The Overlord of Puluo

Li Banfeng traversed through Mount River Moon in the Outer Gully, trekking more than fifty kilometers through the mountains. Then, at three in the morning, he finally reached a gorge.

According to Yu Nan’s description, once he passed through this gorge, he would arrive at the newly formed land.

However, the gorge was hard to walk through. At its widest, it spanned two or three meters, and at its narrowest, he could only edge through sideways.

He squeezed sideways through a long, narrow fissure for more than half a kilometer. According to his senses as a Wanderlust Cultivator, that distance took more effort than walking five kilometers in the Inner Gully.

As Li Banfeng stepped out of the fissure, he failed to notice the sheer drop beneath his feet and tumbled off a cliff more than ten meters high.

Fortunately, as a Wanderlust Cultivator, he was exceptional on his feet. He slid along a slope, letting it absorb the momentum of the fall before landing. Ultimately, he walked away unscathed.

His clothes were torn, but that hardly mattered. It was just the Geng Family’s guard uniform.

However, his shoes had worn through, and that pained him a little.

He brushed the dust off his clothes and glanced back at the cliff face. A spider emerged from the crack. Hanging from a thread of web, it slowly descended toward Li Banfeng.

What was so special about a spider?

Well, this one truly was unusual. It was huge, and that size didn’t even include its legs. The spider’s core body alone measured more than a meter across.

Stranger still was that the spider wore a black fedora. When it approached Li Banfeng, it even removed its fedora and gave him a gentlemanly bow.

Not only could the spider bow, it could even speak. ”My lady, why do you walk alone in this region of peril?”

My lady?

Li Banfeng stared at the spider for a moment. ”I think you’ve got the wrong person.”

Hearing Li Banfeng’s voice, the spider froze. It turned out that the stunning woman with heavy make-up was actually a man. ”Ah, a mister. My mistake. Are you heading to the activation of the new land? As it happens, we’re heading to the same place.”

Activation of land?

For farming?

”Are you an Agrarian Cultivator?” Li Banfeng asked.

”Agrarian Cultivator?” The spider chuckled. ”You’re such a joker. Look at me. You should be able to tell at a glance that I am a Physique Cultivator.”

The spider didn’t speak like the locals, but it didn’t talk like someone from modern society that Li Banfeng was from either.

It spoke similarly to a voice dubber, with a clear and distinct projection.

Of course, the way the spider spoke was not the main point.

The main point was that Li Banfeng was talking to a spider.

At the Geng Family’s medicinal trading house, Li Banfeng had seen Song Boming, who, as a Physique Cultivator, resembled a crab to some degree.

Back on Mount Bitterfog, Li Banfeng had met a Physique Cultivator whose body bore natural armor.

And now, he was looking at a spider. Clearly, the path of Physique Cultivation produced a wide variety of forms.

The path ahead was wider, so the spider scurried a few paces and walked shoulder to shoulder with Li Banfeng. ”My friend, your steady footing suggests you are a Wanderlust Cultivator. The initiation powder for Wanderlust Cultivation is very costly. You must be well-off.”

”Eh, I’m okay,” Li Banfeng replied offhandedly.

”My life is hard. I have no money to build my foundation or buy the initiation powder. I could only try my luck at the Three-Headed Fork.”

The spider was very chatty. Upon hearing him mention the Three-Headed Fork, Li Banfeng’s interest was piqued.

”You built your foundation at the Three-Headed Fork? Have you grown three heads yet?”

The spider laughed. ”Are you poking fun at us Physique Cultivators?”

Li Banfeng shook his head. ”I’ve never left Medicine King Gully. I do not know much about the Three-Headed Fork.”

As they walked, the spider continued, ”Even if you have not been there, you must have heard how Physique Cultivators come to be. All Physique Cultivators under the heavens spring from the Three-Headed Fork. For the poor, it is the only road to cultivation.”

”Why the poor?” Li Banfeng asked.

