The Overlord of Puluo

On New Year’s Eve, Li Banfeng sat at the entrance of Potsticker Village, brewing insecticide.

It smelled medicinal. Very medicinal. The sort of smell that made mosquitoes come zooming in from every direction as if invited to a feast.

The moment the mist touched them, more than ninety percent dropped out of the air. The remaining ten percent did not die right away. Unfortunately, that stubborn little minority was more than enough to ruin an entire village’s harvest.

And it wasn’t just one village. Every village in the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs was in the same miserable state.

Like all other insecticides, Old Mister Yao’s formula worked extremely well at first, but after some time, similar problems would emerge.

The village chief of Potsticker Village plopped himself down beside Li Banfeng and gave a cheery laugh. ”It’s the new year! Come to my place, have a bowl of dumplings, and drink a cup or two.”

Li Banfeng shook his head. ”You drink. I am not hungry.”

”Master Qi,” the village chief said earnestly, ”you have done everything you could for us. Our village will never forget this kindness.”

”Nonsense,” Li Banfeng replied. ”There’s no kindness here. I am just freeloading food. Hurry along. Another freeloader will be showing up later.”

”Another...?” Xiang Jichun hesitated, clearly not understanding what Li Banfeng meant. When Li Banfeng refused to explain further, the old village chief sighed helplessly and left.

Not long after, Pan Dehai appeared and launched straight into speaking.

”Virtue is the foundation of one’s standing,” Pan Dehai said. ”Virtue is the basis of self-cultivation. Do you know what it means to possess great virtue?

”To plan for the long term and deliberate carefully, that is great virtue. Acting rashly and without proper consideration can hardly be called the conduct of a virtuous person. And restlessness? Short-sightedness? How could either of those possibly be virtuous?

”Failing to respect one’s elders and refusing good advice can hardly be called the conduct of a virtuous person. And arrogance? Perverse behavior? How could either of those possibly be virtuous?”

”Yap, yap, yap. Are you never gonna stop?” Li Banfeng snapped, shooting Pan Dehai an angry glare.

Pan Dehai was furious as well. He jabbed his walking stick against the ground and barked, ”The formula Old Yao had you deliver doesn’t work at all! Do you have any idea how much effort I put into reallocating medicinal ingredients? How much money did I spend? How many local land deities I had to bow to and beg? You and that Old Yao are both sorely lacking in virtue!”

Being accused by Pan Dehai of lacking virtue made Li Banfeng furious.

Pan Dehai snapped, ”Where’s the fan I gave you?”

”I threw it away.”

”How dare you! That’s a supreme treasure of the mortal world!”

”I hid it somewhere.”

Pan Dehai let out a series of long sighs. ”I should have asked you to give it back to me. You didn’t help at all!”

Li Banfeng could not say anything in response. He truly had not expected the Medicine King’s formula to fail.

After a long silence, Pan Dehai let out a deep sigh and said, ”Even the Lu Family’s solution did not work.”

Lu Dongjun failed as well? Li Banfeng muttered inwardly. He watched the mosquitoes swarm across the sky, and a heavy despair crept up from the depths of his heart.

Pan Dehai shook his head. ”I never should have trusted the two of you. In the end, I still have to do things my own way. Only when all of Puluo Province hates the mosquitoes together will we be able to put an end to this plague.”

Li Banfeng turned to look at him. ”You are planning to send the mosquitoes into another region again? Even the Medicine King’s insecticide no longer works. Where else do you think you can send them?”

”I will send the mosquitoes into Greenwater Bay,” Pan Dehai said. ”Greenwater Bay has the most capable people. Even if Lu Dongjun failed, there are others who will surely find a way to deal with the insects.”

”Send them to Greenwater Bay?” Li Banfeng asked. ”Can you defeat Green Beggar?”

Pan Dehai spoke with righteous fervor. ”Even if it costs me my life, why should I not try? This is the firmness of virtue. This is the courage of virtue. This is the heart of virtue.”

Li Banfeng shook his head. ”Green Beggar won’t help you.”

