Hello

Niu Youdao and Yuan Gang had only just met, and they had plenty to say, so they drifted to the very back of the group.

Up ahead, Shang Chaozong happened to hear Shang Shuqing still muttering the words "airplanes and tanks." He glanced back at the two people trailing far behind and laughed. "They don't want to talk about it, yet Qing'er is still dwelling on it? Why didn't you get to the bottom of it earlier?"

Unable to see the expression beneath Shang Shuqing's Gauze Hat, he heard her say, "They don't want to talk about it, but I feel that Niu Youdao isn't the kind of person who spouts nonsense casually. Those words he let slip gave me a strange feeling. They didn't seem to be a slip of the tongue, but more like he simply didn't think there was anything worth hiding from us. And the way Yuan Gang looked at us was disdainful too."

Shang Chaozong said suspiciously, "Qing'er, what you're saying contradicts itself. I'm getting a little confused."

Shang Shuqing said, "I can't explain it clearly either. It feels like disdain in terms of attitude—a feeling of 'I'll say it if I feel like it; it's not as though you understand anyway.' To some extent, when facing us, they seem to have a psychological advantage of looking down from above."

Shang Chaozong let out a laugh. "Maybe they think they're mages, while in their eyes we're merely ordinary mortals."

"Perhaps!" Shang Shuqing murmured, then turned around and asked, "Mr. Lan, what do you think he meant by agreeing to go to the village with us, only to refuse later?"

Lan Ruoting said, "Perhaps he was trying to protect the villagers. This Yuan Gang may truly not want us to come into contact with them."

Shang Chaozong said, "Now that we know where the place is, wouldn't it be easy to make contact later if we wanted to?"

Lan Ruoting said, "Did the Prince not notice just now? If there really is a village in the mountains, it's clearly no ordinary village. You could tell from that whistle alone that the village has tight self-protection measures. The moment outsiders approached, the villagers would probably be on guard. Perhaps, as they said, they've been terrified of being plundered by soldiers."

The group left the small path and continued racing along the official road.

Niu Youdao rode alongside Yuan Gang at the rear, telling him about what had happened to each of them over the years. They were happy to meet again, and Niu Youdao didn't mind eating dust at the back of the group.

There was nothing Niu Youdao needed to hide from Yuan Gang. He told him everything from the time he woke in the ruined temple and met Dongguo Haoran to his journey out of the mountains this time. He even told him about discovering the 'Qiankun Jue' through the Bronze Mirror.

Yuan Gang had never expected that Niu Youdao had been under house arrest for five years. "Daoist Master, if what you're saying is true, did the Shangqing Sect try to harm you?"

Niu Youdao sighed. "Probably. Judging from the various signs and Tu Han's warning, they likely wanted me to die sooner. I don't know what I did to offend them. I never harmed them, so why make things difficult for me? I still can't make head or tail of it."

Yuan Gang said, "They could have easily acted against you while you were in the Shangqing Sect. Why wait until now?"

Niu Youdao said, "That puzzles me too."

Yuan Gang asked, "How does Daoist Master plan to resolve this?"

Niu Youdao said, "It seems unsafe to keep following that group ahead of us. Let's wait until we pass Nanshan Temple. Once the Shangqing Sect thinks I'm dead and the danger of being hounded has been cut off, we'll shake them off and leave at once. After that, the world will be ours to roam. With the abilities of the two of us brothers, we can travel around and see everything."

After discussing the matter, Niu Youdao began telling Yuan Gang what he knew about the cultivation world, so that Yuan Gang's thoughts could break free of that mountain village and he could better understand the world and protect himself. Unfortunately, the books written by the Shangqing Sect about the cultivation world had not been allowed out, or this explanation would have saved them a lot of breath. Yuan Gang had spent so many years mixing around in the "archaeological world," so reading Small Seal Script was no problem for him.

Yuan Gang listened and thought along the way, then suddenly blurted out, "I truly can't understand how people from the cultivation world could intervene in the mundane world, even getting involved in the struggles for supremacy among the various nations."

Niu Youdao chuckled. "What's so hard to understand? Only ignorance makes it seem incomprehensible. The things you don't know about don't cease to exist. You've read Investiture of the Gods, haven't you? How many cultivators took part in the War of Shang and Zhou? Jiang Ziya, Nezha, Yang Jian, and the rest. It's much the same as the world we're in now. Just think of us as having entered the world inside Investiture of the Gods. Then your mind will naturally be able to turn the corner."

Yuan Gang was somewhat speechless. Frowning, he said, "Daoist Master, according to you, are there really immortals in this world who can fly around?"

Holding the reins as he raced along, Niu Youdao smiled again. "That depends on how you understand the so-called immortals. If you're only talking about the ability to fly around, then there probably are such people. It's just that there don't seem to be many in this world who have reached that level of cultivation. If someone truly possessed that kind of cultivation, they would already stand at the top of the food chain, with a whole crowd beneath them supplying benefits. Ordinary matters probably wouldn't be enough to make them show themselves."

"They can really fly around?" Yuan Gang shook his head. Though the words came from someone he trusted, he still found it hard to believe. "That's not scientific!"

Niu Youdao spread his hands. "It's very scientific. You just haven't come into contact with the core principles, so you can't understand them."

Yuan Gang was astonished. "Scientific? Where's the science in it?"

Niu Youdao pondered briefly, considering how to explain it. After sorting out his thoughts, he said, "Before we came here, I was just like you. I didn't believe in immortals either. But after cultivating in the Shangqing Sect for five years and comparing the two sides, I more or less understood where the secret lay. Watch!"

