t a dream—let alone a Martial Dao Master.

Once he became a Martial Dao Master, dominating a region in this chaotic age would be no problem.

Then he could host lavish banquets daily, and whenever he felt like it, send out a few minor targets—just imagining that life made it all worthwhile.

But if cultivators—those terrifying beings—truly existed, even if he became a Martial Dao Master, he’d still be a mortal, and one spell from them could crush him instantly.

The contrast was a plummet from heaven to earth!

“Correct. Legends say cultivators are mysterious figures possessing extraordinary, almost divine abilities. Our Ji family ancestors once befriended a cultivator.

Many of the Ji family’s herbal formulas are said to have originated from him, and of course, this talisman was also a gift from him—but after generations of use, only a few remain.” Ji Wenyue said this, glancing at Xia Daoming, her eyes tinged with faint resentment.

Xia Daoming pretended not to notice and asked: “What happened to that cultivator later?”

“Afterward, for reasons unknown, that cultivator never appeared again—not a single trace,” Ji Wenyue said.

“Are there any cultivators in Licheng?” Xia Daoming asked.

“Cultivators transcend the mundane, elusive and mysterious—they rarely appear in the secular world. Even if there were any, I wouldn’t be the kind to know,” Ji Wenyue said, her eyes filled with reverence and longing.

“Hmm.” Xia Daoming nodded, his mood conflicted.

On one hand, he didn’t want cultivators in Licheng—it would add dangerous unknowns. On the other, he hoped they did exist—perhaps he could find a path to cultivation himself.

But soon, Xia Daoming shook his head with self-derision.

Why think so much?

His greatest assets now were the system and martial arts—he must first focus on improving his martial cultivation and fully utilizing the system.

That way, whether or not he ever gained access to cultivation, he could at least survive and establish himself in the secular world, unlike his master Chou Zhiheng, who was killed in a single misstep.

“By the way, when I fought Elder Liao, his force was strange—it penetrated through my palm into my body. How is that possible?” Xia Daoming quickly shifted to asking about Elder Liao.

This was what he most needed to understand right now.