Dao of Money

On Earth, acquisitions and mergers were standard practice in business—that they were almost mundane. But in this world, they were rare.

Poaching? That happened all the time. Cultivators jumping sects, clans bribing each other’s elders, rogue talents being lured away with promises of pills and treasures. But actually buying out a falling organization?

That was something else entirely.

Usually, it was the hobby of rich clan sons or daughters trying to prove a point. They’d pick up a collapsing business or small mercenary group for cheap and forget about it when things got hard.

But what Chen Ren had in mind… went far beyond that. He was thinking of acquiring an entire sect.

It started as a ridiculous thought—one even he wouldn’t have entertained seriously a few months ago. But the more he worked on pill production, the more he came up against the same bottlenecks—lack of equipment, lack of trained hands, lack of formal infrastructure. It was like trying to build a tower from sticks and spit.

That’s when he remembered something Qing He had said offhandedly while sipping tea and talking about sects one day— hundreds of sects fall and rise every year. Most so small no one remembers their names.

That stuck with him.

Wouldn’t at least some of those fallen sects have alchemists? Or at the very least… cauldrons?Alchemy was, after all, one of the most widely practiced disciplines in cultivation. Even minor sects often had at least one cauldron and someone who knew how to use it. That thought—innocent at first—had snowballed into something bigger when he recalled what Tang Boming had mentioned weeks ago.

How the Darkmoon sect in Broken Ridge City had absorbed and disbanded multiple smaller sects and clans in the area over the past decade, consolidating power like a slow, creeping shadow. Tang Boming had explained that many of the alchemists had been poached, but that conversation stuck with Chen Ren for another reason.

He never said anywhere that all of them were taken.

It stood to reason that the Darkmoon Sect wouldn’t have the resources—or the need—to absorb every single alchemist or disciple from the sects they destroyed. Some people would be left behind. Some wouldn’t have made the cut. But his focus also shifted to equipment, artifacts and cauldrons that could’ve been left behind.

Without wasting any more time, he made his decision to travel to Broken Ridge City.

He left Zi Wen, Luo Feng, and Li Xuan behind to protect the village, instructing them to keep everything running smoothly in his absence. Qing He, reluctant as ever, agreed to continue refining their recipes—though not without warning him she wouldn’t tolerate any “half-baked schemes” derailing her work.

Once the cauldron and alchemist issue was solved, Chen Ren planned to begin full-scale pill production.

He could already picture it all coming together—his own production line, a shop full of customers, and spirit stones flowing like water. He would have everything and would slowly began to get richer in the immortal world too.

He smiled to himself, watching the road ahead. Then Wang Jun’s voice cut through his thoughts.

“Your plan is stupid,” he said bluntly. “You’re relying entirely on chance and luck. And frankly, I don’t think you’ve got much of either.”

The carriage bumped over a rocky path, rattling slightly as Chen Ren turned his gaze toward him. Across from him, Anji let out a soft sigh, clearly used to Wang Jun’s way of speaking by now. Yalan was perched near the window, half-asleep and swaying with the motion of the carriage.

Aside from the three mortals seated in front, driving the carriage in turns, Chen Ren had brought only this small group with him. Originally, he had intended to travel with just Anji. But Wang Jun had insisted on tagging along, citing something about guiding Anji’s soul cultivation and ensuring she kept practicing her perception.

But rather than doing that, he was just being annoying.

Chen Ren didn’t rise to the insult. Instead, he leaned back and looked out at the passing trees before replying.

“Every business opportunity is a chance. All of them. The difference is in how you see it.” He tapped his temple lightly. “Chances are everywhere—you just need the eyes to spot them.”

“Good eyes?” the head scoffed. “I’ve got a better brain, and I can’t even imagine someone selling their sect to you when you don’t even have the spirit stones to buy a dozen cauldrons. You’ve got no high-grade artifacts, no valuable techniques to trade. What exactly are you going to give them in exchange—optimism?”

Chen Ren frowned.

The man had a point, annoying as it was. He truly didn’t have the resources to outright buy a sect—not in spirit stones, and certainly not in anything a proper cultivator would consider valuable. Mortal currency wouldn’t get him a bowl of soup in a sect, much less resources or allegiance. He had gotten a good amount of spirit stones due to looting the vault, but they were only a few hundred in total, all low grade.

