Skywind Rain-Listening Tower

Thirteen secret courier boxes lay on the table. Chen Yuan locked the doors and windows before opening them one by one for inspection.

This scene really did feel a little like opening loot boxes in the game back then.

These small secret courier boxes mostly contained private letters and such. Chen Yuan even dug out a love letter.

But the contents were a little too explosive, practically no different from an obscene book.

It was already this bold on paper. Heaven knew how many tricks they could play when they met face-to-face.

By the time Chen Yuan opened the seventh secret courier box, he finally found a small porcelain bottle.

The bottle was made of finest Jun ware crackle porcelain, while its stopper was thousand-year fire pine, capable of keeping out dampness and preventing the medicinal properties from dissipating.

There was a Medicine King Valley mark beneath the bottle, along with five tiny words: Nine-Turn Nourishing Origin Pill.

Chen Yuan pulled out the stopper, and a rich medicinal fragrance immediately wafted out. One slight breath of it left him instantly refreshed.

"Sure enough, it's good stuff."

Chen Yuan praised it, but he did not hurriedly swallow the pill. Instead, he opened all the remaining secret courier boxes as well.

After all thirteen secret courier boxes had been opened, there were unexpectedly two more bottles of pills produced by Medicine King Valley.

One bottle was called the Fire Dragon Pill. Its medicinal power was tyrannical and fierce; after taking it, one's strength could greatly increase for a short time, but the meridians would be scorched by the medicine and would need time to be nourished and restored.

The other bottle was called the Essence-Restoring Blood-Coalescing Pill. It could rapidly heal internal and external injuries and was one of Medicine King Valley's treasured healing medicines.

"Sure enough, there were unexpected gains."

Chen Yuan had already felt that there should be more than one bottle of pills inside these secret courier boxes. The player in the original plot might have missed some of them.

Now it seemed that was indeed the case. These three bottles of pills had all been sent out by the same client.

Clearly, someone had been meant to take the Nine-Turn Nourishing Origin Pill to increase their strength, then use the Fire Dragon Pill to unleash their power and fight an enemy to the death, and finally use the Essence-Restoring Blood-Coalescing Pill to heal their wounds.

But that person had probably met with some accident. The pills went unused and became dead couriers, ultimately benefiting Chen Yuan instead.

After putting away the other two bottles, Chen Yuan directly tossed the Nine-Turn Nourishing Origin Pill into his mouth and circulated his internal force through a heavenly cycle to refine it.

In truth, Chen Yuan did not even need to refine it.

Medicine King Valley's pills were of exceptional quality. This Nine-Turn Nourishing Origin Pill practically melted the instant it entered his mouth, transforming into the purest medicinal energy and seeping into Chen Yuan's eight extraordinary meridians.

The originally meager thread of internal force began racing wildly through Chen Yuan's body under the pill's guidance. In just one minute, it had even completed one heavenly cycle.

Yet such rapid circulation of internal force did not overwhelm Chen Yuan's meridians.

This medicinal energy was upright, balanced, and gentle. While accelerating the circulation and refinement of his internal force, it also protected Chen Yuan's meridians, bringing no side effects whatsoever.

Only after one shichen did the circulation finally slow, changing from swift to gentle.

Two shichen later, the medicinal power had been completely refined. A thin layer of sweat covered Chen Yuan's body as he let out a long breath.

But the stream of air he exhaled shot forth like an arrow, producing a sharp, crisp crack within the room.

Refining a single Nine-Turn Nourishing Origin Pill could not directly let Chen Yuan enter the Blood-Shifting Realm, but it had brought him straight to the peak of the Meridian-Unblocking Realm. He only needed to break through the bottleneck to step into the Blood-Shifting Realm.

The faint wisp of internal force cultivated through the Azure Wood Method had originally been like a thread within his body—weak and pitiful to the extreme.

Now, it had grown several times thicker. When his internal force circulated and his strength erupted, he was several times stronger than before.

Chu Ziping and Qin Yuancheng had both entered the Meridian-Unblocking Realm years ago, yet neither possessed internal force as powerful as Chen Yuan's now.

This single pill was enough to equal ten years of their bitter cultivation of the Azure Wood Method.

After taking a bath, Chen Yuan pulled out his notes and read through them once. His fingers lightly tapped the table as he pondered.

What he urgently needed now was a cultivation method, but none of the opportunity Easter eggs intended for newcomers in Linked Mountains City would appear anytime soon.

But it did not matter. If opportunities would not appear on their own, he could simply take the initiative and seek them out.

Duan Mubai's matter was a warning from the past. He could not act entirely according to the original plot.

No matter how faithfully he recreated the original plot, it was useless. With a different person involved, the outcome could be different.

Since that was the case, there was no need for him to follow a map to find the steed. Taking the initiative was also an option.

Early the next morning, Chen Yuan arrived at Worry-Free Tower.

Taverns like Worry-Free Tower generally had many customers at night, but there were not many people during the day.

A few jianghu wanderers who had just awakened from drunken stupors were startled by Chen Yuan. They had been about to curse, but once they saw who it was, they forcibly swallowed their words.

This master had slaughtered people in Worry-Free Tower not long ago. What blind fool would dare provoke him?

Chen Yuan called over a waiter who was still dozing off. "Where is your proprietress?"

"The proprietress is upstairs. I'll go call her right away."

At that moment, a lazy, seductive voice drifted down from upstairs. "Young Master Chen seems rather fond of my Worry-Free Tower?"

