"Please forgive my ridiculous display, sir."
It took Huang Buyu quite a while to compose himself. He dusted off his clothes with both hands, then respectfully performed a full kowtow.
"Your disciple, Huang Buyu, thanks you for the grace of remaking me, sir!"
Having mastered the Art of Ascending and Copying, if he tried a few more times, he would most likely be able to shed his beastly form and take human shape.
Yet he had to admit that opportunity and risk went hand in hand.
Every failure would inflict irreversible damage upon the foundation of his cultivation.
Otherwise, he would not have lost his mind back then and tried to kill the Chen family's only son!
Now that an immortal had spoken a prophetic bestowal over him, it was countless times better than seeking a bestowal himself. Calling it the grace of remaking him was no exaggeration.
Most importantly, the immortal's willingness to bestow that prophecy meant he had already won his initial approval.
That meant he had taken another step closer to that great immortal opportunity!
"Rise. There may be an opportunity in Steward Zhang's study in Jinghe County. Go investigate it carefully, and do not alert outsiders."
Mo Chuan accepted the gratitude calmly and assigned him a new task.
"This disciple obeys your decree, sir!" Huang Buyu hurriedly replied.
"Do not trouble the Chen family again. If you seek this poor Daoist in the future, sincerely burn incense, contemplate this poor Daoist's appearance, or recite this poor Daoist's assumed name. This poor Daoist will naturally sense it."
Mo Chuan offered another instruction. His figure immediately vanished, leaving behind only a faint wisp of blue smoke that lingered without dispersing.
Huang Buyu's heart shook violently at those words.
Sincerely offering incense would allow one to communicate with an immortal... What kind of divine power was that?
Even spirit-writing techniques could, at most, summon down a Primordial Spirit or wandering soul.
Look at Immortal Mo—he crossed over directly in the flesh.
The difference between them was simply heaven and mud!
Thinking of this, Huang Buyu looked again at his living human body, and the fervor in his heart grew ever more intense.
He had to enter the immortal's sect. Even if he could only become a registered disciple and learn a move or two, it would be enough to benefit him for life!
After Mo Chuan departed, he casually found a desolate mountain path and examined the treasure Huang Buyu had offered him.
—Nabo.
Anyone with even a little cultivation could tell that this Nabo was far from ordinary.
Not only was spiritual energy coiling around its surface, but a fierce metallic aura trembled within it.
If it could be released, it might very well shatter souls and pulverize flesh.
But how was it activated?
Mo Chuan tried striking it with external objects.
Whether stones or magical artifacts, none succeeded.
Even when he struck it with the Three Pure Ones Bell used to command the Headless Ghost, it did not produce the slightest ripple.
"Could it be that this magical artifact has to come in a pair before it can be activated?"
After a round of futile effort, Mo Chuan gritted his teeth and made up his mind. He simply poured all his primordial qi into it.
He wanted to see what this dead thing would look like once it reached its limit.
"Bzzzz—"
As primordial qi flowed into it, the Nabo suddenly began to tremble and hum.
The fierce metallic aura hidden within rapidly expanded, spinning ever more violently as though it wanted to burst free of its confinement.
"Hm?"
Mo Chuan let out a startled sound. At that instant, through this half of the Nabo, he actually sensed the location of its other half.
"Interesting!"
His interest was piqued. With nothing else to do, he followed the fleeting memory of that sensation and went searching.
Once he set out, Mo Chuan was dumbfounded.
The mountain looked close enough to kill a horse running toward it.
In that vague sensation, the other half of the Nabo had seemed nearby. Yet before he knew it, the sun was already sinking, and he still had not found it.
Fine. Looks like I won't find it today.
Mo Chuan climbed to a high place and looked into the distance. Seeing smoke rising from cooking fires afar off, he decided to seek lodging for the night.
It had to be said that traveling in a physical body was far more troublesome than traveling as a soul or Xian Body.
Hunger, thirst, and exhaustion—every single one was a burden.
He even had to shit and piss.
A distance of twenty li had somehow turned into forty li after all the twists and turns.
In the past, he could disperse into qi. Forests or ravines, it did not matter; as long as his primordial qi could sustain him, he could travel a thousand li in a day.
No wonder the Daoist sect's famed soul-exiting divine power was called Spirit Travel.
It truly lived up to its name.
"Stop hitting me! Stop hitting me! Sob... I'm begging you..."
Before he even approached the village, a woman's pained pleas reached his ears.
Mo Chuan craned his neck and looked over.
In the distance, he could see several dozen villagers wielding shovels and clubs as they chased and beat a woman.
The woman was still clutching a wooden bucket. She shouted as she ran toward the village, while the washed clothes in the bucket scattered all over the ground.
Mo Chuan's expression turned strange.
As the old saying went:
Better spend the night in a wild graveyard than lodge in an ancient temple.
It meant that human hearts could sometimes be more terrifying than vicious ghosts.
Why was this such a coincidence?
This Daoist had only just passed by, and he was being handed a scene like this? Was he supposed to play the hero and save the beauty?
Mo Chuan mocked inwardly, but his feet quickened.
"Will you bear one or not? Will you bear one or not?"
"Huh? Will you bear one or not?!"
As Mo Chuan drew closer, bits of an obscure local dialect entered his ears. He had initially watched coldly, but the more he watched, the more something felt wrong.
These villagers were actually beating her for real!
Their shovels and clubs whistled through the air with tigerish force. Beneath the rain of blows, the woman had been beaten black and blue, blood smeared across her face, and looked utterly miserable.
At first, the woman had begged for mercy without cease.
