Chapter 5: True Cultivation of the Dao

Above, the black sky was dim and lightless; below, the yellow earth and thin mist were gloomy.

The winding dirt road before them was like a great snake crawling over sand dunes, plowing a path through the forest toward the unknown.

Xu Qing still remembered what Liu Youdao had said before they set out—once the sun went down and they had eaten their fill, he would take them to the Charity Hall.

As for what the Charity Hall was, he was not entirely clear.

However, with a little thought, he could roughly deduce a few things.

Liu Youdao was a thorough corpse merchant; usually, he herded and sold corpses. In the past, Liu Youdao could sell them to the Cui Family Mill; perhaps today he would sell them elsewhere, and this place was likely the so-called Charity Hall.

As Xu Qing pondered, Liu Youdao, sitting at the front of the stretcher, suddenly intensified the sound of his bell; at the same time, the lead zombie altered its path, leaning toward the right side of the small road.

"Baa—"

From the left side of the small road, chaotic sheep bleats came.

Xu Qing's gaze was drawn over, and he saw an old shepherd by the roadside ahead.

The old man wore a yellowed, curly woolen cloak and held a tobacco pipe in his hand; while puffing on the pipe, he stared at the corpse-herding procession, looking exactly like an old farmer on the village ridge who loved to watch the spectacle.

Xu Qing felt inexplicable surprise; who herds sheep in the dead of night?

However, what puzzled him even more was yet to come.

As they passed the flock, Xu Qing did not smell a trace of grassy musk; in his impression, whenever passing a flock of sheep, that fishy musk would absolutely rush to his head!

After the corpse-herding procession passed, the shepherd flicked his whip, the crisp sound especially clear on the night road.

Xu Qing's doubts did not diminish; as they passed the old shepherd's sheep path, he specifically paid close attention to the ground, yet did not see a single grain of grass or pill on the earth.

Sheep have straight intestines, defecating wherever they go; wherever a flock of sheep passes, immortal pills are visible everywhere.

These sheep were not right!

Xu Qing could not help but recall the folk legend of the Beast-Creation Art; this evil technique could turn living people into sheep that only baa.

Just as his scalp tingled, another figure in red robes, feet not touching the ground, swung toward them on the dirt road ahead.

"Sheep, tasty."

A cold wind blew past, the woman's voice carrying a low murmur like a sleep-talker.

By the time Xu Qing came to his senses, that red-robed figure had already passed by.

His nostrils twitched slightly, smelling the lingering scent in the air; it was the strange incense smell that only appeared when burning paper money for the dead.

In such a short stretch of corpse-herding road, Xu Qing had encountered no fewer than three dirty things; he could not help but feel a chill in his heart; just how many underworld things were there outside Linhe Fang?

Fortunately, after the woman in red robes drifted away following the scent of the sheep, he encountered no strange people or things again.

Around the second watch of the night, when the night was extremely quiet, as if even insects and birds had grown weary and ceased their chirping.

The ethereal sound of the bell seemed like a voice isolated from the world; as Xu Qing was thinking about how much longer the journey would take, a point of light suddenly appeared on the pitch-black road ahead.

Xu Qing gazed from afar, vaguely seeing lanterns and torches flickering, illuminating a building.

The Charity Hall was about to be reached!

At this moment, Liu Youdao, sitting in front of the stretcher, put away the incense burner, and the speed of the entire corpse-herding procession instantly returned to normal.

With the Charity Hall close at hand, Liu Youdao's mind relaxed; he jumped off the bamboo pole and walked forward slowly.

The other zombies, carrying the corpses on the stretcher, followed closely behind.

But just when they were two or three li away from the Charity Hall, an abnormality suddenly occurred!

They saw a white-robed man, covered in flowing blood, suddenly burst out from the pitch-black forest nearby.

The man's eyebrows flew into his temples, and his eyes, with more white than black, were narrow like a crescent moon.

He held a magic sword upside down and blocked Liu Youdao with a bright smile.

"Old sir, please wait; a young junior has just arrived in your land and does not know the direction. May I ask what realm this is? If I head north to Luojing from here, how far is the distance?"

Liu Youdao looked at the young man; seeing his attire and appearance were extraordinary, and he was covered in blood, he suspected he was no ordinary person. Following the principle that fewer troubles are better than more, he replied politely: "This place is Liu Village Charity Hall; fifty li south is Linhe. If you wish to head north to the capital, you must follow the Liu Village road eastward; after walking about a hundred li, you will reach Jintian Fucheng. Once you reach Fucheng, you may simply head north; at that time, whether by water or by land, you can go directly to Jingcheng."

"Thank you, old sir! This junior is in a hurry to travel, so I shall proceed first!"

Having spoken, the blood-stained, white-robed, eerie youth rose from the flat ground as if wrapped in feathered wings, breaking through the air toward the northeast at a speed difficult for the naked eye to perceive.

Liu Youdao bared his old yellow teeth; judging solely by the young man in white's movement technique, he knew the other's cultivation must be far beyond his own.

Fortunately, he was experienced and never easily offended figures in the Jianghu; otherwise, he might not have lived to this age.