He signaled for Yuan Gang to look. Flipping his palm, he pushed out with his power, and a cloud of dust kicked up by the horses racing ahead immediately spun like a vortex in his palm without dispersing. After casually waving it away, he asked, "What do you think I was doing just now?"

Yuan Gang said, "That was the Internal Energy produced by the Qi Cultivation you practice." He had seen similar things from Niu Youdao before.

Niu Youdao nodded. "It was Qi Cultivation, yes. But after circulating my power, where did that force come from? Can you explain it?"

Yuan Gang fell silent. He had never really thought deeply about it. He only knew that it was Qi Cultivation. He shook his head to show that he didn't know.

Niu Youdao said, "In the early stages of Qi Cultivation, when your body, mind, and senses open up, you can feel your body absorbing something from the unseen world. According to Daoist teachings, it's called the spiritual energy of Heaven and Earth. I always understood it in that abstruse, hazy way. But after comparing things here, I think I more or less understand what this so-called spiritual energy of Heaven and Earth really is."

Even though Yuan Gang remained composed, he couldn't hold back his curiosity. "What is it?"

Niu Youdao said, "If I explain it with a more scientific term, you should understand. Dark matter. Have you heard of dark matter?"

Shock flashed through Yuan Gang's eyes. "You mean the substance smaller than electrons and photons, impossible to observe directly, which scientists have tried every possible way to capture?"

Niu Youdao nodded. "Exactly. After comparing the two worlds and thinking it over carefully, I believe that spiritual energy is dark matter. There's something from old superstition you should be familiar with: ghosts. They seem to exist, yet seem not to exist. But in the Shangqing Sect, I confirmed from certain ancient texts that ghosts truly exist here. I think so-called ghosts are actually formed from dark matter invisible to the naked eye. After a person dies, their thoughts and consciousness remain, existing through dark matter as a medium, thereby forming what people call a ghost. The principle is actually the same as the physical bodies you and I possess now. The difference between us and ghosts should merely be that the mediums through which our minds operate are different. The universe is vast, and diversity exists side by side. There are too many things humanity doesn't understand. That doesn't mean they don't exist; everything requires a process of contact and understanding."

"..." Yuan Gang looked at him speechlessly.

"Don't look at me like that. There's no need to make such a fuss. If I'm not mistaken, the difference in Internal Energy and magical power is actually just the difference in the power of controlling dark matter and releasing dark energy." Niu Youdao smiled faintly and raised his sleeve to block a large cloud of drifting dust before continuing, "Only after cultivating here did I discover that the spiritual energy of this world—in other words, the dark matter you can understand—is far more abundant than in the place we came from. I tested it repeatedly, and the speed of cultivation here is far greater than there. According to certain ancient texts, there wasn't this much spiritual energy here in the past, so there naturally weren't as many cultivators either. Later, Shang Song, the founding emperor of the Wu Kingdom, supposedly poked a hole in the heavens, and spiritual energy began leaking continuously into this world. I don't know exactly what happened. By the way, are you still practicing Hard Qi Cultivation?"

Yuan Gang nodded. "I've kept at it ever since my injuries healed. You need at least some ability to protect yourself."

Niu Youdao's face turned playful. "True Hard Qi Cultivation for body tempering actually works together with a breathing technique. It also absorbs spiritual energy—in other words, dark matter as you understand it. If I'm not mistaken, your progress in Hard Qi Cultivation must be far greater now than it was before."

Yuan Gang fell silent. That was exactly right. Daoist Master had guessed correctly. He had never understood why, but after Daoist Master explained it so simply and clearly, he seemed to grasp it now.

Niu Youdao cheerfully said, "The Qiankun Jue I practice is pretty good. Later, I'll examine your body and see whether your constitution is suited to cultivating it. If it is, you can practice it too."

Yuan Gang shook his head. "I'm not interested in sitting cross-legged and wasting time in meditation. I'd rather do something meaningful with that time."

Niu Youdao said, "Don't be foolish. This world isn't like the place we came from. Wouldn't it be better to have a little more strength to protect yourself? Living longer, extending your lifespan, and slowing down aging are good things too."

Yuan Gang still shook his head. "What meaning is there in living longer if you spend all that time sitting in meditation? Life lies in movement!"

"Monkey, I'm telling you..."

"Daoist Master, don't try to persuade me. I'm not like you, always obsessed with this stuff. I really have no interest in those abstruse and mysterious things. You should understand my attitude toward life."

"Fine, I can't be bothered to talk anymore." Niu Youdao sighed, then pointed at him and reminded him, "But don't give up your Hard Qi Cultivation. I suspect the Hard Qi Cultivation you practice isn't ordinary. You could glimpse certain clues from Daoist legends in the place we came from. The amount of spiritual energy there must once have been decent too, but something happened later, and it became extremely thin. Over the long years, any cultivation method with even slightly poor sensing and absorption abilities would certainly have been eliminated. The methods that still produced results in your and my era should all have been extraordinary. Here, they might produce entirely different effects. You must have felt that yourself, even without me saying it."

Yuan Gang grunted. After falling silent for a while, he asked, "Daoist Master, what are your plans for the future?"

Niu Youdao looked around at the world beneath the sky and laughed heartily. "Since we're here, we might as well settle in. I'll give this world two words!"

"Two words?" Yuan Gang didn't understand and asked in confusion, "Which two words?"

"Hello!"

Niu Youdao raised his brows, tossed out the words, and lashed his whip against the horse before galloping away.

"Hello?" Yuan Gang froze for a moment. He looked around, then urged his horse into a gallop and chased after him, the two racing one after the other.