A gift of pills

The other two little paper figures crawled out of the corpses and walked over to the one in the middle, one on either side.

Xiao He had taken human form and was crouching behind the three little paper figures.

"Yanyan, what are these?"

Xiao He lowered her head, watching them dubiously. She wanted to reach out and touch them, but did not quite dare.

Song Yan shook his head. He had never seen anything like them either.

Rustle, rustle...

The little paper figures swayed in the mountain night wind, making the sound of paper rubbing together.

Under Song Yan's astonished gaze, the three little paper figures actually cupped their hands and bowed to him, then ran northwest.

His brow furrowed, and his fingertips formed another Method Formula.

The three Law Artifact fragments that had fallen nearby rose with a hum and shot toward the three little paper figures.

Shhk-

The three fragments pinned the three little paper figures to the ground, one apiece.

There were no screams, no cries for help, not a single sound.

The little paper figures seemed to have died quietly, just like that.

Suddenly, three streaks of blood-red light emerged from the paper figures and continued flying northwest. They were so fast that there was no time to stop them.

Song Yan frowned thoughtfully.

Those certainly don't look like anything respectable...

But his cultivation was low and his knowledge limited, so he simply stopped thinking about it.

He walked straight over to the three corpses and began examining them.

Of the three, only Lu Xiaowei had a Heaven and Earth Bag. The other two could be said to be utterly penniless, with only a little bell between them.

Song Yan immediately wielded his spiritual power and erased the imprint on Lu Xiaowei's Heaven and Earth Bag right where he stood.

"So poor."

Before this, Song Yan had thought he might be one of the poorest cultivators in the world, but compared with these three, he was actually doing reasonably well.

There were eight Spirit Stones in all and two black nails. Counting the three from earlier, that made five nails.

There were several coffins, some empty and some with corpses lying inside. Song Yan had little interest in them.

There was a sheet of paper covered in writing and two loose Jade Slips.

Most of the middle of the page was obscured by black bloodstains. Song Yan could not make out what it said at all, only catching words like "Sacred Cult" and "yin-aspected"...

He extended his Divine Sense into the Jade Slips. One was blank; there should originally have been something inside, but someone had erased it.

The other recorded the refinement method and medicinal effects of something called the "Spirit-Transforming Blood Pill."

Blood from a middle-aged corpse, heart's-tip blood from a dead infant, blood from an elderly corpse...

Looking at these pill-refining ingredients, Song Yan nearly retched.

Yet the effects of this Spirit-Transforming Blood Pill made Song Yan's jaw drop.

Repeated consumption could cause a special kind of meridian to grow inside mortals with no aptitude for cultivation, thereby giving them a chance to cultivate to Qi Refining, third layer.

It could let cultivators without spiritual root aptitude cultivate to Qi Refining, third layer?

Simply unheard of...

Soon, Song Yan found a bottle of these pills in the Heaven and Earth Bag.

Song Yan opened the porcelain bottle, and a heavy stench of blood struck him in the face. His brow furrowed and his gaze sharpened as he saw the unnatural color of the pills inside.

They were so deep red they seemed about to drip, as though stained with blood.

"..."

Xiao He turned into a snake and slipped into his sleeve, circled around once, then poked her head out of his robe collar.

"Eww, that smells awful."

Song Yan sealed the pill bottle. "This Rogue Cultivator of Xin Mountain really must be a surviving Devil Cultivator..."

"Once I return to the sect, I'll just report everything exactly as it happened..."

If the sky fell, the tall ones would hold it up. When those mighty Devil Cultivators wreaked havoc on the world, surely they would not start by taking a nobody like him to the chopping block...

These things were completely useless to Song Yan, too.

He planned to pick something that did not look particularly valuable and hand it over to the sect along with his mission "testimony."

Whatever the case, since there were clues involving Devil Cultivators, he still had to report them.

As for everything else...

Song Yan decided to sell it to Granny Qin.

