Chapter 12: Transaction

Tao Ji was muttering on the boat about the black cat: “Pan Yun treats it so harshly—I wonder if she’ll abandon it to save her own skin.”

After all, a little girl carrying a black cat is quite noticeable, easier to inquire about—if it were him, he might very well ditch the cat to shake off pursuers.

Just imagining the black cat wandering alone, suffering hunger and cold, limping on a broken leg, its fur matted and filthy when they next meet, so that even as old friends they’d fail to recognize each other—Tao Ji’s heart ached.

Xuan Miao glanced at him. "Third Senior Brother, don't focus only on alchemy—spend some spare time learning divination."

“Pan Yun won’t abandon that cat. Though I don’t know why, their fates are bound together—the bond between her and the cat runs deeper than the one between her and her father, Pan Hong.”

Tao Ji: “Then when we reach Kaifeng, won’t we just need to ask about a little girl carrying a cat to find her?”

Xuan Miao: “If she hides the cat, it’ll be harder to track. Still, be thorough—focus on children around seven or eight years old, traveling alone.”

Children that age can be disguised so easily their gender becomes indistinguishable, so we can’t even lock down gender.”

But they hadn’t expected that upon inquiring at Zhuxian Town, not a single child aged seven or eight had arrived at the dock alone.

One man, tired of being asked twice, snapped angrily: “Who’d let a seven- or eight-year-old travel alone by boat from Great Ming Prefecture to Kaifeng? Afraid of being snatched by water ghosts to become a substitute corpse?”

Tao Ji stood there, innocent-faced, turning to look at Xuan Miao.

Xuan Miao frowned, turned away, and said: “Let’s eat something first. We’ll search again after we’re full.”

They sat at a stall. Xuan Miao pulled out a handful of copper coins, selected three cleanest and most identical ones, held them in her palm, shook them, and cast them six times in succession, then arranged the hexagram for divination.

Tao Ji whispered: “Sister, aren’t you supposed to avoid repeatedly divining the same matter?”

Xuan Miao: “When there’s no path ahead, you must divinate.”

Xuan Miao stared at the hexagram, frowning. It was too strange—it showed danger, yet wasn’t ominous. After thinking, she overturned it and started over.

Xuan Miao performed the simplest divination: “Where is Pan Yun right now?”

The hexagram appeared. Xuan Miao said: “After eating, we head north. The hexagram shows Pan Yun is north of us.”

Tao Ji: “So she’s already left Kaifeng heading north? Then we’ll catch up faster on land.”

Xuan Miao felt something was off, but couldn’t pinpoint what—she nodded: “Heading toward Datong won’t be wrong. Her ultimate goal is to find Pan Hong and his son there.”

After eating noodles, Xuan Miao and Tao Ji went to the carriage stable to rent horses.

Yes, to chase her, they’d finally splurged on renting horses.

One rider each, they galloped north along the imperial road, eyes scanning the northern travelers until dusk, when they stopped.

By the fire, Tao Ji tossed more wood in, incredulous: “We haven’t seen her all this way—did she rent a carriage too? I remember she had no money. Or did we search in the wrong place?”

Xuan Miao was arranging the hexagram. After a moment, she tucked the coins away and said firmly: “She’s still north of us.”

Tao Ji opened his mouth, then closed it.

Xuan Miao snorted: “I can’t be wrong. She took the water route south originally.”

Then how could she have reached north of them so fast?

Tao Ji’s eyes widened. “Could it be some arcane art? Shrinking distance, traveling a thousand li in an instant?”

The more he spoke, the more excited he grew: “It’s possible! Sister, she can vanish into plum trees—such arcane arts you can’t even do. Too bad she’s been so hostile all along—we couldn’t ask about secrets like this.”

Xuan Miao fell into thought, considering the possibility.

But regardless, it had stirred her competitive spirit. She clenched her fists: “I will catch her.”

In the flickering firelight, Pan Yun completed her Small Heavenly Cycle, pressed the spiritual energy into her dantian to make it her own, and let the excess disperse into her limbs and body, nourishing every part.

Days of exhaustion vanished. She rose, stretched her arms and legs, feeling refreshed. “Eight years—I’ve never felt this healthy before.”

The black cat, curled on the leaves, remained silent.

Pan Yun glanced down at it, sat cross-legged opposite, choosing to face it directly. “Since we officially met, we’ve never had time or space for a serious talk. Now there are no outsiders—don’t you think we should speak openly, for our future?”

The black cat lifted its front half, sitting like her, hind legs pinned by branches, one leg splayed awkwardly—unimpressive, yet it still stared solemnly and meowed: “Fine. Let’s talk.”

A Xiuchun knife suddenly appeared in Pan Yun’s hand. The cat recoiled, rolled over with a grunt, and angrily meowed—but before it could speak, Pan Yun had laid the blade across her knees. “See? Without you, I can still retrieve things from the Three Jade Spirit Realm.”

