Chapter 107: It Seems Useless

Wei Yuan silently felt ashamed. Xu Waner’s concealment Dao art was remarkably potent; had he not possessed the Immortal Lord’s karmic array plate, he would never have found her. Before setting out, Wei Yuan habitually reviewed the dossier.

Lanshen Palace lies thirteen hundred li northwest of Quliuzhen; its mountain gate was destroyed several years ago. Since a fragment of a celestial grotto fell there, the space is especially fragile—should a True Person unleash full power, it could trigger unforeseen consequences. Meanwhile, all karmic, feng shui, predictive, and tracking spells lose effectiveness, and curses may undergo unpredictable changes. Choosing to meet there means one can easily escape in chaos if trouble arises.

From Yun Feifei’s reply, it seemed she was being hunted too, though the identity of her pursuers remained unknown.

Now that Yun Feifei’s whereabouts were confirmed, Wei Yuan no longer delayed. He pulled out a small silver vial and said to Xu Waner: “Open your mouth.”

Xu Waner obediently opened her mouth, letting Wei Yuan drop a single drop of liquid inside, then swallowed it.

“This is the Severed Immortal Elixir. With a thought, I can dissolve your physical form and leave you with only your Primordial Spirit. Don’t even think of fleeing—if you lose contact with my spiritual sense for more than three days, it will activate anyway. When I meet Yun Feifei, I’ll give you the antidote,” Wei Yuan said.

“I won’t run,” Xu Waner nodded, offering no resistance.

Wei Yuan waved his hand, and Xu Wenwu fell to the ground from the wall. Though he faced away from them, he had heard everything just now. Now freed, he shuffled over, tilted his head back, closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and stuck out his tongue, ready to swallow poison to prove his loyalty.

Wei Yuan shoved him aside.

The Severed Immortal Elixir was no ordinary poison—it was a gift from the Immortal Lord, activatable by spiritual sense from afar, and extremely valuable. Xu Wenwu, whom Wei Yuan could kill with a flick of his wrist, didn’t warrant wasting such divine medicine.

After Xu Waner ingested the Severed Immortal Elixir, Wei Yuan returned all the items he’d confiscated to her, then packed his gear to leave Quliuzhen. With Wei Yuan watching and Xu Wenwu glaring nearby, Xu Waner no longer dared hide things inside her body; instead, she simply packed them into a satchel and slung it over her shoulder.

Before leaving, Wei Yuan handed Wang Lang’s corpse to the innkeeper in exchange for eight hundred liang of immortal silver. Since the job was completed cleanly, the innkeeper added fifty more liang to cultivate goodwill.

Though the bounty was posted by Xu Waner, Wei Yuan couldn’t directly take her money—that would be no different from robbery. Collecting the bounty, however, was legitimate. Wei Yuan accepted the silver without guilt, even though Xu Waner had killed Wang Lang. As the saying goes: a gentleman loves wealth, but takes it by the right path.

In an instant, all preparations were complete. Wei Yuan set off with the two toward the ruins of Lanshen Palace. Before departing, he bought two horses for transportation; the three rode together. Frankly, Xu Waner thought Wei Yuan’s decision strange—being a Foundation Establishment cultivator, flying on a spiritual artifact was fastest; three ordinary horses moved like snails. But since Wei Yuan had decided, she said nothing and accepted it gently.

Night was still deep when the three thin horses slowly left the Liangping Inn, passed east through Quliuzhen, then turned northwest after leaving town—this detour alone might take them until dawn.

In the northern district mansion of Quliuzhen, a young swordsman with bandages wrapped around his face sat in the center of the main hall, his expression dark. A servant below was being whipped—each whip-wielder was a slender girl, yet each strike landed heavy and cruel, spraying blood with every lash.

The servant rolled and screamed continuously; after dozens of lashes, the young swordsman finally vented some of his rage and ordered the whipping stopped.

“Useless fool! I told you to capture one person—how could you fail at such a simple task? Six in a row you got wrong! What good are you?”

His wounds reopened from the shouting, blood staining the bandages. A nearby girl immediately said softly: “Young Master, your wounds have split again—let me help you change the medicine in the back.”

“I’m not in the mood.”

The girl pressed closer: “Then change it here.”

The young swordsman shoved the girl off his arm, irritated: “I said I’m not in the mood! This is ridiculous—I got wounded and heal so slowly, even the Life-and-Death Hall’s healing salve doesn’t work.”

The girl said: “Could you be cursed? Should we find a master to dispel it?”

“Looks like I need to consult a master,” the young swordsman suddenly remembered something and asked: “Wasn’t there some idiot named Li something, calling himself ‘Ding Sword Dual Mastery,’ making a big fuss? Why haven’t you brought him in?”

A burly man standing beside the hall stepped forward and said gravely: “Young Master, that fellow fled overnight. He had two accomplices. But they left riding ordinary horses—likely frauds. I was chasing Yu Yirou for the ‘Destroying Soul Cauldron,’ so I ignored him.”

The young swordsman perked up: “Yu Yirou? I heard she’s got some looks?”

The burly man said: “She’s a bit old. She dresses like a girl, but her bone structure’s clearly over forty. Her skin’s full of Dao-art repairs.”

The young swordsman lost interest immediately: “Then keep searching until you find that bastard! The blow that struck me wasn’t ordinary—it must’ve been at least a Heavenly Grade, possibly even late-stage.”

“Understood. I’ll screen accordingly.”

The young swordsman walked toward the back hall and said: “Prepare that Xu girl—my distant cousin from the Prefect’s family is still worth a few more rounds. Hmph, if Xu Zhijie found out, he’d die with eyes wide open. Too bad his daughter ran away—she was the beautiful one.”

