Chapter 69

“Loose Cultivator? Loose Cultivators are great, really great!”

Zhou Yi nodded in satisfaction, not interested in anything but Loose Cultivators; he would rather look elsewhere.

If it were a sect’s spiritual land, the entrance examination would include a magic artifact to test bone age, instantly revealing one’s age. Being dissected for research wouldn’t be the worst-case scenario – becoming a cultivation furnace for some bigshot in the Cultivation World was a real possibility.

He continued reading, and the material roughly described the origins of the marketplace.

About six or seven hundred years ago, the Dan Ding Sect discovered the Spirit Vein at Qi Yun Peak, rich in Ziling Copper – a superior spiritual material for making Pill Furnaces.

So, they established the marketplace on the foundation of the Spirit Vein and named it Little Dan Mountain.

“The Dan Ding Sect established the marketplace to provide Loose Cultivators in Fengyang Country with a place to live, where they could farm spiritual fields or mine spiritual ores, to prevent them from causing harm to mortals in the secular world…”

Zhou Yi’s face showed confusion as he continued to read, his expression gradually turning rigid.

The Dan Ding Sect used a large Spirit Gathering Array to enclose the Spirit Vein within the marketplace’s borders, where the concentration of Spiritual Energy was ten to twenty times higher than the outside world, truly a blessed land for immortal cultivation.

Loose Cultivators could enter the marketplace and apply for a cultivation dwelling for free, but it wasn’t truly without cost.

Even for the lowest-tier dwelling, the price in Spirit Stones was astronomical. After a Loose Cultivator moved in for free, they needed to help the Dan Ding Sect tend to the spiritual fields or mine ores at Qi Yun Peak to repay their debt.

“Spirit Stones are easy to understand; they must be the currency unit in the Cultivation World.”

“But this mining, farming, zero down payment, long-term debt repayment…”

Zhou Yi recalled some unpleasant memories, felt a throbbing headache, and forcefully continued reading.

There was a trading area in the marketplace where cultivators could set up stalls for free, share knowledge on spells and cultivation, or rent a shop from the Dan Ding Sect at around a hundred Spirit Stones per year.

“Why does this model feel so familiar?”

Zhou Yi suddenly felt less willing to venture into the Cultivation World. If other cultivation landscapes also exploited like Little Dan Mountain, there’d be nowhere as free and easy as in the Mortal World.

After all, other cultivators struggled hard for that one in a trillion chance of becoming immortal, but Zhou Yi had already obtained the Longevity Dao Fruit.

Continuing such arduous efforts seemed somewhat reluctant!

“Due to Ji Sheng’s death by a plot of Emperor Chongming, which angered the overseeing officer, not only was the Zhao family line destroyed, but an official mission was also issued to sweep away cultivators hiding in the Mortal World…”

Upon reading this, Zhou Yi felt the Dan Ding Sect was even darker than real estate developers; at least in his previous life, one could build their own house in the countryside and lie flat.

Now, even lying flat had become a serious crime!

Zhou Yi highly suspected that the Dan Ding Sect’s so-called “protecting mortals from harm by Loose Cultivators” and “providing Loose Cultivators with a place to live” was purely because they coveted cheap labor.

“However, this also proves that the status of an official disciple of the Dan Ding Sect is much higher than I expected!”

According to the booklet, almost all of Little Dan Mountain’s inhabitants were Loose Cultivators, with only one true-transmission disciple of the Dan Ding Sect as the warden and a handful of official disciples at critical positions.

Just below them were no more than a hundred recorded disciples, most of whom were descendants of deceased true-transmission disciples.

That families like the Jiangnan nobility could continue their lineage was only because they completed many official missions, ensuring that generation after generation had disciples associated with the sect.

“No wonder Ji Sheng went mad with frustration; an emperor was like an ant to him, yet he was capsized in a drain!”

Zhou Yi grew curious how Ji Sheng, with such a high status, could have been missing for decades without anyone looking for him.

This thought was fleeting, and he couldn’t be bothered to ponder it further.

“Since it’s confirmed to be safe, it’s time to experience the Cultivation World for myself—who could resist the dashing and handsome Sword Control?”

After Zhou Yi broke through to the third level of Qi Refinement, flying with the Mountain and River Cauldron allowed him to travel one or two miles.

Originally, the cauldron was used for cooking food, sitting inside felt like being stewed in a pot.

The image was not too flattering!

…

Spring left and autumn arrived.

