Shu’s Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon had gotten a late start and still used steam engines made of the old version of Moon Plated Gold, which by now wasn’t to be found in either Chu or Wan. 

Small, strong Miah laborers hefted shovels, shoveling coal into the boiler the whole way, themselves turning as black as charcoal, with only many pairs of eyes of all different colors showing. Occasionally they straightened up and looked around somewhat blankly. 

The Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon’s carriages were divided into four classes. The Mirage Building could simply arrange for you to get a private compartment. 

The compartment took up an entire carriage, complete with tea room, study, and bedroom; there were both male and female attendants assigned to the compartment, who came at the press of a bell. 

Behind that were the first class and second class carriages, boarded entirely by respectable Xiuyi. Only after the previous class of passengers had boarded did the next class of carriage allow people to board. 

When it came to the third class carriages, the “dragon-leading managers” on the platform would bawl as though herding sheep, shooing the pushing and shoving passengers onto the train. Often the people crowded to the very back wouldn’t have time to board before the train got moving, so they had no choice but to throw themselves at it like locusts descending on a rice field, clinging with difficulty to the outside of the carriage, then climbing inside amid scolding and cursing, assisting children and the elderly. 

Up until she boarded the westbound Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon, a question was constantly echoing in Zhao Qindan’s mind: Are the Lingyun Mountains your family business? 

For an ascended spirit cultivator like Tai Sui, trespassing into another country for no reason might end up attracting the notice of the great divine tool of the mountains. Last time, when all the ascended spirits in Tao County had violated the taboo, it was only that Xuanwu hadn’t wanted to make enemies of his neighbors and had decided it wasn’t worth it to punish the majority. This time it was only him. Even if he ranked among the thirty-six peak masters, if he died here, Xuanyin Mountain still wouldn’t be able to say anything about it. 

These were another country’s immortal mountains, a blessed place of great importance. The great mountain array was connected to tens of thousands of li of veins of the earth. A foreign cultivator illegally entering the country would want nothing but to stay as far away as possible. And he was going there, just like that? 

Had they been in Chu, Zhao Qindan might have suspected that Tai Sui was up to no good and was once again planning to play the “marriage alliance” card and slip someone a bearded, middle-aged Luwu for a wife. But this was Southern Shu. The Shu were extremely cautious about marriage. They didn’t have the Xiang family’s fondness for marrying all over the place like a dog pissing. If someone’s child had an illicit affair with an outsider, they would kill them if it meant guaranteeing that their bloodline would remain untainted. 

She was so curious she was about to explode, but in the private compartment’s small tea room, Senior Tai Sui seemed to be meditating, and Zhao Qindan wasn’t in a position to rashly disturb him. 

An ascended spirit cultivator, no matter how slovenly a spiritual image mask he was wearing, became solemn when he entered meditation. 

He was like the Illuminating Dragon¹; when he closed his eyes, the surroundings changed according to his mood—the Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon’s attendants, who came in periodically to inquire after their well-being, somehow didn’t come bother them again. To Zhao Qindan’s hearing, on the level of a cultivator half a step from an established foundation, the jolting and rumbling in the compartment of the Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon’s movement was actually completely inaudible. She felt that even her consciousness was being drawn in by the ascended spirit aura. Her heart, which seemed before to have sprouted hair, calmed within a few breaths. She suddenly felt a bit of enlightenment. When she came back to herself midway, the Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon had already entered the next station—she had inadvertently begun to meditate. 

Zhao Qindan suddenly understood—it was no wonder that the disciples from each class who went directly into the inner sect cultivated far faster than those in the outer sects, and those who had the fortune to be chosen by some peak master as a direct disciple were faster still. Resources and natural endowments were one aspect, but it turned out that being beside a senior meant you could be taken by them to visit new heights! 

Tai Sui ordinarily didn’t appear often. The majority of the time, he was in long-distance contact with them. This was an opportunity that couldn’t be passed up. Looking around, the Luwu cultivators who had come with them had seized the opportunity to do their daily lessons. Zhao Qindan also quickly picked up a few spiritual stones and began to meditate. 

