Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Time and location were unknown. The realness was unspecified as well.
Blankets of glowing white clouds floated in the dark void, plucked away to reveal the sun. There was a hovering mountain among the clouds with a light sprinkle of mist and cranes around it.
The mountain was not ginormous, nor was it tall.
Water flowed at the base of the mountain, watering a neat patch of farmland. Bamboos and aged pine trees stood tall atop the mountain, winding like dragons.
There was a rustic quadrangle Daoist temple at the peak with a peach tree of indefinite age planted in the center.
Peach blossoms fell incessantly. There was no end to it.
The girl who was counting the peach blossoms was in her prime of youth. She was ethereally beautiful and unadulteratedly pure to her core, and her well-developed figure hinted at the allure of a woman in full bloom.
“Passing flowers galore yet unattached to even a piece of a leaf. Mother, your child has been too lucky in love and romance recently. I wonder what I should choose.”
A crisp and prideful voice resounded in the yard.
“Shush!”
The indistinct voice of a woman came from the clouds.
“A girl with a tidal physique can never be with a man.”
The young girl pouted, chin tipped with a scowl.
“But I have opulent good luck when it comes to romance. It can’t be helped!”
“If you must linger in the mortal realm, then be with a woman.”
“I don’t want a woman. I like cute boys!”
“You can like men. If you’re fortunate enough to meet a man who allows you a peek of enlightenment at the ways of heaven, you may stay together for life.”
“Mother, you’re bluffing again! We stand across from the ways of heaven. Other than a deity, how could any other man enable me to do that?”
“You’re right. Only god is qualified to command you in this world. Do not ever belittle yourself!”
On the Sword-Wielding Mountain, Lingzhou Yue’s eyes flew open abruptly.
The golden hue of the setting sun spilled in through the window, casting itself on a face that kept radiating with unbridled purity no matter how much earthly dust fell on it.
Hah, immortals were all dead now—how could there be a god?
Were girls so bad?
Tuning the disturbing remnants of her dream out, Lingzhou Yue raised her arm to take a swig of wine. She lazily flipped her fair body over, the fragrance of wine slipping like an incoming wave.
…
The wind of immortality was as invigorating as the shades of the sunset.
Xiao Ran’s first flight since his transmigration was on a paper kite—just like his first flight before his transmigration had been on paper.
History was always alarmingly similar.
In the center of the huge paper kite, Xiao Ran sat in front of the stairs of a two-story disciple house in a lotus position.
As he kept his eyes slightly open, everything he saw all around him was mountain peaks that pierced the layers of clouds.
Spiritual energy, sprinkled mist, the sound of beasts, and the lull of a bell blended together and resonated in the world. The sound was vast and vague, as though this was not the mortal world.
In contrast to the desolate scenery outside the mountain-guarding array, it felt like a second transmigration, as if he had entered another world.
Unfortunately, Xiao Ran was not fated to enjoy the divine scenic view.
His brows were slightly creased as he remained concentrated to sense the force of the bloodline.
This was his first flight after all. It was exhilarating, but it was inevitable that he would get nervous.
With a gust of wind or an incoming crane, the paper kite would teeter as though it was falling.
The journey was no more than 10 kilometers, but it took Xiao Ran more than a quarter of an hour. Finally, he moved to the sky above the Sword-Wielding Mountain in the lingering sunlight.
Spotting his location, he slowly exerted energy and landed securely.
Xiao Ran heaved a long sigh of relief.
The night was over!
The new disciple house was located on the southeast side of the straw hut, about 10 meters diagonally away from it.
In terms of absorbing the fengshui spiritual vein, this was the second-best spot on the Sword-Wielding Mountain after the straw hut.
Xiao Ran entered the house.
There was a bamboo bed, a wardrobe, a table… All the furniture was in order. The kitchen was fully furnished with utensils and flint, while a small storeroom was equipped with various farming tools.
