Mirage Castle

Li Qi sized up the old man, whose cultivation level was at least eighth grade, and the large fish he was standing on was a ninth-grade spirit beast.

The old man walked along the path of fish to reach a place several miles away from Li Qi.

This distance is practically "face to face" for both parties; they could be right in front of each other anytime, anywhere, but not so close that there's absolutely no time to react.

"Sir, I'm here to ask for directions. How do I get to East Isle from here?" Li Qi asked.

"Ah, passerby, you come to the East Sea, yet you ask for East Isle. Didn't you make any preparations?" The old man looked at Li Qi with a face full of doubt, but he did not loosen his grip on the harpoon in his hand.

"I made preparations and even called a boat that I knew well, but the boat broke down on the way, so I had to travel on my own. I thought I could find East Isle with my eyesight, but I couldn't find it after searching for a long time. I even encountered a Sea Loach on the way, so after thinking it over, I decided to ask a local for directions!" Li Qi shouted from the side.

"I see. Then please wait here for a moment, passerby. I'll go home and measure the location for you. East Isle is moving, so we have to measure it constantly to find its position," the old man said.

"Then I will wait here. Please help me, sir. Oh, and please accept this as a token of my gratitude." Li Qi said, taking out a fat pig and a spiritual herb from his Mustard Seed Bag.

It was just taken out of the Mustard Seed Bag, and it still has ice crystals on it.

This is leftovers from the area around Paibomen. The sea is full of fish, but there's no fat in it, so this kind of pork should be quite appealing.

As for the spiritual herbs on land, they are even less common in the sea.

Upon seeing this, the old man's attitude changed.

"Since you've already received the gift, it's not appropriate to leave the guest standing. Why don't you come aboard with me? We're going to East Isle anyway, so why don't you come with us?" the old man said.

"Very good, very good, then I'll trouble you." Li Qi was more than happy to oblige and nodded decisively.

It would be great if someone could lead the way. Although he could definitely find it on his own, why go through all that trouble?

So he carried the gifts and went aboard the boat with the old man.

Upon arriving on the ship, Li Qi saw that the people here were all six or seven feet tall, with red hair and black faces, clearly different from the Human Race on land.

Their hands and feet were longer, their skin was oily, and Li Qi even noticed that they had cheeks.

They are said to be Human Race, but they don't really look like it.

That's quite normal, though. "Human Race" is a general term for all humanoid beings. You know, even the Sacred Flame Tribe is considered Human Race.

The old man boarded the boat and introduced Li Qi to the tense men around him.

Li Qi, being perceptive, immediately presented the gifts. With the fat pig and the spiritual herbs, everyone's attitude improved considerably, and they all welcomed Li Qi aboard the ship. Only then did Li Qi begin to examine the vessel further.

This is a sea fortress consisting of hundreds of ships linked together, spanning several miles in length and width. Walking on it is no different from walking on land, and obvious traces of Technique Method can be seen on it.

This is a Law Treasure ship. It looks simple, but its power is hidden within. It should be their prized possession and the foundation of their existence.

As Li Qi walked on the boat, seawater splashed up from time to time, but everyone seemed to be used to it and had no aversion to being soaked. The air was warm, so they didn't need to wear cotton clothes. They went barefoot in the waves without socks, and neither men nor women cared about being seen. Some even simply didn't wear those simple clothes so they could go into the water at any time.

You can also see many children, boys and girls, all of them agile and skillful, setting up fishing rods, spears and other tools, searching for turtles, crabs, clams and other creatures in the water, competing to swim faster than fish and better than Wave-Pushing Gang people. Ordinary fish and shrimp cannot escape their grasp, and they do not need parents to provide for them.

Then I saw an adult couple. The woman was steering the boat with one hand and cooking fish with the other. Their children were on her back in the bag. The man was pulling the net and rowing the boat, and he was also mending the boat with the rope.

Further on, we came across another workshop, which looked like a weaving workshop. Next to them was a pile of algae, such as hair seaweed and kelp, which were being spread out on the roof to dry.

Some of the dried cloth was smashed by men with large bone clubs into fibers. Skilled women would then separate these fibers, soak them in a certain medicine, and weave them into cloth, which is the most common green cloth worn here.

Further on, you'll see a blacksmith's shop, where blacksmiths are hammering away at Law Treasure.