In the blink of an eye, three years had passed.

Zhou Yi sat cross-legged atop a mountain peak, waiting for a suitable passing cultivator.

Over the span of three years, several rainbow lights flew by, but their aura was strong and domineering, so he dared not call out to disturb them.

“Waiting is the most prudent strategy!”

Zhou Yi had long understood that to befriend time, even if today marked another drop to the limit.

That day.

A figure flew over Zhou Yi’s head, riding on a wide-bladed flying sword without even a protective aura, its flying speed was barely faster than a galloping horse.

“His aura is much weaker than mine, and he looks about in his teens, you’ll do!”

Zhou Yi leapt into the Mountain and River Cauldron, soared into the sky, and called out to the youth’s retreating figure.

“Fellow Daoist, please wait!”

“Ah!”

The white-clad youth was startled to hear someone calling him, got slightly distracted, and his flying sword tilted, almost causing him to fall from the sky.

Zhou Yi rode the cauldron and stopped twenty zhang away from the youth, after years of testing, he knew that at the third layer of Qi Refinement, his mana could extend fifteen or sixteen zhang at most.

“Could this fellow Daoist be heading to little Dan Mountain? I am Zhu Gang from Cloud Stack Cave of Fu Ling Mountain, how about we go to the marketplace together?”

“Xu Yi of the Xu family from Jing State, I’ve seen Fellow Daoist Zhu,” said the white-clothed youth as he stabilized his flying sword and greeted Zhu Gang with a fist and palm salute: “The little Dan Mountain is up ahead, not more than twenty or thirty li away, so there is no need to travel together.”

Before he finished speaking, the flying sword was already heading towards the Eight Peaks.

Zhou Yi didn’t insist, the Mountain and River Cauldron landed on the ground, and he used Qinggong to move through the forest, which made him even faster than Xu Yi who flew above.

“He can control the flying sword without exhausting his energy, he must have a Sword Control Spell or similar, not merely relying on pure mana support!”

About a quarter of an hour later.

Zhou Yi was the first to appear at the foot of the Eight Peaks, only a dozen zhang away from the surging, tumbling dense fog.

Young Xu Yi landed outside the cloud mist, puzzled why Zhou Yi had stopped, but he remembered teachings from the elders of his clan not to speak with unfamiliar cultivators to avoid falling into traps.

Touching the dense fog with his hand, it dissipated on its own, and Xu Yi hurriedly proceeded into it.

“Just as expected.”

Zhou Yi, following what was recorded in the booklets, used his mana to touch the enchanted mist and a path leading into the mountain appeared before his eyes.

He walked along the mountain path for a long time, the fog gradually thinned from dense to light until the way ahead suddenly became bright and clear.

The first thing that caught his eye was a vast expanse of farmland, populated with cultivators who were tending it, mainly planting rice, the stalks as thick as thumbs, the ears bearing rice grains the size of pearls.

There were also various spiritual medicines being grown, colorful, bizarre, and strange; Zhou Yi couldn’t recognize the species.

“The spiritual energy at the edge of the marketplace already exceeds the outside world by three to five times. It’s said that the closer you get to the central Qi Yun Peak, the more concentrated the spiritual energy becomes, reaching over three to forty times in the core area!”

Zhou Yi followed the road forward, with the silhouettes of buildings looming in the distance.

A moment later.

The Dan Mountain Marketplace was right in front of him, spanning roughly four to five li in diameter, with streets laid out in three horizontal and three vertical rows.

On both sides of the streets were uniformly arranged shops with signboards hanging at the entrance while the pedestrians on the streets were all cultivators.

“Most of the cultivators are wearing monk’s robes or Daoist robes; odd and exotic attire is quite rare, so it seems that Buddhism and Daoism are still the most powerful in this world.”

“It’s hard to accurately judge the levels of Qi Refinement, but just from the strength of the aura, does the third layer seem neither high nor low?”

Zhou Yi had thought he was a newcomer at the bottom of the Cultivation World, but now it seemed that his hundred years of hard work in the mortal world were not in vain.

After visiting all the shops and asking about prices, he gained an understanding of the basic pricing in the Cultivation World.

“A single inferior-grade magic artifact costs over a hundred spirit stones, and the cheapest elixirs that increase cultivation require at least ten spirit stones each, and I… don’t even have one spirit stone…”

Since arriving in this new world, Zhou Yi felt the sting of poverty for the first time.

“Do I really have to take on a job?”