Subdued

"Who are you? What is your mission? Where are your teammates?" The moment the Shaman Hunter opened his eyes, he was met with this barrage of three questions. Fighting down the dizziness in his head, he looked down toward where the voice had come from, only to find a short, ugly fellow standing before him, questioning him in all seriousness. He immediately barked, "What right does a wind-dried pig trotter like you have to yell at a mighty shaman?" Suppressing a surge of murderous intent, Wei Yuan said coldly, "You'd better understand your situation. I can crush you to death at any time!" "Ha!" The Shaman Hunter let out a loud laugh. "A pig trotter talking big?" At this moment, the Shaman Hunter was bound to the tower shield, his four arms and two legs bent backward around it and tied together. There was no helping it; there were no pillars here, much less a torture rack. Yet no matter how Wei Yuan threatened or coaxed him, this Shaman Hunter simply failed to grasp the situation, shooting back countless bizarre epithets, quite a few of which were synonyms for bugs. Beside them, Zhengang could no longer watch this in silence. "Master, this won't work. You have to do it like this—" His hands moved faster than his brain, too; without waiting for Wei Yuan's approval, he slammed a vicious punch into the Shaman Hunter's body, followed by a crisp crack of fracturing bone. The Shaman Hunter's eyes narrowed. Exhaling a breath, he boomed, "Not bad... but still a bit short—" Zhengang looked troubled. That had been his full-power strike; he couldn't hit any harder. Yet Wei Yuan finally understood: only a heavy fist could make a Power Shaman submit. "Step aside!" Wei Yuan pushed Jidao out of the way, eyed the Shaman Hunter, and delivered a gentle punch to his stomach. "This punch of yours is like a mosquito massage—" But halfway through the sentence, the Shaman Hunter suddenly felt all his internal organs begin to dance! Not only that, every inch of flesh in his body seemed to be struck by a forging hammer. In his ears, it was as if thirty female shamans were squabbling, while his consciousness fractured into dozens of pieces, each raising a banner of rebellion. His body curled into a shrimp, pulling against the tower shield until it creaked and groaned as though on the verge of warping. Only after a good while did the Shaman Hunter let out a choked gasp to catch his breath, after which he vomited everything he had eaten over the past few days. Once he regained his senses, the Shaman Hunter discovered Wei Yuan instructing Jidao on how to exert force. In Wei Yuan's appraisal, Jidao's punch was riddled with flaws—seventeen or eighteen mistakes at the very least. After trying it, Jidao threw another punch that was indeed significantly more ferocious. Utterly won over, he said, "As long as I train diligently, will I be able to catch up to you one day?" Wei Yuan glanced at him and said flatly, "No. You will only surpass yourself. The gap between you and me cannot be bridged by hard work." In an instant, the Shaman Hunter felt that Wei Yuan was incomparably towering and radiant. The Shaman Hunter was subdued. Then Wei Yuan realized that rather than gaining two followers, he had gained two more mouths to feed. The Shaman Hunter carried only a meager amount of food and water, barely enough to sustain him alone for three days. With Wei Yuan and Zhengang added, it would last only one day. Now that Jidao Zhengang had learned how to exert force and recognized once again the chasm between himself and Wei Yuan, his servility plummeted to new lows: "You can just call me Zhengang from now on, or Xiao Zhen." Wei Yuan, however, felt that he could never bring himself to say the words "Xiao Zhen." This Shaman Hunter also had several names: usually he called himself the Xuanhuang Hunt God; before the strong, he was Little Hunter; and before prominent figures of power and influence, he was Hunter Thirty-One. "Little Hunter, you mentioned there's a market in this region. What kind of dangers are there?" Wei Yuan asked in a warm, genial tone. The Shaman Hunter said respectfully, "There are indeed many dangers there, but if you go, you would be the greatest danger." Wei Yuan's impression of Power Shamans as a whole immediately rose. Who said Power Shamans were an uncultured, boorish lot? They might not be smart, but they spoke pleasant words. Piecing together the full yet very limited intelligence the Shaman Hunter provided, Wei Yuan decided to hunt some game first. Once they had goods on hand, they would go to the market and see what they could trade for. The environment in this region was simply too extreme; all food and water had to be brought in from the outside. According to Hunter Thirty-One, there was only one market within a three-thousand-li radius. Food and water at the market cost exorbitant prices, as did weapons and arrows; only convicts' heads