Wei Yuan stood facing the wind, the ten-thousand-li expanse of Qingming stretching out behind him.
The recent contest with Cui Wantong had made it clear to the world that Wei Yuan, relying solely on his Dao strength and divine abilities, was already capable of contending with immortals. Furthermore, the sheer breadth of trump cards and methods at his disposal was in no way inferior to that of a formidable true immortal. While Lu Changhe had indeed been killed by an ambush, had they truly engaged in a fight to the death, Lu Changhe's end would most likely have been the same.
It was this head-on clash with Cui Wantong that truly earned Wei Yuan awe and respect among the immortals.
Even so, Wei Yuan still felt a twinge of regret at this moment. Back in the day, when the Patriarch was merely in Scenery Command, he had already been hunting down immortals across the world, considering it a disgrace if one managed to escape.
Yet Wei Yuan himself found it arduous just to kill a run-of-the-mill immortal. First, he had to pin them down with domain power, then bind them with karma through the Peerless Dao Domain, and only then could he deliver a fatal blow—such as Counter-Slay; Sweeping Away the Four Barbarians and End of Ten Thousand Generations from the Sword of Ten Thousand Generations and Autumns; the Wicked Sun Heavenly Pillar; the Slash of Mortal Karmic Luck... and that was it. Most of his remaining methods could only wound, not kill.
Wei Yuan deeply felt that his repertoire was too meager and that he fell far too short of the Patriarch. Thus, he pondered carefully where he could make further improvements. Yet the records left behind by the Patriarch were mere fragments, and he had not even left a distinct Dao path of his own. Most of his path had been dismantled and integrated by the three immortals to become the paths of the Three Abbeys later on.
Wei Yuan had not quite understood it before, but now he began to grasp why: the Patriarch's Dao path must have been too profound and difficult to pass down intact. Thus, his three disciples had each inherited a portion, then found ways to synthesize them and lower the threshold, thereby creating the lineages of the Three Abbeys and ascending to immortality through them.
Since the gap between himself and the Patriarch was so vast, Wei Yuan decided to set the Dao path aside for the moment and focus on learning how the Patriarch carried himself, dealt with the world, and bore his demeanor—with an emphasis on demeanor.
And so, with one hand clasped behind his back and the other resting before him, he stood against the wind. His robes fluttered, his expression turned solemn and imposing, and clarity shone in his eyes. In this posture, he carried at least a fraction of the Patriarch's bearing from back then.
However, after striking this imposing pose, Wei Yuan waited for well over an hour, yet that mysterious immortal never showed up. Still, a faint premonition lingered in Wei Yuan's heart, leaving him unable to leave. He had no choice but to keep standing there on high, letting the wind buffet him.
Gradually, perplexed gazes began to peer over from beyond the heavens, seemingly wondering what on earth Wei Yuan was doing. Wei Yuan faintly felt heat stirring beneath the surface of his skin, but it was not quite hot enough—merely the temperature of the sun's surface, not enough to breach his thick skin and make him blush.
Meanwhile, on a small dirt hill in the distance, a campfire crackled, stewing a pot of hot soup. Bald Sixth held an earthenware bowl, guzzled down the remaining meat broth in a few gulps, and wiped his mouth with a greasy sleeve before saying, "Eldest Brother, don't stand so high up. Watch out, you might fall."
Wei Youcai stood atop a boulder taller than a man, the biting mountain wind whipping his sash and sideburns forward. Compared to back then, his temples had grown noticeably gray.
The boulder was covered in moss, and just a short distance ahead was a small cliff; one misstep, and he would plummet over the edge. Buffeted by the mountain wind, Wei Youcai swayed slightly, yet he refused to come down, merely saying, "It's fine. Let me look for just a moment longer."
Bald Sixth sighed and stopped trying to persuade him, leaning back against a large tree, lost in thought.
The old housekeeper from back then emerged from who knew where. Without a word, he busied himself putting out the fire and cleaning up all traces of their presence.
Just then, a ghost-like figure appeared, swiftly ascending to the mountaintop. Both Bald Sixth and the housekeeper broke into pleased smiles and asked, "Fifth Brother, did you get it?"
The man produced a porcelain vial from his robes and uncorked it. A stream of azure light surged out from the mouth of the bottle, thick as liquid, rippling with wave after wave of brilliance.
