"Let us speak while riding the wind."
Kong Yu had clearly been waiting for this for a long time. Terrified that his fellow disciples might steal his business, he could not bear to linger at the foot of the mountain gate for even a moment longer. Riding the wind across Shanji Commandery, he said, "According to my master, it should be some venerable lord from Mount Luoxia, the northern orthodox immortal sect, who descended to undergo a tribulation. I have no idea which eminent figure it might be. In any case, it will all go according to the script: Qi Refinement in nine months, Foundation Establishment in three years, surrounded by beauties, toppling noble clans, purging demonic cultivators, enjoying every earthly blessing... all the way until he returns north..."
"This! This..."
Li Xuanxuan was somewhat incredulous, yet at a loss for words. He could only murmur, "If that is the case, the two of us are merely passing through. Surely no harm could come of it..."
A flicker of terror crossed Kong Yu's face. He said in a muffled voice, "You have never encountered such people before, Fellow Daoist, so naturally it sounds like nothing to you—just a prodigy, right? But the day you meet one who carries destiny or even a golden nature, you will understand.
"Senior Tongya should know of this as well. You can simply ask him when you return."
With that, he clamped his mouth shut. No matter how Li Xuanxuan probed and prodded, he would not breathe another word on the matter.
The two had no choice but to change the subject and chat about other things. By the time they crossed out of Shanji Commandery, night had fallen in all its depth. Kong Yu took out a jade box, placed it in his palm, puffed his cheeks, and blew a swath of black cloud out from it. He called out, "Fellow Daoist, this is the magical artifact Night Walking Cloud. It can conceal our presence. The journey ahead is perilous, after all; bring that spirit beast of yours inside."
"Very well!"
Li Xuanxuan did not stand on ceremony. Though the Xuanyue Gate was fallen and desolate, it was an ancient lineage nonetheless. As a descendant of Real Person Changxi, Kong Yu was adorned with treasures from head to toe.
With demonic cultivators running amok nowadays, the two of them could not travel through Yufu Commandery. They had to journey through the hills and dense forests, where rogue cultivators and dilapidated shrines littered the wilderness. There was no telling how many demonic cultivators lay in ambush; it was exceedingly dangerous.
They had no choice but to rest and cultivate during the day, then ride the wind by night. Kong Yu was a talkative man with considerable insight into the path of talismans. As he compared his knowledge with Li Xuanxuan's talisman arts, both gained a great deal—an unexpected pleasant surprise.
One day, as they flew near the border between Yue and Xu, a cultivator fled before them riding a demonic wind. Golden light streamed through the night sky behind him as another person pursued relentlessly, driving a golden ring that cleaved through the air.
They had witnessed such scenes many times before and had always avoided them. What was more, both the immortal cultivator and the demon were at the peak of Qi Refinement, hardly people to provoke. Yet Kong Yu halted in his tracks and whispered, "Someone from Tangjin Gate... The Situ family has ties of friendship with my Kong clan. I cannot simply look on with folded arms... Allow me to lend a hand."
With that, he sacrificed a jade seal and sent it hurtling toward the demon's head. Li Xuanxuan sighed, but he too unleashed several spells and coordinated them with talismans to obstruct the demonic cultivator.
*Boom!*
The demonic cultivator was already at his wit's end. Flanked on both sides and hindered by the two of them, his secret escape and life-preserving techniques proved useless against two disciples of immortal sects. Within a few dozen exchanges, he lost his life.
The Tangjin Gate disciple waved his golden ring, unleashing a hazy golden radiance that seized the demonic cultivator's corpse and drew it before him, clearly intending to claim everything for himself. Without the slightest courtesy, he demanded bluntly, "Who goes there?"
Li Xuanxuan did not care to deal with him, so he feigned deference by stepping behind Kong Yu. Kong Yu also frowned, replying, "I am of the Xuanyue Kong clan. It has indeed been quite some time since I last encountered anyone from Tangjin Gate. My intervention just now was not out of a desire for spoils. Rather, the Kong clan has always remembered the favor of you yielding the path in years past, which is why I lent a hand."
"Oh?"
The young man seemed exceptionally cold. Meeting Kong Yu's warm face with a frigid glare, he drawled, "Oh?! Fellow Daoist is quite the meddler."