However…Flying Jade Peak’s General Zhi might not have especially approved of the conclusion she had come to. 

Zhaoting being restored had made up for the strength that had nearly been boiled out of him by the Bell of Tribulation. Little by little, Zhi Xiu could occasionally catch his breath. He was no longer restricted to buzzing. 

Whenever he had free time, he would run over to Xi Ping to watch that brat practice swordsmanship; it seemed as if he wouldn’t die content if he couldn’t manage to teach his disciple a second sword move. 

In order to get the Unbound Furnace for him, Xi Ping had gone pilfering under the nose of a full moon sage and nearly been turned into a lotus root. How could he let his shizun say as inauspicious a word as “die”? 

So this great “filial” disciple had spent eight years learning many crooked teachings from the surviving Lancang manuscripts Qiu Sha had left behind, listening at the windows of the Three Heroes of Turmoil to a bellyful of grievances and romantic grudges, single-handedly leading Tao County to prosperity, developing the prototype of the toilet bulletins inspired by boundless vulgarity and spreading print culture throughout the whole continent… One could say he really hadn’t been wasting his time, but he hadn’t learned that second sword move. 

The young mistress didn’t know that right now, the unfathomable ascended spirit “senior” she beheld, steady as the landscape, was being beaten by Zhaoting. 

“Focus.” Zhi Xiu sighed feebly. “Xi Shiyong, what’s got you distracted now?” 

Xi Ping was very wronged. “I’m not distracted. It’s not like you can see what I’m thinking, shifu. My consciousness has even turned into the shape of a sword!” 

Zhi Xiu in fact couldn’t see what he was thinking, but he could sense that there wasn’t a trace of sword aura in his spirit. 

An ascended spirit couldn’t study the sword by practicing moves. He needed to become completely absorbed in the sword aura, repeatedly temper and refine himself…but Zhi Xiu trying to teach this rebellious disciple to “sink into the sword aura” was like trying to teach a feral cat to wear clothes—if you held down his head, he’d extend his claws; he refused to be shoved in dead or alive. 

“While sunk in the sword aura, a person loses their powers of speech. And you’re still bantering with me!” 

Doubtfully, Xi Ping said, “Practicing swordsmanship makes you lose your powers of speech? The way of the sword is too bizarre. Wouldn’t everyone in it eventually turn into a mute? Shifu, could it be that you spent so much time squatting on your snow-capped mountain with no one to talk to that you forgot how to talk…ow!” 

Zhaoting had dealt him another blow. 

“Unreliable” may have been an inherent natural trait. Xi Ping had probably reached his present age without knowing the feeling of “a clear mind with only one thing in it” or “forgetting heaven, earth, and self”—when this kid had opened his spiritual eyes, shattered to bits and been held together by Princess Duanrui, he had still been mentally cracking jokes to himself; while establishing a foundation, he had been simultaneously scheming against his san-ge and the heart demon; on becoming an ascended spirit, the circumstances had been even more amazing—while being struck by heavenly lightning, he had been consulting with Zhou Ying on how to take precautions against the Heartless Lotus. 

“I was mistaken.” Zhi Xiu sighed again. “How fortunate that you did not enter the way of the sword with me back then, or else perhaps you could not even have established a foundation.” 

These words softly touched the past. For a moment, Xi Ping’s mind wandered. 

If he couldn’t establish a foundation, perhaps he never would have left the mountain. He would only have been a troublemaking little disciple living with his shifu, now and then breaking pieces off the snow-capped mountain, going down into the mortal world for the New Year to check in back home, bringing local specialties back and forth between the two ends. 

With shizun watching over him, perhaps he would never have grown up. He would have hung around Flying Jade Peak for two centuries, and then, when his lifespan ran out, would tranquilly have gone away. When that happened, shifu would probably have been sad for a time, as if a pet cat or dog had died, but there was no such thing as an endless feast; having lived to his present age, the peak master had long ago accepted this. Since they hadn’t let each other down in life, there would be nothing to feel uneasy about after death. Perhaps, feeling lonely, shifu might have taken another step forward in the way of the sword and, working according to the prescribed order for some centuries, he could have become a shed skin all the same. 

