The massive influx of Shaman karmic luck caught Wei Yuan completely off guard, leaving him wondering where such a pleasant surprise had come from. Fortunately, his dharma body now stood within the Sea of Bitterness, allowing him to gaze down upon the mortal world from above. Because the karmic luck and its underlying causes were so potent, Wei Yuan's dharma body opened its eyes in the Sea of Bitterness and traced the luck back to its origin.
Down below, gathered in a vast public square, were nearly a hundred thousand Shamans. Judging by their attire, most were lowborn pariahs or outright slaves. Pungent smoke drifted across the entire square; the moment the shamans inhaled it, their heads grew light and hazy, only for a strange excitement to stir within them.
Over a hundred massive war drums ringed the square. Atop each drum danced a lovely shaman maiden whose rhythmic steps beat upon the skins, driving each drumbeat straight into the hearts of the gathered throng.
Each of the lovely shaman maidens possessed her own distinct beauty. Whether hoof or tentacle, every footstep struck the drums in perfect unison—clearly the result of rigorous training. These lowborn shamans and slaves had never seen such a spectacle in their lives, and they had long since been struck dumb, unable to take it all in even if they had a dozen eyes. Sturdy Shaman warriors then distributed large bowls of wine to every lowborn in the crowd. The liquor was exceptionally potent and fragrant, yet without receiving an order, not a single one dared drink. To drink before being told was to court death—an unquestioned rule of survival among pariahs.
At the center of the square stood an elevated platform, upon which towered an enormous, grotesque statue that appeared incomparably hideous to Shaman eyes.
Tianyu stood upon the platform, roaring at the top of his lungs, "From this day forth, Meijuyuan, the God of Beautiful Shamans and Fine Wine, is our true god! Drink!"
A hundred thousand low shamans downed their bowls in a single gulp. The unprecedented deliciousness moved several to burst into tears on the spot!
In the blink of an eye, the entire crowd dissolved into a chorus of weeping. Such sublime wine, and so many diverse and enchanting shaman maidens—things they had never dared imagine in their wildest dreams were all laid before them today.
Watching the low shamans weep hysterically across the square, Tianyu's eyes gleamed with an orange light. He could see strands of karmic luck rising from their bodies and funneling into the statue of Wei Yuan. The single drop of Wei Yuan's blood was embedded between the statue's brows, serving as a medium to channel all that karmic luck straight into Wei Yuan. Watching the billowing luck ascend, Tianyu gave a satisfied scoff. This routine—fine wine, pretty shaman girls, and collective weeping—was something he had mastered long ago. Even those who led the weeping were shills he had paid for. Once people held each other and shared a good cry, even a feud over a stolen concubine could be softened, to say nothing of these bumpkins who had never seen the world.
Yet just as Tianyu was savoring his triumph, he suddenly sensed a faint wisp of killing intent in the sky.
He looked upward, perceived nothing, and paid it no further heed. Stepping down from the platform, he summoned his trusted aides and ordered them to prepare the flying boat so they could proceed to the next city and host another "Beautiful Shamans and Fine Wine" assembly.
Before boarding, Tianyu casually tossed several tens of thousands of liang of immortal silver to the local tribal chieftain. The chieftain who had organized the low shamans and slaves was so grateful he practically longed to lick the soles of Tianyu's boots. His only regret was that Tianyu hadn't taken a liking to any of his wives, concubines, or daughters.
Wei Yuan sat upon the Sea of Bitterness with an expressionless face, staring down at his snarling, bared-fang effigy, feeling as though retribution had finally caught up with him. Once that drop of blood departed aboard the flying boat with Tianyu, the statue—steeped in raw Force Shaman style while catering to low Shaman tastes—finally passed out of sight. Still, he had to admit that the results were astonishingly good: the hundred thousand low shamans present had yielded sixty thousand points of Shaman luck. The rest were simply willing in spirit but too frail in body, thoroughly depleted of any luck to squeeze out.
Wei Yuan withdrew his gaze and sighed softly. Karmic luck was grand, but it came at a price, and that price weighed upon the Dao heart.
Just as his dharma body was about to close its eyes, Wei Yuan suddenly felt a strand of karma laden with karmic hindrance latch onto him. Sitting in the Sea of Bitterness, he examined these karmic threads closely, and the inner voices of countless shamans echoed in his ears: "O God, let me have a different lovely maiden every day!" "O God, let me drown in wine!"
Wei Yuan did not know whether to laugh or cry. Even the wishes of these simple, low shamans were remarkably crude. Such wishes were wilder than anything a turtle in a wishing pond would dare dream.
These prayers also carried a touch of karmic hindrance. If left unfulfilled, adverse consequences could follow—the most common being disappointment, which would cause him to lose this stream of faith and vow power.
Even so, Wei Yuan knew that wishes were one thing, and how they were fulfilled was quite another.
Take those who wished for a different lovely maiden every day: if a peerless beauty were actually set before them, they would wish for nothing more than a crack in the ground to hide in. In that manner, the wish could be considered fulfilled.
Wei Yuan naturally wouldn't entertain requests for lovely shaman maidens. Wine, however, was easily granted. They didn't even need a cup every day; an occasional sip would be more than enough.
Wei Yuan immediately resolved to ramp up the production of strong liquor and develop a brew tailored specifically for low shamans using industrial leftovers. He laid down three explicit requirements for this concoction: massive volume, dirt-cheap cost, and industrial flavorings dumped in without restraint!
In truth, past Buddhist lands—including the Great Baohua Pure Land—only rarely considered answering the wishes of their believers. Even when they did, the recipients were either bound by momentous karma and deep affinities from past lives, or members of royal lineages and prominent nobility. Only Wei Yuan was seriously contemplating answering the prayers of low shamans.
