Dragon Canon

“Today is a fine, sunny day, suitable for fishing.”

That was the only sentence on the jade paper. It was as out-of-the-blue as it seemed meaningless.

Wei Yuan turned it over and over in his hands in search for additional hints, then searched around in hopes of asking the woman herself what she meant. Of course, Grandmaster-Junior Zhu was nowhere to be found.

If Zhu Yuanjin didn’t want to be found, even Wei Yuan with his extraordinary senses would struggle to detect her. Still, he had learned something about his grandmaster-junior from this latest interaction: she had to be a part of the Traditional Party.

Members of the Traditional Party were fond of playing word games and speaking in half-truths, saying one-part and leaving nine-parts unsaid, dropping riddles everywhere and expecting their disciples to figure things out on their own.

Back when Wei Yuan was still receiving centralized tutelage, and the Reform Party and Traditional Party were locked in a fierce struggle, both sides often engaged in daily verbal sparring and showed each other no courtesy whatsoever.

For instance, during a class, one teacher openly declared, “There is nothing that cannot be written clearly; only things one has not thought through clearly.” If someone could write a coherent and lucid essay, it meant they had thought the matter through clearly.

Conversely, someone who relied on cryptic allusions to convey their meaning, spoke in half-truths, left nine parts unsaid, or extolled the past while disparaging the present, was someone who simply failed to grasp the teachings themselves. They were afraid that others might see through their ignorance, which was why they had deliberately spoken in obscure, difficult-to-understand terms, leaving it up to their audience to figure things out on their own. Even if said audience did manage to figure it out, it usually had little do with the speaker themselves.

Since arriving in Qingming, Zheng Sheng had improved considerably in this regard. Thus, Wei Yuan hadn’t encountered a senior like Zhu Yuanjin in quite some time.

Fishing? How does one fish, and what does one catch?

Wei Yuan, in fact, knew how to fish. He was particularly skilled at fortune fishing. He possessed both the array and the bait, but the question was what was he catching, and which bait should he use. Wei Yuan had plenty of bait at his disposal. Some of it, once cast out, would result in more than just fishes—it would be like trying to fish for heaven and earth. If he succumbed to foolishness, he had no doubt he would be written into the history books and remembered as the textbook example of courting death for generations to come.

Although he deeply resented the practice of digging deep pits[1]and speaking in riddles, Wei Yuan had no choice but to play along with this game for now. He carefully reviewed the bait in his possession.

The Bay Laurel Immortal Tree’s branch was out of the question—it was originally the Immortal Lord’s fishing tool in the western regions, and it wasn’t even alive back then. Now that it had come to life, it would not be inaccurate to say that the roles had been reversed.

What about the girl, Yin Yang[2]? Wei Yuan shivered and hurriedly dismissed the dangerous thought.

Both of his Star Dragon Trees were mutated variants. They possessed decent status and could be quite useful after they had matured, but not yet.

Xu Wenwu? That one seemed promising....

After going through everything he had, Wei Yuan realized that the one object he possessed that could be considered special, and was pretty rare even in the Shaman realm, was the nether soil he had dug up from the Realm of Coldbelow. The item was currently available for exchange in the Palace of Absolute Beginning and carried a hefty price tag.

Wei Yuan took out the array disc, materialized a small amount of nether soil, and placed it in the center. He then infused it with Dao energy to activate it. The array disc had been bestowed upon him by the Immortal Lord back then. Although it had lost its exalted status after the Immortal Lord’s mystic energy was exhausted, the material itself was still of excellent quality.

The nether soil itself was a sufficiently high level existence, but just in case, Wei Yuan imbued it with a wisp of advanced blue fortune. This should ensure that the fishing would yield results.

Having finished these preparations, Wei Yuan had just stowed the array disc when he suddenly sensed something. Looking up, he saw a streak of dark red tinged with black appearing in the void. Then, a thin but viscous, damp mist descended toward him.

The appearance of the red mist was accompanied by a foul, fishy stench—like a mixture of rotten food and decaying corpses left to sit for days. It was filled with the stench of decay, ruin, chaos, and madness. Dozens of human faces faintly emerged from within the red mist, and Wei Yuan recognized them all to be soldiers from Song Chao’s unit. In fact, one of the distorted faces was Song Chao himself.

With a single thought, Wei Yuan moved himself and his mount ten zhang to the side. However, the red mist continued its descent toward his head as if he had never moved.

