The Wild Fox Country Great Market began on the fifteenth day of the sixth month and ended on the seventh of the seventh month. 

Though it had nearly become a local holiday, the “black market” was still the “black market”; the Wild Fox Country Great Market took place at night. 

On the fifteenth of the sixth month, the night of the full moon, the Snake King’s Immortal Palace would begin holding “night feasts,” admitting up to fifty people every day. During the feast, apart from a menu, each guest would also receive a “treasure list,” detailing the treasures that would be sold that night. If a guest liked something, they would check off the item they wanted and place spiritual stones and the treasure list into one of the mustard seeds prepared to hold goods at the feast; it would be up to them how much to pay. 

When the night feast ended, the puppet attendants would return the mustard seeds to all the guests. If the deal was successful, the item would be in the mustard seed. If they had offered a lower price than someone else, the precise number of spiritual stones would be returned with thanks. The buyer and seller never saw each other, and the buyers at the feast had no need to haggle until they were red in the face. While the money the Snake King could make as a middleman in this way wasn’t as much as he could have made through haggling, it saved on a great deal of conflict. 

For a bit of money, you could buy the night feast treasure lists in advance—though they wouldn’t necessarily be complete. Some people sold things that couldn’t stand up to the light of day and often only revealed them once they had entered the night feast. 

Each night’s entry fee fluctuated depending on whether there were any “big-ticket items.” Usually it was one or two liang of jade stamps. 

As soon as the middle ten days of the sixth month began, the “admitted” sellers began sending “notes” to the Immortal Palace one after another—they chose for themselves which day they wanted to shill their wares. The slots were first come first serve, and once a particular day’s treasure list was filled up, the rest would be postponed according to the order their requests came in. The “notes” had to include a down payment in advance for the Snake King, and on the night they were to be sold, the goods had to be handed over to the Snake King for inspection. If the goods weren’t up to standard, they would be withdrawn from the treasure list. The down payments generally weren’t returned; they were used to pay back the entry fees paid by the buyers who chose those items. 

All of that was big business. There was also small business. 

The majority of people weren’t up to the trade at the night feasts. During the Great Market, every day when the sun set, a night market would appear in the streets of Wild Fox Country. All sorts of people mixed together at the night market, trading in all kinds of little knickknacks. There were also local commoners peddling Chu specialties. Each vendor had to buy that year’s Ghost Market Certificate from the Snake King to hold a space and guarantee their safety. It would cost anywhere from one or two liang of silver to one jade stamp stone. 

Petty profits were subject to all kinds of quibbling; any coin that could be saved counted. Big business was cowardly in following the rules, not daring to be too greedy even if it meant missing out on profits. The Snake King had amassed his fortune through trickery and had built Wild Fox Country single-handed. He’d had some tricks up his sleeves—if that idiot Xu Rucheng hadn’t come in and beaten the master craftsman to a pulp, it probably really would have taken the Luwu a few years to infiltrate. 

This year, Wild Fox Country began to bustle unusually early. At the start of the sixth month, before the mats had been laid for the night feasts, all kinds of vendors started coming one after another to set up their stalls. When Xu Rucheng went out for a stroll, he could feel the oppressive spiritual energy. For a moment, he became even more worried in spite of himself. He secretly had a discussion with his colleague Lao Tian: “Is there some way we can come up with to make the mortals evacuate this place? If what’s-her-name really does appear and ascended spirit masters start fighting, never mind the evil cultivators who value resources more than their lives, what will happen to Seventeen Li Town’s common people?” 

Lao Tian tactfully reminded him, “The common people of Seventeen Li Town belong to Chu. I thought that our brothers from Yuzhou hated the Chu most of all?” 

What does it have to do with you? Have you forgotten that you’re a spy from a foreign country? 

Xu Rucheng was silent a moment. “Yes, my whole family died at the hands of the Chu. But that was done by the Qilin Guard leading Chu soldiers. It had nothing to do with the common people. Those bastards at the Qilin Guard are all nasty pieces of work. They wouldn’t balk at exploiting mortals.” 

There were many common cultivators from every country in Tao County. The mortals who did business here more or less all had some spiritual stones. The Qilin Guard would periodically buy them all up, supposedly offering less than half the price of what spiritual stones cost on the market. It was all the same if someone didn’t want to sell. Never mind that the Qilin Guard turned a blind eye on real evil cultivators; they kept an extremely careful watch over mortals attempting to sell spiritual stones on the black market. 

