From Jieji Prefecture, a small Second-Grade prefecture on the fringe, to the largest nearby Third-Grade Azure Wolf Prefecture, the mountain roads were rugged, side paths scattered, and among the shadowed forests lay many dead ends.
For unfamiliar cultivators traveling this road for the first time, getting lost was almost inevitable.
Fortunately, Mo Hua had hired Head Escort Luo to "escort" him, making the rest of the journey much simpler and easier.
Head Escort Luo traveled this road often.
Though the route passed through barren mountains and treacherous waters, where vicious cultivators abounded and no small number of incidents arose, Head Escort Luo had spent many years escorting shipments and handled everything with practiced ease.
Mo Hua watched the fires from across the river, untouched by Karma, and was thoroughly relaxed.
Since he happened to have time, he looked over the mountain villages and settlements along the way, taking in their local customs and scenery.
His first impression was still poverty—utter poverty.
They were no different from the independent cultivators he had previously seen in the mountain villages of Jieji Prefecture.
These cultivators were sallow and emaciated, unable to fill their bellies.
Most were only at the third or fourth layer of Qi Refining.
Mo Hua even saw quite a few "natives" who were already no longer young, possessed Spirit Roots, yet showed absolutely no trace of cultivation.
That meant that from the day they were born, they had almost never refined a single Spirit Stone or breathed in even a wisp of spiritual energy.
They muddled through life until they were thirty or forty, relying solely on physical labor to earn a mouthful of food—and often, they could not even get that much.
Mo Hua had never imagined that in the world of cultivation, there truly were cultivators so poor