and molten beasts were dirt cheap. In truth, the bounty on a convict was quite high. For instance, Zhengang claimed his shaman heart was worth at least fifty thousand immortal silver. At the market, however, Zhengang's shaman heart could only be traded for barely ten days' worth of food and water. In the Wu domain, that tiny bit of food and water wouldn't even cost five taels of immortal silver. In short, at this market, everything the Shaman Hunters needed cost an astronomical price, while everything they hunted was dirt cheap. For a power to exist stably and maintain a monopoly over a market in this chaotic land, it was naturally formidable. It was said that the overseer behind it was a direct subordinate of Jiuri. As a Shaman Hunter, Hunter Thirty-One's living conditions were actually only marginally better than Zhengang's. They had all signed extremely harsh contracts; a Shaman Hunter had to pay out of pocket for their standard full set of equipment, which was outrageously expensive. Their ordinary basic income came from hunting down convicts like Zhengang and claiming bounties on their corpses. As for supplies, a meager amount of food and water was dropped at designated locations at set intervals. This food and drink was nowhere near enough to sustain the Shaman Hunters across the entire region, so they had to fight over it. Fierce battles erupted over food and water time and time again; many Shaman Hunters died not from the harsh environment or at the hands of convicts, but at the hands of other Shaman Hunters. Occasionally, important figures came to inspect the area. They would drop food and water, then watch Shaman Hunters and convicts fight to the death over a scrap of nourishment. If the battle was bloody and spectacular enough, the dignitaries would casually toss down some rewards. That pittance of reward was the Shaman Hunters' only hope and their only chance to improve their lives. "Why become a Shaman Hunter?" Wei Yuan asked. Hunter Thirty-One pointed overhead and smiled wryly. "For this sunlight, and to survive. I had the best physical talent in the tribe and was originally capable of becoming a Desolate Shaman, but my family had no influential backing. Every time I went to battle, the rewards I risked my life to earn were seized by the tribe and spent on the Grand Elder's own grandson. "That fat worm consumed enough resources for me to advance six times over, yet he still couldn't become a Desolate Shaman! And then he snatched away the spot to enter the Desolate Realm that rightfully belonged to me! "I refused to accept it, so I volunteered to become a Shaman Hunter, hunting convicts while providing amusement for the big shots. Only this way could I temper my body with the Desolate Realm and perhaps have a slim chance of breaking through to Desolate Shaman." Wei Yuan swept his gaze over Hunter Thirty-One's body. Though his divine sense could not penetrate deep, he could roughly gauge his physical strength. Shaking his head, he said, "You cannot become a Desolate Shaman." Despair flickered in Hunter Thirty-One's eyes. "I know that too. Without pills and without enough food, the improvements to my body over several decades have been very limited. But at least I can still make some progress here. If I leave, I don't even know what I could do." Wei Yuan knew that in most small Shaman tribes, property was owned collectively by the entire tribe. In large tribes like the Desolate Ancestor's, or in the various kingdoms, collective ownership was no longer feasible. Still, Wei Yuan had not expected the issues within small Shaman tribes to be so severe. Going by Hunter Thirty-One's experience, this was no longer mere embezzlement; the chieftain directly treated the entire tribe as his private property, using it however he pleased. A talent like Hunter Thirty-One, who had possessed great potential to strive for Desolate Shaman and whose innate talent had originally far exceeded Tianyu's, was still forced to become a Shaman Hunter who traded his life for a chance. Put bluntly, his ancestors simply had no Desolate Shamans. Yet now, after Hunter Thirty-One had struggled in the Desolate Realm for decades while Tianyu spent most of his time feasting and reveling, advancing by swallowing pills, Tianyu's physical constitution had clearly surpassed Hunter Thirty-One's. In Wei Yuan's eyes, the conduct of Hunter Thirty-One's tribe was truly outrageous. Had this happened among the Human race, someone would have long shouted: *Are kings and lords, generals and ministers born to their station?* Hunter Thirty-One was not an isolated case. It was said that many Shaman Hunters had similar stories; otherwise, they would never have become Shaman Hunters. And Zhengang's tale was more tragic still. Wei Yuan faintly conceived a grand plan in his mind. Perhaps while retrieving his master's Dao Sword, there was something else he could do?