Lao Tian then said, “Don’t worry. Since she’s announced herself so early, she won’t necessarily come—won’t she be walking right into a trap if she comes? We recently received reliable information that that individual’s traces have appeared in several places in Chu. Sanyue’s inner sect masters are hunting for her all over the country right now. I think this is a feint. It’s likely her goal is something else.” 

Having heard this, Xu Rucheng thought it made sense. He nodded hesitantly, then said doubtfully, “Isn’t what’s-her-name supposed to be completely on her own? How can she be in several places at once?” 

Lao Tian shook his head. “Being completely on her own is information that she herself released. When she’s being mysterious, she’s too mysterious, and when she’s being arrogant, she’s too arrogant. You can’t rely on rumor. But at any rate Sanyue’s inner sect belongs to the orthodox path. They’re different from the Qilin Guard, who don’t have to answer to Ways of the Heart. The inner sect masters of any country must abstain from harming the common people. Even if there really is a clash, they’ll still contain the battlefield within a mustard seed. Haven’t you seen that all those evil cultivators have dared to come get in on the fun? This damn Tao County—nothing planted here grows, and whether you can get any fish from the river depends on the weather. Wild Fox Country is the only thing that’s made this place turn slightly for the better. The minor merchants and peddlers have to use this month to cover the costs of their whole family’s daily expenses. If you keep them from coming, do you expect them to fill themselves up drinking the northwest wind?” 

Was your life more important, or was money more important? 

There was no saying for sure. It depended on who you asked. No two lives had the same price. 

Xu Rucheng understood only too well. Hearing this, he sighed and didn’t mention it again. 

As the fifteenth of the sixth month approached, the group of Luwu didn’t even dare to meditate and practice their lessons anymore, because dozens of Qilin Guardsmen in disguise had established themselves at the Immortal Palace, and just from what Xu Rucheng could tell, there were a dozen inner sect established foundations and four or five he suspected of being ascended spirits. On the inside of the snakeskin Xu Rucheng wore, the inscriptions heated up painfully every day. Unless it came down to absolute necessity, no one would dare to use spiritual energy. 

They were as careful as possible when sending routine reports, even having three or four people standing guard. They were already using a backup second-class encrypting inscription that they had brought along, and they changed their array and location every day. 

On the fourteenth of the sixth month, the blue moon in the sky was only a sliver away from being full. The treasure list for the first night’s feast had already been revealed, and the entry fee had been raised to one blue jade. 

Apart from daily operations, the Snake King’s Immortal Palace was basically under the control of the Qilin Guard. The treasure lists, the guest lists…all of it had to pass through the hands of the Qilin Guard before the “Snake King” Xu Rucheng got his turn. 

A Kaiming Cultivator like Xu Rucheng, who came from a common background, always kept count when using spiritual stones and couldn’t resist converting spiritual stones into gold, silver, and copper, then automatically thinking of how many centuries you would need to labor in a factory to earn that money, how many families it could keep well fed for how many years. 

When he got the treasure list, Xu Rucheng looked at it for a while and went numb all over: a flood dragon tendon worth a hundred liang of jade stamps, a paramount grade elixir worth thirty liang of blue jade, cloth of gold armor worth ten liang of white spirits…

White spirits! Oh, mother, he’d never even touched a white spirit! 

All the sellers’s listings were crowded into the first few days of the night feasts; they were afraid of bumping into the great personage who would be presenting the final item in the later stage. 

There was only one solitary item on the list for the seventh day of the seventh month: Set of spiritual bones of an ascended spirit prick cultivator¹, excellent quality for toolmaking; total cost one thousand jin of white spirits; the weight of the bones is 20 jin 6 liang, the price to be divided according to weight. 

Chu’s writing and Wan’s writing were similar. Many characters were used interchangeably. This seller’s listing was written in Chu characters, but Xu Rucheng recognized at a glance that this was the handwriting of the person who had used his immortal tool that day. 

Just then, Lao Tian ran over and said to him, “Half of the ascended spirits in the Immortal Palace just left.” 

Xu Rucheng quickly asked, “What’s going on? Didn’t they just receive Qiu…what’s-her-name’s listing?” 

