Each Walked Their Own Road

Dawn had only just broken when horses neighed and carriages rattled, and everyone set off one after another.

"Qingyun, everyone, Four Seas Pavilion will be taking its leave first!"

The Four Seas Pavilion caravan had traveled the martial world for many years and had long since made all its preparations. They were the first to depart. Wang Muyun lifted the carriage curtain and called out a greeting to Li Qingyun from afar.

Li Qingyun stood tall and nodded as he watched them leave.

He also returned the bow and arrows to Guard Zhang of the caravan. As a cultivator, he would not stoop to coveting such trifles.

The thunderous spell markings on that great bow faded away as well.

They had only been imprinted temporarily the previous night rather than engraved into a refined artifact, so the "Thunder Bow" could not last for long.

Then the Cai family party set out as well.

As Young Madam Chu Hongyu's lavish, fragrant carriage passed Li Qingyun, she lifted the curtain and cast him a quiet look. Her expression was somewhat cold now, no longer carrying the gentle warmth and enthusiasm she had shown the night before.

She had felt Li Qingyun's indifference and deliberate distancing the previous night.

Once the carriage had passed, Li Qingyun suddenly smiled and began to hum and sing softly:

"Upon the road of mortal dust, desires swirl in chaos; deep amid a hundred flowers, there is no worthy love..."

Hearing the song, Chu Hongyu lifted the curtain and looked back. Her lovely face turned faintly pale, her expression complicated. Only after quite some time did she lower the curtain again.

Carriages and horses rolled onward, raising dust in their wake; at the ends of the earth, strangers scattered in every direction.

Li Qingyun smiled faintly and drifted onto his horse.

"Senior Brother, let us go as well!"

Naturally, he had sung it deliberately for Chu Hongyu. With her intelligence, she would certainly understand what Li Qingyun meant.

As a disciple of Lingbao Temple and He Xiao's roommate, Li Qingyun truly could not bear to see the temple's reputation damaged or his roommate stray down the wrong path—and make such a lowly mistake at that.

The cold wind sighed bleakly as the figures of all parties dispersed.

Gatherings and partings, unions and separations—such was the way of things. Who was not merely a passing traveler in another's life?

Traveling by daylight, Li Qingyun and Zhao Yifan did not rest much as they hurried straight toward Yinshan Town.

At dusk that same day.

The two men and one cat arrived at the town situated at the foot of Great Yin Mountain.

From afar, the vast, unbroken Great Yin Mountain lay shrouded in Gray Mist, hazy and indistinct.

It was now the turn of autumn and winter. A pale gleam could faintly be seen atop the mountain peaks, which must already have been covered in sheets of snow.

Before they had even entered the town, Li Qingyun felt that something was strange:

Why was there scarcely a soul to be seen outside the town?

The sky was still fairly bright, with some time before nightfall, yet not a single farmer could be seen working in the fields or vegetable plots.

There were no pedestrians on the official road either, apart from the two of them.

At the distant foot of the mountain, however, several mountain folk wearing cloaks and strange rune patterns painted on their faces held hunting forks and carried bows on their backs. They pointed at Li Qingyun and Zhao Yifan from afar, seemingly shouting something.

But neither of them understood the mountain dialect. They simply waved in acknowledgment before entering through the town gates.

Once inside the town, Li Qingyun frowned even more deeply. At once, he sensed a faint, lingering chill permeating the air.

This chill was not caused by ordinary weather. It carried a trace of bleak, yin-coldness.

There were only two or three old soldiers at the gate, huddled into a frozen clump as they held their spears and warmed themselves by a fire in a sheltered spot beneath the wall.

When they saw people entering the town, the old soldiers did not question them. They merely gave them expressionless glances before lowering their heads to continue warming themselves by the fire.

Atop the gate tower, the vague figure of a Daoist stood silently, watching Li Qingyun and Zhao Yifan enter the town with an expressionless face.

"This Yinshan Town is strange everywhere..."

When they passed a notice board beside the street, Li Qingyun stopped.

He looked at the talismans on the board rustling chaotically in the wind, then raised his head to gaze at the heavy Gray Mist hanging over the entire town, lost in thought.

Their horses moved slowly over the frost-covered street stones. The clopping of hooves and the snorting of breath sounded exceptionally clear, echoing again and again.

The arrival of the two Lingbao Temple Daoists did not stir up any particular commotion, much less a welcoming crowd lining the streets.

The town was not small. Houses, towers, and halls stretched on in succession; its streets were broad and its winding alleys numerous. It was a town of tens of thousands, yet the streets were sparsely populated at a glance, cold and desolate.

