Yun City

The next morning, I got up and washed up. Then I went downstairs and bought two steamed buns from a shop for breakfast.

After a hasty meal, I returned to my room, grabbed my backpack, and went downstairs to check out.

"Young man, leaving so early? You can check out as late as noon here," the landlord said.

"No, Uncle, I have some things to do, so I'll be going now."

"Alright, alright. That'll be fifty-six yuan. You've still got several hours until noon, so I'll just charge you fifty."

I took out a fifty yuan bill and gave it to the landlord. Then I asked:

"Oh, right, Uncle, do you know where I can find shops that deal in antiques around here?"

"Antique shops? Hmm... There's one over in Garden Residential Area.

But it's a bit far from here, about seven or eight kilometers."

He then told me to just take a taxi, and the driver would take me there. I thanked him.

Then I hailed a taxi and asked the driver if he knew how to get to Garden Residential Area. He said he did, and we set off.

When I arrived, I got out and walked, checking the house numbers as I went. Soon, I saw a sign that read "Number Nine."

I looked up and saw it was a slightly old storefront. Then I strode inside.

"Looking to buy or sell?" an old man wearing reading glasses said, lying on a chair.

"Hello, Uncle, my name is Li Yutong. I'm looking for someone."

The old man paused, then asked who I was looking for.

"I'm looking for Yun Hong. He's an old friend of my father's. Do you know where he lives?"

After hearing my words, the old man shot up from his reclining chair.

Then, he looked at me warily and said, "What are you looking for Yun Hong for? And who is your father?"

"My father is Li Daorong. He's an old friend of Yun Hong's. My father sent me here to find him," I replied. Then I asked if this was indeed Number Nine Garden Residential Area.

The old man said it was, then looked me up and down.

He then told me to wait a moment while he made a phone call to ask, and walked towards the back room.

I waited for the old man inside the shop. With nothing else to do, I casually looked at the items on the counter.

There were many things in the cabinets: bronze coins, jade pendants, teacups...

Many of them looked quite beautiful, but unfortunately, I don't know anything about antiques.

But there was one thing I could judge: these items looked nice.

However, compared to the jade pendants hanging from the man's waist in my Yin gathering token, they were far inferior. Just in terms of their luxuriousness, these antiques in the shop couldn't compare.

Before long, the old man came out and told me to sit down and wait, saying a car would be here to pick me up soon.

Hearing this, I found a place to sit and started chatting with the old man.

The old man said his surname was Liao, he was almost sixty years old, and because he knew a lot about antiques, he helped Yun Family manage the shop here. He'd been doing it for many years.

He then went on about how profound his knowledge of antiques was, how he entered the antique business in his teens, and had seen more antiques in his lifetime than I had eaten salt, and so on.

I figured the old man had been here too long, and perhaps because no one was around to talk to, he latched onto the first person he saw and started rambling. I smiled and nodded in response.

After waiting for about half an hour, just as I was starting to get impatient, the sound of a car horn came from outside the shop.

"Beep~ beep~ beep."

I looked up and saw a Range Rover parked outside the shop. A moment later, a girl dressed very purely got out of the car.

The girl was wearing a white T-shirt with a bear pattern on it and a white mini-skirt.

She had on white leather shoes and her hair was in a ponytail. Her cheeks were a little chubby.

She wore light makeup, and her long legs made me dizzy.

"Uncle Liao, I heard someone was looking for my father. Where is he?" the girl said as she entered.

"Young miss is here! It's this gentleman," the old man stood up and pointed at me.

Hearing this, I also stood up and said to the girl, "Hello, my name is Li Yutong. I'm the one looking for Uncle Yun."

The girl stared at me with her watery eyes, making me blush. For a moment, there was silence in the shop.

"Hello, my name is Yun Yao. Are you the one looking for my father?" the girl asked.

I said yes, and then explained that my father had asked me to find Yun Hong.

"Okay, I understand. Follow me then," the girl said.

I asked the girl with some confusion, "Follow you? Where to?"

"We're going to my place first, then we'll see what Grandfather says. We can't have you staying here, can we?" the girl said to me with a smile.

When she smiled, two dimples appeared, her eyes narrowed into crescents, and her skin was so flawless it looked like it could be broken with a puff of air. She was very beautiful.

I thought to myself, As expected of a girl from a big city. Someone like me, a bumpkin from a small mountain village, can't compare.

"Uncle Liao, we're leaving now."

"Alright, drive carefully on the way," Uncle Liao replied.

The girl nodded with a smile, and I also said, "Thank you, sir," to Uncle Liao. Then, I got into the car with the girl.

I wasn't familiar with this place, so I had no idea where the car was heading.

I felt a little uneasy along the way, so I asked the girl where her home was and how far it was.

"It's a secret. You'll know when we get there," the girl replied with a smile.

I was helpless, so I looked at the scenery by the roadside and guessed where our destination might be.

The car drove out of the city and into the suburbs, then headed into the mountains, winding and turning into a forest.

Suddenly, the girl sharply turned the steering wheel, and the car headed straight for a large rock.

My pupils contracted sharply, and I let out a loud "Ah!"

Out of fear, I instinctively closed my eyes and gripped the seatbelt tightly with both hands.

This is it, I'm done for, I thought. Female drivers really are unreliable.

She just went for it, but after a long time, there was no sound of a collision.

I opened my eyes and saw that the car had stopped. I looked at the girl, still shaken.

The girl let out a snicker and then burst into laughter, holding the steering wheel.

"Hahahaha..."

I was completely bewildered. "What happened? Weren't we about to crash into that rock?"

The girl laughed for a while before saying to me, "That large rock just now was an illusion array.

They set up an illusion array at the entrance to prevent ordinary people from finding this place."

Hearing this, I breathed a sigh of relief. Knowing the truth, I wasn't as scared as before.

After all, Maoshan talismans also had talismans similar to illusion arrays.

I just didn't think they were very useful, so I never made any. Thus, I calmed down shortly after.

"Why did you calm down so quickly?" the girl asked me.

My face flushed. Thinking about how I had acted earlier, I felt a bit embarrassed and replied somewhat unconvincingly:

"It's nothing, really. I was just startled when I suddenly saw it."

"Oh... really?" The girl looked at me with a playful expression. I nodded, trying to appear calm.

I got out of the car and lit a cigarette. Then I noticed my hands were still trembling.

It took me several tries with the lighter to finally light the cigarette. After taking a puff, I looked up...

The smoke I had just inhaled almost choked me to death. I saw a massive city before me.

Buildings were everywhere, stretching as far as the eye could see...

Not far from us was a very long street, filled with shops and stalls selling all sorts of goods.

Some vendors displayed their items on tables, while others simply spread a cloth on the ground.

Their wares were displayed in a dazzling array, and the stall owners and vendors shouted out, hawking their products.

The cigarette in my hand fell to the ground as I stared at the scene, dumbfounded.

"Welcome to Yun City," the girl said, walking up to me with a smile.