Lao Tian said, “When an ascended spirit dies, the leftover spiritual bones will weigh at least a few hundred jin. There won’t only be this little bit. I hear that traces of Xiang Zhao’s spiritual bones have suddenly appeared all over the place. Presumably the Sanyue inner sect doesn’t have enough people… How dishonest. She’s too dishonest. Can she actually have more henchmen than there are masters in Sanyue’s inner sect? You must remember to report this matter to our lord.” 

“Oh?” Just then, the evil god Tai Sui’s voice suddenly sounded in Xu Rucheng’s ear. “The seventh day of the seventh month?” 

In recent days, no matter how he burned incense, the evil god had ignored him. Finally hearing him speak, as soon as Lao Tian had left, Xu Rucheng hurried to ask, “Senior, is there something wrong with that date?” 

Tai Sui was silent for a while. 

After that mysterious young woman from Wan had sold the empty Silver Tray Lottery ticket, she had disappeared from his line of sight. Before, he had been able to find her with a thought, but now, no matter how he searched, it seemed as though there was a haze before his eyes. Someone was obscuring his vision. 

Of course, Tai Sui didn’t absolutely have to see her. If he couldn’t see her, then he would drop it. No matter how anxious everyone in Wild Fox Country was, it wouldn’t hinder him in any way. He had been planning on returning to the divine image to rest. But as the Wild Fox Country Great Market drew near, all of a sudden, something fiercely prodded his spiritual sense. He suspected that if he had been human, his eyelids would have been twitching to the tune of the “Ambush from Ten Sides²”

“It’s nothing,” Tai Sui said slowly. “Let me give you a free bit of advice. Starting today, when you correspond with your lord, you had better write the date on your letters.” 

“Why?” Xu Rucheng said doubtfully.

The communication device was only so big. Normally it didn’t matter if a message was a few words more or less. If you couldn’t write it all at once, you would send a few letters, in order of priority. But lately the Luwu had been working cautiously, going around with their tails tucked between their legs, cutting down the number of letters sent back and forth as much as possible. Each time they sent a letter, several people had to rack their brains to stuff increasingly more information into a limited space—where would there be room to write the date? 

There was only the Xia River between them; wasn’t it the same day in Chu as in Wan? 

Tai Sui said impatiently, “You don’t have to listen to me.” 

This “divinity” was especially loathsome; he was only pleasant when he wanted to swindle Xu Rucheng or order him around. This was his usual behavior. 

Xu Rucheng wanted to ask more questions, but there was once again silence on the other end. 

Though Xu Rucheng was completely puzzled, through some mysterious urge, he still went along with the evil god’s instructions that day and wrote the date in a corner. 

As soon as the letter was sent, he regretted it, suspecting that Mr. Bai would think there was something wrong with his head. 

Meanwhile, in a small farmyard in Great Wan’s Yuzhou, a man so pale he was almost transparent had been sunning himself in the yard all day. 

Yuzhou was hot and humid, and the sun of the sixth month was especially vicious, but this man seemed to be made of snow and ice that had frozen over thousands of years. The scorching sun couldn’t leave a single mark on him. While the cicadas shouted themselves hoarse, not a drop of sweat fell from him. 

The sun was setting in the west. His eyes were closed. A kite on a broken string fell out of the sky and landed in the yard. 

The man in the rattan chair opened his eyes and saw a piece of white paper float out of the kite and change to human form. “My lord, the Luwu have sent a report.” 

The man in the rattan chair—Zhou Ying—nodded to him almost imperceptibly and listened as Bai Ling went over the contents of the letter. 

“The letter is in Xiao Xu’s handwriting and tone,” Bai Ling said. “My lord, since sending that letter, Qiu Sha hasn’t contacted us again. The Great Market is about to begin, and now different parts of Xiang Zhao’s spiritual bones have appeared in various places in Chu. What is she planning?” 

Zhou Ying absent-mindedly said, “Lin has reached the South Sea. She will come.” 

Bai Ling said, “Sanyue has sent a group of ascended spirits to hunt for her everywhere, and people have come from Northern Li and Southern Shu. Most likely they are coming for Hui Xiangjun’s relics, not to help her. I truly cannot imagine how she plans to escape.” 

Zhou Ying muttered to himself for a moment. “The mist has been very heavy over the Xia River these last few days. This mist is quite strange, and I am unable to see the weather conditions on the opposite bank… The Luwu are there—have they noticed anything unusual in Tao County?” 

For safety’s sake, Bai Ling inspected Xu Rucheng’s letter once more. “Nothing… Oh, wait. For some reason, Xiao Xu wrote today’s date at the end.” 