Yes, Law Treasure. There seem to be very few minerals on the sea, so the blacksmith shop is just what Li Qi calls it. The most common raw materials in this shop are the bones of various fish, or special materials similar to pearls, with very little metal.

But even with just these things, it seems that they still managed to create some pretty good Law Treasure, including harpoons and many parts of this giant floating island.

A little further on, you can see a huge fish, about ten meters long, which has already been hunted and is hanging on the boat, where people are dismantling it.

The person dismantling the fish was using a knife about the size of a thumb to meticulously slice through the entire large fish. This was the only metal tool Li Qi had seen after coming ashore.

However, Li Qi did not think that the reason for using a small knife was because he could not afford metal, because he knew a principle: the bigger the prey, the smaller the knife used.

Li Qi found it more and more interesting the more he read it.

Is this what life is like for ordinary people in the East China Sea? Is this on the water? What about the other races?

Unlike the Human Path and Shaman Paths, which are mainly Human Race, the Human Race in the East Sea are only a very small minority. Moreover, judging from their appearance, they are also severely Demonization, and probably have a lot of Demon Race blood in them. Li Qi could even see many pure demons living peacefully with humans on this ship, including the fish demon that the old man had been stepping on earlier.

This floating island has formed a unique ecosystem, where thousands of people live without feeling cramped. Instead, they drift on the sea, living the lives they are accustomed to.

Li Qi's eyes were opened.

That's why he wants to travel everywhere. How many landscapes are there in all the heavens and myriad worlds? How many kinds of ecosystems and how many Dao Path?

That's really interesting.

Li Qi continued to follow the old man with great interest. Along the way, there were countless gazes, but with the old man present, they were all just curious and not hostile.

However, what attracted even more attention was Old Ma.

They seemed to have never seen anything like Old Ma before, and people would ask what Old Ma was from time to time. When Li Qi said it was 'horse', they were all confused.

However, after a while, Li Qi followed the old man into a houseboat.

"Please come in, guest. The compass is inside. You can use it to calculate the location of East Isle," the old man said to Li Qi.

Li Qi immediately nodded in acknowledgment, then looked at the compass.

The compass was placed on the niche, with fine sand underneath, and the plate was placed on top.

But then the old man stepped forward, leveled the surface, placed lamps around it, closed the window, and compared the light with the water clock to determine the direction.

Li Qi carefully observed his actions, but found that he couldn't understand them.

The compass on this compass was not marked with the common cardinal directions or the Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches that Li Qi was familiar with, but with a different kind of marking symbols.

This seems to be a method that uses the weather as a record, its own location as the origin, and uses a scale to calculate the flight path.

Through observation, Li Qi quickly summarized the method.

This method is not difficult and is very simple to understand, but it works surprisingly well on the flat ocean.

Although the ocean exists in three-dimensional space, its movement is essentially two-dimensional. There are no hills or valleys, and the horizontal plane keeps the entire ocean on a single plane, making coordinate calculations much easier. This calculation method is simple I Ching studies, yet incredibly accurate...

It was created by someone great! Who was the genius who developed it to benefit the world?

However, precisely because it was simple I Ching studies, Li Qi only needed to read it once to master the method.

There was no way around it; True Knowledge Dao Charm's ability to directly read information was simply too strong. Coupled with his information flow vision, this ingenious but not very complex structure was something he could learn at a glance.

He couldn't even Supreme Lore, because Li Qi couldn't turn off the True Knowledge Dao Charm at all, and could only subconsciously ignore some messy information.

Moreover, this is ignoring, not blocking. He has simply learned to shut down his mind, letting it ignore the useless information that True Knowledge Dao Charm keeps sending.

"Ah, the result is in. From here, head towards the southeast corner at 16:440. Maintain a narrowing deviation of 92.45 degrees. It will take four days to reach our destination. Would you like to come with us, guest?" the old man invited Li Qi.

"Thank you for the guidance, but I can go there myself. Now that I know the location, it will be much faster." Li Qi smiled and politely declined the other party's offer to stay.

There's no need to stay. He's much faster. This journey will take four days, but Li Qi estimates he only needs one day. He'll spend most of that day finding his way.

