Blood Imprint

After his last crossing, Yu Chen had already understood that he could not take any material objects with him when he crossed worlds. Therefore, his goal this time was simple: spiritual magical artifacts and books filled with the wisdom of those who had come before.

That was also why, when he had questioned the old fox earlier, he had specifically asked about the cultivation forces in this area.

The place where Yu Chen currently was was neither a major thoroughfare nor home to any heavenly treasures. As such, there were not many cultivators in the surrounding region.

According to the old fox, after Yu Chen excluded the riffraff who were even more worthless than the old fox, there were only three forces that warranted his caution.

One was Wang Daoist, who had driven the old fox into hiding among the burial hills. He was an elder of the local Wang Family. Forty years ago, he had gone elsewhere to study the Dao. Having achieved success in cultivation several years ago, he had returned and established White Hua Monastery on Little Fragrant Mountain, over twenty li east of the town. There, he worshiped the White Hua Goddess and a guardian deity.

Another was Water Moon Nunnery, thirty li west of town. Mirror Flower Chan Master lived there, a bhikkhuni with profound mastery of Buddhist teachings. She and Wang Daoist stood one to the east and one to the west, without interfering with each other.

The last was the City God Temple, the residence of the local City God. Yu Chen observed it from afar and saw waves of red light rising above it, their radiance pure and free of evil. This was a Red Edict Orthodox God, exceedingly formidable.

Upon seeing the divine light, Yu Chen also bowed from afar toward the City God Temple, showing his respect.

After taking a few more steps, Yu Chen heard a burst of commotion. He saw several servants tugging and shoving with a middle-aged man.

Yu Chen did not pay much attention and continued onward, intending to see whether there was a bookshop in town.

A bookshop was simply a bookstore. Its origins dated back quite early, with such establishments existing as far back as the Western Han Dynasty, though there had been very few of them then—perhaps only a handful in the entire country.

Things improved somewhat during the Tang Dynasty, when classical-language storybooks rose to prominence, but it was not until the Song Dynasty that bookshops began expanding on a large scale.

It was also then that bookshops acquired many names, such as book forest, book hall, book stall, and book store. Their names began to diversify, and there were even plenty of attention-grabbing titles. For instance, during the Qianlong and Jiaqing eras of the Qing Dynasty, there had been bookstores called Ancient Collection Studio, Tao Zhengxiang, and Five Willow Abode.

Therefore, in the game world of his previous life, looking for bookstores in dungeon worlds was one way to investigate the era one was in, or the historical era upon which it was modeled.

Sure enough, Yu Chen found a small bookstore.

What surprised Yu Chen was that, besides quite a few classical-language storybooks, he also saw storybooks in the store that were primarily written in vernacular Chinese.

Afterward, Yu Chen went to the City God Temple for another look and inquired about the City God's authority. Learning that, besides guarding the city, the City God held the authority to discern good and evil and communicate between yin and yang, and was the lord of the local mountain, river, and water gods, he roughly figured out the background of this dungeon.

So it was not one of the Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming, or Qing dynasties, but a composite resembling the Song and Ming Dynasties?

It was only natural for Yu Chen to reach this conclusion. Classical-language storybooks had reached their peak in the Tang Dynasty, while vernacular storybooks had emerged during the Song Dynasty. At the beginning, the City God had been the god of the city walls and moat. As history changed, the god gradually gained duties such as protecting the lives and property of the townspeople. It was not until the Song Dynasty that the City God further acquired such authorities as discerning good and evil, warding off disasters and calamities, overseeing the Registers of Laurel, praying for blessings and bringing peace to the people, and foreseeing major events.

It was also during this period that the City God entered the state sacrificial canon, developing into a god who governed the people and gaining widespread worship.

