"Everyone, hurry to Black Bubble Pond! I heard someone found one or two hundred Fireball Talismans there!"
"What?! Someone found a thousand Fireball Talismans at Black Bubble Pond!"
Just as Wei Suo had expected, the three cultivators who had first taken pleasure in his misfortune, then gone mad with jealousy and cursed the heavens over why they had not been the ones to find that rusty iron chest, quickly spread the news. In fact, Wei Suo had waited quite a while for these three fellows. Only low-level cultivators around his own level would make him confident they would not kill him and rob him after seeing how many Fireball Talismans he had taken. Wei Suo had kept up an act near Black Bubble Pond for an hour or two before finally waiting for these three people, who should not have been able to beat him even if they tried.
But Wei Suo had never imagined the story would grow so absurd. Not only had the number of talismans become wildly exaggerated—from a hundred at first, to a thousand, then tens of thousands—every kind of bizarre rumor had sprung up as well. Some said they had seen Wei Suo pick up a powerful intact magic treasure in Black Bubble Pond. Others claimed he had found a seventh-rank demon core there.
"No way, right?"
As the very instigator of the rumor, Wei Suo nearly planted his face on the ground after selling a Fireball Talisman outside a shop in the north of the city and overhearing several people talking by the roadside.
Those people were actually saying that someone had seen Wei Suo pick up the intimate bra of Fairy Bai Ling, the most beautiful female cultivator on Tianxuan Continent several thousand years ago... Was that not a little too outrageous?
At least several hundred people had now gathered in the marshes around Black Bubble Pond. It was said that two fairly sizable factions were even fighting bitterly over priority rights to search a patch of swamp. Hearing this, Wei Suo truly wanted to go watch the excitement, but out of caution, he instead hurried toward a magnificent golden hall near the eastern city gate, bearing a huge plaque of pure gold with the words Tianyi upon it.
Just as Wei Suo hurried toward that hall, Han Weiwei happened to be wandering aimlessly through the Free Market outside the city gates.
For a girl, every first time was extremely important. The first demon beasts Han Weiwei had ever killed were actually those two Stone-tailed Wall Lizards. In truth, she was not as foolish as Wei Suo had imagined. For her first time sneaking out alone to hunt demon beasts, doing as well as she had was already quite impressive. Yet the two Stone-tailed Wall Lizards she had worked so hard to kill had been snatched away by Wei Suo. And he had not openly taken them from her—he had pretended to take off his pants in front of her, then slung the two Stone-tailed Wall Lizards over his back and run away. Thus, Han Weiwei could be said to have an unforgettable impression of Wei Suo. These past few days, she had often come to wander around the Free Market, thinking that a low-level Rogue Cultivator like Wei Suo would likely come here to trade. But she had not expected Wei Suo to have been cooped up at home, desperately crafting talismans all this time.
Although Wei Suo's hair was now burnt into a wild mess, and Han Weiwei had only seen his profile from afar in the Free Market, she recognized him at once as that shameless bastard who had stolen her first time.
The moment she recalled how that fellow had run so fast she could not catch him, yet still waved back at her and shouted, "Beauty, let's have tea together next time," Han Weiwei immediately gritted her teeth and chased after Wei Suo without a word.
That building with the huge pure-gold Tianyi plaque was one of the Tianyi Sect's structures housing Teleportation Arrays. Within a radius of several thousand li around Lingyue City, the Tianyi Sect had built numerous Teleportation Arrays. Since Lingyue City itself stood at the edge of Tianxuan Continent, some of the Tianyi Sect's arrays even extended beyond the heavenly dome. So long as they paid enough Spirit Stones, cultivators in Lingyue City could even appear directly beyond the heavenly dome, thousands of li away.
Inside this resplendent Tianyi Sect hall was a vast, imposing main chamber. Sixteen massive golden pillars coiled with dragons supported the entire hall, while three Teleportation Arrays inlaid with gemstones of every color and carved with profound runes stood side by side in the center.