After the small interlude of asking directions, Liu Youdao set out again, but he did not expect that before they had walked two li, another stranger from the martial arts world blocked the road!

Moreover, this time there was not just one person blocking the road!

"I am Zuo Zixiong, a Hundred-Household Commander of the Jingji Divine Machine Camp. May I ask, old sir, have you seen any demons of the Tianxin Sect pass through here?" Zuo Zixiong, wearing light armor and carrying dual knives and dual swords on his back, spoke first.

"This old man's eyes are dim and blurred; I have not seen them."

"You old ghost dare to lie with your eyes open!" Cui Yuanlong, also a Hundred-Household Commander, grabbed Liu Youdao's collar, his face fierce and angry: "I can still smell the scent of the demon in front of you; are you perhaps with the Tianxin Sect, intending to cover up? If so, then let us take you back to Jingcheng to be punished!"

On the side, Zuo Zixiong stepped forward and pulled Cui Yuanlong's hand away, speaking in a calm tone: "Old sir, you might as well think carefully again; as long as the old sir is willing to speak the truth, we will absolutely not make things difficult."

As he spoke, Zuo Zixiong's hand, as if unintentionally, rested on the hilt of the knife at his waist.

"..."

Liu Youdao had struggled in the underworld professions for many years; he had seen big ghosts and small ghosts, and he had seen all kinds of people; but officials were often caught between humans and ghosts, even more difficult to deal with than ghosts.

In his silence, he finally told them about the white-robed man asking directions; after Zuo Zixiong and Cui Yuanlong heard this, their thoughts instantly became clear.

What a case of darkness under the lamp!

They had originally pursued from Jingcheng, yet they could never have imagined that this demon would dare to turn back.

The two immediately hesitated no longer, turned around, and chased toward the direction of Fucheng!

Liu Youdao watched the direction where the few had disappeared; for some reason, his heart grew increasingly uneasy, feeling that something was not quite right.

He could not figure it out left or right, so he simply continued toward the Charity Hall close at hand; as for the events of tonight, let them just rot in his belly!

"Where is the old sir going?"

Just as Liu Youdao prepared to step forward to travel, a familiar voice suddenly came from behind.

"Senior Old, I truly ought to thank you for betraying my whereabouts—without it, I might never have shaken them off. But I hate traitors who betray others more than anything in this life. What do you think I should do?"

Liu Youdao's withered body jerked violently; with all his strength, he twisted his head sideways—and saw the Tianxin Sect demon who had asked him for directions standing behind him, unseen until now.

A blade of light slashed like a white ribbon; he tried to speak, but could only emit a hoarse, hissing gasp.

Then his vision began to sink downward; in that moment, he saw his own neck pumping out blood, his own slightly hunched back, and the yellow earth road behind him.

The white-robed man with eyes as eerie as a ghost sheathed his sword, then turned to glance at the motionless zombies still carrying the stretcher.

"Street tricks—too vulgar for the halls of refinement."

With a soft sigh, the white-robed man glanced northward, then leapt away toward the southwest.

The night wind brushed lightly; the thick stench of blood drifted from the front of the stretcher.

Xu Qing, who had witnessed everything, still had not regained his composure.

Had the corpse-handler who turned him into a zombie really just died?

Xu Qing held the bamboo pole, standing frozen in place, too afraid to move.

Only after confirming that the corpse-handler, his head severed, truly could not rise again, did he dare shift his body.

The moon was cold, the stars sparse; the air reeked of blood—any moment, something unclean might be drawn. Xu Qing dared not linger, yet had no idea where to go.

The mortuary ahead was where corpse-traders conducted business—he absolutely could not go there!

Could he really just slip into the woods and become a wandering corpse?

Xu Qing's thoughts raced like lightning—then suddenly, inspiration struck; his gaze fixed on Liu Youdao's severed head and body.

Of course! He still had the Sutra for Guiding Souls—he could still gain more information by liberating the dead!

At this thought, Xu Qing felt as if clouds had parted and blue sky reappeared!

He released the bamboo pole, approached Liu Youdao's corpse with a mix of nervousness and excitement.

The thick scent of blood in the air was like a hallucinogenic poison; his Adam's apple moved involuntarily up and down.

So fragrant. Truly so fragrant.

Xu Qing suppressed the latent instinctual desire within him, held his breath, focused his mind, and struggled to keep his thoughts clear.

Thick, viscous blood still dripped in strands from the clean cut at the corpse-handler's neck; even the dry yellow earth could not fully absorb it.

Forcing down his inner revulsion, Xu Qing reached out and placed the corpse-handler's head back in position, aligning it with the neck wound.

Floating in the sea of desire, the world is unpredictable.

As the Sutra for Guiding Souls turned its pages, the corpse-handler's entire life began to rewind.

The corpse-handler had no father or mother; the villagers called him Tie Dan, because he always wandered the village wearing open-crotch pants.

On Qingming Festival when he was twelve, Tie Dan, raised on meals from a hundred households, slipped out at night as usual and sneaked to the graves just beyond the village to scavenge food.