Kong Yu's face fell, unable to conceal his embarrassment. Just as he flicked his sleeve to turn away, the young man sneered with an equally sour expression, "And here I wondered who it was—turns out to be the 'One Stick of Incense Clan'!"
"Junior, how dare you?!"
Kong Yu flared up in fury. His magical artifact rose into the air as he shouted in anger. The young man showed no fear whatsoever, only showing disgust as he replied, "Let this be known to you: Kong Nuanmeng married Situ Li, and that branch of his was wiped out by my own lineage, the lineage of Situ Mo, long ago! If your Kong clan dares mention any favor of yielding the path again, you will be making an enemy of my house!"
Kong Yu's complexion shifted, stunned by the sheer absurdity of the words. He looked at him as though seeing a freak of nature, caught between furious rage and bitter laughter. Gritting his teeth, he said, "You muddleheaded fool! Situ Tang was a hero of his generation, yet he spawned foolish vermin like you!"
With that, he turned on his heel and left. Ignoring the shocked and enraged expression of Situ Mo, a direct descendant of Tangjin Gate, he rode the wind away in haste. Li Xuanxuan, who had been hiding in the cloud trembling with fear, breathed a long sigh of relief upon seeing that the man had not pursued them. He sighed, "Fellow Daoist, why bother?
"The techniques of Tangjin Gate excel in combat, and that Situ Mo carries the air of a direct young master. The golden ring in his hand was exceedingly formidable. If you had truly pushed him to bloodshed, disaster would surely have followed."
If a real fight broke out, Kong Yu, an old fellow nearly a century old who had failed to break through to Foundation Establishment, might not die, but a petty talisman shopkeeper like Li Xuanxuan would almost certainly lose his life. Naturally, he had been frightened to death.
Kong Yu let out a sigh and said sullenly, "Back then, when Real Person Changxi passed by Mount Tangjin, his movement of the mountain affected the earth veins, forcing Tangjin Gate to relocate several peaks. That was how ties were forged, and an engagement was arranged. Who would have thought that with the passage of time, the Situ family would become home to such arrogant, decadent young masters?"
With Tangjin Gate in turmoil for so long, how could Kong Yu not know of the changes in the Situ family? The branch into which the Kong daughter had married had long been slaughtered down to the last person.
It was only because the Kong clan was weak and feeble, unwilling to breed grudges, that they attributed the debt of gratitude to Tangjin Gate as a whole, hoping to remain allies. Now, after being cursed out so ruthlessly and counted as enemies by Situ Mo, Kong Yu's heart had turned entirely cold.
Li Xuanxuan was still turning over the words "One Stick of Incense Clan" in his mind. He refrained from asking right away, offering only quiet comfort while waiting for him to speak.
Li Xuanxuan was no sheltered noble scion who had cultivated peacefully on an immortal mountain from childhood. Having tumbled through several decades of mortal worldly affairs, the old man understood human nature all too well.
The moment they met, Kong Yu had brought up his deceased eldest senior brother, and now he had rambled on about the favor of yielding the path. Clearly, he was of a self-pitying nature, someone who could never bottle up his sorrow. There was no need to probe; after barely a dozen breaths, Kong Yu indeed opened his mouth:
"To tell you the truth, my Kong clan suffered terribly from affairs like the one in Yufu Commandery.
"My late grandfather died in just such an ordeal. Back then, he went out to collect spiritual items. As he drew near Jishui Commandery in the state of Daxu, he lost his mind and fell into madness. Traveling thousands of li just to seek out a tiny tavern would have been strange enough, but he insisted on hurling insults and humiliating a young lad.
"The youth merely sneered and walked away. Half a year later, he stormed our clan and struck my grandfather dead. And my late great-great-grandfather, a grand immortal cultivator at the peak of Foundation Establishment, actually let a Qi Refinement cultivator slip right through his fingers!"
Li Xuanxuan felt as though he were listening to a storybook. In utter disbelief, he exclaimed, "How could that be possible?!"
"How could it not be?!"
Kong Yu's face was steeped in gloom, his teeth grinding audibly as he muttered in a low voice, "With his own son beaten to death before his eyes, his mind became bewitched. He actually played some absurd game of 'holding out for a stick of incense' with that youth! And he ended up losing to him, becoming a laughingstock ever since!
"Tell me, is that not laughable?!"
