Looking at the Linmu Celestial Liquid, the villagers' breathing quickened, longing to drink their fill.
Yet without Qi Yuan speaking, none dared step forward.
Qi Yuan looked back at the heavy-breathing villagers. "None of you even play basketball, so why are you so eager to drink bathwater?"
Qi Yuan couldn't help but think of it; back on Blue Star in his past life, there was a basketball star rumored to want to drink someone's bathwater.
"Basketball?"
"Bathwater?"
The villagers couldn't fathom the workings of Qi Yuan's mind.
They were staring at Linmu Celestial Liquid—where had these two baffling concepts suddenly come from?
"Sigh, looks like someone already used this bathwater," Qi Yuan sighed. "Happy Arhat, gather up all this bathwater."
Qi Yuan wouldn't use this bathwater himself, but... if his own subjects wanted it, he wouldn't stop them, would he?
Happy Arhat beamed with joy. "Lord God, I will be condensing my second divine aperture soon. May I have a mouthful of Linmu Celestial Liquid?"
Beside him, Long Eyebrow Arhat hastily chimed in, his eyes full of yearning for the celestial liquid.
The villagers behind them wore the same expression.
Even for those who weren't True Gods, drinking Linmu Celestial Liquid offered immense benefits, boosting cultivation and improving innate talent.
"Go ahead, each of you have a sip," Qi Yuan said without stopping them.
If people wanted to drink bathwater, he couldn't be bothered to stop them.
At that, the villagers rushed forward like mad, thrusting their hands into the bathwater and scooping it into their palms.
Village Chief Yulei's aged face showed a look of rapt obsession as he inhaled the wondrous fragrance of the Linmu Celestial Liquid.
"Truly an extraordinary fragrance in this world! Just a single whiff refreshes the heart and clears the mind.
To take a sip—what inconceivable bliss must that be!"
Village Chief Yulei savored the Linmu Celestial Liquid, looking just like a child in a backward feudal dynasty tasting milk for the very first time.
The others fared no better.
A whole crowd of True Gods, Purple Mansion, Divine Infant, and Origin Core cultivators drank the bathwater with looks of drunken ecstasy in their eyes.
"Pity I can't livestream this. It would've been hilarious," Qi Yuan muttered.
Still, he secretly took out a shadow-recording stone and recorded the scene.
Who knew—perhaps after endless spans of time, these figures would all become formidable big shots.
Then Qi Yuan could whip out the shadow-recording stone and show it to them.
Finding out how obsessed they once were with bathwater was bound to be amusing.
"My second divine aperture has opened!" Happy Arhat suddenly called out.
A powerful aura of divine spiritual power surged forth as Happy Arhat opened another divine aperture on the spot.
Linmu Celestial Liquid accelerated the process of condensing divine apertures; Happy Arhat already had accumulated enough foundation, so he directly broke through and opened a divine aperture.
His strength soared in an instant.
The other villagers also grew considerably stronger to varying degrees.
The diverse treasures within the Linmu Celestial Liquid nourished their physical bodies, flushing their cheeks with health and straightening their postures.
"Not bad. To reap this much from just the first tower."
Seeing Happy Arhat's strength rise naturally pleased Qi Yuan.
According to what had been said earlier, this Ancestral Land had seven whole tiers and over a hundred ancient towers.
If the bathwater in the very first tower was already this potent, then if better stuff lay ahead, their overall strength would surely see a major boost.
"Pack up these several tons of bathwater. We're heading to the next tower," Qi Yuan ordered.
The villagers had no idea why Qi Yuan kept calling Linmu Celestial Liquid "bathwater," but they didn't care.
They simply chalked it up to an odd accent or quirk of Qi Yuan's.
After all, how could such precious celestial liquid possibly be bathwater?
Who could ever bathe in such a vast quantity of priceless celestial liquid?
"Yes, Lord God!" Happy Arhat cheerfully took out storage bags and filled them all with the Linmu Celestial Liquid.
Qi Yuan swept his gaze across the tower. Inside, it was strewn everywhere with metallic scrap—all kinds of broken, bizarre contraptions.
To him, these things were practically useless.
"Let's go. To the second tower!" Qi Yuan waved his hand grandly.
The villagers followed Qi Yuan out of the tower.
Outside the tower, the group of Ancient Gods was still waiting in silence. Deeply worried, their nerves stretched taut, they stood ready to mount a rescue at any moment.
"It's been so long with no commotion at all. What is happening?" Venerable Yan Xi asked.
"Truly strange!"
They could hardly help finding it odd.
The towers were fraught with peril, where one could step on a figurative landmine at any second and wake the puppet god.
Over a hundred breaths had passed since they entered, yet there had not been the slightest stir—a rarity of rarities.