What connection would the bewildering transmutations of the world have had with Xi Ping? 

How ignorant a life that would have been, and how carefree.

Xi Ping laughed. “Put that way, it’s a real pity.”

A pity that through the vicissitude of events he had seen the universe, stood in the place of all beings; that the eternal unbound flame had come into his hands.

After a moment’s pause Zhi Xiu understood. He was briefly silent, then, deliberately light-hearted, he said, “Forget it, just practice on your own. If you really can’t do it…well, if you really can’t do it, then when I leave seclusion, I’ll store another couple of moves in your meridians so you can use them to give people a scare… Ah, Shiyong, you’re better off being a good-for-nothing piece of rotten wood. In the way of the sword, a dumb piece of wood still beats a flea.” 

Xi Ping picked up posthaste: “That’s right, shifu. In the way of the Dignitary of Fate, a dumb piece of wood still beats a…hss, I didn’t say anything yet!” 

When it was through beating him, Zhaoting quieted down. The sliver of consciousness Zhi Xiu had split off returned to Flying Jade Peak. 

Biting wind and stabbing frost simultaneously pressed down on him. He was ready. A beam of sword energy that feared neither gods nor demons surged towards the sky, holding out under the latest of some thousands upon tens of thousands of blows. 

The elders thought that he was comprehending the mind of the universe, but actually he had long ago comprehended. 

The will of the Way of Heaven was infinitely clear. If he only compromised, Zhaoting would become a nail fixing the land in place. Jinping’s Dragon Vein, which Zhaoting had previously just managed to sustain, would from then on cease to waver. 

His Way of the Heart complete, he would be among the wisest, unmoved by sentiment, linked to the intentions of the spiritual mountains. He would set aside everything that ought to be set aside. 

He would no longer think about the Land of Turmoil, no longer feel discontentment.

The Zhou clan, which had brought about the disaster in the East Sea, would ultimately decline; all “evil cultivators” would sooner or later be suppressed. When the time came, he would feel the instinct to kill when he heard the words “evil cultivator”; Zhaoting would flash. Even if he knew intellectually that not all evil cultivators were necessarily wicked beyond redemption… Floods were not wicked either, earthquakes did not scheme, plagues nibbling away at human bodies were only following their instincts; even if they were not evil, they must still be cured. This was the instinct of the spiritual mountains. 

He would become a new “sage.” 

An echo from the depths of the spiritual mountains passed over the escarpment of the north slope: What is wrong with that? 

What was wrong with that?

Wailing, a blade appeared out of nowhere. Once again Zhi Xiu hewed a gash in the will of the Way of Heaven. 

But his little disciple would be disappointed. 

Why was he always going to see Xi Shiyong? 

In fact, Zhi Xiu had seen long ago that this kid’s thoughts were too noisy. He didn’t have what it took to study the sword. Naturally he wasn’t afraid of being humiliated, either—anyway, the brat had lost all face for him long ago. 

It was only that…the legendary General Zhi was also an ordinary person; he could also be weak. Without this disciple and his ungovernable way, perhaps he would have compromised by now. It was the pressure coming from his junior that forced him to stay where he was, forced him to think carefully before making any decision: there was a child without a Way of the Heart using him as a standard; was he worthy? 

This was the light at his back. 

He was still alive. He still had to show posterity how far one mortal generation could go in a world that had “always been like this.”

If even the hard and fast rule that evil cultivators couldn’t become ascended spirits could be broken, then couldn’t the impenetrable heavens split open a little further…? 

A mighty sword cultivator couldn’t possibly be outdone by a member of the famously weak way of toolmaking, could he? 

A ponderous force pressed down on Zhaoting. The Sword that Mended the Heavens, though it was thinner by a sliver, had passed through the tempering of the Unbound Furnace; it gave a long cry. Sword energy even keener than before swept out, knocking a crack in the snow-capped mountain. 

The sword cultivator had exhausted his strength for now and went back into hibernation…and from the crack in the snow-capped mountain, a fragile shoot grew. 

