Using the tip of his sword, Lin Yiqing lifted the shield from the ground and snatched it up. It was about three feet square, and felt surprisingly heavy in his hands. It was clearly a powerful defensive spirit treasure.
Five small characters, "Thick Earth Thousand Mountain Shield," had been engraved on the back. As his essence circulated, a faint ocher glow shimmered across it.
He had not revealed his spiritual power cultivation, keeping it as one of his trump cards to guard against any possible moves his opponent might have up his sleeve.
Just imagine: if the other party tried to ambush him without knowing he had cultivated spiritual power, he would only watch for movements of Lin Yiqing's body.
And overlooking spiritual power could decide the outcome of a fight.
"Swish!"
Essence surged in his palm. Lin Yiqing directly erased the imprint the other man had left, then, as Little Fatty stared in disbelief, put the shield into his Universe Bag.
"Argh! Give it back... Give it back to me!"
Watching Lin Yiqing's actions helplessly, Little Fatty let out a heart-rending wail.
His round face contorted, and snot and tears streamed down it without stopping.
Then, despite his grievous injuries, he struggled to his feet and threw himself recklessly at Lin Yiqing, covered in blood.
"Give me back my treasure!"
Seeing this, Lin Yiqing instinctively took a step back. Little Fatty lunged past him and fell to the ground, landing face-first in the dust.
"Waaah, that's my life! Ptooey!"
All that struggling sent Little Fatty into a fit of rage. Already gravely wounded by Lin Yiqing, he spat out a mouthful of blood, rolled his eyes, and fainted on the spot.
Lin Yiqing blinked his innocent-looking eyes, then glanced at the Qingli Ancient Sword clenched in his hand. He couldn't help but sigh that the other man had fainted at just the right time.
If Little Fatty had made even the slightest move to resist while Lin Yiqing was using Origin Qi Vision, he would have killed him outright.
But the guy had managed to anger himself into unconsciousness. If Lin Yiqing attacked now, it would be a victory without honor, and the other man didn't deserve to die.
Since Little Fatty hadn't shown any hostility toward him, Lin Yiqing decided to teach him a lesson and let him live.
Relying on his cultivation and talent, the man had actually dared to pry into someone else's secrets. Another person might have ended him with a single slash.
Lin Yiqing yanked the Universe Bag hanging from the other man's waist, then felt around inside his clothes. Sure enough, Little Fatty had hidden another one on him.
"Heh, you sure know how to hide things."
Lin Yiqing's lips curled up. He pulled a wrist-thick iron chain from the Universe Bag and bound the unconscious Little Fatty up like a rice dumpling.
Then he took the knockout medicine he had concocted earlier from his own Universe Bag, pried open the man's mouth, and poured in several bottles. Only then did he contentedly toss him into a dry well.
He didn't expect the iron chain or the drug to hold him for long. After all, against a powerhouse at Small Perfection of the Origin Pellet Realm, those things were all but useless.
He only needed to buy himself some time.
"Forget it. I'll spare your life. By the time you wake up, I'll probably be in the next city."
Pulling up his hood to conceal his face, Lin Yiqing headed out of the city. The next caravan bound for Ye City wouldn't leave for half a month, and he couldn't afford to waste that much time.
There was no need to pay a fee when leaving the city, so Lin Yiqing got out quickly. In just a quarter of an hour, he was already clear of Qingping City.
It was the height of summer, and the sun blazed overhead, its heat unbearable.
Moving at Lin Yiqing's speed, he reached deep into the Tianyan Mountain Range by noon. He sat on a large blue-gray boulder beneath a tree and began to meditate and recover.
Then he took out the two Universe Bags and counted up his gains. Whether Little Fatty had been telling the truth didn't matter; Lin Yiqing couldn't trust him.
They didn't know each other and had no ties, yet the other man wanted to borrow his spirit treasure and invite him on an expedition. No normal person with even a little caution would agree.
As the stories went, the naïve ended up piled high as bones, half in search of adventure and half in pursuit of noble ideals.
Adventures in the caves of great masters, a cold goddess changing her heart—Lin Yiqing had read more than enough bloody cautionary tales like those.
What was more, the other man's claims about his talent had left him deeply unsettled. Aside from the Qingli Ancient Sword, Lin Yiqing didn't have anything worthwhile in his Universe Bag.
But he couldn't accept someone casually probing into his secrets, either.
If it wasn't about his talent, then perhaps some person or faction had set their sights on him. He could accept that even less.
When traveling abroad, he couldn't afford to let his guard down.
"Gasp! Is this Little Fatty really that rich?"
The moment he opened one of the Universe Bags, Lin Yiqing couldn't help drawing in a sharp breath. Inside were tens of thousands of bright red pills, surging with Yang Gang Qi. Every last one of them was a Yang Yuan Pill.
Even now, most of Lin Yiqing's trade currency was still Yang Yuan Stones. He rarely had any occasion to use Yang Yuan Pills.
Of course, that had a lot to do with how rapidly his strength had grown. In just a few short months, he had already become a cultivator of the Lesser Origin Pellet Realm.
"Hmm? What's this... Pure Yuan Pills!"
Suddenly, Lin Yiqing spotted a small pile of smooth, jade-like pills in a corner of the Universe Bag, each about the size of a baby's fist. They were clearly top-grade, and every one of them contained astonishing fluctuations of essence.
These were Pure Yuan Pills, which an Origin Pellet Realm powerhouse could only condense one of each month. He hadn't expected to find nearly five thousand of them in the bag.
"Tsk, no wonder he's the owner of the Hundred Treasures Pavilion. He really is rich."
With a chuckle, Lin Yiqing opened the other Universe Bag. It contained some high-grade spirit herbs, Monster Crystals, and a few spirit ores.
But just as he was about to put the Universe Bag away, a beast-hide scroll tucked into a corner caught his eye.
With a thought, Lin Yiqing took it out. The moment he unfolded it, his pupils shrank.
It was a map depicting part of the terrain in the Tianyan Mountain Range. In the center, someone had drawn a series of black lines and arrows pointing to a mountain hollow.
The marked location wasn't far from where he was. At full speed, it would take only a day or two to get there.
"Could that guy have been telling the truth?"
Lin Yiqing suddenly recalled Little Fatty's earlier mention of a cave abode. Comparing it with the beast-hide scroll, he began to see what was going on.
He studied the map for a while, then activated Origin Qi Vision—and was surprised to find that an extremely dense trace of essence still clung to it.
"Interesting!"
Lin Yiqing's lips curved up, and a glint flashed in his deep-set eyes. If he hadn't had his own special means, he probably wouldn't have spotted the other man's tell.
The beast-hide scroll had clearly been artificially aged, and the hide itself had probably been taken from the beast not long ago.
If it had really been handed down for hundreds of years, there shouldn't still have been essence clinging to it under Origin Qi Vision. It should have dissipated long ago.
"Schemes stacked on schemes, each one more underhanded than the last!"
But Lin Yiqing was all the more curious. If the other man had merely wanted to rob and kill him like some bandit, he wouldn't have needed to go to all this trouble.
Now he was supposedly searching for a spirit treasure and had even gone to the trouble of making a fake map. That could only mean something was amiss.
After a little thought, Lin Yiqing decided to investigate the place first and see what was really there.
If his guess was right, there might indeed be a treasure in that mountain hollow. But whatever lay there was bound to be extremely dangerous.
Otherwise, the other man—an Origin Pellet Realm powerhouse at Small Perfection—wouldn't have gone to such lengths.
With that in mind, Lin Yiqing put away the beast-hide scroll, turned, and sped toward the place marked on the map.
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