Immortal Funeral Bearer

Vast mountains stretched endlessly, shrouded in hazy dawn mist.

A suona cry pierced the mountain's silence.

It was followed by the weeping of dutiful sons and daughters.

The funeral procession slowly departed Peach Blossom Village.

Amid the procession, a youth in a green robe skillfully played the suona.

He had sword-like brows, starry eyes, and a face like carved jade. His frame was somewhat lean, his refined features carrying an air of gentle elegance.

A mourning White Banner was tucked diagonally behind his neck.

A half-grown Black Dog followed at his side.

A mournful, plaintive suona melody flowed from his lips.

With a single suona, he suppressed the gongs and drums, igniting the grief of the funeral procession.

As the procession moved onward, fine beads of sweat appeared on the youth's forehead.

"Ah, this body is truly far too weak."

The youth was named Bai Yu, a transmigrator who had arrived in this world two and a half days ago.

In his previous life, he had merely been an ordinary handsome guy.

He had stayed up late cultivating immortality and suddenly dropped dead.

When he woke up, he had become this unlucky fellow named Bai Changsheng.

The Bai family had passed down the art of playing the suona for generations.

A few days ago, his father and mother had rushed off to conduct a funeral and were swept away by a mountain flood, leaving neither corpses nor bones behind.

His parents had barely died when the village tyrant, the Chen family, seized their house.

Back then, the Bai family had traded two fen of irrigated farmland with the Chen family for a plot of residential land and built their home there.

For more than ten years, both sides had lived in peace.

Now that only a child remained in the Bai family, the Chen family immediately turned hostile, claiming that the Bai house occupied Chen land.

They forcibly took the Bai family's house, naturally refused to return the irrigated fields, and even threw Bai Changsheng out.

Bai Changsheng had backbone. He died on the spot.

At that very moment, Bai Yu happened to transmigrate over.

With nowhere to go, Bai Yu could only build a shack in the mountains and live there.

After only a few days in this world, Bai Yu had come to understand one truth:

"Being handsome can't fill your stomach."

Just yesterday, his household had run out of food.

Fortunately, Bai Changsheng still possessed his family's inherited skill of playing the suona.

A funeral happened to be taking place in the village, so he came over and joined the funeral band.

Uncle Dazhuang, the drummer, had worried whether Bai Yu could keep up with the rhythm.

In the end, Bai Yu's rendition of Grand Funeral Procession nearly sent him off instead.

Rhythm? There was no such thing.

Once the suona sounded, I was the rhythm.

Uncle Dazhuang was so shocked that he kept praising Bai Yu, saying he had the bearing of a band leader.

"Old Bai has a successor. Our Peach Blossom Village funeral band is whole again."

Bai Yu joined on the spot and began conducting funerals for others.

If he handled this funeral well, he would be able to gain a foothold in Peach Blossom Village and officially become a member of the professional team.

Thus, Bai Yu put forth twelve parts of his spirit along the way.

He played the suona at an unhurried pace, keeping a firm grasp on the rhythm.

However, as the funeral procession climbed the mountain—

Beads of sweat the size of soybeans appeared on Bai Yu's forehead, and his face turned somewhat pale.

This body had already been constitutionally weak, and dying once afterward had only made it weaker.

Although his suona skills were not bad, his stamina could not keep up.

"No matter what, I have to hold on."

Bai Yu forced himself onward, revealing not the slightest flaw.

Only Uncle Dazhuang noticed that a large patch across Bai Yu's chest had already been soaked with sweat.

At last, the coffin was lowered into the grave.

Bai Yu's vision repeatedly went black.

Fortunately, he had finally endured it.

Once he recovered, he discovered a blue light screen before his eyes.

Funeral target: Zhao Laogen.

Identity: Farmer.

Cultivation: None.

Skills: Planting, cooking, woodcutting.

Funeral participation: 10%.

Reward: Strength +3, life experience +5.

The hand holding Bai Yu's suona could not help trembling.

Yet his expression remained unchanged.

It seemed his golden finger had arrived.

An ancient scripture appeared in his mind.