Wei Yuan’s mind raced. This black, putrid blood mist felt as thought it was an innate part of him, as if it was meant to be with him from the very beginning. It was a very different sensation from the Shaman’s blood curse, which had a clear targeting mechanism—whether based on karma, fortune, or simply geography. This blood mist, though, had no such constraints. It had simply appeared above his head without any rhyme or reason.

The last time he had encountered a similar situation... was when he was receiving a worldly reward.

Wei Yuan made no further attempt to evade the blood mist, allowing it to envelop him. Instantly, he felt his body grow heavier, and his physical body and primordial spirit aged slightly. After the blood mist entered his sea of consciousness, it transformed into hundreds of vengeful spirits that fluttered about in all directions.

What is this? Lingering specters seeking revenge against me?

Wei Yuan was not one to be at the mercy of fate; the Palace of Absolute Beginning had plenty of methods for dealing with vengeful ghosts and lingering spirits. He was just searching his memory and selecting a few Dao spells to annihilate the specters when suddenly, as if suddenly finding a target, they flew en masse toward the jade hill and plunged into the black pool.

The black pool rippled for a few moments, then returned to stillness just like that. All the damage done to Wei Yuan’s body and primordial spirit had healed as well. It was as if nothing had ever happened.

The shadow in the moon shifted slightly and released a wisp of black qi. It was an advanced fortune, and it hovered in front of Wei Yuan.

It had been a long time since he obtained an otherworldly fortune, but for some reason, Wei Yuan found himself unable to feel joy. The last time he had obtained an otherworldly fortune was when he sacrificed the remnant soul of a Xu Clan Avatar. This time, it was the lingering specters of Song Chao as his men, seeking to drag him to his doom only to be absorbed by the black pool within the jade hill. Moreover, the black pool itself had been formed by the convergence of the remnant souls of tens of thousands of Shaman fighters.

Wei Yuan was now certain that the black pool was inextricably linked to the shadow in the moon.

Back when he was studying Heaven and Earth Theory and Fortune Theory at the Palace of Absolute Beginning, his teachers had repeatedly warned them to avoid the domain of souls as much as possible before reaching the World Ruler stage. Reincarnation, soul binding, so on and so forth, they were all out of the question. His teacher had spoken with grave solemnity but did not explain why, merely stating, “You will understand naturally when your cultivation has reached that level.”

Wei Yuan’s heart felt a bit heavy. He had a vague sense that he had stumbled upon something he shouldn’t have.

However, this was beyond his control, so he could only set it aside for the time being and return to the realm first.

Having secured this batch of military provisions, they would basically be able to hold out until the new harvest. However, Wei Yuan had no intentions of stopping here; he planned to buy a couple more batches and see if he could pick up anything else while the option was still available to him. He still had a fair amount of immortal silver left over from the secret vault of Xu Jingfeng’s father after all, and stockpiling more grain couldn’t hurt.

This was just their first transaction. Yue Qilin had to have more supplies in his possession; he wouldn’t have revealed everything out of the bat. If Wei Yuan stopped here, their relationship would gradually grow distant as well. That was why Wei Yuan planned to conduct several small-scale transactions after this. Through these repeated exchanges, their bond would deepen. This was the essence of “forging deep bonds[3].”

Meanwhile, ten thousand li away, several cultivators dressed in peculiar attire were making their way through a deep, ancient forest. Each one was carrying a wooden backpack and wielding different tools.

As they walked, they caught insects and worms, gathered herbs and plants, even collected some soil and water along the way.

The lead cultivator suddenly stopped in his tracks and took out an array disc from his robe. The disc had a peculiar shape, resembling a white jade bowl. Inside the bowl was a tiny, jet-black figure about the size of a finger. It was babbling away like a baby and pointing a figure toward the northwest.

The lead cultivator was taken aback at first. Then, he exploded with joy, “I never imagined there would be nether soil in the western regions, and a hefty amount at that! Truly, the heavens are on my side!”

One of the cultivators spoke up, “Where there is nether soil, there must be danger. Should we inform our senior brothers at the Mastercraft Hall to join us in the exploration?”

The lead cultivator waved his hand dismissively and declared, “No need! Our feng shui is excellent today—it is a good day to keep all the spoils to ourselves!”

1. You know like how the classic elder would set an obstacle and expect the MC to overcome it with little to no explanation whatsoever? This is referring to that. ☜

2. From now on, the girl would be referred and addressed as Yin Yang. ☜

3. Wei Yuan hasn’t forgotten that his survival hinges on forging as many deep bonds as many important people as possible. Have you? ☜