Ghost-Fearing Sea

Human Realm, third month, eighteenth day of the year 4024 of the New Immortal Calendar.

Tang Yuan, clad in a straw rain cape, had just stepped out of his courtyard when he saw Old Man Kang, Kang Cang, approaching.

"Tang Yuan, are you still planning to go to the Ghost-Fearing Sea to fish for Red Spirit Eels?" Kang Cang asked, concern written across his face.

"I don't have much choice. The buyer of Red Spirit Eels I met at the Xuan Dou Cultivator Market paid me a deposit, but after setting aside compensation for the trouble you and Liu Hanchuan are taking, I'm still a little short of Spirit Stones. So I'm planning to visit the Ghost-Fearing Sea and see if I can catch some Red Spirit Eels." Tang Yuan sighed softly.

After returning to Ten Thousand Snakes Island from the Xuan Dou Cultivator Market yesterday, Tang Yuan had told Kang Cang and Liu Hanchuan that he was buying two hundred Red Spirit Eels this time and needed them all ready by the fifteenth of next month.

Kang Cang was around eighty years old and had an eighth-layer Meridian Opening cultivation. He had worked for the Xi Household for over sixty years and was Tang Yuan's neighbor on Ten Thousand Snakes Island. He usually looked after Tang Yuan quite a bit.

Liu Hanchuan was about the same age as Tang Yuan and currently had a sixth-layer Meridian Opening cultivation. Both had embarked on the path of cultivation under Daoist Gou back then and could be considered classmates for five years, so they were on good terms.

Naturally, Tang Yuan had not said he intended to sell the Red Spirit Eels to the Demon Realm. Instead, he had said that he had met a merchant at the Xuan Dou Cultivator Market who was willing to buy two hundred Red Spirit Eels every month at five Spirit Sand apiece.

Tang Yuan could not possibly approach each of the Xi Household's more than two hundred fishermen to buy Red Spirit Eels, so he wanted Kang Cang and Liu Hanchuan to purchase them on his behalf.

If he asked people for help, how could he not let them profit? So Tang Yuan bought the eels from Kang Cang and Liu Hanchuan for three Spirit Sand apiece, while the two of them bought the eels from the fishermen for two Spirit Sand apiece.

"There are indeed more Red Spirit Eels in the waters of the Ghost-Fearing Sea, but do you know why it's called the Ghost-Fearing Sea?

"It's because even ghosts fear the dangers in those waters.

"Besides, it's the last third of the month now, and the Ghost-Fearing Sea is even more dangerous.

"If you die there, who are Liu Haichuan and I supposed to sell the Red Spirit Eels we've collected to?

"If we sell them to the Xi Household, Liu Haichuan and I will each lose ten Spirit Stones out of our own pockets." Kang Cang curled his lip.

"Don't worry, Old Man Kang. I'm only twenty-four this year, and I still have a wife and four children to support. I don't want to die.

"I'm just going to take a look at the Ghost-Fearing Sea. If it's really dangerous, I'll come right back.

"Put your heart back in your belly and buy the Red Spirit Eels without worrying. I definitely won't let you lose money." Tang Yuan patted Kang Cang on the shoulder, stepped onto his bamboo-leaf flying boat, and flew toward Emerald Creek Island. The Ghost-Fearing Sea was more than ten thousand li from Ten Thousand Snakes Island, so he could only take a fishing boat out to sea from the dock on Emerald Creek Island. If he took the bamboo-leaf flying boat, his Spiritual Qi would run dry before he reached the Ghost-Fearing Sea, and he would fall into the sea and drown.

"That boy Tang Yuan is a decent person, but he's far too bold.

"I was even thinking of marrying my granddaughter to him as a concubine. Looks like I was too hasty.

"What kind of place is the Ghost-Fearing Sea? Never mind Meridian Opening cultivators-even late-stage Qi Refinement cultivators, and Foundation Establishment cultivators for that matter, don't dare go there as they please.

"Within ten days, that boy will surely come back empty-handed." Kang Cang shook his head with some disdain...

The fishing boats rented by the Xi Household's spiritual fishing workers were naturally no ordinary boats. Once supplied with spiritual power, they could race forward on their own.

The fishing boats could also be powered by Spirit Stones, of course, but Xi Household spiritual fishing workers like Tang Yuan could not bear to use Spirit Stones for that. Instead, they powered the boats with their own spiritual power, then began casting their nets for spirit fish once they reached the fishing grounds.

After renting a fishing boat at the Emerald Creek Island dock, Tang Yuan put a Spirit Stone straight into it to power it.

With the Spirit Stone powering it, the fishing boat kicked up waves like a speedboat and raced westward as swiftly as the wind and lightning.

"Good heavens, using a Spirit Stone to power a fishing boat? Isn't that a bit too extravagant?

"We fishermen scrimp and save all year round and can only put away two or three Spirit Stones."