"Burial World Record"!

On its pitch-black cover, a speck of white light would occasionally flash before swiftly fading again.

If one's eyesight was sharp enough, one would discover that the speck of white light was clearly a great thousand world.

A line of tiny words was written on the cover.

Bury heaven, bury earth, bury the myriad realms!

As Bai Yu focused his mind on the Burial World Record, he immediately obtained its effects and methods of use.

First, he began with immortality.

Second, conducting funerals made him stronger.

Every time he conducted a funeral, he could obtain some of the target's abilities.

For example, strength, vitality, even martial arts or cultivation.

Of course, this was not the right occasion to explore his golden finger in depth.

He calmly waited for the funeral to end.

At last, the funeral Taoist finished reciting the scriptures.

Bai Yu and the funeral band played another tune, "Song of the Azure Sky."

"Dust returns to dust, earth returns to earth; once one sets off for the Yellow Springs, there is no road back."

Funeral successful. Reward obtained: Strength +3, life experience +5.

Claim?

Bai Yu did not immediately claim the reward.

He feared some strange phenomenon might occur when he did.

He returned to the village with the group and sat down for the final funeral feast.

He sat at the professional team's table.

Uncle Dazhuang and the others drank a little wine and entered bragging mode.

Bai Yu, meanwhile, buried his head in his meal.

He appeared calm and unhurried, but was actually eating at astonishing speed.

These past few days had truly starved him badly.

In the blink of an eye, nearly half the dishes on the table were gone.

Uncle Dazhuang and the others cried out that this kid was terrifying beyond measure.

They stopped drinking and stopped bragging, hurriedly joining the ranks of those devouring food.

Half an hour later, Bai Yu rubbed his round belly and headed home.

Before leaving, he even took a red plum from the fruit plate on the table.

Most importantly, ten copper coins had appeared in his palm.

Each member of the funeral band received twenty coins.

Bai Yu was underage, so he could only receive half wages.

That was the rule in the countryside: only adult men counted as official laborers.

Children and women only counted as half a person.

With the ten coins, he bought more than ten jin of sweet potatoes at the shop by the village entrance.

That would last him at least a week.

Bai Yu carried the sweet potatoes home in high spirits and whistled.

A half-grown Black Dog came scampering over from afar, its tail wagging furiously.

"Old Mo, I want fish."

The Black Dog seemed able to understand human speech and leaped into a small stream, splashing about wildly.

Half an hour later, it emerged from the water with a small fish the length of a finger in its mouth.

"Good. Tonight, we'll have roasted sweet potatoes and stewed fish soup."

Bai Yu cheered.

He carried the sweet potatoes, while Old Mo carried the little fish.

One man and one dog, relying on each other for survival.

Bai Yu took out a plum from his sleeve and bit into it. Bitterness exploded in his mouth.

Yet after the bitterness passed, a faint sweetness touched the tip of his tongue.

After bitterness came sweetness.

Seeing Bai Yu eating alone, the Black Dog jumped about and barked, as though accusing Bai Yu of lacking loyalty.

"Woof! Woof!"

Bai Yu fed the remaining half of the plum into the Black Dog's mouth.

The Black Dog took a bite, then jumped even higher.

"Woof woof! Awoo!"

Bitter and astringent—far too disgusting.

Bai Yu collected the plum pit in his palm and chuckled.

"It isn't ripe yet. It'll taste good once it ripens."

The Black Dog followed Bai Yu while grumbling and cursing, as though saying:

"Though I'm not human, you really are a dog."

One man and one dog soon returned home.

It was a crude shack built from branches and thatch.

A dull woodcutter's blade, a suona, and a half-broken jar—this was everything Bai Yu owned.

As for his other property, it had all been seized by the Chen family.

Looking at the dilapidated shack, Bai Yu said to the Black Dog,

"Old Mo, we're not in a hurry."

"When the world wrongs me, slanders me, and looks down upon me, what should I do?"

"Just endure him, yield to him, and ignore him."

"In a hundred years, dig up his grave, whip his corpse, and wipe out his entire household."