The man smiled and said, "Mission accomplished! I got this much in one go—Eldest Brother's matter should be secured now."
The housekeeper glanced at the vial's opening and clicked his tongue. "So much! Isn't that a bit too much?"
The man replied, "There was far more than I had anticipated. What I took was only a small fraction, so it won't affect anything."
Bald Sixth walked over to the boulder and helped Wei Youcai down. Wei Youcai took the porcelain vial, looked inside, and nodded. "This should be enough."
Dressed in night traveler's attire, Lao Wu asked, "Shall we leave then?"
Wei Youcai looked back one last time before departing with the others, vanishing into the bustling mortal world.
Wei Yuan waited for half a day until suddenly, his premonition vanished, leaving behind only a flurry of gazes looking at him as if he were a fool.
Furious, Wei Yuan immediately brought out a page of a storybook outline—the content was intensely scandalous, with only the character names left blank. Wei Yuan held a brush in hand and made a show of preparing to write names onto the draft. Sure enough, the surrounding gazes scattered in an instant, terrified of being singled out by Wei Yuan.
In the past, Wei Yuan had carried tens of millions in mortal karmic luck, like a walking bomb—whoever provoked him met with disaster. Today, relying on the fact that Qingming's people were all educated and enlightened, with Body Casting cultivators everywhere and Dao Foundations as numerous as cattle hairs, yielding a karmic debt a hundred times greater than the realms outside, Wei Yuan could mobilize his populace within Qingming to curse immortals by name. For an immortal, this was equivalent to being constantly surrounded by tens of thousands of flies—flies that not only spoke human tongue, but cursed with utter filth.
The immortals found it insufferable, yet there was nothing they could do. If they followed past protocol and struck down with a lightning bolt in retaliation, they might incur the karmic debt of tens or even hundreds of thousands of mortals.
Therefore, nowadays, ordinary immortals were utterly unwilling to cross Wei Yuan, desiring only peace and quiet.
In the end, Wei Yuan failed to wait out the final immortal and had no choice but to return to Qingming. Yet the moment he entered Qingming, he immediately sensed something amiss. Wherever his divine sense swept, many people appeared somewhat listless. Among them were mortals and Body Casting cultivators, but the majority were template Dao Foundation cultivators.
Wei Yuan promptly scanned the data from several central spiritual energy stations. Sure enough, their spiritual qi output had dropped by around ten percent.
Wei Yuan immediately alerted the cultivators of the Palace of Grand Beginning. In the blink of an eye, the cultivators all entered the Splendor of the Many Realms to investigate their respective areas of responsibility. Sure enough, the investigation uncovered a problem: the mortal karmic luck being nurtured within at least several thousand template Dao Foundation cultivators had completely vanished!
During the previous great war, Wei Yuan had exhausted all the karmic luck and even the power of vows of Qingming's people. But as time went by, new karmic luck had gradually begun to form in some of them. In these template Dao Foundation cultivators, mortal karmic luck was about to be born, just shy of full maturation and not yet ready to be contributed, only for that karmic luck to abruptly disappear!
Because their karmic luck was nearly formed, its sudden loss left these cultivators listless, as if they had gone days without proper sleep, causing their efficiency across all areas to plummet, which was how the anomaly had been discovered.
When this conclusion was reached, even Wei Yuan found it hard to believe. Could unformed mortal karmic luck inside the body simply vanish?
The matter was of great import and lay in a domain completely unfamiliar to Wei Yuan, so he invited Immortal Monarch Yanshi. Upon arriving, Yanshi stood above Qingming, and with a single sweep of his divine sense across the entire domain, he flagged an additional hundred-plus thousand individuals. Most were Body Casting cultivators, with another thousand-odd template Dao Foundations, and even two Golden Core dharma idols!
The results of Immortal Monarch Yanshi's probe gave Wei Yuan another shock. Even a dharma idol's karmic luck could be stolen? The perpetrator's methods were truly unbelievable!
Wei Yuan himself had no idea how to steal karmic luck; he could only use the clumsy method of transforming heaven and earth, benefiting the multitude, and then waiting for people to contribute karmic luck of their own accord. Because the vast majority of those whose luck had been stolen were cultivators, the total loss amounted to nearly two million strands of ordinary mortal karmic luck azure qi.
