The Overlord of Puluo

He Yuxiu fought for three whole days and activated the plot without the least bit of trouble.

Li Banfeng hired several people from Meng Yuchun's territory to build her a house. He also bought plenty of food and wine from the Cook Monster, then arranged a splendid feast inside the tent to celebrate her success.

He Yuxiu picked up a sheep's head and took a hearty bite. "The Cook Monster really is an excellent cook. Culinary Cultivators are rare these days. If he wasn't a creature of the New Land, I would really want to take him back to Greenwater City with me."

He Yuxiu was, after all, from a distinguished family. She might have been rather reckless at times, but she had seen enough of the world to recognize where such wonderful food had come from.

She was perfectly pleased with the food and wine, but when she glanced at the wooden house being built nearby, a small frown appeared on her face. "Brother, must I really live here?"

Whenever other people were present, He Yuxiu called Li Banfeng Brother. The two of them had agreed upon this beforehand.

Li Banfeng nodded. "You will have to stay for at least a few months."

He Yuxiu sighed. "I never liked visiting the new land, even when I was young. It is always so dark here. There are talking birds and beasts wherever you look, but hardly any people to have a proper conversation with. Stay here too long, and a person might simply perish from boredom."

Nectarine stood beside her. "Sister~ You can always talk to me~"

He Yuxiu gently hooked a finger against the bridge of Nectarine's nose and smiled without saying anything.

Nectarine knew that He Yuxiu might have something private to discuss with Bai Sha, so she found a little excuse and slipped out of the tent. Once she was gone, He Yuxiu lowered her voice. "Have you heard any news from Greenwater City?"

Li Banfeng had indeed managed to gather some information through Luo Zhengnan and said, "The bad news is that the Border Control Office is still targeting the He Family. The family's businesses are doing worse by the day. The good news is that none of the He Family's branches have tried to stir up trouble. For the time being, everything in your family is still peaceful."

He Yuxiu nodded. "Haiqin was ruthless. He dealt with all the ruthless and dangerous people in the collateral branches, so the rest became obedient. But when real trouble comes, none of them are of any use. And now, Haiqin is gone, Haisheng is in the Outer Provinces, and if I don't show up, the He Family might really fall apart."

Li Banfeng shook his head. "But if you show yourself and fall straight into the Border Controller's hands, wouldn't the He Family fall apart even faster?"

"It might not be safe for me to hide in the New Land too," He Yuxiu said as she looked outside the tent. "I have seen many Agrarian Cultivators, but never one as strange and evil as this. Just look at his plot. It doesn't even look like a plot in the New Land anymore."

Zhang Wanlong's plot looked very different from the land around it. Paths and fields crossed the half-a-kilometer domain in neat lines, and the crops were growing thick and green. He hadn't actually activated the land, but he had already arranged everything in a very organized manner.

By the following afternoon, the three days were over. Zhang Wanlong had successfully activated the plot, just as everyone expected.

Li Banfeng brought food and wine into the plot to congratulate Zhang Wanlong and Little Gen. The two of them were so busy that they did not even have time to eat.

Zhang Wanlong had planted several mu[1] of crops, but they were not meant for people. They were food for aberrant creatures.

Soon, two-faced sheep, headless cattle, donkey-headed maggots, and eight-legged rabbits came from all over Li Banfeng's domain. More and more of them arrived in little groups.

These aberrant creatures had not come to cause trouble. They had come for a meal.

The crops Zhang Wanlong had grown for them were neither poisonous nor harmful. In fact, they were very tasty. There was only one reason for feeding them so well. As the aberrant creatures ate, they also produced the ingredients Little Gen needed to prepare his golden juice.

Little Gen no longer had to wander about with a spoon and fork, searching everywhere for gold. There were now great golden mountains piled up before him, ready for him to collect.

Li Banfeng stood there with the food box in his hand and sighed to himself. No matter how skilled the Cook Monster was, the delicious aroma of his food could not compete with the mighty presence of those golden mountains.

Zhang Wanlong smiled. "Master Qi, this is not the place to eat. Please wait a moment. I will prepare another place for us."

A half-a-kilometer plot was neither very large nor very small. Besides the farmland and the golden mountains, Zhang Wanlong had also made a little garden.

They placed a table among the flowers, and the meal became much more pleasant.

After drinking two cups of wine, Li Banfeng asked, "With your abilities, activating another one-and-a-half plot or a two-and-a-half plot of land shouldn't be an issue, right?"

