Alchemists were as plentiful as hairs on an ox in the Imperial City these days.
His Majesty the Emperor had taken a liking to cultivating immortality and pursuing the Dao. He had ignored affairs of state for far more than a year or two, although the running of the country as a whole had suffered no substantial impact.
Yet, little by little, quite a few of the Imperial City's common people had come to grumble about the old emperor, who spent all day pursuing immortality and the Dao while issuing numerous decrees granting preferential treatment to Daoist priests and Buddhist monks.
Ouyang knew no art of reading auras, but merely standing atop the city gate and looking down over the city gave him the impression that its sun was already sinking toward the western hills.
Buddhist chants lingered in the air, and fragrant incense smoke wreathed the city. The entire city seemed like a devotee obsessed with Daoism and Buddhism.
Mortals could not cultivate, and even an emperor, exalted as the supreme sovereign, was no exception. The Heaven and Earth Essence here had been washed so thin by the smoke and bustle of mortal life that it could no longer be sensed.
Chang Xiaoyue had also told him that even she, a great cultivator of the Body Integration Realm, had her cultivation suppressed to barely Foundation Establishment within this city of millions.
It was easy to imagine that, for cultivators, the Mortal World was hardly a desirable destination. They even avoided such places like the plague.
Ouyang looked toward the most imposing palace in the center of the Imperial City. That was where the old emperor lived, and also the endpoint of the Heart-Questioning Scheme his master had arranged for his second junior brother.
*The Dao that can be spoken