He did not mind looking stupid. If he did not understand something, he just asked about it.

The spider chuckled. ”My friend, you’re just acting stupid, aren’t you? The poor cannot afford miraculous pills or the price of acquiring Dao affinity. They can only try their luck at the Three-Headed Fork.

”That place is naturally filled with Dao affinity, but not all can bear it. Of ten who go, nine become three-headed freaks, and such folk live out their days as monsters. The last person is the only one who still has a good physique and can cultivate and produce results. That is why our path is called Physique Cultivation.”

”So producing results means… cultivating into a spider?”

”I cannot shake the feeling that you’re mocking me,” the spider said, all of his eight eyes rolling up at once to stare at Li Banfeng. ”What form one attains depends on luck and innate gifts.

”Some become birds, others become beasts, and many become scorpions or spiders. Do you look down on how I look?”

Li Banfeng shook his head. ”Not at all. This route is hard, and you move along it better than I do as a Wanderlust Cultivator. That is a real skill.”

”Thank you for the praise.” The spider tipped his fedora and bowed again. ”I say all this to show you I am honest. If you are going to activate the land for the Lu Family, we can be partners.”

Partners?

That brought to mind his painful experience of forming a temporary team at Mount Bitterfog.

”I truly am not going to activate the land,” Li Banfeng said, politely declining.

”If you are not, then do not blame me…”

”Blame you for what?”

Li Banfeng smiled at the spider.

All eight of the spider’s eyes met his two.

They stared at each other for a heartbeat, then the spider suddenly spat a strand of silk.

Li Banfeng’s smile remained because the spider hadn’t spat the silk toward him. Furthermore, he didn’t sense any malice.

The silk latched onto the rock wall ahead. The spider reeled it in and continued along the cliff face.

”If you are not going to activate the land, then I shall not lead you there. Ohohoho!”

The path ahead was very narrow and muddy. Li Banfeng slogged through the mud while the spider flitted along the wall, smug and spry.

A few minutes later, the spider disappeared from Li Banfeng’s line of sight.

Two hours later, he finally reached the end of the gorge.

It was no wonder that Yu Nan had come here to hide. Even as a level-one Wanderlust Cultivator, Li Banfeng had found the route grueling. Other cultivators would have likely lost a layer of skin just making the trip.

He’d thought the end of the gorge would be a normal exit, but it was another cliff face.

It was more accurate to say that the gorge was a fissure running through the cliff. Now, he had to emerge from it.

At the edge of the gorge, Li Banfeng had two choices: jump straight down or climb down with his bare hands and feet.

The drop from the cliff was several hundred meters deep. Neither option seemed wise.

Li Banfeng chose the wisest option.

He opened the Pocket Dwelling, and as he stepped inside, he tossed the house key off the cliff.

He sat inside for a while. Then he exited the Pocket Dwelling and picked up the key from the base of a tree.

Looking before him, all he saw were trees. He looked around, and it was just more trees. The dense gathering of trees and foliage made up around ninety percent of what he could see.

Li Banfeng took a step forward. Fallen leaves and dead branches swallowed his ankles.

He took another step, but he tripped over a root hidden under the leaves, plunging his other foot into mud.

He sank so deep that the mud swallowed his thigh.

Nevertheless, Li Banfeng had quick hands. He swiftly grabbed a vine and heaved himself up, pulling his leg free. Just as he regained stable footing, he sensed danger closing in.

However, it wasn’t just closing in;it had already arrived.

A prickling itch ran up his calves. He rolled up his pants to find a densely packed layer of leeches covering his legs, making it look as if he was wearing fur trousers.

He yanked off one leech. It was no ordinary leech;it clung to his skin with such force that a patch of skin came away with it.

If he stripped off the whole ”fur pants,” he would likely lose all the skin on his legs.

Instead, he retreated into the Pocket Dwelling and took off his pants. He grabbed a jar of salt and sprinkled the salt over the leeches.