"Never mind the two hundred fishermen in our Xi Household. Even counting the Xi Household's two hundred miners and two hundred Spirit Plant workers, among all its roughly seven hundred contracted spiritual workers, those who can save five Spirit Stones a year are as rare as phoenix feathers and qilin horns.

"Look how freely that boy spends. He must be a direct descendant of the Xi Household, heading out to the open sea to race his boat."

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. Rich people sure know how to have a wild time..."

Quite a few of the Xi Household's contracted spiritual workers at the dock watched Tang Yuan's carefree departing figure with envy.

On the shore, a woman in green wearing a veil watched Tang Yuan speeding westward, her brows knitting slightly. "The household head strictly forbade members of the Xi Household long ago from squandering Spirit Stones on wine and women, racing dogs and fighting birds. I've never seen this person before. Could he be a child of the Xi Household's extended family?"...

The Ghost-Fearing Sea was dangerous, and Tang Yuan knew it, of course.

But Tang Yuan was willing to waste Spirit Stones and go to the dangerous Ghost-Fearing Sea all to put on a show.

Now that Tang Yuan had Spirit Stones, pills, and Spiritual Qi, he could naturally raise his cultivation to the eighth layer of Meridian Opening very quickly.

But he needed a reasonable explanation for where those Spirit Stones, pills, and Spiritual Qi had come from.

If he could not explain it, disaster would strike. When others saw his cultivation rising so quickly, they would surely report him, saying his resources had come from unknown sources and that he had encountered some great fortuitous opportunity.

If he encountered a great fortuitous opportunity and neither shared it nor told the Xi Household about it, then sorry, the only fate awaiting him was death-the kind where his entire family died with him.

Tang Yuan could not wait to sell the Red Spirit Eels and improve his cultivation slowly, either.

A long night brought many dreams. Who knew how long he could keep reselling his Red Spirit Eels?

Besides, what if the Xi Household saw how much his Red Spirit Eels sold for and insisted that Tang Yuan reveal the merchant who did not exist at the Xuan Dou market?

So the solution Tang Yuan came up with was to become an Alchemist in the public eye.

As an Alchemist, he could refine pills to take himself and sell pills for Spirit Stones. That would explain why his cultivation rose so quickly and why he had become wealthy.

As for explaining how he had become an Alchemist, Tang Yuan's idea was that he had found an Alchemist's legacy in the Ghost-Fearing Sea.

The Storage Bag, spirit sword, and Pill Furnace Tang Yuan had bought at the Xuan Dou market yesterday were all meant to give everything a reasonable explanation: once he reached the Ghost-Fearing Sea, he would throw them into the sea and then fish them out again.

Because every Xi Household fishing boat had a tracking function, the Xi Household could check whether Tang Yuan had actually gone to the Ghost-Fearing Sea and exactly how many days he had spent there. So Tang Yuan had no choice but to make a real trip to the Ghost-Fearing Sea to put it on his route...

The fishing boat raced west for a day and a night. Just as dawn broke, Tang Yuan finally saw the Ghost-Fearing Sea's landmark: Ghost Return Island, which rose about fifty zhang above the sea.

The fishing boat came ashore, and Tang Yuan jumped onto the island.

He took the Spirit-Floating Paulownia Wood out of the Mystic Spoon and secured it to a huge boulder on the island with a hundred-zhang-long black iron chain. He also tied up the fishing boat with a chain.

Tang Yuan took out his fishing gear and began fishing for Red Spirit Eels from the shore.

Before an incense stick had burned, and before the Red Spirit Eels had begun to bite, the weather over the sea suddenly changed. Dark clouds abruptly filled the sky, bolts of lightning struck down from the heavens, and, as far as the eye could see, monstrous waves were surging toward him.

Bizarre whirlpools also appeared on the surface of the sea not far away.

The corner of Tang Yuan's mouth twitched. "It really is the Ghost-Fearing Sea. No wonder even late-stage Qi Refinement cultivators don't dare come here.

"Go up into the sky, and the rolling thunder overhead will strike you dead.

"Enter the sea, and cultivators are already at a disadvantage in the water. Even with a Water-Avoidance Pill, a Qi Refinement cultivator can only hold their breath for three or four shichen. But I've heard that Ghost Return Island stays submerged for at least ten shichen. Add those bizarre whirlpools, and a Qi Refinement cultivator trying to shelter in the water would have little chance of survival.

"The air is filled with wind, rain, hail, and lightning. As soon as you show yourself, you're bound to be battered from head to toe.

"It's far too late to escape now, too.

"A human cultivator is certain to die now.

"But I, Tang Yuan, can turn into a bastard turtle...

"Pah... I can turn into a sea turtle and hold my breath underwater for more than twelve shichen."

Watching the towering waves, as high as the clouds and almost upon him, Tang Yuan swallowed a Turtle Transformation Pill and directed his magic power into the intrinsic demon core in his Dantian.

He then used his intrinsic demon core to drive his spiritual power and refine the Turtle Transformation Pill in his belly. In an instant, he transformed into a large sea turtle weighing over a hundred jin and slowly crawled into the seawater...