"Could it be that he really can divine fate?" the younger twin sister murmured in surprise.
The Ancient Gods smiled faintly upon hearing this, none of them taking it seriously.
Fate was the most fickle of all things.
Inside the Ancestral Land's towers, even a master diviner would meet his doom.
After all, the objects and laws within the Ancestral Land's towers were far more chaotic than those of the Mortal Heart Realm.
Just then, a voice suddenly drifted down: "What are you all doing here?"
The Ancient Gods snapped their heads up toward the sound.
At the very top of the tower, Qi Yuan pushed open a contraption resembling a glass window and leaped out.
The villagers followed suit, hopping out of the window one after another.
They vaulted out of the tower with an ease reminiscent of illicit lovers hopping out of a woman's bedroom window.
The Ancient Gods stood frozen.
They...
Blunt and outspoken, the younger twin blurted out, "How did you get to the top floor?!"
To come out from the top floor naturally meant they had reached it!
This tower had three whole floors.
Many Ancient Gods had bled and died on just the first floor, and to this day no Ancient God had ever set foot on the second.
How had two True Gods and a bunch of mortals made it all the way to the top floor and walked back out unscathed?!
Had the puppet god inside overslept?
The Ancient Gods were utterly dumbfounded.
Qi Yuan and his group touched down beside them. "I know how to tell fortunes, so naturally I found a path of survival. Pity there weren't any good treasures in this tower—just a bunch of bathwater."
Qi Yuan spoke at his leisure.
Indeed, the first tower hadn't held anything particularly good.
"Bathwater? Why would there be bathwater stored in a tower?"
The Ancient Gods exchanged bewildered looks, baffled by Qi Yuan's words.
"Just bathwater?"
"Wait, whose bathwater?"
Watching Qi Yuan and company emerge like this, numerous thoughts crossed their minds.
Either Qi Yuan was absurdly lucky, or he genuinely had some real skill, or the tower had malfunctioned.
Whatever the case, it filled them with envy and jealousy.
After all, Venerable Yan Xi had once entered this very first tower.
Unfortunately, merely a single breath after entering, he was pursued by a horde of puppet gods, and in the end he had to leave a thigh behind inside.
On that venture, after bitter hardship and devastating losses, he had only managed to snatch a wisp of golden gossamer, which he used as a face veil because of its aura-concealing properties.
His agonizing struggle stood in stark contrast to Qi Yuan's casual stroll.
An uncomfortable sense of unfairness welled within them.
Yet hearing that it was only "bathwater," their minds regained some balance.
That certainly didn't sound like any kind of treasure.
Right then, the elder twin suddenly glanced at the people behind Qi Yuan. "They seem to have undergone a complete metamorphosis, especially..."
She looked toward Happy Arhat and sensed that his strength had advanced a level.
In such a short time, his cultivation had skyrocketed!
There had to be a supreme treasure!
"Linmu Celestial Liquid! I smell Linmu Celestial Liquid!" A man with a large mole between his eyebrows stared at the villagers behind Qi Yuan, his eyes shining.
"Linmu Celestial Liquid! I smell it too!"
"It's actually Linmu Celestial Liquid!" The eyes of some Ancient Gods turned bloodshot.
For True Gods beneath Great Venerables, Linmu Celestial Liquid was a priceless treasure.
Not only was it delicious, but it also emitted a rare fragrance—an unparalleled delicacy of the world.
Most importantly, drinking a single drop would quintuple the speed of condensing divine apertures for ten years.
If a True God had been stuck without a breakthrough for a long time, drinking a few drops even offered a chance at breaking through.
Such precious Linmu Celestial Liquid, and yet... Qi Yuan had fed it directly to those mortals!
Judging by the aroma wafting from them, they hadn't just drunk a drop or two either.
What a waste of heaven's gifts!
Casting pearls before swine!
The Ancient Gods felt their hearts ache with distress.
The benefits such a treasure could bring to them would vastly exceed what it did for mere Origin Core and Divine Infant mortals.
"You mean this bathwater? It really is quite something. Shentu has always been frail and skinny, but after drinking it, he's put on some meat. If he likes drinking bathwater from now on, he'll have to drink a bowl every day. Otherwise, having such a frail fellow trailing behind me might make people mistake me for preferring the company of men."
Generally speaking, Qi Yuan didn't care what others gossiped about him.
He was always magnanimous—at worst, he would track them down and hack them to death in person.
But being accused of preferring men was something he could not accept.
He was a married man, after all.
"Bathwater? Linmu Celestial Liquid?"
"A bowl every day..."
The Ancient Gods were completely at a loss.
For an Origin Core—this was utterly wasteful!
*Go on, choke on it and burst!*
Certain Ancient Gods writhed with dark thoughts in their hearts.
