In the Grassroots, in a market district on the southwestern frontier.
The rising sun cast its gentle light over the roads. Figures began to move along the clean, spacious streets as ordinary folk, merchants, rogue cultivator Spirit Tamers, wandering martial heroes, and others emerged after a night of quiet cultivation.
The whole town seemed to come alive at once.
Several cultivators who looked like rogue cultivators rode gray wolves slowly along the street. Travel-worn and dust-covered, they looked as though they had just returned from a long journey elsewhere.
Each wore a look of delight he could hardly conceal. They had clearly just emerged from a blessed land in a spirit valley outside town with quite a haul.
Sure enough, before long, they headed straight for the treasure pavilion the Universal Trade Association had established in town, without even stopping at an inn to find lodgings.
When they came out, every one of them stood straighter and looked relaxed. Laughing and chatting, they made their way to the restaurant beside the association's treasure pavilion.
"Come right in, all five of you!"
The waiter called out loudly when he saw them.
"Waiter, hurry up and warm five pots of Osmanthus Aged Wine, and slice ten jin of Cloud-Inside Meat. Fill the table with your other signature dishes, too. We're all starving, so don't keep us waiting!"
The rogue cultivator leading them was a middle-aged man approaching fifty, already beginning to show his age.
His usual life of rootless wandering, poverty, and hardship had left deep marks on him. He seldom had the means to spend freely in places like this and had to weigh even the cost of ordinary food with care.
Today, however, he ordered five pots of the restaurant's widely renowned wine in one breath, along with an assortment