Her little shop should buy these things, right? Whatever he could get would do; it would count as a small windfall.

Even a mosquito was meat, however small. Song Yan was now so poor he could barely afford to live on the northwest wind.

Once Song Yan had finished everything, he went back and buried the three villagers' bodies.

"Brothers, sister, sorry for the offense just now. It was so you could rest in peace..."

He sighed.

"Lives are worth no more than grass..."

Song Yan put everything in order and hurried back to the thatched cottage that same night, before dawn.

The next day, Song Yan went down the mountain.

"Senior Brother Zhao, I'll be heading back to the sect today. Sorry for troubling you to look after the townspeople..."

Zhao Fengcheng also liked peace and quiet and lived near the foot of Qingshi Mountain.

"Junior Brother Song, those three..."

Song Yan smiled faintly. "They probably won't come to Shiliang to cause trouble again..."

"Oh... that's good."

Zhao Fengcheng nodded repeatedly, his gaze full of envy as he looked at Song Yan.

To those inner disciples, outer disciples like Song Yan might be a dime a dozen, utterly unable to keep pace with their cultivation, with no possibility of seeking the Dao and attaining longevity either.

But to a disciple like Zhao Fengcheng, who had been dismissed, being able to remain in the sect and continue cultivating as Song Yan did was already something he could only dream of.

And how many people in Shiliang Town looked upon Zhao Fengcheng with envy?

That was how it had always been between people.

"Senior Brother Zhao, this is a bottle of Qi-Nourishing Pills I refined myself. They may have mid-grade efficacy."

Song Yan swept a finger, and a little porcelain bottle appeared in his hand. "They may not be the pills best suited to you, but please accept them as a token of my regard."

Anyone who knew Zhao Fengcheng would actually know that he was not particularly likable.

Weak, timid, and self-abasing.

Yet he had diligently searched the town for promising cultivation seedlings on behalf of the Dongyuan Sect. Song Yan was one of the disciples he had discovered and brought into the sect.

When Lu Xiaowei and the other two caused trouble, he had also dared to step forward and back up the townspeople.

In this cultivation world where everyone feared for their own safety, setting aside his motives, he had already done right by many people.

Since Song Yan had now broken through to Qi Refining, fifth layer, and Qi-Nourishing Pills were no longer of much use to him, he might as well repay the favor of having been "guided" onto the path of immortality all those years ago.

Song Yan was poor, but he did not hesitate over things that ought to be spent.

"This..."

Pills, mid-grade pills!

Though they were only the lowest-level Qi-Nourishing Pills, to Zhao Fengcheng, they were already priceless treasures.

His eyes burned with longing. Polite words such as "I was only doing my duty, how could I accept this?" reached his lips...

Yet he simply could not bring himself to say them.

"Thank you... Junior Brother Song."

Every time he uttered the words "junior brother," they seemed to scald his mouth.

He bowed deeply, lowering his head far down.

"Senior Brother Zhao, there's no need for this. If you hadn't brought me into the sect back then, how could I ever have glimpsed this path of cultivation?"

"I'll repay this kindness today, lest I die and my Dao perish someday before I have the chance."

Song Yan gave a self-mocking smile and left.

"Die and his Dao perish..."

Zhao Fengcheng let out a long sigh, tightening his grip on the porcelain bottle.

After they had walked some distance, Xiao He's muffled voice came from his sleeve. "Are we going to the immortal mountain?"

"Let's go into town first and say hello to A Nian, Da Rong, and the others..."

Though Lu Xiaowei and the other two were dead, he still did not know why they... or rather, that so-called Rogue Cultivator of Xin Mountain, had wanted to find Sheng Nian.

"Whatever the case, I have to warn A Nian."

A cultivator, traveling all that way to find a mortal constable...

What sense did that make?

Thanks to Banshu Qingcha for the monthly vote! Thanks to everyone for the recommendation votes!