"I don't know either!" Ji Wenyue looked around and said.
"What? You don't know either? How could you not know? Since you didn't know, couldn't you have left someone alive?" Xia Daoming was dumbfounded this time, his mouth firing off rebukes like a machine gun.
"I, I..." Ji Wenyue had not expected Xia Daoming to be quite friendly before, with such "kind" eyes, only for him to start berating her in the blink of an eye. She was badly startled, then lowered her head in grievance.
"I what?" Xia Daoming said irritably.
He had been perfectly fine getting lost on his own. Now, not only was he lost, he had to look after some young lady from a wealthy family.
What use was a weapon that could kill? It was better to have another bag of water.
At the thought of water, Xia Daoming hurried up the mound.
"When I was being hunted, I panicked and chose the wrong path, so I had no idea where I'd run to. And just now, I was worried that Uncle wouldn't be able to defeat Liao Min, so I hurriedly killed him without thinking that much about it." As Ji Wenyue spoke, she raised her head, her eyes glistening with tears as she tried to win some sympathy.
There was no helping it. The desert stretched boundlessly before them, and the sun was about to set. If this odd uncle before her abandoned her in a fit of anger, she would be done for.
After more than thirty days of sleeping rough and eating whatever he could find in the wilderness, Xia Daoming's hair was disheveled, his beard untrimmed. Though his voice sounded young, he truly looked weathered and old.
Especially those eyes of his—they were shrewd and seasoned.
As a result, the moment Ji Wenyue raised her head, her deadly weapons surged violently.
It turned out Xia Daoming had not been listening to her at all. He was reaching out and groping over Liao Min's body.
After searching Liao Min, he searched the other five corpses as well.
Finally, Xia Daoming led all six of their horses over.
By then, Ji Wenyue had calmed herself and took down the saddlebags hanging from her dead horse.
"Uncle, where are we going now?" Ji Wenyue asked.
"How old are you?" Xia Daoming asked instead of answering.
"Ah, um, I'm seventeen this year." Ji Wenyue froze for a moment, then answered honestly.
"Only seventeen?" Xia Daoming was startled, his gaze once again sweeping back and forth over her deadly weapons.
"Uncle, the sun is about to set. Where exactly should we go now?" Ji Wenyue gave Xia Daoming a helpless look and asked again.
She had more or less grown accustomed to Xia Daoming's jumpy way of speaking, as well as his seasoned gaze.
"Miss Ji, I'm twenty-four this year!" Xia Daoming answered something entirely different.
"What? Uncle is only twenty-four?" This time, Ji Wenyue was the one taken aback.
Other than his youthful voice, no matter how she looked at him, Xia Daoming did not seem like a twenty-four-year-old.
"Do you think it's appropriate to call a twenty-four-year-old man uncle?" Xia Daoming was utterly speechless at Ji Wenyue's slow reaction.
"Ah!" Ji Wenyue finally caught on and hurriedly said, "Oh, then I'll call you Big Brother."
"Sigh, speaking of which, it's been years since I last heard such a young and beautiful girl call me Big Brother." Xia Daoming suddenly became weathered and melancholy.
"Ah!" Even though Ji Wenyue had been born into a prominent Lineage and seen plenty of the world, being praised as young and beautiful to her face by a man still made her blush crimson at once.
Under the setting sun, Ji Wenyue's cheeks were flushed, her legs long and slender, her deadly weapons standing proud. The sight made Xia Daoming's heart surge with emotion.
Being young really was wonderful!
The setting sun was like blood.
A young man and woman each rode a horse, heading toward the direction where the rolling outline of mountain ranges could only vaguely be seen.
The man also led a horse in his hand.
Several saddlebags hung from its back.
That young man and woman were naturally Xia Daoming and Ji Wenyue.
Horses required fodder and water.
With the road ahead shrouded in uncertainty, Xia Daoming kept only two horses for riding and one for carrying supplies and luggage, setting the other three free.
As for whether they would ultimately live or die, that depended on their own fate.
Along the way, Xia Daoming had already gained a rough understanding of Ji Wenyue's circumstances.
She came from the Ji Family, a major medicinal-herb merchant family in Li City.
Though she was only a woman, she had displayed astonishing talent in alchemy from a young age.
Many incomplete ancient formulas left behind by the Ji Family had only seen the light of day again after passing through her hands.
The Ji Family's Evergreen Hall had also flourished in business because of her.
Thus, despite being only a seventeen-year-old girl, her position within the Lineage was pivotal.
This time, the Ji Family received news from their branch in Eya City in the north that someone had brought a five-hundred-year-old Phoenix Jade Grass to sell.
