Chapter 1355: Gathering
Han Li raised no objection to the woman and merely asked, “How many spirit medicine seeds did you gather this time. Last time, Fellow Daoist Yan managed to find several. Although they were rare, they didn’t have many uses.”
The woman sweetly laughed and said, “Don’t worry, Fellow Daoist. This time I was able to gather most of the ones you pointed out to me. To tell the truth, if it weren’t for the fact that there will soon be a war, I wouldn’t have paid such a large price for these seeds. I have other things that I have to worry about. More importantly, I hope you’ve brought enough myriad year spirit herbs.”
Han Li strangely smiled and asked, “We’ve traded several times before. How would I be lacking in spirit medicine?”
“This time, however, the seeds are exceptionally rare. They are no less valuable than your myriad year spirit herbs. It’s only that spirit herbs of that age are hardly seen, or else I wouldn’t be doing business with you.” The woman sweetly giggled and flipped her hand to produce an emerald green wooden box. She tossed it over to him.
There were simple flower patterns engraved on the box. The faint talisman characters flickering on the box clearly showed it was no common object.
Han Li caught the box with a solemn expression. Without opening the box, he peered inside it with his Brightsight Spirit Eyes. He also searched it with his immense spiritual sense.
For a time, Han Li stood in place with the box in hand.
The demon woman didn’t view Han Li’s actions as strange and didn’t urge him to be faster. She simply stared at Han Li without a word. It was as if she was trying to make out Han Li’s true appearance through the silver light.
A short while later, the woman sighed and withdrew her gaze.
There was no doubt she was curious about this person. His identity must be unordinary since he possessed so many myriad year spirit herbs.
If she were to guess, this person most likely belonged to one of the hidden true spirit noble clans. It was most likely he belonged to the Min Clan who were renowned for spirit medicine nurturing.
However, her partner was extremely cautious. She attempted to approach the topic several times, but not only did she come up with nothing, she almost revealed her own identity in a moment of carelessness.
This left the woman incredibly vexed for a long while after.
Although he couldn't find her using the name she’d give her, it completely stifled her intent on finding his identity.
She instead became vigilant in not releasing any more information about herself.
But she couldn't help but be excited at the thought of acquiring the myriad year spirit medicine.
Although she came from a somewhat extraordinary background and possessed some status in her clan, she still wasn’t able to acquire many spirit medicines, no matter how many spirit stones she offered.
So long as business here succeeds, she would have enough spirit medicines to have someone refine them into various required medicine pills she needed to break through her bottleneck.
Of course, she was also greatly interested in the spirit medicine seeds that Han Li was collecting, but so long as he paid her as agreed, she was disinclined to delve deep into the matter.
When the demon woman started to feel her heart thump, Han Li finally finished examining the box and nodded with satisfaction. “Not bad. It’s most of the seeds that I told you to get. Here are your medicinal herbs. Take a good look at them.”
With that, he took out several jade boxes from his body and handed them over to her.
The woman didn’t dare to be careless and carefully inspected it as well.
The woman put away the medicine herbs and giggled, “Yes, they really are medicine herbs ten thousand years of age. This will be the last business we’ll have for some time to come. If you truly manage to avoid calamity, perhaps there will be another opportunity to meet.”
Han Li swept his sights past the other vendors and pensively said, “I hope that’s the case. Now that we’re done, I’ll be taking a look around to see if there is anything good. There should be a few hidden treasures waiting to be found.”
“You are quite shrewd. From what I’ve seen so far, there are many rare treasures. However, I have other things to attend to, so I’ll be parting here.”
“Please, go ahead,” Han Li calmly saluted her.
The woman nimbly turned around and made her way to the exit on the demon side.
After Han Li saw her leave, his lips twitched into a smile.
Originally, the Clear Jade Pills were only supposed to be effective for the early-Deity Transformation stage. Now that he’s done several trades with the woman, he collected enough medicines to create two types of medicine pills that would be useful to a mid-Deity Transformation cultivator. It appears he wouldn’t have to worry about medicine pills for some time.
With that important matter out of the way, he felt relief and slowly walked past a human vendor that was set up nearby.
After walking around the hall, Han Li frowned.
Although there were many vendors, the treasures they presented were far more previous than he had seen before.