Still, it didn’t mean all doors were closed.

He glanced over at the head and said coolly, “Sometimes you don’t need spirit stones or artifacts. You just need to figure out what the other party really wants. If it’s something other than spirit stones, I might be able to get it.” He let a beat pass, then added with a smirk, “Worst case? I just sell you. Pretty sure any cultivator would be interested in studying something like you.”

Wang Jun snorted. “First, I’m priceless. And you’d have the emperor’s inquisitors knocking your door down if anyone saw me with you. I don’t exactly scream righteous cultivator mascot, do I?”

“Then keep your mouth shut and behave. You can’t be seen in the city.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Anji said from beside him, her voice calm as always. “Master will stay in the room with me. He won’t cause trouble.”

The head grumbled. “At least let me out at night. I’ll die of boredom.”

Chen Ren didn’t respond. He simply looked out the window, watching the road wind through the hills, rocky and covered with snow. But he wasn’t really seeing the terrain. He was thinking over the head’s words.

Was he relying on chance?

...Maybe.

He just didn’t want to admit it. But there was some logic behind it. Logic built not on numbers, or wealth, or leverage—but on something simpler. Something that every cultivator had, regardless of age, status, or sect. Pride.

And if Tang Boming’s stories were true, Darkmoon Sect had risen through ruthlessness—absorbing, discarding, and humiliating anyone they didn’t need. Which meant they had bruised a lot of pride.

If Chen Ren could find the ones left behind—the alchemists tossed aside like old tools—then he didn’t need spirit stones or fancy artifacts. He just needed to offer them something far more valuable.

A chance at payback.

Chen Ren’s thoughts were interrupted by a sudden jolt—the carriage lurched violently and came to an abrupt halt. He nearly lost his balance, stumbling sideways and brushing against Anji, whose face flushed a faint pink.

He muttered an apology and shifted his focus and looked at Yalan, whose sleepy gaze had sharpened into something eerily focused. She sat upright and her nose twitched slightly.

“I feel something,” she murmured.

Chen Ren nodded. That was all the warning he needed.

He stepped out of the carriage, boots crunching into the half-frozen dirt path beneath. The wind had grown colder and sharper. The sky above was a dull grey, clouds thick and unmoving. Tall, leafless trees flanked the worn path on both sides. A faint mist clung to the earth.

At the front of the carriage, three mortals stood frozen—Zushi, Tao Li, and Han Fei. Their faces were pale, almost bloodless, eyes wide with fear.

Chen Ren followed the line of Zushi’s trembling hand as he pointed toward the mist-shrouded path ahead.

And then he saw them.

Six ghostly figures drifted slowly in a wide circle, moving without sound. Their bodies were translucent, their outlines vague, but he could make out long trailing robes and faces blurred like fogged glass. They didn’t seem to notice the living at all. They simply circled… aimlessly.

A cold dread settled in his chest.

The ground near them was half-covered in snow, and just off the path, half-buried in it, lay corpses—at least four of them. Villagers, judging by the worn linen clothes and farming tools still clutched in dead hands. Their skin had gone pale blue, eyes wide open and staring into nothing.

Zushi’s voice cracked as she whispered, “Frost Spirits… they’ve come to take us with them.”

“You know what they are?” Chen Ren asked, turning to her.

Zushi gave a stiff nod, not daring to look away from the spirits. “I’ve heard stories, Sect Leader Chen. From my grandfather. He said when people die during the frost moon, and their spirits can’t find peace, they wander in circles like that—forever cold, forever lost.”

“They’re spectres,” Zushi continued. “Wandering souls born in the wilds—feeding on the spirits of those who die in winter. That’s how they grow stronger. Once they’ve fed enough, they don’t just wait anymore… they kill. Lure people off cliffs, drive beasts into villages, even whisper into the ears of children.”

Beside him, Tao Li added, “Seeing them is a bad sign, Sect Leader Chen. Very bad. We should turn around.”

Chen Ren narrowed his eyes. “Is there another path?”

The three mortals looked at one another before slowly shaking their heads.

“No, Sect Leader,” Han Fei said. “This is the only route to Broken Ridge unless we turn back and go around the river. That’ll take a week.”

Chen Ren took a breath and exhaled sharply. “Then wait here. I’ll deal with it.”

