A Land of Fish and Rice

"Hmph." Ye Hailiang snorted coldly, "Tang Tiansong, before the engagement, I inquired about you from various sources and learned that you are honest, kind, and skilled in both literature and martial arts. I really like you, which is why I betrothed my second daughter to you."

Your Tang Household is now Lineage of cultivators; my Ye Household can't possibly be worthy of your status.

I heard that you are now a monk.

"What, now that you can cultivate immortality, you look down on my Ye Household?"

The fact that four members of the Tang Household are now capable of cultivating immortality has led Ye Hailiang to consider breaking off the engagement.

Firstly, they are from Lineage cultivators, while I am just a mortal. A person of little means shouldn't bow to someone of little means; I should know my place.

Secondly, the path to immortality is fraught with difficulties and dangers, and the four cultivators of the Tang Household might all die one day.

Third, since it was the Tang Household who came to break off the engagement, the fault lay with the Tang Household, and the reason was with the Ye Household. They still needed to maintain the proper attitude, otherwise they would be looked down upon by the Tang Household even more.

Tang Tiansong bowed again and said, "Uncle Ye, indeed, all the mistakes are my fault, Tang Tiansong's fault."

Besides the original dowry of gold and silver, which my Tang Household can double, Uncle Ye, please feel free to name any other conditions, and I, Tang Tiansong, will try my best to meet them.

Upon hearing that there would be additional compensation, Ye Hailiang's expression softened, and he became more determined to break off the engagement. At the same time, he felt a surge of excitement. "Opportunities to make money are rare; we must know how to seize them."

Others might not know, but if they were to take advantage of Tang Tiansong Tang Tiansong, given his character, he wouldn't hold a grudge...

After pondering for a few moments, Ye Hailiang also felt a bit troubled. "Tang Tiansong is, after all, a cultivator now. What if he attains enlightenment and rises to power in the future? If we make things too difficult for him now, we'll only be creating trouble for ourselves. But how much compensation should we ask for?"

Asking for too much will definitely make Tang Tiansong unhappy.

If I ask for less, I'll be unhappy.

Seeing that Ye Hailiang seemed to be hesitating, Tang Miao assumed that he did not want to break off the engagement, so he quickly explained, "The reason why my brother Tang Song wants to break off the engagement is really for the sake of the second young lady of the Ye Household."

The wedding date for my Tiansong and the second young lady was originally set for the year after next.

But my Tiansong is now a cultivator, and he has decided to go to the dangerous Three Graves Mountain to kill Demon Beast and Cultivation Method.

To put it bluntly, if my Tiansong were to meet with misfortune at Three Graves Mountain, then the Second Miss would be branded as a jinx, which would be really bad for her reputation.

Ye Household, as you know, the path of cultivation is fraught with peril, which is why my Tiansong is considering annuling his engagement with the Second Miss before heading to Three Graves Mountain."

Three Graves Mountain!

"That's a land of Demon Beast. I've heard that even cultivators from immortal cultivation sects rarely dare to go there." Hearing this, Ye Hailiang admired Tang Tiansong's courage to some extent.

A forced relationship will not be sweet.

Well, well, it seems the Ye Household and the Tang Household are not destined to become in-laws.

"I, Ye Hailiang, agree to the marriage between my daughter and you, Tang Tiansong." With a sigh, Ye Hailiang looked regretful, but then his tone changed, and a shrewd look appeared in his eyes. "Although my Ye Household is not Lineage cultivators, we still manage tens of thousands of people in the surrounding villages."

If I were to easily break off my daughter's engagement, I would inevitably be ridiculed.

Since you, Tang Tiansong, are a cultivator, you are different from us mortals.

The gold and silver betrothal gifts that my family originally gave can be returned in full by your Tang Household.

But besides that, you have to compensate my family with a few more Spirit Stone!

A few pieces of currency for cultivators: Spirit Stone.

My daughter is sixteen years old this year, and you are worthy of sixteen Spirit Stone from my family.

Tang Tiansong, do you agree?

Tang Jincan, the second son of Tang Tiansong's second uncle, was Ye Hailiang's informant planted in Dangwu Mountain. Ye Hailiang was somewhat aware of some of the changes in the Tang Household.

According to Tang Jincan's description, the Tang Household Tang Household Cultivation Method manuals and talismans from the very beginning of their cultivation journey. These items were worth at least several hundred Spirit Stone, which is why Ye Hailiang dared to ask for sixteen Spirit Stone in compensation.

Ye Hailiang!

Are you desperate for money?

Do you know the value of sixteen Spirit Stone?

The Cui Household Lineage Lineage cultivators south of Iron Bridge Village, has been cultivating for over two hundred years, yet their total annual income is only a hundred or so Spirit Stone.

