Chapter 32: The Ten Thousand Beast Banner?

Passing through the mist formation, the valley beyond, which looked shrouded in clouds and silence from the outside, turned out to be bustling with activity.

The streets were full of passing cultivators, and roadside stalls were everywhere. Most of these stalls were selling unranked talismans, damaged manuals, freshly gathered low-grade herbs, and in some cases, outright piles of junk awaiting a gullible buyer to take the bait.

At these stalls, Qi Refining cultivators argued loudly over the price of a single spirit stone—some left elated, others disappointed. The diversity of expressions painted a vivid picture of life.

In contrast, the shops lining both sides of the street were clearly much higher-end. Their shelves displayed talismans, magical tools, and rare materials.

In front of one particular pavilion adorned with red lanterns, Lu Yan even saw several beautiful female cultivators in thin dresses enticing customers.

All these women were uniformly at the First Layer of Qi Refining—having just shed their mortal shells. They were only slightly better off than Lu Yan himself when he was doing menial labor at the Talisman Hall.

But they had one overwhelming advantage: beauty.

The cultivation world lacked neither beautiful women nor female cultivators. Especially after reaching a certain level, it was a simple matter to reshape one’s appearance through cleansing and remolding techniques. There was no shortage of stunning beauties.

However, such women were either powerful in their own right or backed by formidable forces and had nothing to do with most bottom-tier rogue cultivators.

As for beautiful mortal women, those held little allure for most cultivators—they were too easy to obtain.

Thus, a particular industry had emerged. Some cultivators would venture into mortal cities to select beautiful women. Those with talent were long ago snatched up by the major sects. The ones left behind generally had poor aptitude and couldn’t progress far on the path of cultivation.

But rogue cultivators didn’t care about their potential.

They’d simply pass down specific techniques and then recklessly use pills to rapidly increase their spiritual energy and refine their bodies, forcibly pushing them to the First Layer of Qi Refining.

Women who became cultivators through such means would never improve further. Some even suffered permanent damage to their dantians due to inferior pills, making it difficult to circulate spiritual energy at all.

Even so, they had still transcended their mortal shells. With the identity of a true cultivator, they could easily attract the attention of some rogue cultivators.

Lu Yan felt no particular sympathy for them.

After all, he had actually been worked to the bone at the Talisman Hall—and had nearly had his soul extracted and refined.

By comparison, these women could live for 120 years. If they saved up some money, they might even enjoy a comfortable life in a mortal city one day. That wasn’t such a bad outcome.

Given the commonalities across different version settings, Lu Yan had strong suspicions that these female cultivators were likely the equivalent of borderline streamers on small platforms during the Urban Version.

Sighing at the decay of societal values, Lu Yan took a walk around the entire Qinggu Market.

Situated atop a spiritual vein, the ambient spiritual energy here was fairly concentrated—about six times greater than in the Urban Version, though still inferior to the Post-Apocalyptic Version.

And that wasn’t even accounting for the Lunar Essence and Sun Essence unique to the Post-Apocalyptic world, which widened the gap even more.

But then again, this street was located on the outer edge of Qinggu Market’s spiritual vein. The deepest part of the valley had the richest concentration of spiritual energy.

The market’s administrators had carved out caves into the valley cliffs, renting them as cultivation residences. The spiritual density there was significantly higher than in the outskirts.

And this was merely a First-Grade Spiritual Vein.

The major sects typically established themselves on Third-Grade or even Fourth-Grade Spiritual Veins, which operated on an entirely different level.

Lu Yan couldn’t help but feel a little wistful—and began to consider staying in Qinggu Market for the time being.

But before that, he needed to purchase some essentials and gather information.

Instead of entering the ornate shops, Lu Yan went straight to the roadside stalls. He picked up a copy of the Compendium of First-Tier Spells from a stall stacked with old books.

The spells listed in this compendium were the most basic—utterly commonplace.

