Where Immortals Once Walked

He Lingchuan understood. It seemed Fang Canran had never underestimated the difficulty of working with Juju.

“How much?” If it was too expensive, he could not afford it.

“Use it as a gift from me.” Fang Canran looked at the chains. “Back then, I heard the seller say that no more than five pairs of this treasure still exist in the world. You’ll put it to proper use, won’t you?”

What Fang Canran was really saying here was that since He Lingchuan could not afford it anyway, he might as well give it to him for free.

After all, the mission mattered most. As for making money, that actually came second.

“Of course.” He Lingchuan’s tone was serious. “Right, any news on the frost pellets?”

“Several teams have already returned from the Fu Realm, but none brought back frost pellets.” Fang Canran reached into his robe and took something out. “However, I did manage to get this.”

At first glance, He Lingchuan thought he had taken out a piece of glass or crystal, transparent and colorless.

“Is this glass?”

“Not quite.” Fang Canran handed it to him. “This is the glazed gold you wanted. Hold it up to the light during the day, and the edges will faintly shine gold. By the way, what do you need it for?”

“You really got it!” Overjoyed, He Lingchuan took it and saw that it was roughly the size of an entire roof tile. Its shape was irregular, and it was a little over three centimeters thick. Who knew what magical artifact or building it had been taken from?

“The array eye of the Grand Spirit-Gathering Array is a magical artifact, and its material is basically glazed gold. I need to find a way to break through glazed gold and get inside.”

Fang Canran flicked the glazed gold twice with a finger. “That simple?”

“At that point, there’ll also be a lightning restriction over the glazed gold shell.”

“The gods are shameless enough. The restrictions they’ve laid on Mount Xu come layer after layer, endless and overlapping.”

Is Fang Canran speaking from bitter experience? He Lingchuan smiled faintly. I mean, who doesn’t like stacking buffs?

Fang Canran sighed. “I don’t have much confidence in you. I only hope that if you’re captured, you won’t give me up.”

“Don’t worry. But what benefit does my operation bring Chief Steward Fang in the end?”

Fang Canran smiled slightly. “If you can throw Mount Xu into chaos, I’ll be deeply grateful.”

* * *

The next morning, in a residence on Sweet Wheat Street[1] in Lower Lingxu City’s Main City District.

The weather was unusually warm today. The servants had risen before dawn, working as they yawned.

This residence, occupying about two thousand square meters, had only just changed hands, and most of its servants had stayed on. The new owner was a fur merchant from out of town. After fifteen years of struggling in Lingxu City, he had finally scraped together enough money for the down payment. The rest had been advanced to him by a money house, to be repaid over ten years.

Having a home of one’s own in Lingxu City was an enormous honor.

However, life was not easy for the servants, as the new mistress of the household was rather difficult.

She could not tolerate even the smallest speck of dust. She demanded that every corner be spotless, complained that the cook’s wages were too high while the meals they made tasted ordinary, and accused the steward of spending too much when he went out to purchase supplies, saying the goods were not worth the price.

Of course, what she scolded most fiercely was the servants’ laziness, so she liked supervising work in person.

The hired hand A’Qing had even overheard her complaining to her husband the previous night, “These poor wretches are all lazy bones. If you don’t watch them closely, they won’t do their work properly!”

The fur merchant did not care about such trivial matters. “Scold them a little less, or we’ll have to hire new people again.”

“You don’t understand. Since we’ve just moved in, we have to establish authority. We have to make these lowly servants know who the master is, or they’ll think we’re easy to fool and bully!”

Her husband gave her a sidelong glance and said, “Who could bully you?”

At first light, before the masters had woken, birds were already chattering nonstop in the great tree in the rear courtyard.

The oak here was two hundred years old, lush with branches and leaves, and there were dozens of nests in its crown. Birds large and small quarreled every day over territory.

The new owners hated them and demanded that the oak’s crown be sawed off. The servants could not bear to do it, so nothing had been done so far.

When A’Qing told the others what she had overheard while listening by the wall last night, all the servants grew angry. Someone spat on the ground. “Tch, her family started with a small business. The work we do now is work she used to do every day herself. How come now that she’s mistress of the house, she loves standing there with her hands on her hips, ordering people around?”

“What do you know? How else can she show she’s nobler than us if she doesn’t flaunt her power?” The cook, who was sitting at the back plucking vegetables, did not even lift her head. “I heard a storyteller at Cassia Tower say that when a slave becomes a master, they act more like a master than a real master does.”

Everyone burst out in laughter.

“The old master was much better. He didn’t show up more than twice all year.” This naturally also meant that he had not had so many demands.

Someone said, “The old master wasn’t from Lingxu City. I heard he’s been especially short on money lately.”

The cook then said to A’Qing, “Didn’t the mistress tell you to clear out the old things yesterday? If you don’t do it now, she’ll come scold you again later.”

After the residence changed hands, the things left behind by the former owner had all been moved into an empty side room, waiting to be sorted and dealt with.

The new mistress could not bear to throw them all away. Everything in Lingxu City was expensive, and they themselves still carried a debt of 40,000 taels. No, ten years from now, that would be 55,000 taels.

Lingxu City was indeed prosperous, but it also sucked blood just as fiercely.

A’Qing curled her lip and stood, then went to the empty side room at the back. A short while later, she came out carrying several drawers.

They were full of odds and ends, none of them worth anything. She had to hurry and throw them away, lest she “waste the mistress’s time.”

As she passed beneath the old oak, A’Qing suddenly heard a sharp, chaotic burst of birdsong by her ear. Before she could see what was happening, two balls of feathers slammed into her face.

It was a red-billed blue magpie and a koel fighting with great enthusiasm. They had fought from the tree down to the ground, using their sharp beaks and talons.