You actually dare to demand sixteen Spirit Stone as compensation! Sixteen Spirit Stone could buy the lives of tens of thousands of mortals!

"You're taking advantage of my good temper, Tiansong! Otherwise, you'd see if I dared to wipe out your Ye Household right now!" Tang Miao's face was full of anger, and with a slight movement of his right hand, a ball of mysterious fire appeared in his hand.

"Hmph, do you think I, Ye Hailiang, am easily intimidated?!" Ye Hailiang smiled, his tone fierce but his heart filled with fear.

Tang Tiansong smiled bitterly, thinking to himself, "Perhaps this is fate, my Tang Tiansong, the tribulation that leads Yu Wei and me to marriage."

Father Tang Yuan left behind one hundred Spirit Stone for us six children to use for our spiritual practice.

On average, that's exactly sixteen yuan per person.

"So be it, so be it. At worst, my cultivation will be slower, and I'll just repay my share of this marital tribulation."

"Alright, my Tang Household is willing to compensate the Ye Household with sixteen Spirit Stone," Tang Tiansong said, enunciating each word clearly.

"Great, that's satisfying!"

Tang Tiansong, you are indeed someone I admire.

"Bring tea, spirit tea!" Ye Hailiang's face lit up with joy, but he also felt a pang of regret. "The Tang Household is rich. Sixteen Spirit Stone is too little; it should be one hundred and sixty."

Tang Miao stared in astonishment, but there was nothing he could do but curse Ye Hailiang's greed in his heart.

Seeing Ye Hailiang's ambiguous smile, Tang Tiansong sighed softly, "Now that the engagement with the Ye Household has been successfully dissolved, Yu Wei and I can get married openly in a few years..."

Crack!

On the second day of the second month of the year 4038 in the new Celestial Calendar, Tang Tiansong stood in front of a collapsed thatched house and snapped off a small, withered tree branch.

Looking out at the vast desert beyond the broken wall, Tang Tiansong gave a bitter smile: How could this possibly become a sacred place for cultivating immortality?

It's estimated that even in another thousand years, it will be impossible...

A moor is a big lake.

However, Gazing Dragon Lake, which covers an area of thousands of square miles, is not a large lake with abundant fish, but a vast desert.

The vast desert of Gazing Dragon Lake, stretching as far as the eye can see and as hot as a furnace, is quite eerie. Not only is it boundless and scorchingly arid, but it is also accompanied by faint, mournful cries and an overwhelming aura of resentment that constantly lingers and obscures the sky.

Looking at the collapsed thatched house, Tang Tiansong sighed.

This collapsed thatched house was built by my father, Tang Yuan, all by himself last July. He lived here alone for more than a month last year, just to avoid having any karmic ties with his family.

In the earthen courtyard in front of the thatched house, ten giant ceramic water vats are neatly arranged.

The water tank was empty, filled only with a small amount of sand and dust.

The courtyard and its surroundings are planted with hundreds of waist-high boxwood, locust, peach, mulberry, and willow trees, as well as hundreds of clumps of saxaul, cacti, and resurrection plants.

The resurrection plant, also known as the desert dandelion, is found only occasionally in ordinary deserts.

But now, all the plants in front of me have long since withered and decayed, making them good firewood.

All I could see was yellow sand; there wasn't a single patch of green.

These were all transplanted and planted by my father himself. Although he watered them every day, all the plants he planted withered and died within three days after he left on the fifteenth of August last year.

How can such a godforsaken place become a sacred place for spiritual practice?

Tang Tiansong walked out of the courtyard dejectedly, bent down and grabbed a handful of sand and dust. After looking at it, his eyes lit up: the soil in Gazing Dragon Lake was not all sand, but contained a lot of dust, and he could even see some tiny broken roots, stems and leaves of plants.

Yes, Gazing Dragon Lake was originally a vast lake covering thousands of miles, and legend has it that a divine dragon once dwelled there.

A thousand years ago, a cataclysmic war between immortals and demons turned this place from a lake into a desert, and it was filled with malevolent energy.

Although Gazing Dragon Lake is less than a hundred miles away from Dangwu Village, it seems as if there is a barrier around Gazing Dragon Lake.

Dangwu Village, not a drop of rain fell in Gazing Dragon Lake.

At the same time, there are no monsoons here, only strange tornadoes, so the fine dust in Gazing Dragon Lake is basically never blown out of the surrounding area by the wind.

Father is right.

"As long as there's a water source, the soil in Gazing Dragon Lake will definitely be fertile, and it will surely become a land of plenty in the future." After carefully examining several patches of sandy soil, Tang Tiansong looked around with great joy...