The Brocade Continent was a fledgling cultivation world. That was what the books said.
Thus, compared with an ordinary human world, Brocade had an exceedingly long cultural history, but when it came to cultivation history, it was still a primary school pupil. As for individual cultivation, there were few heavenly treasures, spirit plants and rare wonders, treasure hoards and hidden realms, or legendary figures. In terms of an era, they had only just begun.
Although Old Meng had not known him well, he had vaguely understood that this Tiji sympathized with him, and had once privately given him an ancient stalk of so-called immortal grass. In truth, it was merely a hundred-year-old ginseng worm.
There was no room here for immortal grass to grow. Humanity's long presence had already left this continent with very few places untouched by human feet. Never mind hundred-year-old plants-even ten-year-old medicinal herbs could only be encountered by chance, not found by searching.
Uncle Sun had accepted the ginseng worm while he was away. Personally, he considered refusing gifts the bare minimum of integrity for anyone who upheld the law, but he had not yet found a suitable opportunity to return it.
Now there was no need. Old Meng's soul had already returned to the underworld, and he had killed the last son of the Wang Family, which counted as doing right by that gift.
But now, what difference did it make whether he took it or not?
Pulse movement, also called qi sensing, meant that one's meridians resonated with the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. Put simply, ordinary mortals could not sense that energy. Only a tiny handful, through extraordinary gifts, an established lineage of instruction, a chance encounter, or sheer blind luck... could cross this threshold.
Those with a genuine cultivation background had their own special methods, naturally achieving twice the result with half the effort. But with aptitude like Hou Niao's, even calling it a chance encounter would have flattered him. He had simply blundered into it.
Once one could sense the spiritual energy of heaven and earth, the next step was to stabilize that perception. This was no alarmist talk: many people struggled back and forth at this level, bobbing up and down. Sometimes they could sense it, sometimes they could not. With that intermittent sensitivity, further cultivation was out of the question.
At the pulse movement stage, the human body could sense spiritual energy and gain some benefit from it while walking, sitting, lying down, and going about daily life. This made their bodies stronger than those of ordinary mortals, but there was no fundamental difference.
To bring about a fundamental difference, one had to actively absorb the spiritual energy of heaven and earth through a cultivator's cultivation method, thereby thoroughly transforming the mortal body, its meridians, and its internal organs. Only then would it become possible to use the basic law techniques available to cultivators alone.
This was precisely where Hou Niao had stalled. He had spent his entire fortune searching the world for all manner of introductory Daoist Sect methods, but none suited him. Their effects were abysmal when he practiced them, no better than nothing.
As those who had been through it put it, this was not a problem with the cultivation methods, much less with the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. The problem lay in his own aptitude.
Though few people in this world could achieve pulse movement, the vast population meant their absolute numbers were still astonishing. Most, however, were like him: able to sense qi, but unable to draw it in. This was a rule of heaven and earth. In the end, cultivation was the exclusive privilege of a very few. If everyone could cultivate, humanity would sooner or later suck this world's spiritual energy dry.
The Daoist Sect's people had seasoned eyes. They saw through Hou Niao at a glance and therefore refused to admit him. He was not the first to fall at this threshold, nor would he be the last.
Had he not draped himself in this Daoist guise, had he willingly lived his modest life as an ordinary man, he would certainly have enjoyed a longer life. Yet he insisted on using that guise to put his ideals of law into practice, which made things rather awkward.
Now, everything was over.
He carefully put everything in the study in order, knowing that once he left this time, he would scarcely have a day of return. In this world, danger was ever-present. For someone like him, it was only a matter of time, nothing strange.
After he left, these law books and legal codes would probably go untouched. No one in officialdom nowadays cared to study such things. Receiving guests, seeing them off, and forming cliques were more fashionable.
What a pity. Which bookshop would get them for a bargain? Or would they end up as kindling?
He turned and left the study, entering a little room beside the bedroom. Cloth curtains hung low, and incense smoke curled through the air. No household with any means would place its ancestral shrine somewhere so shabby, but the Hou Household had long since ceased to be what it once was.
He replaced his parents' incense with fresh sticks, then knelt to pray. The Hou Household was no great clan and had few rules, but now that he was about to travel far, this final offering of incense...
"Honored Father and Mother above, your unfilial son Niao has failed his forebears..."
There was little sincerity in his prayer, really. The Hou Household did not believe in such things. It was a common failing of families versed in law: they did not believe in ghosts or gods.
But in this world, ghosts and gods had long existed. When these mysterious, unfathomable things spread across the continent, what suffered most was actually the law!
These were the growing pains that a mortal world had to endure as it transformed into a cultivation world.
Tired of kneeling, he simply folded his lame leg beneath him beside the incense table. Knowing he would have no such opportunity again, he no longer held his tongue.
"Father, don't think I don't understand. All those things you taught me from childhood-you couldn't live up to them yourself. What were you thinking?
"When I was seven, I saw you take from both the complainant and the defendant, fanning the flames between them besides... When I was ten, someone crept up to our door in the middle of the night to commit murder. That was because you'd beaten someone into confessing, wasn't it?
"I knew all of it, yet you still taught me to be an upright man of criminal law. Were you hoping I would make amends for the wrongs you'd committed?"
He sighed and murmured, "Perhaps it's just as well you died. Otherwise, sooner or later your son would have brought you to justice... You should know that I followed the path you laid out only because I felt it was what I ought to do, not because of you."
He gave a self-mocking smile. "But in the eyes of the true Daoist Sect, I'm only a mortal after all. Mortals have mortal selfishness. How could I truly become the embodiment of the law?
"You had shady dealings with the Wang Family, didn't you? Was it an uneven split of the spoils? Or did you have something on them? You went too quickly, too suddenly. Even now, I haven't entirely figured it out. But that doesn't mean I don't know how you were murdered!"
Tired of sitting cross-legged, he simply lay down, pillowing his head on his hand. "At least I got rid of the Wang Family's son. That counts as avenging you. It was the only time in my years of handling cases that I acted out of selfishness, and the last... There won't be any more afterward, either..."
He went on murmuring to himself, as though his parents were beside him listening. He was speaking to his family, and to himself as well. Faintly, there seemed to be some slight movement outside the courtyard, but he paid it no mind. He truly did not believe any enemy would dare trouble him at a time like this.
He had already killed a man in court. Even a fool understood that, with a caged tiger like him, one could only quietly await its demise, never press it too hard.
Sure enough, rustling sounds rose at the courtyard gate, subsided, then rose again, endlessly... He was in no mood to take issue with these people. Though he was not truly a member of the Daoist Sect, he believed himself to be one, and that imposed restraints.
Those who upheld the law ought to discipline themselves.
The night passed in a haze. At daybreak, Uncle Sun's voice reached him. "Young master, young master, come quickly and look outside the courtyard gate."
Hou Niao strolled out, rather exasperated. Uncle Sun was good in every way, except for that timidity...
The moment he stepped through the courtyard gate, the sight outside startled him. There was not a soul in sight, but things lay all over the ground.
There were several robes, finely stitched traveling boots, a brand-new oil-paper umbrella, a catfish-skin waterskin, steaming provisions wrapped in cloth bundles, freshly picked fruit and vegetables, and even several large silver ingots and scattered bits of silver...
Clearly, these things had come from different people, and all would be useful on a long journey!
His eyes grew a little damp. This was the best repayment he could have received!
Right and wrong had their own true measure; justice always lived in people's hearts. High above stood the blue heavens; three feet above one's head were the gods!