I suppose this Steel Fortress was what allowed the samurai of the Land of Iron to maintain their neutrality.
After all, there were plenty of neutral countries in the Ninja World, but the Land of Iron was the only one that had managed to remain neutral for centuries.
That made sense. With the fortress protecting them, any ninja who wanted to take down the samurai would have to expend considerably more strength.
And while the samurai couldn't launch attacks from the fortress, they could certainly defend themselves.
As Bai Sui took in the fortress, the samurai on the walls spotted him. He hadn't done anything suspicious, but a patrol soon came over to speak with him.
They weren't overbearing. They simply asked Bai Sui what he was doing there. When he explained that he was a wandering doctor, they told him a few of the Land of Iron's rules and let him pass.
I have to say, you can tell from these samurai that the Land of Iron really is a decent place. Bai Sui hadn't actually entered the country yet, but he already had a favorable impression of it.
He walked on, and the fortress loomed closer and taller with every step. There was no mistaking its twenty- or thirty-meter walls.
Of course, he had seen buildings over a hundred meters tall in his previous life, so he wasn't as astonished as the common folk here. Still, walls this tall, stretching for miles and even tens of miles, were truly impressive.
If he hadn't wanted to avoid unnecessary trouble, Bai Sui would have flown up to admire the fortress from above. Even in his previous life, he had never seen a structure like this.
Following the route the samurai had just given him, Bai Sui passed through the fortress gate and headed inside.
The high walls stood along the border of the Land of Iron. There were buildings for the samurai nearby, but no villages. After all, this was a military installation, and outsiders weren't allowed near it.
Bai Sui followed the rules and didn't linger. Instead, he made his way toward the nearest city.
As he traveled, he felt how different the Land of Iron was from the outside world.
It wasn't that people here lived especially prosperous lives. It was that they lived in peace.
They didn't have to worry about whether they would live to see tomorrow, or feel lost about the future. Even though they weren't well-off and worked hard, Bai Sui felt, for the first time in a long while, a trace of the world he had known in his previous life.
It wasn't that the surroundings looked familiar. It was the atmosphere. Most people didn't have to struggle for their lives; they simply worked toward a better one.
He didn't just keep walking along the way. After leaving the village, he had decided to stop hiding his abilities.
He openly used his qi and traveled across the Land of Iron as the Needle Doctor.
He stopped and started along the way, and before he even reached the city, word of him had already spread to the country's ruling elite.
This place was different from elsewhere. There were no ninja here. Though many samurai also trained in chakra, they had no organized methods for using it to heal.
So a person like Bai Sui immediately caught the attention of the higher-ups.
They promptly sent people to investigate his background. But in this war-torn era, how much information could they possibly find?
On top of that, Bai Sui had hardly ever appeared in public, so they found nothing at all. It was as if he had sprung from a rock.
His mysterious background only made the higher-ups more curious. They all waited for his arrival.
Bai Sui had no idea that people in the city were waiting for him. He kept going at his own pace, stopping wherever he pleased.
Of course, he wasn't treating people for free. He charged them what they could afford to spend on a day's meals: less from the poor and more from the rich.
By the time he had traveled this far, he'd had to buy a carriage—not to ride in, but to carry the money.
He had already made up his mind. As he traveled through the Ninja World, he would drive this carriage, with his medical fees and the food he bought with them packed inside.
The people of the Land of Iron were still able to make ends meet, but those living in other war zones weren't so fortunate.
If he came across someone in truly dire straits, he would give them a meal. He didn't expect to save anyone that way. Truly helping them was beyond the power of one person, but it was still good to be able to help.
The reason Bai Sui was willing to spend his time traveling through the Ninja World was that his current cultivation was the Golden Elixir stage. Meditating and practicing hard every day no longer helped much. From here on, time itself would do most of the work.
It was a slow, steady process that could only be achieved by accumulating time.
So he decided to use that time to broaden his horizons. He had already read countless books in his previous life, though back then, all he had done was read.
Now that he had an opportunity he'd never had before, he naturally wanted to travel far and wide as well.
For one thing, when he'd traveled in his previous life, he'd mostly used vehicles. He'd never really measured the land with his own two feet.
He wasn't walking on the soil of his previous world now, which was a shame, but it was still a rare experience.
So Bai Sui didn't deliberately regulate his pace. He let his body decide and wandered wherever he pleased.
Along the way, Bai Sui stayed at villages and inns, and rested in the mountains and forests. He didn't care whether one village was next to another. He simply followed his whims, and whenever he felt like resting, he would find a rock and sit down to meditate.
And he did have something to show for the journey.
Not long ago, he had met a samurai well into his seventies. Though his body was frail with age, his spirit was still vigorous.
After examining him, Bai Sui found no illness. His body was simply undergoing the normal decline of old age.
After talking with him, Bai Sui learned that the old man had already transcended the way of the sword and entered the Way.
"I began practicing the sword when I was six. After that, I trained with my teacher for years, gradually absorbing the sword in my hand until it became part of me.
"After that, I began traveling. With the sword in my hand, I cut down the unjust and upheld the convictions in my heart.
"I can't remember when it started, but at some point I could no longer sense the way of the sword. By then, I no longer sought the sword. Or perhaps, to me, anything could be a sword. If I wanted to kill someone, I only had to decide to do it.
"But I always remembered my teacher's lessons. Whenever I had the time, I kept practicing the sword. Then one day, I suddenly felt something change.
"It was just like gripping my sword in my hand. I 'gripped' myself, then swung myself like a 'sword.'
"In that moment, I felt as if I were an outsider, watching my body move on its own while I stood there and watched. I didn't need to do anything. I only had to will it, and my body would carry out my intent in the best possible way."