He stepped forward, boots crunching frost. As he walked, his spiritual perception spread outward like a silent wave, brushing against the air and locking onto the six circling forms.

Just as he thought—their energy was thin.

There was no weight to it, no pressure like what he’d felt from higher cultivators or beasts. They were dangerous, yes—but not powerful. Not in the way he feared. Even six of them, right now, weren’t enough to threaten him.

Still… he felt uneasy.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

These were ghosts. Astral beings. And physical attacks meant little to them. His punches and kicks wouldn’t help much if they could phase through his strikes. But he had something better.

Lightning crackled faintly along his fingertips as he walked, using the qi in his dantian and tracing it in his veins like electro threads. Lightning was one of the most effective elements against wandering spirits, he had read in a book and now it was time to test it.

As he drew closer, the mist thickened and the spirits stopped circling. They turned toward him. And for the first time, Chen Ren got a full look at their faces beneath the pale veil of fog.

If they could be called faces at all.

Flesh peeled and hung from bone, patches of icy skin split and crumbled. They had no nose, no mouth—just gaping sockets filled with twin orbs of pure white, glowing like fog lamps in a storm. They didn’t speak. Didn’t shriek.

They just stared.

Without hesitation, Chen Ren spread his arms, pushed his qi outward, and let the lightning build into a sharp crackle.

A bolt of bright golden lightning ripped from his palm toward the nearest spectre.

It hissed through the air—clean and deadly—but the ghost dodged, slipping sideways like smoke caught in a breeze. Its jaw tore open suddenly, flesh splitting down the middle in a grotesque spiral to reveal a row of jagged, crystalline teeth.

And then, all six charged at once.

Chen Ren didn’t wince as one of the spectres lunged at him, a jagged claw arcing down toward his chest. Instead of dodging, he let the lightning within him surge.

The energy exploded outward with a thunderous crack, bursting from his body like a web of fury. Arcs of lightning lashed through the air, snapping toward the ghostly figure.

The spectre didn’t even have time to scream properly—it was consumed mid-lunge, writhing as the lightning tore through its misty form, burning it into fragments of pale vapor that vanished into the wind.

Around him, the road grew deathly still. The frost-covered trees stood like silent sentinels, their twisted branches groaning softly under the weight of snow. The mist swirled with each movement.

The lightning danced, trailing behind him in snapping, flickering streams. The other spectres shrieked in wordless, primal sounds as they circled closer, no longer in an eerie trance but now driven by mindless hunger and rage.

Even as one collapsed into the dirt, its form breaking apart into a drifting fog, the rest charged toward him, weaving erratically, trying to slip through the arcs of lightning.

“Stupid things,” Chen Ren muttered, watching one try to dive beneath a crackling bolt and get clipped in the stomach. “Mindless ghosts. Can’t even be good targets.”

But the next attack came faster.

A second spectre slashed at him, its claws gleaming with cold spiritual malice. Chen Ren leaned back—just enough to let the strike pass by his face, ruffling his hair—then slammed his fist forward.

Lightning-qi surged into the blow.

His fist collided with the creature’s distorted face, and for a moment it looked as though it would shatter entirely—but instead, its jaw unhinged grotesquely, trying to swallow his entire forearm. Mist churned violently around its neck as if it were choking on the pain.

With a grunt, Chen Ren brought his other arm up and drove it straight into the thing’s chest.

The spectre split apart with a high-pitched shriek, collapsing into a pile of mist that scattered with the next gust of wind.

He exhaled, letting the qi in his core swirl and stabilize.

Across the road, three more spectres came rushing in, claws swinging, their ghostly bodies weaving through the trees and over the rocks. But Chen Ren didn’t even feel a shred of fear.

They were weak and killable. And now that he had confirmed that, he charged.

Snow kicked up in a spray behind him as he dashed forward, lightning wrapping around his arms like coiled serpents. The spectres attacked in tandem—two from the sides, one from above—but he ducked, twisted, and lashed out.

Each blow met its mark.

As the battle went on, Chen Ren noticed something different. The spectres were adapting.

Their dodges became sharper. The moment he raised his arm, they would jerk to the side. When he gathered qi in his palm, they began to scatter, separating instead of swarming. One of them even tried to bait his lightning bolt before pulling back, letting it strike the frozen ground.