Based on what the orange grove’s owner had said, Li Banfeng could already see the truth of it. Green Beggar had wanted the plague to spread within his own territory. If he did not even care about his own land, how could he possibly help Pan Dehai?

Pan Dehai shook his head stubbornly. ”I refuse to believe I can’t beg him until he says yes!”

Li Banfeng gave a bitter smile. ”All you do is yap, yap, yap.”

”How insolent!” Pan Dehai barked. ”How can someone so young show such disrespect to his elders?”

Then, just as suddenly, his tone softened. ”From what you said earlier, it seems you are acquainted with Greenwater Beggar. Since you have a heart to save the people, why not go and...”

”You want me to go find Green Beggar?” Li Banfeng snapped.

No wonder Mister Yao had warned him that all of Pan Dehai’s pleasant words were no better than farting.

”I am not asking you to fight Green Beggar,” Pan Dehai said. ”I only want you to go see him first.”

Li Banfeng looked at him with open contempt. ”You are afraid of him yourself, so you want me to go die in your place.”

”When have I ever been afraid of him!” Pan Dehai declared righteously. ”My righteous qi endures. What is there to fear from a mere Greenwater Beggar? Even if he were standing right in front of me right now, I would still...”

He stopped mid-sentence.

”...What is that smell?”

In the blink of an eye, Pan Dehai moved and positioned himself firmly behind Li Banfeng.

Li Banfeng was startled and muttered inwardly, What is going on?

A beggar was walking toward them from a distance. He wore nothing but tattered rags, and his body was covered in festering sores. Thick green pus oozed from them as he moved, leaving behind a stench that seemed to cling to the air.

The Green Beggar! Li Banfeng was shocked. But then, he suddenly heard Pan Dehai say, ”When did Green Beggar become a blondie? This is not Greenwater Beggar, but he sure smells just like him.”

The figure approaching them was not Green Beggar at all. It was the Disease Cultivator, Cedric.

Cedric staggered up to Li Banfeng. His face was a mess of festering sores, and he squeezed out a thin smile. ”I finally found you.”

Li Banfeng took a step back. ”What do you want with me?”

”I am here to help you,” Cedric said. ”I am here to help the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs get rid of the mosquitoes. I love the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs.”

Li Banfeng glanced toward Pan Dehai. ”He says he loves the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs.”

Pan Dehai’s cheek twitched, but he said nothing. The green pus covering Cedric’s body made his skin crawl.

Cedric did not possess the Keen-Eyed Perception technique. Although he had reached the sixth level of cultivation, he could not see Pan Dehai at all.

”Who were you talking to just now?” Cedric asked in surprise.

Li Banfeng looked toward Pan Dehai again, expecting him to reveal himself. Instead, he found that Pan Dehai had already fled and was nowhere in sight.

Pan Dehai fled at the sight of the illness. Only his voice lingered in the air behind him.

”Tell Greenwater Beggar this. If he dares to bring the plague into the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs, I will never let this go!”

Who would have thought that the old man could still run so fast, even while leaning on a walking stick? Li Banfeng exclaimed inwardly. He then turned to look at Cedric. ”Do we know each other?”

”We do,” Cedric said. ”You saw me at Medicine King Gully. I am the foreign devil. Not that fake foreign devil. I am the real thing!”

It was at this moment that Li Banfeng remembered and realized that this was the foreigner whose body had been covered in blisters.

Did he evolve? Li Banfeng wondered. How did blisters turn into festering sores?

The moment the recognition settled in, Li Banfeng stepped back and gripped the key in his hand. He was already preparing to run.

Cedric waved a hand dismissively. ”Don’t run. I really am here to help you get rid of the mosquitos.”

He glanced at the cauldron on the ground and shook his head. ”This insecticide doesn’t work perfectly, but it isn’t useless either. It can kill mosquitoes. Out of every hundred, it kills ninety-five.

