Chapter 631 (3): The Light Breeze and the Shimmering Moonlight

Fu Ke picked up his flagon of wine, then continued drinking alone as he cast his gaze out the door and murmured to himself, "You came to me to see if you could change your fate, and I reciprocated. I left the Rain Dragon Sect to meet you, and I gave you an opportunity of a lifetime. If you had remained grateful instead of taking everything that I gave you for granted, perhaps I would've even made you my right-hand man.

“Your cultivation base and aptitude aren't anything special, but you've always been a smart man. Unfortunately, you've decided to squander this opportunity, so you can't blame me for silencing you. You're only a cultivator of the Lower Five Tiers, and you've never witnessed the scenery on the mountain summit, yet I have.

“It's a beautiful place, but you must also constantly tread with caution because a fall from the mountain summit will shatter you into a million pieces. I can tell that you were initially grateful to me, but you've since shown yourself to be an envious and insatiable wolf that I can never satisfy.

“If I keep you by my side, I'm eventually going to regret it, so I may as well put an end to things here and now. You know, there was another reason why I decided to keep you by my side. Every time I saw you, it served as a warning of sorts to me. Seeing you reminded me of how low and wretched I once was, and it served as a warning for me to never grow complacent or take anything for granted.

“You really think it's a big deal if you die? I can simply leave this place without doing anything or offering any explanation, and the entirety of Green Jade Island will pretend like you never existed. Well, I suppose that's not true. Even though you're dead, they'll still be grateful to you for establishing a connection between Green Jade Island and me.

“You could've easily lived a cozy life here, with the entire island treating you like an esteemed guest. That's what a smart person would've done. In the end, you were too short-sighted, and it's led to your demise."

Fu Ke rose to his feet, then turned to take a glance at the lifeless Yu Fujing as he concluded, "I told you not to get drunk or you may say something that you'll regret, but you didn't listen."

With that, he really did simply depart from Green Jade Island without any explanation, returning to the Rain Dragon Sect on his talismanic boat.

As he lay on the talismanic boat with his eyes closed, he began to think about his future. For now, his priority was to reach the Nascent Tier, and from there, he would ascend to the Upper Five Tiers and become leader of the Rain Dragon Sect.

He would then lay claim to the Water Essence Palace on Stalactite Mountain, following which he would return to the Eastern Treasured Vial Continent to visit all of the celestial maidens that he had once regarded as goddesses who were completely out of his reach.

He would take a few of them as his maidservants, such as Su Jia of Sun Scorch Mountain... Actually, no, she had already fallen from grace, reduced from a phoenix soaring in the heavens to an earthbound chicken with its wings clipped and its legs broken. She could be the most beautiful woman in the world, but it still wouldn't change the fact that she was damaged goods that weren't worth touching.

Fu Ke raised a hand up high, then gently clenched it into a fist as he smiled and murmured to himself, "I wonder if I'll have the chance to claim a few of the female sword immortals on the Sword Qi Great Wall for myself. I hear that Luo Jian and Situ Weiran are both quite young and beautiful, and they're also top-tier prodigies to boot. Maybe I'll have a chance to swoop in and take them once the Sword Qi Great Wall falls."

Even if the Sword Qi Great Wall were to fall, the Confucian sages would be the ones to clean up the mess, so Fu Ke and the Rain Dragon Sect had nothing to worry about, and there was no guarantee that the Sword Qi Great Wall would fall anyway.

Fu Ke couldn't help but find the swordsmen of the Sword Qi Great Wall rather amusing. The Qi refiners of the Majestic World were all scared of death, yet the swordsmen of the Sword Qi Great Wall seemed to all embrace death and be terrified of living.

It's a real shame that those imbeciles of the Savage World are so useless, he thought to himself.

***

Reed Flower Island was a neighbor of the Rain Dragon Sect, yet it hadn't become a subsidiary island to the sect, and that hinted at the notion that there was something special about the island.

Over the past thousand years, that sword immortal was the only one who had managed to come out on top against the Rain Dragon Sect. Aside from him, all other cultivators who passed through the area, including even the earth immortals and Upper Five Tiers immortals, had all been forced to submit to the Rain Dragon Sect in one way or another.

The Rain Dragon Sect was situated very far away from the three nearest continents, so its authority was almost completely unchallenged, and under many circumstances, the rules of the Rain Dragon Sect had to be obeyed over even the rules of the Confucian academies.

The reason why Reed Flower Island hadn't been forced into submission by the Rain Dragon Sect even after all this time actually had nothing to do with the native cultivators on the island. Instead, it had everything to do with a set of ancient ruins on the island, which had been given the name of the Creation Cave by some people who had nothing better to do.