He burst into loud, bitter laughter, his voice sinking low. "Every person sent out by our family turned into a fool, fed to him one by one as nourishment. In the end, even my late great-great-grandfather at the peak of Foundation Establishment died by his hand. That youth trampled our immortal mountain into dust, disbanded the Kong clan, and finally returned north."
"What of Real Person Changxi?"
Li Xuanxuan's mouth went dry. Listening to the tale, he hurried to ask.
Kong Yu replied in a whisper, "Later, Real Person Changxi returned after making his breakthrough. But our Kong clan, an established house of three hundred years, had crumbled to pieces within three years, earning the name 'One Stick of Incense Clan.' Real Person Changxi was filled with dread and unease, so he relocated away from the state of Daxu, which was how the Xuanyue Gate came to be."
"Alas..."
Li Xuanxuan broke into a cold sweat down his back. Sighing in sympathy, he thought to himself, *No wonder the Xuanyue Gate is so destitute. Most of their cultivated clansmen were wiped out back then, and they still haven't recovered even now...*
Kong Yu's face was drenched in sorrow as he replied, "Every page of my Kong clan's calamity is inscribed with the word 'helpless.' Heaven only knows what powerlessness my ancestors felt when they met with that disaster.
"This affair caused an uproar in Daxu, known to everyone far and wide. The clansmen who fled in refuge blended into various families, spreading the tale even further."
Moved by his words, Li Xuanxuan asked softly, "That figure from back then... what was his name and title?"
Kong Yu spread his hands and chuckled. "His name? A lowly cultivator like me dares not utter it."
Li Xuanxuan was choked into silence. Reflecting on everything he had heard, he suddenly felt something was amiss and murmured, "Since he is such an untouchable lord, why go to such lengths... to make it known to everyone? There is no benefit to your family... Forgetting this matter is the only way to preserve the lives of your descendants..."
*Spreading it far and wide like this—is it not blatantly declaring to that great lord that the Kong family harbors deep hatred?*
Li Xuanxuan added that thought in his heart. Yet Kong Yu looked deeply at him and answered, "A lowly cultivator like me dares not speak his name, dares not hate, and dares not avoid discussing it. Whenever this matter is mentioned, I must recount it in full, from beginning to end. For nothing else than to keep this story alive, to flatter that lord, all so we may scrape by and survive.
"After all, it is a storybook script that the venerable lord painstakingly orchestrated. The wider the story spreads, the more the Kong clan serves as the stele witnessing his rise, and the less that lord wishes to see my family extinguished.
"For if even the story's villains forget the tale, where would the audience find any amusement in the play?"
Kong Yu's voice fell somber.
***
The Li family.
As the end of the year drew near, white snow drifted down; the day to collect tributes was fast approaching.
Li Yuanping finished tallying the registered households. Under the Li family's governance, the five peaks and eighteen towns now sustained three hundred and twenty thousand people, which, combined with the two hundred and eighty thousand of the Eastern Shanyue, totaled a full six hundred thousand people.
These six hundred thousand people were the fruit of the three brothers—Li Yuanxiu, Li Yuanjiao, and Li Yuanping—persistently relocating populations day in and day out over decades. They had shifted people from the densely packed regions of Lijing and Huaqian to the newly acquired mountains of Huazhong and Yuting. Coupled with the demonic calamity that had driven refugees from the eastern shore families and the Yu family toward the Li clan, they had finally achieved their present state.
"Six hundred thousand people!"
The richness of the Li family's five peaks was second only to the vast fertile plains of the dense forest, far better than the deep, wild mountains of the Fei family. Yet sustaining six hundred thousand people was reaching the absolute limit.
Thanks to this, although the Li family's Qi Refinement cultivators could be counted on two hands, they possessed the largest number of Embryonic Breathing cultivators among all the local houses. With the five peaks instituting the administrative system overnight, the registered Embryonic Breathing cultivators surged, climbing from nearly two hundred before the end of the year to a full three hundred-odd today.
Li Yuanping understood the cause clearly: on the one hand, the prominent clans saw profit to be had and promptly registered the cultivators they had cultivated under the Li clan's registry; on the other hand, rogue cultivators caught scent of benefits and immediately came to offer their allegiance.
"Nothing moves hearts like wealth and prestige!"
A sneer appeared on Li Yuanping's pale face.
