Northward

Most who traveled with such large merchant caravans were small trading groups.

Huo Yuhao was the only one traveling alone.

The squad leader who had taken him in did not make things difficult for him for the sake of the money. He ate and slept with them directly.

Lei Ao had originally thought that a refined-looking young man like this, someone who seemed never to have suffered much hardship, would not be used to dry rations and had planned to give him a few words of advice. Unexpectedly, the boy ate quite happily.

When they made camp that night, everyone naturally got busy preparing dinner. Meals were taken by squad, and since Huo Yuhao was the only outsider, the captain naturally would not let him near the cooking stove.

Everyone received a large bowl of plain noodles in water. The dozen or so burly men all took out their own preserved side dishes. Squad leader Lei Ao had originally wanted to share some of his meat sauce with him, but he saw Huo Yuhao take two small jars and two cucumbers from his bundle.

"I made these myself before. Would everyone like to try some?" As he spoke, Huo Yuhao opened one of the jars. The instant the lid came off, an overpowering meaty aroma wafted out.

With a flick of his chopsticks, he picked out a large chunk of meat sauce. The sauce was richly fragrant, glossy with oil, and the shredded meat was translucent and pleasantly springy.

Holding a cucumber in his palm, he did not even need a chopping board. He sliced it again and again into fine shreds as thin as toothpicks and added them to his bowl. The other jar contained fried peanuts. With those colors combined, a simple bowl of plain noodles instantly rose several levels in quality.

"Kid, those are some skills you've got." Seeing the noodles in Huo Yuhao's bowl, one of the accompanying men could not help salivating as he said enviously.

"My teacher said I still need more practice." Recalling the first time he and his teacher, Rong Nianbing, had entered the kitchen and been chased out, Huo Yuhao's smile deepened.

At first, he had possessed no particular talent for cooking. The only thing that had caught his teacher's eye had been grilled fish. Everything else had basically been one-to-one reproductions of his teacher's dishes. In his teacher's words, they were full of mere craftsmanship and utterly devoid of soul.

It was only later, after the matters of the Far North and soul beasts had troubled his mind, that he finally began to develop a feel for it.

What he had on hand was stock left over from Killing City. In a place like that, nothing but food made by himself was fit to eat. Because it had been too delicious, he had even been hunted by that lot over it.

The man had originally wanted to refuse. After all, Huo Yuhao had only temporarily joined their group, and they needed to maintain at least some caution.

But seeing even his boss restraining himself, his eyes immediately shifted. "Fine, let's just call it testing for poison on behalf of the boss."

As he spoke, he scooped a huge spoonful from the jar. Huo Yuhao glanced at the amount in his bowl, then cut him some cucumber shreds as well.

The moment the man took his first bite, he could not stop.

A while later, when they saw him swiftly reaching for a second bowl, the others immediately joined in as well.

"Kid, with your skills, you could probably serve as an imperial chef," Lei Ao said with a sigh. Of course, he had never eaten food from the palace, but he had once tagged along with the merchant caravan's third-in-command to mooch a meal at a grand restaurant under the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect. If this truly had been made by the boy, he could at least become a head chef there.

"You flatter me, Captain. How could my skills compare to those of the royal imperial chefs?" Huo Yuhao shook his head. When it came to cooking, even his teacher Rong Nianbing would not dare claim that he was certainly better than every cook in the world. He merely had unlimited time to study it.

"Kid, you're being modest. At your age, with skills like these, your future is boundless. Since I ate your food today, and since this old brother has a few more years on you, you can call me Brother Lei without feeling awkward. Let me boldly ask: at your age, shouldn't you be following a teacher from a junior academy to obtain a soul ring? Why are you heading alone to somewhere as far away as Heaven Dou City?" Lei Ao asked, feigning difficulty.

Someone who had remained in such a large merchant caravan for over a decade was naturally not careless. He knew how to judge the proper boundaries when taking people along.

The sense of contradiction surrounding this boy was too strong. At first, he had thought Huo Yuhao was a young master who had run away from home. Yet while his conduct was as polite as a noble's, he lacked that particular finickiness nobles had. Then there was his cooking skill. That was not something one could develop in a day or two; it must have come from long, arduous training. What family would have their young master study cooking from childhood?

"You're joking, Brother Lei. It is already a tremendous kindness that you are willing to take me north."

"You should be able to sense, given your great strength, that I am level ten. It is simply that my martial soul is too unusual, and there are no soul beasts suited to me in the nearby soul beast forests. That is why I have to pass by what is near and seek what is far away."

"In fact, even after reaching Heaven Dou City, I will have to continue north. The soul ring attribute I need can only be found in the Far North." Huo Yuhao smiled with the air of someone inexperienced in the ways of the world.

"Oh?! The Far North! That is a forbidden zone for humans. I hear the vicious beasts there are even more ferocious than those of the Star Dou Great Forest. What kind of martial soul do you have that is so unusual you need to go to that man-eating place?"

He could not help growing even more curious about the boy. Not to mention ordinary people, even some soul masters might never hear of the Far North in their entire lives. He himself had only learned of it after years of trading. Yet this boy not only knew of it, but was certain the soul beast he needed was there. That was anything but ordinary.

"Other soul beasts would not be impossible. I just want to take a chance."

"My martial soul is my eyes, and it is the rare spiritual attribute. Spiritual-attribute soul beasts are uncommon, and even when there are some, their locations are too dangerous. But ice silkworms in the Far North are different. Even around the outskirts, they can be found everywhere. For my first soul ring, I plan to find an ice silkworm of a suitable age." Huo Yuhao smiled as he spoke, nine parts truth and one part lie.

For the first soul ring of his Spirit Eyes, he still planned to choose Brother Tianmeng. For no other reason than that, at this point in time, Brother Tianmeng was the only one suffering.

The sooner he got him out, the less he would suffer.

"Eyes, huh? Choosing an ice silkworm isn't bad." Once Lei Ao heard that Huo Yuhao's martial soul was actually his eyes, he immediately relaxed. Martial souls on Douluo Continent came in countless varieties, but he could not imagine how eyes could attack.

Moreover, the first soul ring this kid wanted was merely an ice silkworm, something that could be found everywhere in the Far North. That made the issue even smaller. An ice silkworm's status was more or less the same as Blue Silver Grass.

It was normal for a young man to want to take a chance.

Thinking about it, he had been much the same at that age. It was only that he had not taken that chance back then, while Huo Yuhao had. With that thought, Lei Ao comfortingly patted Huo Yuhao on the shoulder.

"Not bad. Young people should have ambitions. Once you get your first soul ring, do you plan to come back?" Lei Ao asked casually.

If the timing worked out, perhaps he could make another bit of money from him. Ah, even soul masters had it hard when they were middle-aged men supporting a family...