The leeches were unexpectedly stubborn. Despite being covered in salt, they refused to let go.

Li Banfeng was about to cut their bodies off with a blade when the gramophone vented a cloud of steam.

The scalding heat made the leeches writhe in agony and drop away.

Then the gramophone blew steam over Li Banfeng’s legs several times, sterilizing his wounds.

It hurt a little.

But the relief that followed felt wonderful.

The gramophone even played a song to comfort him.

”If not for me, how would you get by…”

He recalled that the original lyric was ”If not for you.”

My dear wife, are you comforting me or praising yourself?

Geng Zhiwei’s soul had long since been devoured, and his corpse had been eaten by the Arcane Crimson Lotus. Its petals stayed shut as it continued making pills.

Seeing the odds and ends lying scattered across the floor, Li Banfeng tidied up briefly. While the Arcane Crimson Lotus was occupied, he hurriedly gathered up the weapons of Geng Zhiwei and the two Martial Cultivators.

The weapons were decent. One of the Martial Cultivators had carried an iron spike that was over a foot long and had two three-inch barbs at the base.

Not knowing what the weapon was called, Li Banfeng called it an iron spike, only for the gramophone to mock him mercilessly.

”Why are you mocking me? Do you know what it is called then?”

The gramophone offered no answer.

The other weapon was quite unusual too. It looked like a fork made of two interlaced crescents, one large and one small.

Li Banfeng called the strange weapon a fork, and the gramophone mocked him again.

Geng Zhiwei had a pistol, and its magazine was still loaded.

He stored away the weapons and tossed the useless junk out of the Pocket Dwelling. Then he followed Yu Nan’s map and continued making his way through the forest.

After more than an hour, Li Banfeng flipped open his pocket watch.

It’s almost nine. Why’s the sky still so dark?

***

The Lu Family Manor, Mount River Moon’s new land, Medicine King Gully.

A sliver of sunlight fell into the main hall. Zhuo Yuling—the second concubine of the Lu Family head, Lu Dongliang—raised a teacup and took the slightest of sips as she waited quietly for her guest.

About an hour later, a man of medium build entered the main courtyard under the steward’s guidance.

He wore a black tailcoat, a black fedora, and black round sunglasses. With full cheeks and regular features, he exuded an air of gentlemanly poise.

The man took off his fedora and greeted Zhuo Yuling with a polite bow. ”Private Detective Daboinsky, at your service.”

Daboinsky?

The man before her was clearly a local, a black-haired Chinese man. Yet, he had presented himself with a foreign name, even though he and Zhuo Yuling were old acquaintances.

Zhuo Yuling did not return the bow, nor did she even rise from her seat to greet him. She just looked at him and responded with a slightly scornful scoff. ”It has been years since we last met, and now you’ve turned into a fake foreigner?”

Her voice sounded gentle, but her words were barbed and harsh.

Daboinsky replied politely, ”Madam, being a gentleman has nothing to do with one’s race, and having poise has nothing to do with one’s country.”

Zhuo Yuling gestured at the chair beside her. ”Just sit down.”

Daboinsky set his fedora back on. He clearly disliked her arrogance, yet he still sat in the chair.

Zhuo Yuling lit a lady’s cigarette, took a drag, and said slowly, ”I called you here for three tasks. First, to activate new land. Second, to find someone. Third, to kill someone. Regarding the activation of new land, there’s not much that needs to be said. You’re aware of the market rate.

”As for the task of finding someone, I wrote about it in my letter. The person I want you to find is my daughter. This matter is of the utmost urgency. Lastly, the person I want you to kill is Li Banfeng. Here’s his photo and information. It will be even better if you can capture him alive.”

Daboinsky studied the photo, went quiet for a moment, and remarked, ”What a pity.”

”What do you mean, a pity?” Zhuo Yuling asked, taken aback.

Daboinsky smiled. ”Nothing. I only think it is a pity about the young man.”