Chen Yuan looked up to see Wen Rou leaning over the railing with both hands, smiling at him.

She seemed to have only just awakened. Her cloudlike hair was loosely gathered into a falling-horse bun, with a golden swaying hairpin placed at an angle. Her pomegranate-red chest wrap was tied exceptionally low, revealing half a mound of snowy-white softness.

Though her face bore no rouge or powder, it carried a faint flush, like a begonia moistened by night dew.

The proprietress's appearance immediately made the recently awakened jianghu wanderers below drool.

But they could only entertain the thought and make a few lewd remarks. No one dared molest the proprietress.

Because anyone who dared do so would have their corpse appear in the drainage ditch of the alley behind Worry-Free Tower the next day.

"I'm not fond of Worry-Free Tower. I'm fond of you, Proprietress."

Wen Rou covered her mouth and gave a soft laugh. "Young Master Chen certainly knows how to talk. Would you like to come up and sit awhile?"

Chen Yuan nodded and went upstairs, following Wen Rou into the room.

The jianghu wanderers below could not help grumbling inwardly.

Slut!

She never lets us touch her, but the moment she sees that Young Master Chen from the Heavenly Wolf Gang is young and handsome, she takes the initiative to invite him upstairs. Is this old cow trying to eat tender grass?

Upstairs, Wen Rou led Chen Yuan into her private chamber. The furnishings were remarkably plain, utterly at odds with her personality.

Wen Rou poured Chen Yuan a cup of tea and asked with a smile, "The people my Worry-Free Tower receives are all jianghu riffraff who cannot be brought into polite society. Why has Young Master Chen come here so early in the morning?"

"I told you, I didn't come for Worry-Free Tower. I came for you, Proprietress."

"I'm a withered flower and fallen willow, and I must show my face in public every day to run this tavern. Am I really worth Young Master Chen of the Heavenly Wolf Gang keeping in mind?"

Chen Yuan took a sip of tea and said calmly, "The proprietress of Worry-Free Tower is naturally not worth it. But the person in charge of Skywind Rain-Listening Tower in Linked Mountains City is."

The moment those words fell, Wen Rou's expression changed sharply.

The seductive and coquettish air around her vanished in an instant, replaced by icy sharpness.

Skywind Rain-Listening Tower was the foremost intelligence network of the jianghu, specializing in selling intelligence and gathering information.

Throughout the Nineteen Provinces of Great Xia—and even across the Western Region grasslands, the great desert, and overseas—Skywind Rain-Listening Tower had intelligence agents everywhere.

No matter how large or small a matter in the jianghu was, it could not escape their eyes and ears.

Wen Rou was the person in charge of Skywind Rain-Listening Tower in Linked Mountains City. The reason Worry-Free Tower's prices were affordable enough to attract so many low-level jianghu wanderers was also to make gathering information easier.

In the original plot, Wen Rou was also an important character who often issued quests to players.

"How did Young Master Chen learn of this?"

Wen Rou stared intently at Chen Yuan.

To ensure their own safety and make gathering information easier, most Skywind Rain-Listening Tower outposts were concealed.

Only in certain major cities would they openly establish branch towers, making it convenient for jianghu people to buy and sell information.

Jianghu people elsewhere who wished to purchase information from Skywind Rain-Listening Tower had to use special secret methods to contact them.

Wen Rou had been in Linked Mountains City for so many years. Even Chen Yuan's adoptive father, Jiang Kaitai, did not know her identity. How had Chen Yuan learned of it?

"Is that important? I came today merely to make a deal with Proprietress Wen."

Wen Rou broke into a smile. "True, I spoke out of turn. But I hope Young Master Chen will not reveal my identity. Otherwise, I will be punished within the Tower."

Skywind Rain-Listening Tower had no enemies; it was an absolutely neutral jianghu faction.

After all, everyone needed to investigate all kinds of information, and that required Skywind Rain-Listening Tower.

But at the same time, most factions did not hold much goodwill toward Skywind Rain-Listening Tower, because they did not want their own intelligence to be known by it either.

"Rest assured, Proprietress Wen. I won't put you in a difficult position."

Chen Yuan lightly tapped the table. "Proprietress Wen is well informed. I want you to help me find someone in Linked Mountains City."

"Your Heavenly Wolf Gang occupies half of Linked Mountains City, and Young Master Chen is also Gang Leader Jiang's adopted son. Do you still need to go through me to investigate someone in Linked Mountains City?"

After saying that, Wen Rou realized something and lightly smacked her cheek. "I spoke out of turn again. Whom does Young Master Chen seek?"

Since Chen Yuan had come to find her himself, it naturally meant that the person he sought either could not be found through the Heavenly Wolf Gang.

Or Chen Yuan did not want the Heavenly Wolf Gang to know that he was looking for this person.

Skywind Rain-Listening Tower only sold information and did not investigate its customers' affairs. That was a fundamental rule.

She had only asked because Chen Yuan's sudden exposure of her identity had left her flustered.

Otherwise, with her professionalism, she absolutely would not have spoken out of turn.

"The alliance leader of the Thirty-Six Waterways Alliance on Lan Prefecture's Nine-Dragon River—the 'Nine-River Flood Dragon,' Zuo Xinglie!"

Chen Yuan said in a deep voice, "Of course, he certainly won't be using that name in Linked Mountains City. There should also be a little girl around seven or eight years old with him."

Wen Rou's eyes instantly widened, her face filled with horror.

"What!? Zuo Xinglie isn't dead? He's in Linked Mountains City?"