The Shop Stood Empty

After leaving Mujiao Town, Song Qingming headed north.

This time, out on his training journey, Song Qingming was in no hurry to travel. He stopped and started along the way, and whenever he came across somewhere interesting, he would deliberately linger to explore it. It was the spring equinox; all things were reviving, and flowers carpeted the ground. Along the way, he saw many beautiful sights he had never seen before.

Song Qingming silently made a resolution: one day, if he achieved success in cultivation, he would surely leave Wei State and take a good look at this Cultivation World.

During his last trip to the Floating Cloud Mountain Range, Song Qingming had faced danger at every turn. How could he have had the leisure to stop and admire the scenery? When he returned from Guiyun Marketplace to Qinghe County, he had rushed home in a flurry so his clansmen would not keep worrying about his safety. He had returned to Funiu Mountain early, with no mind to appreciate the sights along the road.

It was twenty days later when he crossed Pingyang County and turned northwest. By the time he leisurely reached Guiyun Marketplace, more than a month had passed. Just as three years ago, visitors still had to line up at the entrance for their identities to be verified before entering. Only, compared to three years ago, there seemed to be a few more cultivators guarding the gate, and their questioning was more thorough than before.

After entering the Marketplace, Song Qingming made some inquiries and learned that, in recent years, a group of demonic cultivators had appeared in the Floating Cloud Mountain Range and harmed quite a few fellow cultivators. To prevent them from infiltrating the Marketplace, the Carefree Sect had intensified its inspections.

Demonic cultivators were cultivators who practiced strange and sinister techniques from other realms. After cultivating such techniques, their temperaments often changed drastically, and they would stop at nothing to achieve their goals. Some special techniques even possessed the eerie ability to control others, and there were acts that defied the heavenly way, such as Blood Sacrifice of mortals and cultivators.

Cultivators in this realm loathed demonic cultivators to the bone. Once traces of demonic cultivators were discovered in Wei State, the Carefree Sect would often raise a great commotion and wipe them out completely. However, demonic cultivators were all cunning people and skilled at concealing themselves among the mountain wilds and mortal population, often leaving these great sects to toil in vain.

Song Qingming wandered around Guiyun Marketplace for a while. It was not much different from three years ago. Soon, he arrived at the shop where he had bought the Void Sword three years earlier, only for the sight before him to leave him deeply frustrated. The sundries shop where he had purchased the magic artifact back then had been replaced by a shop selling all kinds of spirit beasts, and its owner had become a scruffy, bearded Middle-aged Man.

Song Qingming carefully confirmed that he had not come to the wrong place before stepping forward to ask, "Shopkeeper, may I ask whether Fellow Daoist Li, who used to be here, is still around?"

"Fellow Daoist Li? Which Fellow Daoist Li? I have no clerk surnamed Li here. Are you looking for the pill shop? He transferred this shop to me long ago. If you go a hundred paces farther ahead, you'll find him." As he spoke, the Middle-aged Man pointed toward a pill shop diagonally across the street.

"Pills? Wasn't this originally a sundries shop?" Song Qingming looked in the direction he indicated, even more puzzled.

After spending some time asking around, Song Qingming finally learned that Li's Sundries Shop had long since been abandoned, and this shop had already changed hands several times.

At this news, Song Qingming's heart could not help but tremble. He had long experienced the profound mysteries of the Jade Profound Scripture. He had originally come here to inquire who the expert was that had stored the Void Sword in that shop, but it seemed he had arrived a little too late. This place was now long empty, and he had no idea whether the shopkeeper from back then had known that a cultivation technique was hidden within the sword.

Still unwilling to give up, Song Qingming asked around the nearby streets. People were not unfamiliar with the master and disciple pair who had run the shop here three years ago, but they only knew that the two were master and disciple, apparently Rogue Cultivators from elsewhere. They had usually done nothing but manage that small shop. After asking all around, not a single person knew where they had gone. It seemed that, in the short term, he would find it difficult to learn the answer.

Even if they were worried that I had come to settle accounts, they didn't need to move the entire shop, did they? Seeing that night had fallen, Song Qingming left in disappointment and found an inn in the Marketplace to stay at.

Lying on the bed, Song Qingming continued pondering the matter. He even began to suspect that the two had deliberately hidden this cultivation technique inside the sword.

Now that he had obtained this inheritance and experienced the mysteries of the Jade Profound Scripture, if those two had truly intended to pass it on to him, then they could be considered the benefactors who had transmitted the Dao to him.

Next Morning, Song Qingming left the inn early and returned to the Marketplace. Following the largest street in the Marketplace, he arrived at a plaza on its eastern side. Quite a few cultivators had already gathered there. Some stood in groups of three or five, while others were alone like him, all staring intently toward the center of the plaza.

This was the place in Guiyun Marketplace where demon-hunting missions were issued to cultivators. At the center of the plaza stood a tall circular wall, plastered with missions to kill demonic beasts, procure spirit herbs, and all manner of information on demonic beasts.

From Level 1 Demonic Beasts in the early Qi Refinement stage to Level 2 Demonic Beasts at the peak of Foundation Establishment, all Level 1 and Level 2 Demonic Beasts near Guiyun Marketplace were included. Demonic beasts of Level 3 and above possessed mana and divine abilities comparable to human Golden Core Cultivators. They generally did not appear near Guiyun Marketplace, instead dwelling deep within the Floating Cloud Mountain Range, so Guiyun Marketplace naturally did not dare offer rewards for demonic beasts of that level.

The posted information not only marked where the demonic beasts were active, but also listed their traits and weaknesses one by one. It even specifically noted the valuable items found on those demonic beasts. This was done so that cultivators who accepted the missions could make preparations before setting out and complete their tasks more effectively.

For this purpose, the Carefree Sect had specially recruited a group of cultivators in Guiyun Marketplace to venture deep into the Floating Cloud Mountain Range and investigate information about these demonic beasts. Specialists then gathered the information together and, based on factors such as the demonic beasts' levels and the difficulty involved, attached corresponding Spirit Stone rewards before finally posting the missions in this plaza.

The Marketplace's rules clearly stipulated that any cultivator—whether a direct disciple of the Carefree Sect or an ordinary Rogue Cultivator—could receive the Spirit Stone reward listed on a mission as long as they accepted it, completed it successfully, and brought the required token here.

Guiyun Marketplace was the largest Marketplace in the northern region of the Carefree Sect. More than a thousand cultivators resided within it, most of them Rogue Cultivators. After accepting missions in the Marketplace, these Rogue Cultivators formed demon-hunting teams large and small before venturing deep into the Floating Cloud Mountain Range to kill demonic beasts, bringing an extraordinary prosperity to Guiyun Marketplace.

Guiyun Marketplace did this in order to attract more cultivators to hunt demonic beasts here, reduce the number of demonic beasts in the Floating Cloud Mountain Range, and make more preparations for the Demonic Beast Turmoil in the future.

Before coming here, Song Qingming had already made clear inquiries about the Marketplace. His purpose in coming was to find a place where he could go out and hunt demonic beasts to temper himself.

After wandering around the plaza for a long time, Song Qingming made up his mind to begin with some relatively simple missions and get some practice. After selecting a few fairly simple Mid-grade Demonic Beasts from among the missions, Song Qingming was about to walk toward the center of the plaza to accept them when a voice suddenly sounded beside him.

"Fellow Daoist, please wait a moment."