"May I ask, Fellow Daoist, how much Linmu Celestial Liquid did you obtain?" the younger twin asked earnestly, her eyes burning with desire.
"Not much, just ten thousand jin or so," Qi Yuan replied casually.
The Ancient Gods' eyes reddened, their breath catching in their throats.
Were it not that they were on the same side, that Qi Yuan had done them a favor, and that they clung to their moral bottom line, such a treasure would have been more than enough to drive people to murder and plunder.
"Enough chatter. I need to head to the second tower. My goal is to sweep clean every tower before daybreak."
With that, Qi Yuan led his subjects away.
Seeing this, the Ancient Gods exchanged conflicted glances. In the end, they chose to follow.
Roughly a hundred breaths later, a new tower came into view.
Before the hearts of the Ancient Gods could settle, they watched Qi Yuan and his group boldly stride straight inside.
"Do you think... it was just a coincidence?"
"Even I want to follow them in. That's over ten thousand jin of Linmu Celestial Liquid!"
"The tower is rife with danger. Are you planning to march in and throw your life away?!"
"My eyes burn, I'm sick with jealousy, and my heart aches!" the man with the mole between his eyebrows said.
He voiced what everyone present was feeling.
They had risked life and limb, entering the Ancestral Land more than once, yet the treasures they had obtained didn't even amount to one ten-thousandth of what Qi Yuan had claimed in a single run.
How could they not be jealous?
"If you're so jealous, why don't you become Origin Celestial Venerable's subject just like those mortals?" the younger twin teased.
During their earlier exchanges, they had already shared their names.
Hearing this, the man with the mole flicked his sleeve. "Linmu Celestial Liquid is precious, but I'm not some spineless Ancient God!"
"Indeed. Precious as Linmu Celestial Liquid is, it's only so-so. Unless I could have a sip every day, this old man might consider switching nests," an old man chuckled.
"The first tower might have been luck, but they won't have such good fortune with the second. Everyone, let's stop chatting and watch closely. If anything goes wrong inside, we must be ready to act at a moment's notice!"
The Ancient Gods talked back and forth.
At this point, the man with the mole suddenly asked, "If they come out just like they did from the first tower, what... should we do?"
At those words, silence fell over the group.
Once, one could fool oneself into thinking it was a fluke.
Twice... calling it a fluke twice would just be playing oneself for a fool.
"If they come out of the second tower as well, and if the treasure they obtain is tempting enough, hehe, this old man's bones can soften a bit," Ancient God Wangsong said.
"Ancient God Wangsong, aren't you the proudest pine tree? How come you're also thinking of becoming another Ancient God's subject?" the man with the mole teased.
"Can't this old man suffer from osteoporosis?" Ancient God Wangsong retorted. "I am a pine tree—having soft pine wood in my bones makes perfect sense!"
The crowd chattered, each harboring their own thoughts.
Though they joked about submitting and becoming his subjects, most of it was just teasing, not their true intent.
Precious as these treasures were, they would at most help them advance from Step One to Step Two Sky Treading, or Step Two to Step Three. It wasn't enough to make them surrender their freedom to become the subjects of an unfamiliar Ancient God.
Even without these treasures, given enough time, they could eventually grind their way to higher realms.
There was no need to give up their freedom.
Meanwhile, inside the tower.
Qi Yuan led the group all the way to the top floor once again.
"This is... Taiyin Lightning Orbs!" Shrine Official Shentu was well-traveled and knowledgeable after all; looking at the terrifying thunder orbs packed inside a massive glass jar before them, his eyes filled with sheer terror.
"To think it's the legendary Taiyin Lightning Orbs, capable of annihilating an entire city with a single sphere!"
Taiyin Lightning Orbs were tiny spheres.
Depending on their size, their power varied.
The smallest were merely the size of mung beans, yet when unleashed, they packed the equivalent of a full-powered strike from a Step One Sky Treading Yin God.
The largest were as big as a fist, and when detonated, their boundless might rivaled a strike from a Great Venerable.
Inside the glass jar, mung-bean-sized Taiyin Lightning Orbs were too numerous to count.
And there were twelve fist-sized ones as well.
Yet here they sat, haphazardly stored in a glass jar.
Seeing this, the villagers' legs trembled uncontrollably.
If this went off, the souls of everyone present would be blasted straight into the heavens.
Qi Yuan glanced at the legendary Taiyin Lightning Orbs, a curious look in his eyes.
[Taiyin Lightning Orb, also known as Fish-Blasting Thunderclap Pellet, deeply beloved by certain children.]
"For blasting fish?" Curiosity flickered across Qi Yuan's eyes.
The immense power of these Taiyin Lightning Orbs was even more ferocious than nuclear weapons from his past life.
And yet, they were merely children's toys for blasting fish.
The waters here ran deep indeed.