Whether dried meat, steamed buns, pastries, or candied fruits—anything offered on the graves, he ate and took without hesitation!

This day was even happier for him than the New Year—he couldn't understand why the adults were so sad.

A wild child, unwatched, had never heard the old saying that walking too many night paths invites evil, let alone that eating offerings from the dead was taboo!

On the night of Qingming Festival, as Tie Dan sat leaning against the tomb of a wealthy family in the village, eating candied fruit, a pair of pale, bony hands with sharp claws suddenly burst from the mound behind him!

Tie Dan had no idea the corpse in that grave had just been buried, nor did he know the danger of a corpse transforming!

As the ghostly hands dragged him violently into the grave, he screamed and cried for his dry mother to save him.

A child with no family, raised on meals from a hundred households—how could he have a dry mother?

You wouldn't believe it—but he did!

But the dry mother he spoke of was not a living person—it was the old willow tree he had worshipped at the village's edge.

To expect a willow tree to come rescue him? Wasn't that the dream of a fool?

Yet if you truly examined it, it was strangely plausible.

Just as Tie Dan was about to be pulled into the grave, a corpse-handler rang his bell and descended like a heavenly god, forcibly dragging Tie Dan back from the gates of hell!

The corpse-handler told Tie Dan that earlier, while passing the eastern edge of the village, he had grown tired and rested beneath an old willow tree. As he dozed, he dreamed of an old woman in a green jacket, with thick hair, who spoke to him, saying her dry son had wandered too far west and asked him to call him back when he passed by.

So he came.

After hearing this, Tie Dan wiped his nose—and from that day on, he went nowhere else, not even back to the village; he resolved wholeheartedly to follow the corpse-handler into the world of martial cultivation.

The corpse-handler had no disciples or children of his own; seeing how clever this child was, he took him in.

Thus years passed; as the corpse-handler grew ever more hunched and aged, the little Tie Dan slowly grew taller, and began to ring the bell himself.

But Tie Dan had always been restless, unlike his master, who strictly followed rules.

His master had repeatedly warned him: corpse-handling must have limits—those who died of illness, drowned, hanged, or whose limbs were shattered by lightning or fire, must not be handled.

But those whose heads had been severed and then neatly sewn back on, or who died by strangulation or in the standing cage, could be handled.

In short, the subtleties here ran deep!

Tie Dan promised with his lips—but after he had cared for his crippled master until his death and buried him, he threw all restraint aside.

Whether the wrongfully dead, the unjustly dead, or those poisoned by lovers with arsenic—he dared to bring them all home!

Beyond that, he expanded his corpse-handling business, learned the art of crafting zombies, and became a black middleman, trafficking them far and wide.

Thus, his reputation grew in the Xiangyin region, and naturally, he earned a new title: Liu Youdao.

He took the surname Liu because his dry mother was an old willow tree.

He called himself Youdao because everyone said he was a true cultivator with profound Way!

The old saying goes: good and evil arise from one's deeds; fortune and misfortune are summoned by oneself.

Liu Youdao expanded his business and amassed fame and wealth—but because of his dishonorable deeds, he secretly angered many.

As he grew older, he grew fearful of everything, terrified that one night, while sleeping soundly, a pair of hands would suddenly drag him into a grave!

What should he do? After much thought, Liu Youdao finally had an idea.

A tree dies when moved; a man lives when he moves.

At worst, he could just pack his bags and leave, going to a place where no one knew anyone, opening a shop for spirit relocation and burial services to handle affairs for people; wouldn't that be more comfortable than his current situation?

Once his mind was made up, he packed his bags, wandered around, and arrived at Linhe Market, where he opened a corpse-worker shop on Jingxia Street; thereafter, in just a few short days, relying on his outstanding professional abilities, he secured several business deals.

The largest of these deals was the corpse labor required by the Cui Family Mill!

Reading up to this point, Xu Qing basically understood what happened next.

Finally, he let out a sigh.

This Liu Youdao did not die unjustly!

You said you intended to wash your hands of the trade and never again engage in those rule-breaking deeds, so how could you not control yourself and return to doing those conscience-pricking transactions?

The Scripture of Degree of Humanity states: "The Human Path values splendor, often arising from the heart; the Immortal Path values life, often bringing auspiciousness; the Ghost Path values endings, often inviting misfortune."

Among these, apart from the Immortal, whether human or ghost, all eventually reach the final page.

The Scripture of Degree of Humanity gave its final assessment of Liu Youdao's life as Earth Grade, Lower Quality.

This was the first time Xu Qing had ever seen an Earth Grade rating!

Besides the rating exceeding expectations, the rewards obtained from this corpse degree were also very gratifying!

There was a Soul-Hurrying Bell, a Corpse-Hurrying Whip, and several books imprinted in his mind, namely the "Thirty-Six Incantations of Corpse Hurrying," the "Book of Funerary White Affairs," the "Method of Yin Trajectory and Cave Determination," the "Treatise on Corpses," and a "Scripture of Corpse Nurturing."

(End of Chapter)