The occasional townsfolk they saw were wrapped in thick padded coats, bloated and cumbersome. Every one of them was frozen blue in the face, which seemed somewhat abnormal.

Their gazes wandered, yet they were also like birds startled by the mere twang of a bowstring. They did not dare approach Li Qingyun and Zhao Yifan. When they saw Li Qingyun intending to ask something, they hurried away to avoid him.

Moreover, from the cracks of doors and between the windows of those private homes, hostile gazes would occasionally peek out.

A faintly oppressive atmosphere permeated the air of the little town.

Zhao Yifan was an old hand in the martial world, so naturally he had noticed that something was amiss. His expression grew somewhat grave.

"Junior Brother, this job of suppressing ghosts and bringing peace to the people seems harder to handle than I imagined..."

"Yes. Compared with Ping'an Town, this place is far too deserted, and the townsfolk's moods are not right either..."

When things were abnormal, there had to be something suspicious behind them.

"Let us first go to the Youdao Division and ask what is going on!"

Zhao Yifan had likely visited Yinshan Town before. He led Li Qingyun directly toward the town's government offices.

This place fell under the administration of the You Kingdom court. Officials, soldiers, and personnel from the Youdao Division were stationed here to manage it.

Maple Mountain Lingbao Temple had issued the mission to suppress ghosts and bring peace to Yinshan Town precisely because it had received a request from the chief Dao official of the local Youdao Division.

Demons and monsters ran rampant throughout the You Kingdom. Wherever people gathered, extraordinary powers would inevitably stand guard and offer protection. The Youdao Division was the institution of extraordinary power specially established by the Li Dynasty of the You Kingdom, and its authority was immense.

Yinshan Town's Youdao Division stood in the center of town. Beside it were several town government offices, the Patrol Division, and other agencies. Though the sparrow was small, it possessed all five organs; yet all these offices looked exceedingly deserted.

They even gave the illusion of having been abandoned for a very long time.

"Are there any fellow Daoists in the Youdao Division? We have come from Maple Mountain Lingbao Temple!"

The two dismounted before the Youdao Division's gates. Seeing no one at the entrance, Zhao Yifan had no choice but to call inside.

Even the entrance to the Youdao Division was bleak and deserted, so it was no wonder the entire town had such an atmosphere.

Taking the opportunity, Li Qingyun studied this Youdao Division office, renowned throughout the common folk of the You Kingdom.

Yinshan Town's Youdao Division had been built grandly, with towering gates and a vast compound. The vermilion-lacquered doors were covered in glittering golden studs that still shone brightly despite the yin-cold weather.

In cultivators' eyes, gold contained the aura of Yang intent. Used properly, it could even deter evil entities. Thus, many Dharma artifacts, Dao Lord statues, talismans, and the like used some gold, the purer the better.

Two enormous stone lions crouched on either side of the steps. Their eyes were as large as bronze bells, and they looked mighty and intimidating.

Li Qingyun examined them with interest for a moment, but then his attention was drawn to the stone lions' eyes. He sensed them carefully and felt as though something inside those stone eyeballs was watching him.

"Perhaps this is a surveillance spell of the Youdao Division..."

He then looked up at the plaque above the gates. There stood a small Dao Lord statue with the air of an immortal and the bearing of the Dao. It held a whisk in its hands, its face stern while its eyes held compassion for all living beings.

Li Qingyun recognized this Dao Lord statue. Its honored name was Dao Lord Lingxiao Miaozhen Dongyou Yinyang Rensheng, said to be the oldest recorded existence in the You Kingdom.

Marquis Qinghe's Estate chiefly worshipped this Dao Lord as well. Li Qingyun had bowed before it since childhood.

Every three to five hundred years or so, the You Kingdom dynasty would undergo great upheaval. Beacon fires would rise on all sides, until heaven and earth were remade and a new regime took its place. The current Li Dynasty had risen amid the chaos more than three hundred years ago and seized the royal authority.

By that count, Marquis Qinghe's branch was also related to the imperial family. Li Qingyun carried the bloodline of the Li Imperial Clan, though separated by many generations, it had long since grown thin.

Yet no matter how the world roiled and changed, this Dao Lord remained the chief deity worshipped by every household.

The Nine Heavens Azure Dao Lord of Biyou Palace enjoyed tremendous prestige among cultivators and was considered a rising star, but in terms of accumulated divine authority among the common people, it still could not compare to this ancient Dao Lord.