Meanwhile, a tour bus bearing Xijiang Province plates traveled smoothly along the highway to Yicheng.
There were few passengers aboard, but the atmosphere was unusually solemn.
Unlike the noisy crowds of ordinary tourists, everyone on this bus was a Daoist priest.
There were roughly twenty of them, all dressed in Azure Daoist Robes, their hair tied in high topknots and their expressions serene.
At their head sat an old priest, resting with his eyes closed.
He wore a purple Daoist robe washed so often it had begun to fade. His hair and beard were white, and the wrinkles on his face were deep enough to trap a mosquito. Judging by his appearance, he had to be nearly a hundred.
He was none other than He Daoran, the most senior elder of the Celestial Master Mansion on Dragon-Tiger Mountain.
Just then, another elder in purple robes, around sixty years old, respectfully approached him and bowed, saying softly, "Martial uncle, we'll reach Yicheng in another hour."
This elder was Zhang Jinling, the current head of Dragon-Tiger Mountain.
He Daoran slowly opened his eyes.
His clouded gaze betrayed neither joy nor anger, yet hidden within it was an excitement that had survived sixty years, one even he had failed to notice.
Recently, Chen Family Village had exploded in popularity online. Countless terminally ill patients had flocked there, and reports of miraculous recoveries kept emerging.
He Daoran had long since withdrawn from worldly affairs, but he had happened to see a related video on a young grand-disciple's phone.
At first, he had thought nothing of it.
But when he saw the astonishingly lush vegetables in Chen Family Village, the plump fish swimming in the reservoir, and the genuine vitality radiating from the tourists' faces, it was as though a boulder had been hurled into