But to someone like Lu Yan, who lacked formal cultivation knowledge, the Compendium of First-Tier Spells was exactly what he needed.

Spirit Fire, Flight, Featherlight, Invisibility—these spells weren’t great in combat, but they were incredibly useful in various scenarios. Especially for someone like Lu Yan who constantly traveled across different version worlds, such utility spells were essential.

Though Lu Yan had a fair number of talismans, casting spells directly was far more convenient.

And most importantly—spells didn’t cost money.

The copy of the Compendium of First-Tier Spells on the stall had clearly passed through many hands. The pages were worn to the point of gloss, and some even had hand-written notes from previous owners—little tricks and casting tips. It was actually quite practical.

“How much for this book?” Lu Yan asked.

The vendor gave him a quick once-over before replying, “Twenty-five spirit stones.”

Lu Yan sneered, tossed the book down, and turned to leave.

A brand-new copy of this book only cost thirty spirit stones—and those even came with spirit resonance inscriptions to aid spell comprehension.

An old copy like this one, circulated who knows how many times, was worth no more than fifteen.

“Just kidding! Just kidding!”

Seeing Lu Yan about to leave, the vendor quickly changed his tune.

“How about this—twenty spirit stones and it’s yours.”

“Twelve.”

“Come on, that’s a little too ruthless. It might be second-hand, but all the spells are intact, and there are even annotations. What about fifteen?”

“Thirteen.”

After a round of haggling, Lu Yan finally bought the compendium for thirteen spirit stones.

Though the vendor grumbled about taking a loss, he couldn’t hide the gleam of joy in his eyes. Among all the books at his stall, this one was among the pricier items—but demand for it was low.

Any cultivator with a proper background already had these spells, so the compendium often ended up as dead stock. It had been in his hands for two years.

Finally selling it was a great relief.

Noticing the subtle change in the vendor’s expression, Lu Yan crouched down and began rummaging through the books while casually speaking:

“I just arrived in this region. I heard from some fellow cultivators that things haven’t been very peaceful around here lately.”

“Unrest? What unrest? Must’ve been—”

The vendor suddenly caught himself, then quickly changed the topic.

“Ahem. We’re under the protection of a true disciple of Qingwu Sect—one of the top sects in Southern Frontier. You’ve nothing to worry about, fellow cultivator.”

Lu Yan’s heart sank slightly.

The mention of Zhulinfang likely referred to the death of Gongyang Xuanming.

As he pondered this, the vendor’s tone suddenly shifted again.

“Though if you want to talk about unrest, well… recently something strange did happen in the Wushan Range, three thousand li from here. If you’re planning to hunt spirit beasts there, you’d better be careful.”

Lu Yan raised an eyebrow in interest and cupped his fists. “I’d appreciate it if fellow Daoist could share more.”

The vendor gave a knowing, amused smile.

“Hundreds of years ago, a Golden Core cultivator from Wanling Mountain tried to breed spirit beasts. He raised a massive population in the Wushan Range and had them mate with ordinary animals, hoping to refine their bloodlines through hybridization.

“Wanling Mountain spent centuries on the project, but the result was only a batch of wild beasts with extremely weak spirit beast bloodlines. They’re all over the Wushan Range.

“But these hybrids have unstable bloodlines, incomplete souls—forget producing spirit beasts, most can’t even fully develop their three souls and seven spirits. The whole thing became a laughingstock in Southern Frontier.

“However, three months ago, a madman suddenly appeared in Wushan and began slaughtering these hybrid beasts, extracting their fragmented souls.”

“At first, Wanling Mountain didn’t care. But his killing spree escalated—over 100,000 of these pseudo-spirit beasts were slain in just three months. It finally drew the attention of their elders.”

“Rumor has it that the madman is trying to create a banner like the Ten Thousand Soul Banner… but using beasts instead.”

“He’s trying to forge a Ten Thousand Beast Banner!”

(End of Chapter)