The burly man asked: “What about these mistaken captives?” “They’re still worth something—sell them west.” As he neared the back hall, the young swordsman suddenly looked up at a plaque hanging above the main hall. In his eyes, the plaque emitted a clear light, dispersing faint black-red miasma around it.

The young swordsman’s heart stirred—he barked sharply: “Go after that Ding Sword Dual Mastery! That title gives me the creeps!”

The burly man was startled but asked no questions, obeying immediately.

Outside Quliuzhen, the three thin horses plodded slowly.

Xu Wenwu, never quiet, said: “In our world, roads are perfectly flat—some are even fully enclosed, called expressways. Look at these roads—full of potholes and puddles. How can this work? Our speed here is thirty li per hour? No, per shichen? You don’t know—in our world there’s something called a car, which can travel four or five hundred li per shichen on expressways…”

Wei Yuan flicked his hand, casting a rope that bound Xu Wenwu tightly to his horse, then tied the rope’s end around his mouth. Three invisible black qi streams shot out and sank into the three horses. The horses screamed in pain, their bodies swelling slightly, then broke into a trot—each step covering two zhang, accelerating rapidly until they vanished into the night.

Xu Waner’s surroundings blurred past; she gripped the reins tightly, stunned—this speed approached that of a cultivator flying at full pace, yet these were ordinary horses, not spiritual steeds!

Xu Wenwu screamed in terror, but his mouth was bound with two loops of rope—he could only grunt continuously.

Wei Yuan leaned forward, urging his mount faster and faster until its hooves barely touched the ground, as if treading the wind. The other two horses followed closely under his control.

Outside Quliuzhen, several cultivators flew out of town, circled the road once, then flew north before turning northwest. They flew at full speed, covering over a hundred li in moments—but the road ahead remained pitch-black, utterly empty.

!.

The burly man halted midair, frowning toward the northwest. Three faint spiritual traces lingered in that direction, yet no figures were visible. The Broken Lands were perilous at night—the natural hunting ground of the Wu Yu clan. Though the burly man had cooperated with them before, he didn’t trust them, let alone strangers from their clan.

After a moment’s thought, he said: “No need to chase—they can’t have gone far. Return and search slowly.”

Three ordinary horses covering hundreds of li in under half a shichen? Impossible. These three must’ve set up a decoy—either slipped back into town or changed direction. Either way, they hadn’t gone far. The burly man trusted his tracking art to find them.

After galloping at full speed for a full shichen, Wei Yuan finally halted the horses and rested on a small hill beside the road.

Even Xu Waner’s spiritual energy had weakened noticeably—ordinary horses running at spiritual steed speed weren’t without cost; the jolting and shaking had intensified several times over, far worse than riding a spiritual steed. Her horse didn’t obey her at all, so she simply levitated above it, binding herself and the horse together with spiritual power—effectively letting the horse drag her through the air. This eliminated the jolting, but drained her spiritual power rapidly; by the end of the shichen, she was already exhausted.

Xu Wenwu remained silent—he had fainted long ago.

Wei Yuan dismounted and retracted the spiritual aura.

The three black qi streams returned—but one was slightly diminished. Though the loss was minuscule, it was enough to alert Wei Yuan. He examined the missing aura’s origin and found it came from the horse Xu Wenwu rode.

That horse had been an utterly ordinary one—its coat a patchwork of red, blue, and white, a typical mongrel. But after Wei Yuan reclaimed the aura, it didn’t revert to its former state. Instead, it stood half a head taller, slightly larger in build, and its vitality was noticeably richer. Though it had galloped nearly a thousand li, it now looked vigorous and alert. It was still an ordinary horse—but now a rare, superior one.

Can spiritual aura be used this way? Is it due to the aura—or to Xu Wenwu?

Xu Waner now cut Xu Wenwu’s ropes, dragged him off the horse, and laid him on the ground. She cast a Clear Mind spell. Xu Wenwu slowly woke, then his stomach churned violently—he collapsed and vomited profusely.

Wei Yuan pulled out a jade paper—its map of the Broken Lands was exquisitely detailed. This map alone was worth five hundred merit points in the Merit Hall. But since the Immortal Lord had initiated this mission, the map, the Severed Immortal Elixir, and other items were provided directly—no cost to Wei Yuan.

Wei Yuan’s current position was five hundred li from Lanshen Palace and nine hundred li from Quliuzhen. Due to detours around mountains and rivers, he’d covered over a thousand li in just over a shichen. He studied the map, then recalled Xu Wenwu’s words, and fell into thought.

If Xu Wenwu wasn’t lying, then his so-called car was slower than the three of them. And the car required perfectly flat, utterly smooth roads—where in reality, outside an Immortal Sect’s mountain, could such roads exist?

Roads are for mortals. Cultivators fly on spiritual artifacts—they need no roads. Wei Yuan had turned ordinary horses into spiritual steeds—still needing no roads. Those so-called cars, even on roads, barely reached five or six hundred li per shichen—seemingly useless.

Xu Wenwu had chattered about many other things, but Wei Yuan found them merely bizarre, nothing memorable. He’d heard that in that world, skyscrapers routinely rose over a hundred stories—this piqued his interest. But upon inquiry, he realized the term was misleading: the Tai Chu Palace had many halls over a hundred zhang tall—meaning one story equaled over a hundred of Xu Wenwu’s stories. In Wei Yuan’s view, building a hundred stories was easy; building one story that tall was far harder.

Xu Wenwu was also a chatterbox. After listening a while, Wei Yuan lost interest, tied his mouth shut again, and turned to question Xu Waner about her past.

(End of Chapter)