The cat’s anger froze. It said nothing.

“That means, without its spirit, the Three Jade Spirit Realm is just like the one in my past-life lab—any unsealed portion can be used,” Pan Yun said. “Now it resides in my niwan palace, fused with my spiritual soul. Naturally, except the sealed parts, I can use whatever I wish.”

So the spirit is more liability than asset to me—unless it brings me substantial benefit, it’s unlikely to convince me to keep it.

The black cat had followed her this whole way; it knew arguing sentiment wouldn’t work. She was ruthless, held a grudge over it draining her spiritual energy for eight years, and wouldn’t suddenly welcome it back into her mind because of their mutual aid.

“My distant memories are sealed—I remember little,” the cat began. “But I recall my original purpose.” It sat upright, gazing at the moon in reflection. “The human body is merely a vessel; the spiritual soul is the root. As long as the soul endures, one achieves immortality. My creator intended me to become a world capable of housing spiritual souls—where these conscious beings could persist, transcend, and possess extraordinary wisdom.”

“In my world, they can attain immortality!”

Pan Yun raised an eyebrow in surprise—this direction was unexpected.

Her fingers tapped the scabbard. “Super AI? No—that’s impossible. Detaching from the body to achieve immortality? Even super AI can’t do that.”

The cat sneered at her. “This is Spirit Refinement!”

Pan Yun glanced at it. “Did you and your creator achieve it?”

The cat lowered its head. “I don’t know. I was sealed.”

“But I know this unsealed portion is merely a tiny fraction of me. Space, storage functions—compared to my other abilities, they’re negligible.”

Seeing Pan Yun didn’t refute it, the cat spoke more earnestly: “This world differs from your past life—spiritual energy is scarce, cultivation is far harder, and production technology is backward. Above you sits an emperor who can decide life or death at will. Acquiring cultivation resources here will be infinitely harder than in your past life.”

“But I am your resource!”

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Seeing Pan Yun lost in thought, the cat proudly lifted its head: “You don’t know, do you? The cultivation methods in your past life always had flaws—the energy storage rate was extremely low, always leaking into the surroundings.”

Pan Yun looked at it with disdain. “I know. Not just me—everyone in the country, everyone in the world knows.”

The cat’s grand speech choked in its throat.

Pan Yun: “Otherwise, why would your lab have poured so many resources into you, trying to unseal you?”

“To us, you were nothing but a storage device—like ancient heavenly texts. Many experts believed you held cultivation methods recorded by our ancestors.”

Pan Yun stared coldly at it. “Now it seems you really do have them—not only do you have them, you remember them. But you hid in my niwan palace for years, watching me use inferior methods without warning me—because the spiritual energy I generated was absorbed by you before it could even leak out, wasn’t it?”

The cat fell silent.

Pan Yun: “Fine. I agree not to seal you again. Let’s discuss a deal. Don’t mention that half my energy goes to you—that’s childish. Your leverage doesn’t warrant that reward.”

The cat slumped, a tiny, pitiful ball. “Then how much do you offer?”

Pan Yun was silent for a long while. “One fiftieth. Consider it the cost of renting the Three Jade Spirit Realm.”

The cat’s chest rose and fell, but meeting Pan Yun’s gaze, it surrendered. This amount of spiritual energy wasn’t rent for the realm—it was payment for the cultivation method.

After all, it wasn’t in its original body—she could still use the Three Jade Spirit Realm.

The cat agreed, but muttered under its breath: “So little? How long will it take me to unseal?”

Pan Yun: “You can’t unseal yourself just by absorbing spiritual energy. Wait until I study arrays and talismans—I’ll see if I can unseal you from outside.”

The cat: “Your teachers, the experts far superior to you, couldn’t do it. How can you?”

Pan Yun: “I’m talented. Haven’t you heard the old saying? The waves behind push the ones ahead—I’m the wave behind.”

“Enough talk. Give me the method.”

She needed to cultivate urgently. A persistent unease clung to her—like she’d never escaped safety, still trapped beneath the Five Fingers Mountain.

The cat’s true form resided in her niwan palace. Though it couldn’t sense her exact thoughts, it still felt something—like a spiritual resonance.

Indescribable.

So it felt it too.

The cat said: “The method is recorded on my second jade tablet. I’ve unsealed a bit, but sealed it again.”

Pan Yun: “Oh, to prevent me from noticing?”

The cat ignored that. “I’ll unseal it now. You read it yourself. But before I do, I have one condition.”

Pan Yun signaled it to speak.

The cat lay down, lifting its hind leg. “Besides spiritual energy as rent, you must guarantee my safety—my safety as the spirit of the realm!”

It emphasized: “I keep my word—I’ll never steal or rob your spiritual energy again. You must guarantee you’ll never try to seal me again, and no one else may harm me.”

Pan Yun agreed at once: “Fine.”

(End of Chapter)