There was no doubt that Lin Yunzi was a leader of the Outer Disciples, as he knew the daily necessities of a mortal being who had yet to enter the Refining Qi well…
Before making his master an offer, however, Xiao Ran had two more things to do.
First, he had to secure the foundation base.
Xiao Ran took a big hammer wrapped in a cloth out of the storeroom, as well as eight huge flexible wooden wedges with a mechanism. He pushed the eight wooden wedges into the holes inside the house that he had created in advance and hit each of them into the foundation base with the clothed hammer.
The wooden wedges unfolded as they expanded vertically and went 30 meters deep in the ground. The mechanism was then turned on and the wedges created eight underground stabilizing poles horizontally.
A total of 64 stabilizing poles stretched both horizontally and vertically, forming a 3D network in the foundation base and securing the double-story structure. The worst it could withstand was a Grade-9 hurricane!
In addition, the securing spots of the eight wooden wedges were unique.
They looked like a Bagua, but the sequence differed from a usual Bagua.
Qian (☲)
Kan (☱)
Gen (☳)
Zhen (☶)
Xun (☰)
Li (☴)
Kun (☷)
Dui (☵)
This was the Dao-Ending Period. Spiritual veins were behaving strangely. To absorb the spiritual energy from heaven and earth more effectively, one needed to be unconventional.
Excluding the addition of restrictive spells, a pseudo-Bagua setting like this could draw spiritual energy more directly than the straw hut.
Since Xiao Ran had used a hammer wrapped in a cloth and the wooden wedges had been knocked into the ground inside the house, his master was still sleeping soundly by the time he was done securing the house.
The sky had turned fully dark by then.
Stars peppered the sky the moon was hanging from. The glaze of moonlight and starlight poured over the new disciple house.
It was completely silent save for the sound of crickets.
The second thing that Xiao Ran was going to do was perfect the drainage system of the kitchen and washroom, especially when it came to the matter of excretion. It was something he found unex-pee(pec)-ted.
Who would have thought that an Inner Disciple—no, a Direct Disciple—would need to poop?
Everyone else was an otherworldly fairy that ate spiritual energy and drank immortal dew. One was not qualified to cultivate to become an immortal so long as one pooped.
What gave Xiao Ran a bigger headache was that it would be utterly uncouth of him to feed himself and excrete beside his female master.
However, it was urgent!
Cultivating and achieving inedia were not overnight affairs. Xiao Ran had to fix the wastewater system of the disciple house right now, or he could really forget about answering nature’s call tonight.
After retrieving a shovel from the storeroom, Xiao Ran dragged his fatigued self over to begin digging before joining bamboo pipes one after another to place them in the dug pit.
The straw hut and the disciple house faced east, so the water could only drain toward the west.
Halfway through digging toward the west, Xiao Ran even came across warm underground water. There was warm groundwater even though the mountain was thousands of meters tall—one must really not judge a mountain by its appearance.
The groundwater was warm and clear with a freshness like melting snow. There was a slight tinge of a sulfur scent too… With the warm groundwater, Xiao Ran could solve the domestic water supply and even build a hot spring!
He loved being in hot springs and being in one in the immortal cultivation realm… was wonderful!
This was something for the future.
While clearing a path for the canal westward, Xiao Ran dug along the water vein until he reached the cliff. This was where oddly-shaped rocks and bramble bushes grew uninhibited.
The wastewater would be drained there by following the underground channel into the mountain’s soil and weeds, thus nourishing all sorts of lifeforms.
Suddenly, Xiao Ran caught a whiff of a strange alcoholic scent. Sniffing it with trailing eyes, he spotted a large patch of alcohol in the bushes.
Hold on, there was a faint ammonia smell…
Frowning, Xiao Ran realized that things were not as simple as they seemed. An illogical premonition flooded him out of the blue. He snapped his head around despite squatting on the ground and met his fairy master, who was coldly looking down at him.
“What are you doing?”