"Shameless bastard!"
The instant Han Weiwei rushed into the hall, she saw Wei Suo's back vanish within the white light of one of the Teleportation Arrays.
"Activate the array for me, now!"
Before the Tianyi Sect disciple standing before the array could even speak, Han Weiwei had already tossed three Low-grade Spirit Stones to him and stepped onto the very Teleportation Array where Wei Suo had just disappeared.
"Where did that guy whose hair looked like it had been burned go?"
As soon as Han Weiwei emerged from the Teleportation Array, she found herself in a bare, desolate valley. The Tianyi Sect disciple from before had moved quickly as well, but in only a moment, Wei Suo had already vanished from sight. So without even asking where this place was, Han Weiwei directly questioned the somewhat dull-looking young Tianyi Sect disciple guarding the array beside her.
"He used this array to teleport back to Tianjing City." The young Tianyi Sect disciple guarding the valley's array pointed to another Teleportation Array not far from Han Weiwei.
"What? He had just teleported out of Tianjing City, and then he teleported right back into Tianjing City?" Han Weiwei's eyes widened in disbelief.
"I cannot understand it either. Why would he teleport back into the city right after coming out?" the young Tianyi Sect disciple said with a bitter smile.
"..." Han Weiwei was speechless as well. Each use of such a Teleportation Array cost two Low-grade Spirit Stones. Although the Tianyi Sect was the most powerful sect in Lingyue City, even a Tianyi Sect disciple of this rank could earn at most three Low-grade Spirit Stones issued by the sect for guarding a Teleportation Array all day. This disciple had seemed somewhat slow-witted earlier, but it turned out he had simply been staring blankly at that Teleportation Array, unable to understand how that fellow, who was clearly only a low-level Rogue Cultivator at the Second Level of Sea of Consciousness Realm, could spend four Low-grade Spirit Stones just teleporting around for fun.
While Han Weiwei stood there in a daze, two more cultivators teleported over from the Tianjing City array. Both wore iron-gray robes, and both had cultivation at the Circulation Realm First Level. Yet Wei Suo knew nothing of any of this. The valley where Han Weiwei and the others stood was called Dragon Origin Valley. It lay roughly three hundred li southeast of Tianjing City, and beyond it was Black Wind Ridge. Throughout that mountain range, which stretched for several hundred li, many places were filled with strange black miasma, and several kinds of second-rank demon beasts could be found there, including Five-colored Poison Spiders. Since there was a considerable flow of cultivators traveling here, and small short-distance Teleportation Arrays like these could transport no more than four people at a time, the Tianyi Sect had built two such small Teleportation Arrays here. The other one connected to a Teleportation Array west of Lingyue City.
The moment Wei Suo returned to Lingyue City, he left the Teleportation Array at top speed and ducked into a nearby alley. He took a set of black robes from the bundle on his back and changed into them, wrapping even his entire head. Then he exited through the alley's other end, swiftly circled through several quiet lanes, and only then returned to his small stone house.
Wei Suo, whose eyes would shine at the sight of even a single Low-grade Spirit Stone, naturally would not spend four of them teleporting around for no reason. He knew that if someone had set their sights on him, a low-level cultivator like him would have no way to shake them off. Under such circumstances, the only method he could think of was using the Teleportation Arrays to evade any possible pursuit. There was an interval of at least ten-odd seconds between each activation of a Teleportation Array. Teleporting twice in succession could thus buy him at least twenty seconds, and those twenty seconds were enough for him to slip safely back to his lair through the winding alleys of western Lingyue City, which he knew like the back of his hand.
"Haha, six-six, everything goes smoothly. Even the number is lucky!" Completely unaware that he had just shaken off Han Weiwei, Wei Suo poured an entire bag of Low-grade Spirit Stones onto his bed.
There had been seventy Low-grade Spirit Stones in total. After using four, sixty-six remained—Low-grade Spirit Stones the size of pigeon eggs, gleaming with crystalline green light across Wei Suo's bed.
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