Most likely, the koel had wanted to sneak an egg into the magpie’s nest, only to be discovered by the blue magpie and chased down for a fierce beating.

Unfortunately, A’Qing was caught in the crossfire. In an instant, pain pricked across her face, and she had no idea how many times she had been pecked. Luckily, she shut her eyes in time, or her eyeballs might have been scratched or pecked.

Startled, she screamed and raised her hands to block them.

The drawers flew from her grasp, and the bottles and jars inside smashed against the roots of the tree. There were several crisp cracks as they shattered.

The two battling birds flew off in a clamor of screeches. The others gathered around and asked, “Are you alright?”

A’Qing was still shaken. Several cuts had been scratched across her face, but fortunately, they were not deep.

She looked at the drawers on the ground and cursed, “Damn birds.” Now she would have to clean up the mess as well.

But before she could bend down, the ground about sixty centimeters away suddenly moved. Something long and thick drilled out of the earth.

She leaped backward in fright, thinking there was a snake beneath the ground. But when she looked closely, it was actually a tree root.

Yet this root was rapidly growing thicker and longer, spreading in every direction. One enormous lump after another bulged from it.

A’Qing screamed and fled backward.

It was fortunate that she ran quickly, because the change in the trunk was even more terrifying.

One huge branch after another burst out of the tree trunk. In a dozen or so breaths, they grew into new trunks, and the process repeated itself again and again in a ceaseless cycle.

“Master, Master’s house...” A’Qing pointed at the fur merchant’s main building, her voice trembling.

The great tree was expanding sideways too. It had already been close to the master and mistress’s bedroom, and now, as it expanded horizontally in that direction, the sturdy building was rapidly crushed and collapsed.

Everyone heard shrieks from inside that scarcely sounded human.

Should they move to save them or not?

A few of the long-term workers had the heart to try, but they truly did not have the courage to approach the mutating tree.

Only a few breaths later, the entire small building was ground apart as though it had been fed into a millstone, and the screams vanished as well.

Every witness turned and fled. No one dared stay.

When they finally reached the main gate and turned back to look, each of them stood dumbstruck.

The old tree had already become an extraordinarily bloated, swollen knot of wood. Not only had it reached an astonishing thirty-three meters in height, but it was also over sixteen meters wide.

The birds’ home had been destroyed, and their terrified chirps and shrieks could be heard from afar.

Human screams, birdsong, and collapsing buildings. It was all incredibly loud.

This was the bustling downtown district of the lower city, so neighbors all swiftly came out to see what was happening. They had originally wanted to complain a little, but the moment they saw the bizarre scene taking place, the words stuck in their throats, and no sound came out.

The strange tree was still growing, and it began advancing toward the neighbors’ houses.

A neighbor came charging over aggressively to demand an explanation. A’Qing and the others were just as bewildered. The man shouted angrily, “Where’s your master? Call him out!” Get ready to pay until your family fortune is ruined!

“He’s dead.” A’Qing pointed at the strange tree. “The building was crushed by it. The master and mistress were both inside.”

“...”

With such a bizarre incident happening, the servants quickly ran off to report it to the authorities.

But at that very moment, several screams also came from the neighboring house. A number of people burst through the gate, shouting as they ran, “The sheep is eating people! Run!”

Before everyone could understand what was going on, the courtyard wall burst open with a bang, and a massive figure charged at the crowd of onlookers.

It was a sheep. Or rather, it was what had once been a sheep.

But now, its size was comparable to the bull monsters He Lingchuan had seen in the Han River military camp. Its muscles bulged outward, and every blood vessel and vein had swelled against its skin.

An enormous swelling was growing on its neck. With a pop, it burst.

Everyone thought it was about to die, only for a second head to grow out of the wound.

The sheep’s eyes were blood-red, and blood sprayed from its nostrils, but it was still running everywhere with a pair of sharp horns, goring people.

It was worth mentioning that this pair of sharp horns had originally been only short stubs, round and blunt. Now, however, they were over thirty centimeters long, curved in spirals, and their tips were nearly as sharp as awls. When they rammed into a person, they left two bloody holes.

A young man was too slow to flee and was caught by it at once. The sharp horns entered through his back and came out the front, piercing straight through him.

The giant sheep flung him against the wall. With a wet smack, he slid down, leaving blood all over the bricks.

It did not linger and immediately chased down others.

Pedestrians scattered like startled birds and beasts, and residents slammed their gates shut. However, wooden doors could not stop such a monstrosity. With one bang, it could smash through them, charge inside, and begin another slaughter.

After it had killed seven people in succession, two bear monsters finally rushed out from nearby, hoping to subdue it together.

But who could have expected the mutated sheep’s strength to be so terrifying? Even the bear monsters were knocked flat.

It rampaged through two streets in a row before the government office hurriedly sent people over.

However, the expected bloody battle did not occur because after the sheep monster knocked down another stretch of courtyard wall, it suddenly collapsed to the ground without warning and began convulsing.

The tumors and blood vessels all over its body burst one after another. A dozen or so breaths later, it died.

What the officers saw was chaos across two streets and wreckage everywhere.

There was blood and debris everywhere, and not far away, there was also a strange tree.

That morning, Sweet Wheat Street became thoroughly lively.

The government office immediately gathered all related parties for questioning. The neighbors said that after the old oak mutated, their sheep monster, foolish as anything, had actually gone over and taken a bite of its leaves.

1. The name shouldn’t really matter, but another possible translation for this would have been Fragrant Barley Street, as the name’s actually 香麦街. I just feel like I’ve been using fragrant a bit too much lately, so why not go for something like sweet-smelling wheat street, just changed a little to have a nice ring to it. ☜