After hearing this, Zhou Ying froze, then actually sat up slightly straighter. “The date?” 

Bai Ling said, “Yes, my lord… What is it?” 

“Give it to me,” Zhou Ying said with interest. “Who is this Luwu who wrote the letter?” 

Zhou Ying treated everyone with indiscriminate indifference. He never took any “unnecessary” care—he had little care to give to begin with. Only when he was plotting against others did he pay attention to what they were thinking. He felt very secure in handing the Luwu over to Bai Ling and normally only used them. Had Bai Ling not prevented him, he might have given each Luwu a number for a codename. This was his first time asking about one. 

“His name is Xu Rucheng, a native of Yuzhou…” Bai Ling could recite the life history of each Luwu. On being asked, he briefly told him about Xu Rucheng’s background. 

Zhou Ying nodded casually; it was unclear how much of it he had listened to. “He noted the date… How did he ever think of that? Xiao Bai, this batch of Luwu you’ve trained is remarkable.” 

Bai Ling: “…” 

Remarkable? 

He thought that Xu Rucheng was fairly unremarkable. The young fellow had a broad nose and wide eyes and even a mouth twice as large as normal. Any thought that passed through his head appeared on his features. He was excessively loyal and righteous. In fact, he wasn’t very well suited to infiltrating a foreign country as an “evil cultivator.” It was only that Bai Ling had taken pity due to the debt of blood he carried and had specially approved this opportunity for him… Could he have appraised him wrongly? 

While His Highness wasn’t very good at conducting himself as a person, he was quite sharp when it came to judging people. Bai Ling knew he fell short in this respect and involuntarily began to doubt himself. He didn’t dare to say anything more, only asked, “My lord, what is the use of the date?” 

Zhou Ying said, smiling, “Wait and see.” 

The next day, the day of the fifteenth of the sixth month, reasonably speaking, the Snake King’s Immortal Palace ought to have become a busy mess. But Xu Rucheng’s letter seemed to come even a little earlier than usual. He detailed everything that had happened during the first night feast without reference to importance. He described Chu’s Qilin Guard setting up defenses; the night feast seemed to have gone very smoothly, without any abnormalities. 

But starting from the sixteenth of the sixth month, all news from the Luwu in Wild Fox Country ceased. 

The seventeenth, the eighteenth…for three full days, it was as if all the Luwu had died overnight. They didn’t convey a single word. 

Bai Ling couldn’t help starting to worry: had they been exposed? Had something gone wrong? 

But in fact there had been more than one batch of Luwu sent to infiltrate Wild Fox Country, and there were even some Xu Rucheng and the others didn’t know about, mixed in among the ordinary evil cultivators and acting on their own. Even if Xu Rucheng and his companions had been exposed and wiped out, how could the other Luwu not have sent any word? 

Bai Ling couldn’t resist saying to Zhou Ying, “My lord, why don’t I go across the river and take a look?” 

Zhou Ying waved a hand. “Not today.” 

Bai Ling stared. “Not…not today? Then what day?” 

Why did he need to choose an auspicious time? 

Meanwhile, it was obvious that they weren’t the only ones who had lost contact with Wild Fox Country. 

On the nineteenth of the sixth month, masters from every country who were waiting and watching from the sidelines could no longer hold themselves back. One after another, they went into Wild Fox Country. 

At the same time, news came that parts of Xiang Zhao’s spiritual bones had been found in various places in Chu. The priceless spiritual bones of the ascended spirit sword cultivator had been tossed all over the place by Qiu Sha. Piecing them all together, there were precisely 20 jin 6 liang missing. 

Starting on the twentieth of the sixth month, the Sanyue cultivators who were hunting everywhere for Qiu Sha converged from all directions on Tao County, preparing to besiege the bold evildoer. 

The strange thing was that the people who entered Tao County later also seemed to vanish into thin air. Whether they were established foundations or ascended spirits, as soon as they went in, there was no more news of them. 

Apart from Zhou Ying, no one could hold out and keep watching from the sidelines. 

At the end of the sixth month, even Lin Chi came on shore from the South Sea and proceeded alone towards Tao County’s Seventeen Li Town. 

And meanwhile, the Luwu in the eye of the storm felt that they were dreaming. In Wild Fox Country, from the sixteenth day of the sixth month to the seventh day of the seventh month, twenty whole days had disappeared. 

Time had disappeared!