"Guest, you probably don't know how dangerous the sea is. If you get lost, it will be difficult to find your way. You can't keep track of the direction at all times. Relying solely on the directions I give you, it's easy to lose your way in the vast ocean. At sea, a difference of an inch can mean a difference of a thousand miles. If you're not careful and go astray by even an inch, you'll be a thousand miles away from your destination," the old man advised.

Sailing at sea is unlike sailing on land; there are virtually no landmarks to refer to, and the destination often moves. For example, East Isle can move on its own. The old man was worried that Li Qi might easily run into trouble if he left alone.

Li Qi had previously thought the same thing, hoping the floating boat could lead the way. However, having just learned the other party's calculation method, he can now calculate the route himself and doesn't need to worry about anything else.

So Li Qi replied, "Old man, I've already learned the way, so there's no need to bother you. After all, I'm a stranger, and there are women and children on your boat, so I shouldn't stay any longer."

"You've learned to find your way around?" the old man asked in surprise.

Li Qi smiled, his hand weaving together thousands of strands of energy to simulate the large shrine in the room. It was six inches long, half of which was the base and half the axis. The base was divided into sections, and the aperture was eight-tenths of an inch square, serving as a pivot for observation.

Then, the model in Li Qi's hand began to operate, taking into account the Heavenly Phenomenon, the time, and the current orientation, looking at the seven constellations to the right north at 93 degrees and 80 minutes, and the seven constellations to the right west at 83 degrees and 85 minutes...

Then bring in the speed of East Isle...

"Hmm... old man, it seems you miscalculated just now, but the general direction is correct. According to the direction you gave, do you see, we would be off by three hundred li? However, this distance is not a problem, we can still catch up." Li Qi pointed to his calculation results and said to the old man.

He never imagined he would make a mistake. He had even figured out the more complex changes in the microcosm of the human body. For him, this kind of calculation was just like mental multiplication and voting; he could get the result entirely by instinct.

The old man was dumbfounded. Regardless of whether Li Qi's calculations were correct or not, the entire process had been completely replicated, and he couldn't find a single mistake.

But he still didn't quite believe Li Qi's statement, so he turned around and went to verify it.

How could someone who's just started learning this skill possibly get it right right right away? It took him a full six months to master it.

It took the old man a full quarter of an hour to verify the calculation. However, after this careful verification, the old man was astonished to find that Li Qi's calculation was correct. He had been negligent and miscalculated by one point, which led to a mistake of three hundred li.

"Guest... you already knew this method?" The red-haired, black-faced old man looked up, his originally black face turning a blush of embarrassment, like someone showing off their limited skills before an expert.

"No, it was only after you demonstrated it to me that I learned it. It's just my talent, so please don't doubt me. I really did just come from the Western Lands. I didn't mean to hide it or do anything disgusting." Li Qi quickly explained, worried that he might misunderstand.

The old man took a few deep breaths and said, "I trust you, sir. If you were truly trying to get close and deliberately concealing your abilities, you wouldn't have shown me this skill. It would have been easier for you to just say you didn't know it. It's clear that you are indeed exceptionally gifted."

"But... I've studied for half my life, yet you surpassed me in a single glance. May I ask... what is your cultivation level?" the old man asked.

Upon hearing this question, Li Qi replied, "Have you heard of the Ninth Rank Classification Method, sir?"

"Of course, we've been dealing with East Isle for years, so we understand the Ninth Rank Classification Method," the old man replied.

"I'm currently a seventh-rank official, barely qualified to travel the world alone. I came to the East Sea this time to buy ingredients for an old friend and also to relax a bit," Li Qi said with a smile.

"I see. Then this old man will not keep you any longer. Please go ahead, guest." After hearing this, the old man did not try to persuade him to stay.

Li Qi nodded, called over Old Ma, thanked him for his generosity, left some Qi bead as a token of gratitude, and then departed.

I learned how to locate myself at sea, which is pretty good.

However, right after Li Qi left—

This floating island made up of boats suddenly became illusory.

Then, the illusory floating island began to shake, turning into wisps of smoke. All the life on it, all the people, husbands and wives, parents and children, eventually disappeared in the sunlight.

Instead, there was a huge seashell, its mouth open, floating on the surface of the sea.

If Li Qi were still alive, he would recognize him.

This is one of the most famous mythical beasts in the East China Sea.

Mirage!

(The old group is gone. New group 681201605. Please return in an orderly manner.)