Fang Qing steered the Fire Raksha Bowl openly eastward.
Whenever he encountered cultivators fleeing disaster, those at the Qi Ingestion level dropped to their knees to see him off. Even the few at the Dao Foundation level respectfully made way when they saw the Brahma light of the Six-Syllable Great Illumination Mantra, their manner exceedingly humble.
"Fang Fortress... It's still in Ba Commandery. Back then, I was only a minor cultivator. I couldn't travel far from home, so I had no way to find a better place to settle them."
He had decided there was no need to acknowledge them, nor to deliberately lead the Fang Family onto the path of immortality.
But they were, after all, the kin of this body. Watching their line die out would hardly sit right with him.
Fang Qing decided to go and take a look.
Ba Commandery had become a front line, after all. It might fall any day.
When war raged without end, people were driven from their homes and the land lay barren for a thousand miles. Such things were commonplace.
He looked around as he traveled and found that the farther east he went, the worse the ravages of war became. Quite a few people lay dead of hunger beside the road.
Burning bones to cook, trading children to eat... These were not merely a few words on a page. They had become a blood-soaked reality that struck him head-on. The refugees' eyes held no other emotion, only numbness...
In a world where survival was this hard, perhaps there was no room for any other feeling.
Fang Fortress.
Fang Jingchun was in his fifties or sixties, yet he looked exceptionally old. Despite the snow-white fox-fur coat he wore, a chill still seeped into his bones.
"This damned weather..."
Seated in