”But the remaining five don’t die. They live. They keep reproducing. And their offspring won’t die either. One or two special cases are enough to push an entire species forward. In the Outer Provinces, this is called mutation. It’s also called resistance.” He looked at Li Banfeng. ”You come from the Outer Provinces. You should understand what I mean.”

Li Banfeng understood what Cedric meant as he had already thought about this.

”Do you have a better method?”

”Yes,” Cedric said. ”Poison can’t wipe out a species, but disease can. I can spread my disease among the mosquitoes and let them infect one another. One infects ten and ten will infect a hundred. That is the proper way to exterminate mosquitoes.”

It sounded very effective, but Li Banfeng felt there was a problem.

”Won’t mosquitoes develop resistance to the disease?”

”They will,” Cedric said, nodding eagerly. ”That’s why using only a single disease won’t work either. Out of a hundred infected mosquitoes, one might survive. And that one mosquito’s descendants would all be immune to that disease.”

”Another Disease Cultivator I know had used a similar method and failed. I improved upon his method and made the mosquitoes contract multiple diseases at the same time. Even if one survived, they would not be able to reproduce.”

Li Banfeng asked, ”Won’t there be individual cases among them that can still reproduce?”

”There will!” Cedric said at once. He had clearly thought this through. ”But those rare cases will be altered by yet another disease. Their habits will change. Their lifespans will grow longer, and their diet will change from grain to blood.”

”They will evolve into another species that can survive,” Cedric said. ”The most common result is what you see everywhere. Ordinary mosquitoes. That’s what happens when disease wipes out the weak and selection does the rest.”

”You can make mosquitoes contract so many diseases at once?” Li Banfeng asked.

Cedric nodded. ”I couldn’t before. But now I can. I have gained a special power, one granted by my founding cultivator. It’s incredibly strong, but it nearly cost me my life.”

This time, Li Banfeng had no questions.

Based on what he knew about biology, Cedric’s method was indeed effective. It might even be the only effective method. But why would he do this?

”Why do you want to help the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs deal with the insect plague?” Li Banfeng asked. ”Don’t tell me it’s out of love for Puluo Province.”

He couldn’t shake the unease. If Cedric planned to spread disease under the excuse of helping, things would turn truly disastrous.

Cedric stared straight at Li Banfeng. ”I am doing this to save myself. This is an agreement between me and the Peddler. As long as I save the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs, he’ll save my life. This is the proof.”

He took out a feather duster and said, ”The peddler gave this to me. He said you would recognize it, and that you would definitely help me.”

Using a feather duster as proof? Only the Peddler would think of something like that, Li Banfeng thought. The Peddler had vouched for him, which made Cedric trustworthy, at least with regards to this matter.

”Why didn’t the Peddler come himself?” Li Banfeng asked.

”He said he still has many things to deal with,” Cedric replied. ”He said the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs aren’t the only place in trouble.”

Li Banfeng said nothing.

Cedric studied him for a moment, then asked, ”And you? Why are you doing this? Is there something special about the Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs to you? Or do you also have some special arrangement with the Peddler?”

Li Banfeng did not answer. There was no agreement between him and the peddler.

By delivering the formula, he had already fulfilled his promise to Old Mister Yao. Disaster relief truly was not his responsibility.

”Tell me how you plan to do it first.”

Cedric looked at the cauldron. ”I need to gather mosquitoes. A great many mosquitoes. For the disease to spread quickly, the population base has to be large enough. What we have now isn’t enough. Not nearly enough.”

***

Late into the night, Li Banfeng stood by the farmland, enduring the heavy snow as he waited for Pan Dehai’s reply. After waiting for more than an hour, he finally heard Pan Dehai’s voice.

”Make that foreigner leave at once. The Ridges of Bottomless Stomachs are already in this state. We can’t allow him to bring disease here again!”

Li Banfeng shouted back, ”Give me more herbs! At least let us try once before you decide!”

Cedric sat some distance away, watching quietly. He had no idea who Li Banfeng was speaking to. Then again, Li Banfeng talked to himself often enough.

He must be mad, Cedric thought. But this madman is the only one I can rely on right now.