Then again, reminding himself that he was just a gamer, why bother overthinking it?
"This kid sure had a collector's habit, hoarding so many firecrackers. A pity they're mine now," Qi Yuan said smugly.
His adult self had finally treated his childhood self to a whole glass jar of firecrackers.
Qi Yuan held up the glass jar and showed it off. "See that? Look at all the firecrackers I've got!"
These firecrackers were throw-and-pop bangers, and they could blast fish to boot.
Qi Yuan figured that if he threw one into a river to blast fish, filmed a short video, and uploaded it to Weishi, he would definitely earn heaps of praise from guys everywhere.
"See that? This guy's firecrackers can blast fish!"
Unfortunately, Qi Yuan's showing off was entirely lost on the villagers of Qingshui Village.
Staring at the glass jar, their legs shook violently, terrified that a careless slip from Qi Yuan might detonate the Taiyin Lightning Orbs.
If this many Taiyin Lightning Orbs blew up, the resulting carnage would be unimaginable.
"This haul is way better than the first tower. Let's go!" With a flick of his sleeve, Qi Yuan led everyone out through the window once more.
In this tower, the greatest harvest was the Taiyin Lightning Orbs.
As for the other odds and ends, the villagers took quite a few, treasuring them like prized heirlooms, though Qi Yuan didn't care for any of them.
Outside, the waiting Ancient Gods sensed something and widened their eyes.
"They're out!"
"They actually made it out!"
"Could it be that he really is a divination genius?!"
The Ancient Gods were thoroughly confounded, feeling as though their very grasp of reality had been ruthlessly trampled underfoot.
"You're still here?" Qi Yuan looked at the Ancient Gods in surprise. "The game devs really need to upgrade the NPC AI. All they know how to do is stand around as spectators."
Qi Yuan had played many games, and NPCs in games generally shared several traits:
1. Frequently spacing out.
2. Sloppy modeling.
3. Getting new skins during holidays.
4. Having optional side quests that didn't affect main quest progression.
5. Low HP.
In Qi Yuan's eyes, the Ancient Gods before him were quintessential NPCs.
If he chucked a single fist-sized Taiyin Lightning Orb at them, this whole bunch of NPCs would drop dead, and it wouldn't affect his main quest progression in the slightest.
The younger twin sister seemed to notice something; her eyes went wide, and she bristled like a startled cat. "Taiyin Lightning Orbs! So many Taiyin Lightning Orbs!"
Inside Qi Yuan's glass jar, there were easily over a thousand mung-bean-sized Taiyin Lightning Orbs, and over a dozen fist-sized ones.
All of these Taiyin Lightning Orbs sat sloshing in the glass jar, rattling terrifyingly with every motion of Qi Yuan's hand.
The rest of the Ancient Gods were equally shocked as they noticed them, terror filling their eyes.
Holding the glass jar, Qi Yuan said calmly, "Don't be scared, everyone. These are just for blasting fish."
Once again, he showed off his firecrackers.
The Ancient Gods remained speechless, staring warily at the Taiyin Lightning Orbs.
Those fist-sized Taiyin Lightning Orbs—once detonated, none of them would even have a prayer of escaping.
"Your luck... is truly extraordinary, to be able to find such treasures!" How could the Ancient Gods not be envious?
Ancient God Wangsong's eyes gleamed red.
If the Linmu Celestial Liquid had only inspired envy, these Taiyin Lightning Orbs stirred naked jealousy.
Looking at Qi Yuan, he couldn't help but say, "Fellow Daoist, may this old man enter the next tower with you? This old man... is willing to serve you for ten years—no, to become your subject for ten years!"
He already suffered from osteoporosis anyway; what was wrong with softening his bones a little?
Ten years in exchange for a treasure—an absolute bargain!
Qi Yuan was slightly surprised. "Barely passable, but fine."
Adding one more person presented zero difficulty for him.
In ten years' time, he might have already finished beating the game.
The other Ancient Gods looked at Ancient God Wangsong with utter disdain.
Just then, the man with the mole spoke up: "Fellow Daoist, I too wish to follow Ancient God Wangsong's example and enter the new tower with you. One tower, ten years as your subject!"
Qi Yuan nodded. "All right."
Seeing this, the remaining Ancient Gods tossed aside their earlier hesitation and disdain.
They chimed in one after another.
"Fellow Daoist, count me in too!"
"Origin Celestial Venerable, my sister and I want in as well!"
Now that the dam had broken, none of the remaining Ancient Gods cared about saving face.
In just a dozen breaths, all eight Ancient Gods present chose to follow Qi Yuan into the towers.
Qi Yuan's eyes twinkled with amusement. "Ten years per tower. With over a hundred towers here, you'll be working for me for well over a thousand years."
Chapter 202