Zhang Wanlong shook his head. "We did not come here to claim more land. We really came here to cultivate. If we activate too many plots of land, but cannot actually get more people to join us here, it would just be causing trouble for the land deity."

There was nothing wrong with what he said, and nothing wrong with what he had done.

After everyone had eaten their fill, Zhang Wanlong and Gen went off to their own work. Li Banfeng wandered around the plot for a while. The fields were full of ordinary crops, and all the little "Zhang Wanlongs" that had grown from eggplants had disappeared.

Where did those eggplant people go? Li Banfeng thought.

Li Banfeng was about to leave when he saw a few of them coming back. They each carried a basket on their backs, and the baskets were stuffed with all sorts of herbs.

He looked over at the real Zhang Wanlong and laughed. "It seems your strange little creations can do more than keep you company."

Zhang Wanlong shook his head. "They can only do simple jobs, Master Qi. Just look at what they brought back. Most of it is useless.

"I asked for herbs with long leaves, and they found the short-leafed ones instead. I asked for flowering plants, and they came back with thorny bushes. They even found a ginseng plant, but those fools did not know to dig up the root. They only brought me the leaves. What good are those?"

Looks useful to me. Li Banfeng looked from the little "Zhang Wanlongs" to the real Zhang Wanlong and back again. They were not exactly alike, but the differences were so small that most people would never notice them.

"Could you sell me some of these seeds?"

"Of course!" Zhang Wanlong took out a small bag and handed it over at once.

Li Banfeng turned the bag over in his hand. "Will everyone grown from these seeds look like you?"

Zhang Wanlong laughed. "What would be the use of that, Master Qi? It depends on whose blood the seed drinks. Before you plant it, you must give it one drop of blood. Then it will grow into someone who looks just like the person the blood came from."

Li Banfeng was shocked. "Just a drop of blood?"

"Just a drop of blood."

"How much would a bag of seed like this cost?"

Zhang Wanlong waved away the question. "Talking about money would only make us strangers. I would like to be your friend, so I will give you the seeds for free."

However, Li Banfeng shook his head. "I cannot take something for nothing. You must name a price, or I will give the seeds back."

Zhang Wanlong nodded. "Very well, Master Qi. Since you really wish to pay, I will not ask for too much. One thousand silver dollars for the bag."

That was not expensive at all for seeds with such a wonderful use. In fact, it was so cheap that it was almost hard to believe.

Li Banfeng frowned. "Is that not too little?"

Zhang Wanlong laughed. "I might not sell them to anyone else, no matter how much they offered. But you are different, Master Qi. Whenever you come to buy seeds of this quality, the price will always be the same."

"Very well," said Li Banfeng. "I will remember your kindness. I will take the seeds today and bring you the money tomorrow."

Li Banfeng took the seeds back to the Pocket Dwelling. He chose one, placed it on the table, and loosened the screw on the Blood-Drinking Pendulum. Then he let a single drop of blood fall onto the seed.

Wifey lifted the seed with the gramophone needle and looked at it carefully. Before long, she seemed to notice something very interesting. "What a marvelous method! This could be useful for something very important! Perhaps it could... perhaps it could..."

Li Banfeng wondered why she sounded so excited. "Perhaps it could do what?"

Wifey fell silent for a moment. Then she sang sweetly, "Heyaaaa~ Husband dear, I was only talking nonsense. You need not pay any attention to me."

Li Banfeng took the seed outside and buried it in the plot He Yuxiu had activated. He did not know Zhang Wanlong's special methods, so the seed grew much more slowly. He waited for over an hour, but only a few roots had appeared.

There was nothing else to do, so Li Banfeng went back into the Pocket Dwelling and went to sleep.

The next morning, he went back to have a look. To his surprise, a cabbage more than a metre tall had grown in the field.

Why has it become a cabbage? Shouldn't it be an eggplant? Maybe cabbage people and eggplant people can do different things? Li Banfeng thought.

Li Banfeng cut the cabbage open with his knife, and out climbed a man. He Yuxiu had just come out of her tent to wash. The moment she saw him, she nearly attacked.

She knew the man very well. He had once been a disciple of the Jiangxiang Gang's hall at Soda Kiln, and Li Banfeng had killed him. Just before he died, the Blood-Drinking Pendulum had drawn quite a lot of blood from him.

Luckily, He Yuxiu had seen many strange things before. She looked at the split cabbage, then at the dull-eyed man standing beside it. Before long, she understood that he must have been grown by that uncanny Agrarian Cultivator.

