Sights in the City

At those words, everyone suppressed the astonishment in their hearts. A Foundation Establishment lineage was not someone they could afford to provoke.

But judging by the situation, they seemed to be headed for the testing platform. The crowd exchanged glances, hesitating and not daring to move. They had no idea what this young lady was doing here at such a time.

They could only hope it would not affect them.

Seeing the worry in everyone's eyes, Jiang Lu paused, then quietly withdrew toward the back. A bad premonition rose within her.

The messy hair over her forehead cast a shadow, concealing the panic in her eyes.

Sure enough, by the time she followed the crowd to the testing platform, the guard squad had already stopped them outside.

"By order of the City Lord, this Spiritual Roots test ends here! Those still waiting may return!"

A cultivator from the guard squad waved his hand at the crowd. A booming voice rang in everyone's ears. Those at the very front were violently shoved backward by the guards and fell to the ground.

Fear filled their eyes. They scrambled up and retreated. None of them dared to meet force with force. Cultivators killed without batting an eye; at this moment, these people held the power of life and death.

Boom—

The crowd immediately raised their heads toward the testing platform. Their lips trembled slightly, and their eyes reddened, but they did not dare voice any objection.

The City Lord had offered everyone free Spiritual Roots testing entirely of his own accord, usually to seek out talented disciples and groom them for his own use.

Now that he said it was over, who would dare refuse to accept it?

They were merely a group of mortals. Even if their clans had a few immortal cultivators, they were only at Early Qi Refinement. How could they dare make enemies of them?

They could only sigh that their luck was poor.

If they wanted to test their Spiritual Roots afterward, they could only pay to be tested at the Spirit-Testing Hall: one spirit stone, or ten taels of silver, per test.

To ordinary mortals, that was an astronomical price. If they had no Spiritual Roots, that money would simply vanish like water poured down the drain.

Many people left dejectedly, clutching the wooden tokens in their hands so tightly that veins bulged faintly on the backs of their hands.

Others remained where they were, staring unwillingly at the Spirit-Testing Platform, hoping for another chance to be tested.

Only after the cultivators on the Spirit-Testing Platform and the disciples being tested gradually left did the guard squad withdraw.

Jiang Lu looked at the wooden token in her hand, and all that remained in her heart was endless melancholy. It seemed like the sorrow of missing some opportunity, yet also the relief of surviving a calamity. She could not tell what kind of feeling it was.

Watching the hurried mortals and cultivators around her, her feet seemed glued to the ground. She did not know where to go.

"Little girl, little girl, hurry and leave."

Amid the chaos in her mind, Jiang Lu seemed to hear someone calling her. Her expression gradually cleared, and she saw an auntie beside her calling out to her.

The woman wore patched clothes and held a child by the hand, her expression anxious.

"Why are you standing there in a daze, little girl? You look like an ordinary person too. This isn't somewhere people like us can stay. You should leave quickly."

Though Jiang Lu was puzzled by the reason, the woman's anxious expression made her follow closely behind her.

"Auntie, why is that?"

After they had passed through the city gates and walked some distance farther, Jiang Lu saw the auntie's expression relax and asked.

The auntie looked at her in confusion when she heard the question.

"Miss, you're not from around here?"

Jiang Lu hesitated for a moment, then nodded.

"Did you come from the Mortal Realm?"

Seeing her nod, the auntie leaned closer and asked in a low voice.

Jiang Lu hesitated briefly before nodding again. The auntie did not seem like a bad person; perhaps she could learn quite a bit from her.

The auntie sighed and looked at her with pity.

Another pitiful child. Looking at her bearing and clothing, she must have come from a wealthy family in the Mortal Realm. But seeing how bedraggled she was, she must have endured countless hardships to get here.

"You must have suffered quite a lot coming here. You people from the Mortal Realm all think that once you arrive here, you'll have a chance to seek immortality and ask the Dao. But without Spiritual Roots, how could it be so easy?"

Jiang Lu did not interrupt the auntie. From her words, she learned that this place was called the Immortal Cultivation Realm.

The Immortal Cultivation Realm had Five Great Domains, namely:

Xuancheng Domain: the heart of the realm, flourishing in cultivation, with sects standing in great numbers and the richest resources. It was the foremost of the five regions.

Azure Tide Domain: immortal mountains stretched endlessly, producing rare treasures of the spirit seas. Island immortal estates were scattered like stars across the sky, and its marine heavenly materials and earthly treasures surpassed those of the other five regions.

Desolate Qian Domain: Gobi deserts and sacred mountains coexisted, while the ancient wilderness sprawled far and wide. Demon beasts roamed everywhere, body cultivation flourished, and many ancient secret realms remained. Body-refining sects and noble lineages had dwelled there generation after generation.

Crimson Reed Domain: dense forests covered the land, and spiritual herbs carpeted the ground. Most cultivators there practiced alchemy or poison arts.

Ling Shuo Domain: largely home to reclusive lineages, where the frigid spiritual veins were blessed beyond compare.

Each of the Five Great Domains had its own characteristics. Sects stood in great numbers and lineages covered the land, but the domains lay extremely far apart, severed from one another by the endless seas. Cultivators generally found it difficult to travel to other domains. Only through a few Teleportation Arrays or by entering certain secret realms would they have a chance to do so.

According to the auntie, they were on the edge of the Crimson Reed Domain. This city was called West River City, and everything within a thousand li belonged to West River City's territory.

Spiritual energy was thin here, and cultivators were weak. Someone in the Foundation Establishment Realm already counted as a powerful figure in the area.

The closer one went to the central regions, the denser the spiritual energy became, and the faster one could cultivate.

There should not have been mortals in the Immortal Cultivation Realm, but the mortals here were different. Their ancestors had been immortals, which was why they had the chance to survive here.

Spiritual Roots were rare. Not every descendant born to cultivators possessed them. These were the mortals without Spiritual Roots, yet because their ancestors' blood still flowed within them, they believed that a descendant with Spiritual Roots would eventually appear. They were gambling on that possibility.

In this Immortal Cultivation Realm, where lineages covered the land and sects stood in great numbers, it was always difficult for one person to press forward alone. Under the name of a lineage, one could at least cling to life.

Even those villages Jiang Lu had seen before counted as the land of a single clan. There were always a few Qi Refinement cultivators in the clan, but to become a Qi Refinement lineage, at least one person had to reach Late Qi Refinement—the Seventh Level of Qi Refinement.

Without that, they could only remain villages like those.

The city was inhabited entirely by cultivators with cultivation. Mortals like them were not permitted to stay in the city overnight.

The various clans were exclusionary. The auntie could not take Jiang Lu back with her, but seeing how pitiful she was, she gave Jiang Lu the two flatbreads in her bundle and hurried away.

Jiang Lu watched her leave. She wanted to ask something more, but in the blink of an eye, all she could see was the corner of the woman's clothes.

She sighed softly and could only bury this gratitude deep in her heart. If she had the chance someday, she would repay it.

She came to a broken corner of a wall and considered how she should proceed. She did not know whether she had Spiritual Roots, much less whether she could cultivate. As a lone woman from the mortal world, she did not even dare imagine how dangerous her current situation was.

She took out a flatbread, tore off a small piece, and put it into her mouth before putting the rest away.

She chewed the flatbread with difficulty. She had not touched water all day and was now on the verge of dehydration. She immediately climbed to her feet and began searching for a water source.

Suddenly, two voices speaking came from ahead, accompanied by the sounds of fighting. She immediately held her breath and lay still in the grass, not daring to move.