It was said that there was an unfathomable Daoist cultivator of unknown origins in the cave who claimed the entirety of its fortune and didn't allow anyone else to encroach upon his territory. However, even the most senior cultivators on Reed Flower Island were unable to definitively corroborate or refute this story, as it was all in the far-too-distant past.

None of the foreign cultivators who dared to venture into the Creation Cave had returned, and over time, it simply became ubiquitously acknowledged as an off-limits area. After all, no matter how precious fated opportunities were, they would hardly do you any good if you were dead.

The fact that even the Rain Dragon Sect hadn't conquered these ruins was already very telling, and all of the cultivators of Reed Flower Island knew that it was in their best interests to leave the place well alone.

The only relatively close neighbor to Reed Flower Island was the Rain Dragon Sect's southwesternmost subsidiary island, and it was actually only a distant neighbor to the Rain Dragon Sect.

There were many cultivators on Reed Flower Island, but the island wasn't very wealthy, and the blame for that fell squarely upon the reclusive Parasol Leaf Continent. The continent was so averse to interacting with other continents that it wasn't willing to construct even a single intercontinental ship.

While it was true that the route from the Parasol Leaf Continent to Stalactite Mountain was more perilous than the other routes, such as the one from Old Dragon City, that was really not a valid excuse. If the Parasol Leaf Sect and the Jade Tablet Sect were determined to make it happen, then they could easily establish a trade route between the Parasol Leaf Continent and Stalactite Mountain.

Unfortunately, even though the Parasol Leaf Continent wasn't lacking in powerful sects, they were also renowned across the entire Majestic World for their self-sufficiency. For example, the Jade Tablet Sect owned the Cloud Cave Blessed Land, so the profits to be made from intercontinental trade really didn't appeal to them at all.

In the words of Jiang Shangzhen, "I can make money even from sneezing and farting; I don't have the spare time to go all the way to Stalactite Mountain to make money! You can mock me for my meager cultivation base, but I won't allow anyone to insult my money-making abilities! If anyone dares to do that, then I'll crush them under the weight of my wealth!"

If the Parasol Leaf Continent had some intercontinental ships, then Reed Flower Island would be the prime location to house an intermediary ferry station.

Reed Flower Island was very cut off from the outside world, and they primarily made money by sending pearl divers out to sea.

Hence, the cultivators on the island really liked to gossip about things that happened outside of their island. After all, hardly anything interesting ever happened on the island, and unlike the Rain Dragon Sect, Reed Flower Island had never produced any noteworthy prodigies.

On this day, a conflict broke out between two groups of young individuals, all of whom had very mediocre aptitude for cultivation.

They were debating whether a certain prodigious swordsman of the Rain Dragon Sect would be able to compare with the most exceptional prodigies of the Sword Qi Great Wall. This so-called prodigy had become a Golden Core Tier swordsman before turning a hundred.

One camp said there was no comparison between the two, while the other disagreed.

As their bickering continued, the conversation began to shift, and before they knew it, they had begun discussing the Sword Qi Great Wall.

Some of them said that the Sword Qi Great Wall was home to countless heroic figures and had the most sword immortals in any given place. It was said that one would be able to see sword immortals everywhere they went, even if they were only taking a stroll out on the street.

They proclaimed that the Sword Qi Great Wall was a sacred place, and that a cultivator would have wasted their life if they didn't go to visit the Sword Qi Great Wall and drink there at least once.

Ever since the beginning of time, the most effective trick in an argument had always been to disagree with every assertion that the opposition made. Thus, the opposing camp immediately began to denounce all of the swordsmen on the Sword Qi Great Wall as complete idiots.

Their argument was that if the Sword Qi Great Wall wasn't full of fools, then why was it that every single intercontinental ship that went to Stalactite Mountain was able to profit from them?

There was even a boy who declared that once he was grown up, he would also go to Stalactite Mountain to make money, and he would do such a good job of it that the coffers of all of the sword immortals on the Sword Qi Great Wall would be completely empty by the time he was done.

An old cultivator who just so happened to be passing by scoffed at them for talking about things that they knew nothing about, and he sternly ordered them to return to their cultivation.

However, they didn't follow his orders. Instead, they insisted on hearing his opinion on the matter, and whichever camp that he sided with would be deemed the winner of the argument.

The old man was a renowned storyteller on Reed Flower Island, and he was very easygoing and approachable, so he got along with everyone. Sometimes, when he was in a good mood, he would give out wine to others, even to children who were clearly far too young to be drinking.

The old man was a Golden Core Tier earth immortal, and a chair was reserved for him in the ancestral hall. He owned a huge, sprawling private residence on the island, and he had also jointly opened a shop with a friend on the street at the foot of the Milu Cliff on Stalactite Mountain.