"What a wonderful thing!" He Yuxiu walked around the cabbage man and looked at him from every side. "He looks exactly like the real person."

Li Banfeng nodded. "It certainly is useful, as long as something like this remains in our hands."

He Yuxiu touched the cabbage man's clothes. "He is even wearing a white jacket. Brother Qi, did you prepare it for him?"

Li Banfeng shook his head. He had prepared no clothes at all. The jacket and trousers had come out of the cabbage with the man.

He Yuxiu soon noticed something odd. She felt them and said, "This does not seem to be real clothing. It feels like the thick stalk of a cabbage leaf."

It did not feel real, but it looked very real.

Li Banfeng gently tapped the cabbage man's face with the flat of his sickle. The cabbage man did not move or react. He did not know what fear was.

Li Banfeng looked at him. "What is your name?"

The cabbage man did not answer. It seemed that he could not speak.

Li Banfeng told him to move, but the cabbage man did not understand.

He Yuxiu shook her head. "If this thing cannot move, it will not be of much use."

Li Banfeng thought for a long while. Then he remembered what had happened with the watermelon man.

He cut off two pieces of cabbage stalk and chewed them. They were crisp and sweet, but terribly astringent, just like the watermelon. Soon, Li Banfeng was sweating all over, and his sweat carried the raw smell of cabbage.

The cabbage man slowly turned his face towards him. It seemed that he had sensed Li Banfeng at last.

Li Banfeng called out, "Walk!"

The cabbage man began to walk forward slowly.

"Run!"

The cabbage man quickened his steps at once.

"Kill!"

The cabbage man turned and rushed at He Yuxiu. Apart from Li Banfeng, she was the only other person there. Li Banfeng smelled of cabbage, and the cabbage man would not attack another cabbage man.

Naturally, He Yuxiu was not afraid of this cabbage. She threw a punch and smashed its head into pulp. Yet the headless body went on clawing and tearing at her.

He Yuxiu swung her fists until she had beaten the cabbage man into a heap of rotten cabbage stalks. Even with only a scrap of a limb left, it still tried to fight her.

He Yuxiu shook the cabbage juice from her hands. "Big Bro Qi, we must not underestimate these cabbages. It's easy to deal with one or two of them. However, it would be very troublesome to deal with hundreds or thousands of them. If there were ten thousand of them, they could march all across Puluo Province without anyone being able to stop them."

Li Banfeng looked towards Zhang Wanlong's plot and gazed at the flourishing crops in the fields.

"It really would be troublesome," he murmured. "But it really is something useful."

Li Banfeng went back to the Pocket Dwelling and sat by the bed in a daze. The Gramophone asked, "Heyaaaa~ Husband dear, what is bothering you this time?"

Li Banfeng said, "I don't want to keep staying in the New Land, but there are some things in my land that must be handled carefully. If anything unexpected happens, I need to come back and take a look."

Huff~

"Husband dear, you have given me a difficult problem. Your territory is so far away. Suppose you went to Greenwater City and something happened here. Even if you sensed it, you would not be able to get back in time.

"You don't want to stay in your land, but you want to be involved in everything that happens here. This little wifey really can't figure out a way for you to achieve both."

Li Banfeng thought for a long while, but he couldn't think of any good solutions.

Can I use my mind to make the Pocket Dwelling take me straight back to the plot whenever I sensed something happening in my land?

This could work, but he wouldn't be able to take the key with him. This meant that if he had gone to the plot, he would not be able to go back home again for some time.

As a level-seven Homebound Cultivator, his Peaceful Home and Prosperous Work ability was always in effect. If he stayed away from home for too long, his fortune would suffer greatly.

Buzz!

The Pocket Dwelling suddenly trembled, and an elderly voice sounded in Li Banfeng's ear.

"There is a way. Build a train station here."

Li Banfeng did not understand. "What use would a station be?"

"You can stop anywhere, cannot you?"

"It is not the same. When I stop at a station, it is a proper stop. Anywhere else, it is only a temporary stop."

"What is the difference?"

"The difference is that during a temporary stop, the doors remain closed. When I stop at a station, the doors are opened."

"And how would that... Wait!"

Realisation dawned on Li Banfeng. "You mean that if I build a station in this territory, you can bring me here and keep the doors open?"

"As long as it is within the proper stopping time, the doors will remain open."

Author's Note:

PS: The length of the stopping time is crucial!

1. A Chinese unit of area equal to about 667 square meters, or 0.067 hectares ☜