However, the City God system reached its pinnacle during the Ming Dynasty. Zhu Yuanzhang divided the ranks into such titles as Blessed Radiant Spirit King, Radiant Spirit Duke, Mighty Spirit Duke, Spirit-Blessing Marquis, and Manifest Blessing Earl. The City God changed from an independent deity into a divine official position, holding the supreme authority over the waters and lands of a region.

It was from these two points that Yu Chen determined the dynasty underlying this dungeon was likely a composite centered on the Song and Ming Dynasties.

Come to think of it, the most famous dungeon worlds centered on the Song and Ming Dynasties should be the Strange Tales system!

As Yu Chen pondered this, he heard another burst of clamor. Turning his head, he saw a middle-aged woman holding a kitchen knife in one hand and pulling along a five- or six-year-old child with the other as she made her way step by step toward the City God Temple.

Several dozen people followed beside the woman, along with seven or eight servants. They shoved one another back and forth, their curses never ceasing.

From their words, Yu Chen also learned the cause of the affair.

The middle-aged woman at the front was surnamed Dong. Her family had once been prosperous and owned a large plot of land in town.

While her parents had still been alive, she had been their only daughter. To carry on the family line, they had brought in a live-in son-in-law.

But later, the family fell into decline, each day worse than the last. They tore down some of the buildings on their property and opened up a mu of farmland in their own courtyard. Together with a few scattered properties, they managed to get by.

Before the Dong Family declined, however, they had been a wealthy household. Their location was good, and because their house had been built early, it was even a full size larger than the Wang Family residence right next door.

In recent years, the Wang Family had grown increasingly prosperous and had long wanted to expand their residence. Seeing that the Dong Family had opened farmland within their home, they knew the Dong Family had completely fallen into ruin. So they deliberately went looking for trouble, repeatedly trying to force the Dong couple to sell their house to them at a low price.

The same had happened today. The Wang Family had deliberately scattered a great many goose feathers in the Dong Family's field, insisting that the Dong Family's two boys had stolen and eaten geese raised by the Wang Family.

No one knew what had gotten into the Dong Family's younger son. When others questioned him, he actually said, "Eat goose! Eat goose!"

That gave the Wang Family the evidence they needed. They beat the head of the Dong Family household severely, then forced Auntie Dong to sell the land.

Auntie Dong had gone to the yamen to lodge a grievance, only to be driven out by the runners.

Left with no other choice, Auntie Dong took a kitchen knife in one hand and her younger son in the other, summoned the neighboring villagers, and came together with them to the City God Temple.

Blood Seal Stone! Yu Chen watched the scene before him and slowly closed his eyes. He already knew the origin of this story, as well as its ending.

This story had spawned quite a few dungeon worlds in the game world, or served as a side plot in many dungeon worlds. The one thing they all shared was that the main plot of every version was the same.

Presumably, Auntie Dong had come to the City God Temple with a kitchen knife in hand in order to cut open her younger son's belly and prove her family's innocence.

Then, everyone would see that the child's stomach was filled with snail meat, piece after piece, without a shred of goose meat. As for the Dong Family's younger son saying, "Eat goose! Eat goose!" what he had actually meant was, "Eat snails! Eat snails!" But because he was young, his speech unclear, and his accent a factor, it had sounded like, "Eat goose! Eat goose!"

Afterward, Auntie Dong would go mad. As for what would happen to the Wang Family, that would depend on the later plot or the choices made by the participants.

I never expected to encounter this story here, and before the plot had even begun...

The corners of Yu Chen's lips curved faintly, but his gaze was icy as he followed the crowd into the City God Temple.

Auntie Dong shoved her younger son to the ground and made him kneel before the City God's statue. Just as she was about to speak to the crowd, a young man dressed like a dandy laughed and cursed, "Old woman of the Dong Family, your little son stole and ate my family's geese. Don't tell me you think that just swearing an oath here will make everything fine!"

PS: The changes in bookstores and the characteristics of book sales in different eras have been heavily altered, so do not take them seriously! Also, I'm only writing this sort of exploration once; I won't specifically write about these details again later.