On top of that, he was very well traveled, having been to many places, including the Southern Whirl Continent, Old Dragon City on the Eastern Treasured Vial Continent, and Skeleton Shoal on the Northern Complete Reed Continent.

He was respected as a very experienced and knowledgeable senior figure on the island, so whenever the young cultivators had arguments similar to this one, they were always eager to hear his opinion.

Whenever the old earth immortal got drunk, he would begin telling all sorts of interesting stories on a wide variety of topics, such as the local customs and traditions in different places in the Majestic World, and his stories never failed to inspire a sense of amazement and wanderlust among the children of Reed Flower Island.

The stories the old man liked to tell most were about Jiang Shangzhen. He always liked to claim that he had once shared a drink with Jiang Shangzhen at the same table, but no one believed him.

On this day, the two groups of young individuals refused to let him leave until he weighed in on their argument, so he could only placate them by speaking favorably of both the prodigious swordsman of the Rain Dragon Sect and the prodigies of the Sword Qi Great Wall. Only then was he finally able to leave.

The old man made his way down the mountain along a wide mountain path that was lined with thriving, ancient trees. With nothing better to do, he began to habitually count the steps until he made his way to the shore of Reed Flower Island.

Looking out at the boundless waves, he felt in a very good mood. The shop at the foot of the Milu Cliff had been doing quite well over the past couple of years, earning him many lesser heat coins.

Most importantly, this money felt clean to the old man, and it didn't weigh on his conscience at all. Occasionally, he would feel so grateful to the Sword Qi Great Wall in the dead of night that he would be struck by the urge to send them some money, but whenever this absurd thought surfaced in his mind, he would begin chuckling to himself in self-deprecation.

Who do you think you are, Song Sui? Does the Sword Qi Great Wall need your charity? Do you even know any of the sword immortals there?

The old man scratched his head, feeling a little forlorn. He had never been able to make anything out of himself, and he wished that he had actually drunk at the same table as Jiang Shangzhen as before. If that were the case, then at the very least, he wouldn't feel guilty when he told that story to the children on the island.

The old man cast his gaze back up the mountain, and he hoped that the peace would continue to last, and that there would only be minor frets here and there, but never any major concerns.

A short while later, he made his way back up the mountain, counting the steps once again as he walked up them in a slow and unhurried fashion.

As he did so, he reminisced about a young boy and a young girl, the latter with a pair of rosy cheeks. The boy wasn't handsome, nor was the girl all that pretty, but they liked each other. As cultivators, such a short walk was naturally nowhere near a taxing endeavor, but the girl frequently stopped to rest, and the boy would sit with her on the steps, looking out at the moon above the sea together.

The old man stopped in his tracks, then turned to look out at the moon above the sea, and in doing so, he felt like he could see the girl in his memories.

All of a sudden, he pressed a hand to his own forehead to steady himself, and he cast his gaze up the steps with wide eyes. Just now, he had felt something rather strange for a fleeting moment, but as he inspected his surroundings, he didn't see anything amiss.

The old man was very careful and observant, and even though he hadn't actually shared a drink with Jiang Shangzhen, it was true that he had traveled across multiple continents and encountered many strange people and events.

Hence, he knew better than to brush off that strange feeling just now as a mere figment of his imagination. Thus, he immediately flew onto the top of an ancient pine tree, but still, he didn't see anything amiss, and the mountain-protection formation was completely undisturbed.

In the end, the old man cast his gaze toward the lone peak that had been marked as a restricted area on Reed Flower Island. That lone peak was home to the mysterious Creation Cave.

"If the old immortal in there really does come out of seclusion, then that should be a good thing," the old man murmured to himself in a self-deprecating fashion.

The sea was even more vast than the nine continents, and throughout history, countless immortals had flown out to sea to pick out an auspicious location, where they would go into seclusion to attempt a breakthrough. They either succeeded or perished, and everyone else was none the wiser.

***

The Jade Tablet Sect was situated in the southern part of the Parasol Leaf Continent. The region was filled with mountains covered in lush greenery, and there was an abundance of spiritual energy, making it a cultivation paradise.

There was a seemingly endless line of brilliant prodigies coming out of the Jade Tablet Sect, so it never had to worry about not having enough young talent to replace its more established cultivators. The only concern was how they should distribute their cultivation resources among their many exceptional prodigies to ensure that there was no undue favoritism on display.

At the very top of the pecking order was naturally none other than the leader of the sect, Xun Yuan, and below him was the slightly younger Jiang Shangzhen, followed by the number one prodigy among the younger generation, Wei Ying.

The other prodigies of the same generation as Jiang Shangzhen and Wei Ying would be much more renowned in just about any other sect, but instead, they were all relatively unknown in the Jade Tablet Sect as they were completely outshone by those two.

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