*The external surnames and prominent clans must still be hiding more than half of their Embryonic Breathing cultivators from the registry, fearing that I, Li Yuanping, am playing tricks, waiting for this piece of meat to drop first!*
Looking at the registers, he murmured softly, "Once you are entered into the books... it will no longer be up to you!
"Please invite them in!"
As Li Yuanping gave the order, Dou Yi immediately went down to announce it. A line of cultivators filed into the hall one after another. At their head were An Zheyan and Tian Zhongqing. The An and Tian families had contributed the most, so naturally they walked in front, followed by the Chen, Xu, Ren, and Xu clans...
"In this demonic calamity, the Tian family rendered the greatest service."
Li Yuanping looked down at the assembly and said softly, "Tian Zhongqing shall serve as the Fengqian of Mount Huaqian."
Tian Zhongqing was not surprised by Li Yuanping's appointment.
Li Yuanping's administrative peak system established three heads: the Fengmu, the Fengqian, and the Fengzheng.
The Fengzheng held the formation disks and were drawn entirely from the Li clan's direct and collateral branches. Though not particularly strong in cultivation, they wielded the formation disks; so long as they inspected them from time to time, they could cultivate in peace.
The Fengmu was held exclusively by Embryonic Breathing cultivators, overseeing three bureaus below them: taxation, general affairs, and supervision. Commanding dozens of Embryonic Breathing cultivators, it was an arduous, taxing position, and it was impossible to place Tian Zhongqing there.
The Fengqian was a Qi Refinement cultivator assigned to guard the peak, responsible for slaying demons and subduing monsters. As the strongest individual on the peak, it was the most leisurely assignment. Tian Zhongqing was barely forty years old, an ideal time to advance his cultivation.
"Xu Gongming shall serve as the Fengqian of Mount Yuting; Xu Shumu shall serve as the Fengmu of Mount Huazhong; Xu Gongyu shall serve as the Fengmu of Mount Wutu; Shamoli shall serve as the Fengqian of Mount Wutu..."
Li Yuanping promoted only veterans and meritorious contributors from the demonic calamity. Each peak commanded one Qi Refinement cultivator, three miscellaneous qi cultivators, and dozens of Embryonic Breathing cultivators of varying levels. Most of the Embryonic Breathing cultivators were dispatched day-to-day to farm the fields and manage general affairs, rather than remaining upon the mountains.
Seeing that the positions were roughly filled to a degree that could barely maintain operations, Li Yuanping stopped reading the remaining vacancies.
The cultivators all looked over one after another. Li Yuanping put away the documents in his hand and said warmly, "The cultivators within our clan remain insufficient. Once the Embryonic Breathing cultivators allocated to the various peaks are fully staffed, I shall promote those with merit from among them."
Seeing their hesitant, glancing expressions, Li Yuanping smiled and said, "There are only so many positions on the peaks, appraised according to cultivation and merit. Every position comes equipped with a magical artifact, distributions of medicinal pills, and the establishment of a cave dwelling. Supporting all this strains the clan's resources considerably."
The moment these three conditions were laid out, the eyes of the guest elders, prominent clans, and collateral branches below instantly turned red. In these times, with demonic cultivators running rampant, once one ventured out, one could forget about returning. The sole source of magical artifacts and medicinal pills was the main family.
The Li family was poor, but the cultivators governed by the Li family were poorer still. Although the peak duties came bundled with magical artifacts—which had to be returned should one lose the post—several families could not even boast a single magical artifact between them.
What was more, pills and cave dwellings served to increase one's cultivation. Breaking through a little earlier might grant an additional century of life. Such a temptation was impossible to relinquish...
Seeing their wavering gazes and rising greed, Li Yuanping nodded and waved his hand, dismissing them.
*The serpent demon cave dwelling is even larger than we imagined. The direct line lacks no cave dwellings for cultivation, so we can cast these mountain cave dwellings to them... The magical artifacts would just sit idle anyway; all we are expending is a bit of clan stipend and some pills.*
Li Yuanping let out a breath. Looking at the sparse few reports on his desk, he prepared to expand the Jade Court Guard and the Clan Rectory.
"Another increase in stipends... Spirit rice, spirit stones, spirit pills—which of them are we not lacking? The spiritual materials at the bottom of Lake Wangyue are truly too scarce. If only we could freely enter Mount Dali..."
Chapter 372