Immortal Monarch Yanshi summoned the two Golden Core dharma idols, inspected them closely, and said, "Their karmic luck has been harvested."
Looking solemn, Yanshi waved his hand to scatter several formation disks, assembling a grand formation in midair. Soon, white mist billowed within the formation, and out stepped a little girl whose hair reached the floor.
The girl appeared to be only about ten years old, yet her hair was pure silver, over a zhang long, with most of it trailing behind her. Though standing in midair, brilliance bloomed beneath her feet, as if she were treading on solid ground.
Yanshi said, "This is True Monarch Bai You, the Master of Boundless Abbey. The Dao path of Boundless Abbey specializes in destiny and karmic luck. Its disciples are exceptionally few, and it is the only place in the palace that does not take in candidates through the immortal sect joint examination; every disciple is personally sought out and brought back by the abbey master according to destiny. Over the past few decades, Master Bai has only left seclusion a handful of times, the last being fifty years ago, which is why you have never met her. I recall that two hundred years ago, Boundless Abbey had eight members in total. As for how many disciples remain in Boundless Abbey today, even I do not know."
Bai You spoke, "Right now, I am the only one left in the abbey. I do not know where the others have gone."
Even Yanshi was taken aback, seemingly not expecting that Boundless Abbey—one of the Three Abbeys carrying the legacy of the three immortals—now had only its master remaining. However, he did not press further, instead summoning the two Golden Core dharma idols for Bai You to examine.
Bai You, in the form of a little girl, had eyes that shimmered with an ash-gray luster like burning gray flames. After examining them closely for a moment, sweat suddenly poured down her skin, fatigue washing over her face. She closed her eyes as two streams of tears rolled from the corners of her eyes, and then said, "It is indeed the art of karmic luck harvesting. The caster's skill is masterly, even superior to mine. To harvest karmic luck so cleanly without leaving any residue, yet without harming the foundation of the targets in the slightest, leaving only a single trace of reaping that swept past in an instant—a supreme master! With such methods, one can harvest the karmic luck of tens of thousands silently and in an instant. Such thievery is great enough to be called stealing a kingdom!"
Wei Yuan had not expected the little girl to hold the perpetrator in such high regard, and he felt a sudden pang of apprehension. He hurriedly asked, "Could Senior explain this art of karmic luck harvesting in detail? Having had so much of my mortal karmic luck harvested, is there any way to defend against it?"
Bai You produced a black cloth, dabbed away the tears at the corners of her eyes, and said slowly, "In ancient times, the Human Sovereign used mortal karmic luck as a ladder to ascend to the heavens step by step. Thus, methods of stealing karmic luck have existed since antiquity, mostly as demonic arts. Later, however, with the rise of the Buddhist, Confucian, and Daoist schools, each developed its own methods for collecting karmic luck, under various names. Buddhism calls it 'diverting karma,' Confucianism terms it 'gathering fortune,' and Daoism proclaims 'the virtuous shall possess it.' By the time our Palace of Grand Beginning was founded, the founding immortal ancestor of Boundless Abbey felt deeply that demonic cultivators were running rampant while the other schools watched with predatory eyes, so he decided to research a method of taking karmic luck to contend with our formidable foes. The method he devised proved so sharp and effective that some referred to it as the 'art of harvesting karmic luck,' and gradually, the name caught on."
Wei Yuan finally understood: everyone outside the Palace of Grand Beginning merely "gathered," while only the Palace of Grand Beginning "harvested." Thus, anything outside the palace was deemed heresy, while within the Palace of Grand Beginning lay the orthodox way. The logic was sound enough—how could the righteous path possibly harvest slower than the heretics?
Bai You added, "This person harvests karmic luck both precisely and swiftly, having attained the pinnacle of mastery. Even if I were to ascend to immortality, I fear I would do no better. Judging purely by technique, it bears the marks of both our Boundless Abbey and the Hall of Jianmu, effectively combining the strengths of both."
Wei Yuan felt he had caught wind of something extraordinary once more. The Hall of Jianmu also had methods for harvesting karmic luck? Not only did the Palace of Grand Beginning possess techniques for harvesting karmic luck, but they had more than one school of it?
At this moment, Wei Yuan gained an entirely new appreciation for the depths of the Palace of Grand Beginning's foundation.
Chapter 1155