After this experience, Wei Yuan gained a general understanding of how the Bodhisattvas and Arhats residing on their fruitions cultivated.
Returning from the Sea of Bitterness, Wei Yuan found that the Gate of the Many Realms had already been reinforced with the immortal bones. Before the gate now stood two candles whose faint flames burned entirely with immortal power. As soon as a portion of immortal essence burned away, a fresh supply would have to replace it.
Entering the dead world of his origin once more, Wei Yuan moved far more swiftly. He got straight to the point, testing the effect of introducing Shaman luck. Sure enough, once Shaman luck was added, that small patch of earth not only revealed distinct vitality, coming alive, but also expanded slightly.
Wei Yuan then infused more human luck to establish the land's foundational nature. After adding several million points of human luck, the plot expanded from a few feet across to a full hundred zhang.
Surveying his surroundings, Wei Yuan lifted the entire plot of seed soil, selected the smallest among the surrounding beast-like peaks, and relocated the earth atop it.
From his hazy memories, Wei Yuan knew that these mountains shaped like titanic beasts were unique. If successfully rebooted, each peak would likely bestow a different blessing.
Not greedy to bite off more than he could chew, Wei Yuan picked the smallest one, set down the seed soil, and re-laid the immortal bone array.
This setup took several full days. Just as the immortal array was about to take form, Wei Yuan sensed something amiss. Looking up, he saw a colossal shadow appear against the previously empty vault of heaven, with tens of thousands of eyes gazing down upon the newborn seed soil.
As though spotting a peerless delicacy, the shadow abruptly surged into a tempest and swooped downward!
Wei Yuan instantly unleashed a burst of sword qi alongside a sweep of red lotus karmic fire, while simultaneously attempting to halt time. Yet both the sword qi and karmic fire passed straight through the shadow, as if the two existed in entirely different dimensions. As for stopping time, it had no effect whatsoever; time did not even exist in this world.
The instant the shadow made contact with the seed soil, Wei Yuan triggered the hidden trap he had placed within the immortal array. Immortal power erupted, transmuting into flames that consumed karma, blazing inward along the portion of the seed soil that the shadow had engulfed. In an instant, vast swathes of the shadow ignited. It let out an agonizing, shuddering shriek, recoiled violently, and fled this realm.
"A pity..." Wei Yuan murmured, looking helplessly at the black ash drifting through the air and the remaining half of the seed soil.
The shadow had simply been too vast. Fierce though his counterattack was, it was like an ant biting the foot of a giant; no matter how sharp the bite, it couldn't tear away much flesh.
Wei Yuan reassembled the protective immortal array and counted the remaining immortal bone plaques. The expenditure had been extraordinarily high this time. Plaques he had assumed would last forever now looked capable of enduring three or four more uses at best.
With the protective immortal array in place, Wei Yuan returned to Qingming. Catalyzed by Shaman and Liao karmic luck, life had begun to stir within the seed soil. The urgent priority now was securing more foreign karmic luck.
Through his fruition, Wei Yuan summoned Xiaoyu to inquire about the preparations in the Liao domain.
Xiaoyu separated a strand of divine sense, manifesting an avatar that stepped into the Heaven of Joy and Bliss before Wei Yuan. Wei Yuan had already erected a council chamber within the Heaven of Joy and Bliss, where a map of the Three Rivers Khan Tent was currently displayed.
Xiaoyu swept his hand across it, dividing the map into several large color-coded sections.
"After taking over, I immediately dispatched several survey teams of cultivators deep into the Liao domain to conduct thorough inspections," Xiaoyu reported. "We carried out extensive prospecting across key areas, drilling over three hundred deep wells and mapping more than eight thousand li of earth veins."
Wei Yuan nodded inwardly. Xiaoyu's transformation of late had been rapid. He had evolved from a great-clan scion who knew only combat into a cultivator adept at deploying Qingming's advanced methods.
Genius was indeed capable of anything; when someone as gifted as Xiaoyu applied himself earnestly, he excelled at whatever he undertook. And his transformation seemed to have begun the moment he entered the Heaven of Joy and Bliss.
Xiaoyu continued, "The south borders the battlefield, where the earth veins are almost entirely ruined, leaving pure wasteland. North of there and south of the snow mountains, water sources are plentiful. However, rainfall is concentrated in the summer months. While the pastures look lush to our eyes, the green grass they produce is nutrient-poor for Liao horses; each steed must consume several hundred jin of grass daily, plus supplementary feed.
"The foundational pasture grass of the Liao Clan is golden in color, with blades sharp as swords and rich in metal and earth powers. A few jin of that grass is enough to sustain a Liao horse without requiring meat.
"North of the snow mountains, earth veins are slightly more numerous, with some mineral deposits, but the grades are very low. Aside from a few specialty ores unique to the Liao domain, they aren't worth mining. Water is scarcer north of the mountains, and the pastures consist of the same green grass."
Xiaoyu's survey had been thorough enough to formulate an overall industrial plan.
By now, the condemned prisoners across the land who deserved death had already been executed. Xiaoyu had deliberately reserved a batch to be slaughtered across various pastures and oases, extracting virtually all the Liao karmic luck that could be frightened out of them. All they could do now was focus on development and patiently cultivate the next harvest of Liao luck.
"Are there any other problems?" Wei Yuan asked.
Xiaoyu replied, "There is one! The spiritual qi here is extraordinarily thin. Many of our machines cannot function, and template Dao foundations cannot recharge their spiritual power in the Liao domain; they have to return to Qingming to replenish. That is essentially subsidizing the Liao domain with Qingming's spiritual power, which is not a viable long-term solution.
"After pondering this for a long time, my only conclusion is that we must resort to the primitive electricity from the realm beyond."
Chapter 1313