Exchange Shop

Bai Sui still felt somewhat conflicted about this, as he knew that cultivating a disciple from scratch was an incredibly taxing endeavor that demanded both immense effort and time.

This process would even require starting from the very basics of language, as one's mother tongue truly influences their way of thinking.

Therefore, if Bai Sui wanted to have fellow practitioners to converse with in the future, he would have to cultivate them from the ground up—raising a group of people whose mother tongue was Chinese. Considering the added requirements that they must desire to cultivate, be willing to do so, and possess a heart set on the Dao, one could easily imagine how troublesome such a task would be.

To be honest, Bai Sui did not want to do this; he had no desire to turn himself into a nursery teacher. That would be far too restrictive and would deviate from his own aspirations.

Bai Sui also knew that such a mindset was not entirely correct—after all, where in the world is there a reward without effort?

However, if you asked him to start raising children right now, he was simply unwilling. In the end, he decided it was best to take things one step at a time; if that day truly came, it wasn't as if he couldn't afford to raise them.

He drove his cart along the main road, carrying a wagon full of money and goods toward the next village.

Of course, the wealth on this cart was no longer just from medical fees; a significant portion had been contributed by the bandits and robbers he had encountered along the way.

Bai Sui even discovered that an Exchange Shop already existed in this era.

He had stumbled upon it while using his divine sense to search the lair of a bandit gang. He found a facility that was clearly man-made tucked away in a mountain hollow. Although Bai Sui did not enter, he managed to get a general look at it through his divine sense.

He found it truly interesting and waited on the road for three days, watching many people come and go.

While the Exchange Shop handled various types of business, its most important function was the collection of corpses, the vast majority of which were those of ninjas.

The reason he waited there was to see what they intended to do with these bodies. After waiting for three days, he finally saw the staff of the Exchange Shop take action.

They loaded the corpses onto carts and transported them from the Exchange Shop to a large, specialized underground facility, where they were sorted and stored.

After Bai Sui probed the place inside and out with his divine sense, he discovered it was nothing more than a morgue, which only piqued his curiosity further.

After all, there was clearly something major going on; there had to be a deep secret inside, otherwise, why go to such lengths to keep it hidden?

Fortunately, he didn't have to wait long. The very next day, the morgue showed signs of activity as they opened a hidden compartment that led to a secret passage.

Bai Sui had previously discovered this passage, and in fact, he had found three others as well. However, these passages all led far away, and he had no way of seeing where they ended.

Now that he saw them entering this specific passage and transporting most of the ninja corpses through it, Bai Sui followed along.

Bai Sui wasn't worried about being discovered; he kept a distance of several hundred meters from the team transporting the bodies, relying entirely on his divine sense to observe from afar. No one would ever suspect him.

Bai Sui didn't focus all his energy on that team, either; he continued to practice medicine along the way.

At the same time, Bai Sui roughly determined their destination: the capital of the Land of Iron.

Trailing them from a distance, he watched as the team entered the underground of the capital. Bai Sui did not enter the city himself, instead using the fading light as an excuse to rest outside the walls.

The team eventually arrived beneath a Machiya, where they opened a secret passage to move the corpses out.

At this point, Bai Sui noticed that it wasn't just this one Machiya, but several surrounding ones that belonged to their people. They moved the corpses into different Machiya; Bai Sui did not find any further secret passages, so it seemed that from this point on, these people would have to find their own way to transport them.

Sure enough, not long after—less than an hour later—a group of men arrived to collect a portion of the corpses. They appeared to be subordinates of some noble or Daimyo, though they wore no identifying marks.

After that, more people arrived one after another to haul away the bodies.

This really piqued Bai Sui's interest. After all, this was the Land of Iron, the home turf of the samurai, where ninjas were rare. Even so, a significant number of ninja corpses were being collected here; there had to be a reason.

The next morning, Bai Sui feigned ignorance and entered the capital openly.

When Bai Sui was outside the city yesterday, his conspicuous carriage had already made his arrival known to the city.

Consequently, a team of men had been waiting at the city gates since they opened, ready to welcome him.

Not wanting to refuse their kindness, Bai Sui followed them toward the Daimyo Mansion.

As he traveled to the Daimyo Mansion, Bai Sui made a conscious effort to separate this world from the island nation of his past life. After all, most of the countries in this world were located on a continent.

They were not crammed onto a small, constantly shifting island. While there were many similarities in culture and other aspects, the "island mindset" and the "continental mindset" were ultimately different.

If nothing else, the capital and the Daimyo Mansion before him were built with great grandeur. In his past life, Bai Sui had visited the former residences of Daimyos like Azuchi Castle and Osaka Castle; those so-called castles were not built very large, far inferior to the architecture before him.

It made sense, though; this was on a continental shelf. The Land of Iron alone was roughly the size of Sakurajima from his past life. Naturally, it followed that various structures would be built with more magnificence.

The capital of the Land of Iron also possessed its own unique style. Looking from afar, the Daimyo Mansion shimmered under the sunlight.

A sweep of his divine sense revealed that the roof tiles were cast from metal. He didn't know if it was because the Land of Iron simply had an abundance of metal, but Bai Sui had frequently seen metal creations throughout his journey.

Upon arriving at the Daimyo Mansion, Bai Sui did not use his divine sense to probe, as that would be impolite. He engaged in a simple conversation with his guide.

Suddenly catching the scent of food, he struck up a conversation with the attendant leading the way and learned that the Daimyo had gathered the nobles of the city to host a banquet in his honor.

Bai Sui then clearly stated to the attendant that he no longer consumed food and thanked the Daimyo for his kindness.

It wasn't that he wanted to reject the Daimyo's banquet through the attendant immediately, but rather to give the attendant time to relay the message to the Daimyo.

Sure enough, a minor attendant on the periphery stepped away quickly after receiving a signal.

Bai Sui deliberately slowed his pace, chatting with the attendants about the customs and local conditions of the Land of Iron.

The Daimyo and the others who were preparing to host Bai Sui were not surprised when they received the report from the minor attendant.

After all, Bai Sui had not consumed any food throughout his journey; no one in the villages or towns he passed had ever seen him eat or drink.