Chen Ren narrowed his eyes.

“Learning, are you?” he muttered. “Fine.”

No more ranged blasts.

He shot forward with full speed, leaping onto a jagged rock and launching himself straight into the fray. Mist burst around him as he punched one spectre out of the air, turned mid-spin, and drove his elbow into another’s skull-like head.

Lightning burst from his body on contact, short-range arcs frying anything that got too close. He moved like a streak, a whirlwind of motion and storm. One fell. Then another.

The fight blurred—slashes came, fists answered. He dipped beneath claw strikes, caught one of the spectres by its broken, smoky neck and slammed it down with a burst of qi that shattered its form completely.

He shifted his stance just as the final spectre lunged forward, claws sweeping upward. Chen Ren dodged back, his boot skidding across the frost-hardened ground. Lightning crackled through his legs as he pivoted mid-step and lashed out with a savage kick.

His foot slammed into the spectre’s chest, sending it flying backward like a rag doll.

The spirit smashed into a tree with a low, dull thud, and for a moment it lay there, coiled mist curling around the trunk. It lifted its head and snarled at him—only to be greeted by a sharp arc of lightning, searing through its center.

The spectre shuddered, hissed—and then dissolved into the wind, leaving behind nothing but cold silence.

Chen Ren stood in the center of the now-quiet path, steam rising from his skin in the cold air, shoulders rising and falling as he caught his breath. Around him, the mist began to thin, leaving only the frost-covered corpses... and the smell of burnt air.

For some reason, none of the spectres had tried to flee.

Even as their kind were shredded by lightning and sent howling back to whatever realm had spawned them, they kept coming without a shred of self-preservation.

That suited Chen Ren just fine. The last thing he needed was their kind roaming the countryside, preying on villagers in the night.

He finally exhaled, breath fogging in the chill. The wind had picked up, sweeping through the trees, dragging the remnants of mist into the gray sky above. He stood there, the faint scent of ozone lingering around him, chest rising and falling.

From the carriage, the three mortals stared at him in awe, wide-eyed and half-afraid to speak.

Yalan had already stepped out, padding toward him across the snow-dusted path with her usual lazy grace. Her voice slipped into his mind.

“That was slow.”

Chen Ren turned to her, blinking. “Slow? I dealt with six of them in under two minutes.”

“A lightning cultivator should’ve done it in under one,” she replied without missing a beat. “We may run into more. You should do better next time.”

He grumbled under his breath but didn’t bother replying. She was probably right.

He turned to head back to the carriage, stepping past the frost-coated corpses. But just as his boot met the earth, a strange sensation pulsed through his body—like a ripple in his bones. His eyes widened.

Then a cracking sound came. It was deep, jagged and wrong. Not from the earth—but from inside him. Pain exploded through his limbs.

His arms seized first, then his legs, joints locking as if they were being twisted from the inside out. His chest clenched violently, and then something burned through it—no, everything burned. He felt fire in his bones. Fire in his blood. Even his teeth felt like they were melting.

He stumbled, eyes wide, vision splitting into white and red.

Then the pain hit his head, a thundering wave of heat and pressure. Like someone had stuffed a lightning bolt into his skull and set it off. The world spun. His body seized—and all he could feel was fire and tearing.

Like he was being remade. Or ripped apart. His vision shook violently. One moment he was upright, the next, he felt life leaving his body.

His palms met the frozen earth with a dull slap as his knees buckled beneath him. The sharp sting of ice bit into his skin, but it barely registered. His body convulsed once, a surge of pain lashing through his chest.

Somewhere, through the ringing in his ears, he heard Yalan’s voice.

It was close. He could almost hear her—

But the words were a garbled mess, warped and distant, like she was speaking underwater. He blinked rapidly, trying to focus—on her face, on the ground, on anything—but everything was spinning, twisting, like the world was folding in on itself.

Is it a curse? Or I got attacked by another spectre? Had one of them cursed me after all?

His thoughts scattered like ash in the wind.

Then his eyes went glassy, the grey skies above blurring into nothing but streaks of shadow and light. Blackness crept in from the edges of his vision, smothering color, dulling shape. His breath hitched. Then everything went still.

And Chen Ren collapsed onto the frost-covered path—body limp, fingers twitching—before the dark swallowed him whole.

***

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