Before long, she had fallen into despair, curling into a ball and allowing the crowd to beat her.
"Stop!" a sharp rebuke rang out.
The villagers doing the beating raised their heads in astonishment. They saw a young Daoist with red lips and white teeth striding angrily down the mountain road at the village entrance.
"What wild Daoist crawled out here? Get lost!"
Two of the attackers turned bloodshot eyes toward him. Their unrestrained violence had already stirred the viciousness in their hearts.
"Stop hitting her! What could warrant such a cruel hand?"
Mo Chuan tried to get to the bottom of things, lest he save some woman like Pan Jinlian.
But faced with his questioning, the villagers could not be bothered to explain. They continued beating her without pause.
Only a few villagers glanced at him instinctively, confusion appearing in their eyes.
Clearly, they could not understand Mo Chuan's accent.
"If you do not stop now, do not blame this poor Daoist for being rude!"
Seeing that the attackers still had no intention of stopping, Mo Chuan roared and rushed forward.
"Hey, hey, hey—"
"Ow!"
"Who—"
Amid startled cries of being caught off guard, the attackers were immediately knocked to the ground by Mo Chuan's fists and kicks.
Mo Chuan had never learned martial arts.
But empowered by the Art of Ascending and Copying, his movements were swift as lightning.
As the saying went: among all martial arts under heaven, none could withstand speed.
Against a dozen or so malnourished country bumpkins, such speed naturally made short work of them.
"Ow, where did this wild Daoist come from?"
"What are you doing?"
Mo Chuan had only just knocked down the attackers when the village, which had been quiet all along, suddenly poured out a huge crowd of villagers.
Every one of them held dung forks or shovels and watched Mo Chuan warily. Some were even itching to make a move.
Mo Chuan frowned.
The situation before him left him somewhat bewildered.
Could it be that the woman had truly done something so outrageous that heaven and earth could not tolerate it?
Was that why the villagers had stood by and watched?
"May I ask who is in charge here?" Mo Chuan called aloud.
The crowd parted, and a dark-faced man covered in wrinkles stepped out. "I'm the village chief. Who are you? Why'd you beat our villagers?"
Mo Chuan frowned. "May I ask what happened here? Why were you so cruel to an unarmed woman? Did she commit some grave offense?"
At this moment, a lean, wiry man stepped forward in a fury. "You're the one who committed an offense! She's my wife. I called people to perform Pai Xi on her. What the hell's it got to do with you?"
Mo Chuan looked blank. "Pai Xi? What does that mean?"
Seeing this, the village chief had no choice but to explain.
It turned out this was a local custom. If a married woman could not bear children, her husband could summon relatives and friends to catch his wife off guard and beat her with random clubs.
As they beat her, they had to shout, "Will you bear one or not?"
The harder they beat her, the more effective it was said to be.
Only when the husband appeared carrying a winnowing basket full of peanuts and red dates, scattering them among the crowd while declaring, "She's got one! She's got one!" would the Pai Xi ritual be considered complete.
Mo Chuan found it so absurd that it was like being struck by lightning. He asked instinctively:
"What if she gets beaten to death?"
"If she dies, she dies. Just marry another one."
As the village chief spoke, the woman who had been beaten black and blue was already helped to her feet by several village women. Limping, she disappeared into the crowd, never once looking at Mo Chuan.
"You ox-nosed old Daoist, you made my wife suffer for nothing! If you don't give me an explanation today, I won't be done with you!"
The woman's husband pointed at Mo Chuan's nose, jumping and cursing threats.
Mo Chuan fell silent.
How was this Pai Xi?
This was plainly using a pretext to beat one's wife to death—get promoted, get rich, and let the wife die!
Looking at these aggressive country villagers before him, who felt not the slightest remorse and instead glared at him angrily, Mo Chuan inexplicably thought of Mr. Lu Xun and felt a wave of desolation.
Should he simply leave?
"So it is your village's Pai Xi ritual. This poor Daoist was ignorant of your customs and has caused offense. I truly apologize! How about this? Would this half-string of copper coins be enough as compensation?"
Mo Chuan reached into his robes, took out half a string of copper coins, and offered them in apology.
The villagers immediately looked at one another in astonishment.
Those who had been beaten revealed greedy looks and instinctively took a step forward.
Half a string of coins was worth no small sum in this village, poor enough to rattle.
Before they could speak, Mo Chuan added:
"What a coincidence. This poor Daoist's temple enshrines the Goddess of Child-Giving, and this poor Daoist is quite versed in methods of seeking children! Having offended you layfolk today, I truly feel sorry about it. How about letting this poor Daoist resolve the matter? I guarantee success in seeking a child!"
The moment he finished speaking, the villagers erupted into noisy chatter.
Some asked what Mo Chuan had said.
Others discussed whether this Goddess of Child-Giving was truly efficacious.
"You ox-nosed Daoist, are you trying to lend us your seed?"
The woman's husband widened his bull-like eyes, his face filled with fury.
The surrounding crowd burst into laughter.
Some shameless busybody women even openly teased him.
"Gou Shenzi, look at that little Daoist—his skin's so tender, he's prettier than a woman. If you can borrow his seed, that's your good fortune!"
"That's right!"
"Maybe you'll even have a little Daoist!"
The crowd laughed and joked without the slightest shame.
Because borrowing seed truly was a last-resort measure for some families unable to have children.
Thanks to "Book Friend 20221008233448295" and "One Hundred Ninety-Seven You" for the tips!
Also, the Pai Xi custom was not fabricated. It is said that it still exists even now...
Before you continue