A five-hundred-year-old Phoenix Jade Grass was no trifling matter. The branch manager's ability to appraise medicinal herbs was limited, and he feared making a mistake. Furthermore, the Phoenix Jade Grass was exorbitantly priced, beyond his authority to decide upon, so he sent someone to report it to the owners.
The Ji Family attached great importance to the five-hundred-year-old Phoenix Jade Grass and immediately dispatched a Fifth-Rank Martial Master elder of the family to accompany Ji Wenyue to Eya City.
Yet halfway there, the two encountered an ambush and assassination attempt by Hundred Herbs Hall, their northern competitor.
Ji Wenyue escaped under the elder's desperate restraint, but was eventually caught up to. Had she not encountered Xia Daoming, not only would many of the Ji Family's secret alchemical formulas have fallen into Hundred Herbs Hall's hands, Ji Wenyue herself would have been imprisoned by Hundred Herbs Hall and forced into unpaid labor for them.
"Where did you get this miraculous protective talisman?" Xia Daoming took out the talisman, which looked like paper yet was not paper, and asked with a solemn expression.
"This protective talisman was passed down from our Ji Family ancestors. There are only a few left now. Because my status in the Lineage is special, I was granted two of them." Ji Wenyue stared fixedly at the talisman in Xia Daoming's hand.
Xia Daoming decisively put away the talisman and hid it close to his body before continuing, "Then where did your Ji Family get this protective talisman? Could it be that immortals and demons truly exist in this world?"
"I don't know whether they truly exist, but immortal cultivators definitely do."
"Immortal cultivators?" Xia Daoming's heart thumped, and his mood became exceptionally heavy.
He had once yearned for the carefree immortal life of "traveling the North Sea at dawn and Cangwu at dusk."
But this world was dangerous enough already. He had finally gained some ability to protect himself, and with the system at his side, as long as he did not court trouble or death and developed steadily step by step, not only becoming a Great Martial Master, even becoming a Martial Dao Grandmaster was no mere dream.
Once he became a Martial Dao Grandmaster, dominating one region in this chaotic age would certainly not be a problem.
Then, he could hold feasts at home every day. Whenever he was happy, he could casually spend a few small targets. Just thinking about such a life gave him something to strive for.
But if terrifying beings like immortal cultivators existed in this world, then even if he became a Martial Dao Grandmaster, he would still be a mere mortal. One spell from them could crush him to death.
The contrast was simply a plunge from the heavens into the abyss!
"That's right. It is said that immortal cultivators are mysterious figures who possess extremely wondrous methods nearly akin to those of immortals. One of our Ji Family ancestors once befriended an immortal cultivator.
Many of Evergreen Hall's medicinal formulas are said to have been passed down from that immortal cultivator. Naturally, that protective talisman was also bestowed by that immortal cultivator. But after generations of use, very few remain." As Ji Wenyue spoke, she looked toward Xia Daoming with a trace of resentment in her eyes.
Xia Daoming pretended not to see it and asked, "What happened to that immortal cultivator afterward?"
"Later, for some unknown reason, that immortal cultivator stopped appearing. There has not been the slightest word from them since," Ji Wenyue said.
"Are there immortal cultivators in Li City?" Xia Daoming asked.
"Immortal cultivators transcend the mundane world. They are mysterious and elusive, and normally never appear in the secular realm. Even if there are any, they are not something someone of my standing could know about." Ji Wenyue's eyes revealed a trace of awe and longing.
"Mm." Xia Daoming nodded, his feelings conflicted.
On one hand, he did not want immortal cultivators in Li City, as that would greatly increase the unknown dangers. On the other hand, he hoped there were immortal cultivators in Li City, because then perhaps he too would have a chance to embark upon the path of immortal cultivation.
But Xia Daoming soon shook his head with a self-mocking smile.
Why think so much about it?
Right now, his greatest reliance was the system and martial arts. Naturally, he had to first find a way to raise his martial cultivation and make full use of the system.
That way, regardless of whether he had a chance at immortal cultivation, he could at least protect himself and establish a foothold in this secular world, rather than end up like his master Qiu Zhiheng, who had been killed in a single careless moment.
"By the way, when I fought Elder Liao just now, his force was very strange. It actually passed through my palm and entered my body. What was that about?" Xia Daoming quickly shifted to asking about Elder Liao.
That was what he most needed to pay attention to and understand at present.
That concludes today's update. From now on, the second daily update will be moved to noon.
During the public release period, I'll try to keep a fixed schedule: one update in the morning and one at noon. Any changes will be announced separately.
Before you continue