On the Principal Peak, Princess Duanrui suddenly opened her eyes, feeling the Bell of Tribulation quiver. 

She cocked an ear and listened for a moment, then expressionlessly raised her head and sent out a beam of ice-cold spiritual energy, stilling the Bell of Tribulation before it could ring. After a moment, the trembling of the Bell of Tribulation quieted. As if nothing had happened, she drew back her hand and formed the hand seal for a Heavenly Question: Zhou Ying is a direct descendant of my family. He may study with me, go on record as a disciple of Green Pool Peak. Green Pool Peak does not accept men, but he is always away from the sect. If he needs to cultivate in seclusion, it will suffice to order him to proceed to the Latent Cultivation Temple. 

The Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon on the western continent gave a long wail. At the front of the train, it was raining, but at the back it was still bright and sunny. Like a dragon, the train passed through a small curtain of rain. Its head exhaled billows of smoke that poured into the rainforest to either side. 

As soon as Xi Ping opened his eyes, the clanking of the Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon running over cracks in the tracks immediately filled the whole compartment. The mundane world, kept out by the aura of an ascended spirit, returned. 

Zhao Qindan’s head cleared at once. The handful of spiritual stones in her palm had already turned to powder. 

For a moment, she couldn’t quite come back to herself. Then Xi Ping said, “We’re almost there.” 

A ke later, they came to a town beneath the Lingyun Mountains, called Quancheng, quite small.

Because further up ahead were the Lingyun Mountains and trespassers were forbidden to enter, there was a Dragon Subduing Knights sentry post at the town’s border. The boundary of the great mountain array was less than sixty li from Quancheng. Here, the might of the spiritual mountains could already be faintly sensed. 

Quancheng was the terminus of the westbound Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon. Many traveling merchants and hired laborers disembarked at this stop, because there was a market here: on the fifth of every month, the Lingyun Mountains would bring out the skin, fur, and bones that the sect couldn’t use and auction it off to the mortals. Many wholesalers waited there to pick up goods. Then they would process them slightly and turn them into unconventional ornaments and clothes, more precious than any pearls or jade. 

Only the major merchants with the best connections and financial resources were qualified to come to the spiritual beast fur auction house. Years ago the Luwu had paid a big price in order to enter this channel. Xi Ping had come in no big hurry. The other major buyers had arrived ahead of him. He was quite familiar with all these people. As soon as they arrived in Quancheng, they attended three social engagements in one night. Only then did Zhao Qindan learn that which spiritual beast’s fur was recommended each season was settled among this crowd of merchants, who would agree to promote it together. They were in a tacit understanding to maintain a collaborative framework, and privately there were hidden undercurrents surging as they competed with one another. 

The night of the fifth, when the auction concluded, Zhao Qindan saw a special person. 

Unexpectedly, this was a Turmoiler. 

The Turmoiler had deathly pale skin and only a few scant hairs on his head. He was the height of a half-grown child, with a back as bent as a shrimp. His fingers were crooked to the point of being deformed, like disproportionate claws. His face was overgrown with gullies, and when he smiled, he showed a mouthful of sharp teeth, as if he were about to suck blood and eat flesh at any moment. 

Zhao Qindan had never seen a Turmoiler. When the door opened, she jumped in alarm and thought, What kind of monster is this? She nearly drew her sword. 

But Tai Sui stood up. Coming forward to greet him, he said, “Queru is here.” 

The Turmoiler gave a proper bow and saluted. A sharp trill came from his throat. He spoke the Wan language clearly and slowly: “The conflagration burns on, the cry of the cicada is without end—greetings, Tai Sui. I trust you have been well since we parted.” 

“Oh, go on, get in here,” Xi Ping said, laughing. “Hasn’t Wei Chengxiang taught you people anything worthwhile?” 

Zhao Qindan’s eyes opened wide. She thought, This is one of A-Xiang’s…people? Is he a person? 

“You shouldn’t say that, Tai Sui. What you see as a senseless slogan is spring thunder when heard by those in a lightless place. When everything is too much to bear, you need an incantation to give you a hand.” The Turmoiler unhurriedly strolled in, took off his bamboo hat, and casually saluted Zhao Qindan. “My surname is Li, given name Manlong, nickname Queru. Because I was born in the Land of Turmoil, my appearance is shocking. I’ve frightened the young lady. Pardon me.” 

Zhao Qindan was even more astonished, because she had heard that, owing to having lost the protection of the spiritual mountains, the Turmoilers had turned into monsters who killed people and ate rotten flesh, living ignobly like farm animals or wild beasts. This was her first time learning that Turmoilers could talk…that they could have surnames, given names, and nicknames, and even speak the Wan language with erudition!

“Enough, you’re full of arguments.” Xi Ping poured him a cup of tea and said, “Why have you come yourself? Where’s Renjiao?” 

The Turmoiler who called himself Li Manlong thanked him and accepted the tea, neither obsequious nor supercilious. Then he said, “Renjiao passed away at the beginning of the year.” 

Xi Ping froze. 

“The cultivator stewards of the spiritual beast farm made an oversight and failed to repair the arrays in a timely manner. Two lightning foxes escaped. Renjiao happened to be on duty that day. He had gone to feed the terrestrial beasts and didn’t have time to dodge. He was bitten,” Li Manlong said. “The bite was extremely toxic. There was no pain. Set your mind at ease, Tai Sui.” 

Only then did Zhao Qindan realize that these Turmoilers came from the spiritual beast farm at the feet of the Lingyun Mountains. 

In the Lingyun Mountains, people and beasts lived together. Apart from the spiritual beasts kept by beast-taming cultivators, which acknowledged them as masters, the other spiritual beasts were all on the farm to be bred, trained…or provide materials for the medicine and toolmaking ways. The spiritual beast farm had cultivator stewards, but how could lofty cultivators do dirty, tiring work like feeding animals and shoveling manure? Before, they had enlisted mortals to do it, primarily the Miah, who were skilled in rearing spiritual beasts.

But the spiritual beast farm belonged to the periphery of the Lingyun Spiritual Mountains. There was plentiful spiritual energy. As time went on, some people among these Miah workers, like the miners in the southern mines, would have their spiritual eyes opened. 

The Xiuyi believed that the crafty Miah were doing this deliberately. They had picked several fights about it. Finally, it had been forbidden for mortals to enter Lingyun Mountain’s spiritual beast farm. They only brought in Turmoilers with relatively clear intellects from the Land of Turmoil. The Turmoilers had unusual constitutions. They couldn’t open their spiritual eyes. They were only a little smarter than dogs. All you had to do was feed them; there was no need to pay wages. And if these clumsy things died, that was no problem. There were plenty of them in the Land of Turmoil. All you had to do was snatch up another batch and beat them until they behaved. 

In his shrill voice, Li Manlong calmly said, “The human world is an abyss of suffering. We struggle to survive only because we are unreconciled. Death means freedom. There is no need for you to be troubled, Tai Sui. Anyway, it isn’t necessarily without benefit to us that the spiritual beast farm’s oversight is so lax. Though Renjiao is gone, I am still not lonely. Many of my brothers in the spiritual beast farm are our people now. It is only that our tongues and throats are unusual, and it is difficult for us to learn to speak. I was worried about offending Tai Sui and didn’t bring them today.” 

“No problem,” Xi Ping said after a moment’s silence. “My teacher often says that the human speech I know is limited, too.” 

Having said this, the person in the high clouds met the eyes of the Turmoiler, and they both laughed. Zhao Qindan’s mind heated. She broke out in gooseflesh. 

Then she heard Tai Sui point to her and say, “You could call Miss Zhao a close friend of A-Xiang’s. She recently completed her Way of the Heart and spiritual bones and wants to find a place to establish a foundation. How about the spiritual beast farm?” 

“My life is too unimportant,” Li Manlong said seriously. “I guarantee Miss Zhao’s safety on my honor.” 

“All right, then I’ll entrust her to you. Your honor is worth more than any bullshit spiritual mountains.” Saying so, Xi Ping produced a brocade bag containing a handful of reincarnation wood seeds. “Take me into the Lingyun Mountains.”