As of current, there aren’t many treasures and materials that can easily catch his interest. What most interested him were secret techniques, they were rarely on sale and they weren’t guaranteed to be interesting to him either.
He shook his head and slowly departed from the hall.
He took off to the air as soon as he left and went towards his residence in the stone pagoda.
In half a month, there would be the lecture at Deep Heaven Hall, something Han Li definitely wouldn’t miss. And even without the lecture, he had other things to attend to that kept him in the city.
When he returned to his residence in the stone pagoda, Han Li took the jade badge that had his merits recorded and he took it to another hall in exchange for a permission token. Then he returned to his squad’s base and found a quiet place to rest.
Three days later, he hurriedly left for some part of the city.
Half a day later, he appeared outside the city above a valley.
The valley was lush and verdant. Apart from its natural beauty, there didn’t seem to be anything else there.
The azure streak circled in the air and suddenly dropped down onto the valley.
The light faded and Han Li appeared a hundred meters above a stone wall.
He took a look around and found nothing out of the ordinary. Then with a wave of his sleeve, he released a golden talisman that vanished into the wall.
Han Li quietly waited.
A short moment later, something suddenly changed.
A layer of grey light appeared from the surface of the wall and a six-meter-tall passage appeared before him.
The passage was in the shape of a square and was made of grey stone that shined with a faint light.
Han Li smiled and head downward.
After walking over a hundred and fifty meters, he came across the white jade door covered in light.
Without any hesitation, he formed an incantation gesture and muttered an incantation. The light trembled and split open to form a passage that Han Li leisurely walked through.
Behind the door, there was a hundred-meter-wide hall. Apart from twenty-some stone chairs and a large stone desk at the center, there was nothing else.
Furthermore, there were already nine cultivators sitting on the chairs. There were men and women, all of them in different attire, but each of them with cultivation at Deity Transformation and above.
When these cultivators saw Han Li enter, a few of them smiled and called out to him.
“Brother Han had also come!”
“You’ve come quite early.”
“I heard Brother Han managed to capture a green shadow alive. Tch tch, he is the pride of us ascended cultivators!”
Han Li smiled and saluted them. He then went to the corner of the hall and looked for a stone chair.
The other cultivators that didn't call out to him remained calm or ignored him entirely.
Han Li paid no attention to them either and simply closed his eyes.
Not long after Han Li took a seat, more cultivators began to enter the hall and he uttered a greeting to his acquaintances.
Four hours later, there were sixteen cultivators in the hall. No further cultivators entered after a long while, but nobody had any private discussions. There were all quietly waiting in their seats.
A long while later, a man’s voice sounded out from the large hall. It appears that everyone that planned on coming has arrived, or they are occupied with a mission. Brother Zhao, let’s start.”
“Yes, just about everyone has arrived. Let’s do as you say, Brother Wen!”
The voice sounded quite familiar. As his heart stirred, he opened his eyes.
Two middle-aged men walked into the hall. One of them was white-robed and had a smile. The other had a pale hairless face and was expressionless.
It was Cultivator Wen who gave Han Li his merit bade not long before and Zhao Wugui who brought him to the city.
When the two Spatial Tempering cultivators entered the hall, they began to stir. It was clear most of them recognized them.
Zhao Wugui swept his sights past them and indifferently said, “Originally, it should’ve been Fellow Daoist Wen who would take charge over the meeting of newly ascended cultivators. Because an important matter occurred, we’ll be taking over. I hope there are no objections.”
The cultivators felt their hearts tremble and they remained silent.
When the white-robed middle-aged man saw this, he wore a pleasant expression, “Originally, only Fellow Daoist Zhao was supposed to take charge, but recent affairs have become somewhat peculiar so there are a few important matters I must discuss with you all. That is why I am here.”
An old man with a red nose suddenly asked, “Does the peculiar matter Senior Wen mentioned have to do with a possible attack on the city by foreign tribes?”
When the others heard his question, they felt their hearts trembled and they all stared at the two Spatial Tempering cultivators, waiting for an answer.
Zhao Wugui coldly said, “We’ll be talking about that matter later. In accordance to common practice, we’ll first host the trade meeting and then share cultivation experiences at the end. If anyone has any difficulties in cultivation, we can offer some guidance. But like Fellow Daoist Fan, it will come at considerable cost. Finally, if you believe there is any interesting information, you may report it to us. If it is useful, we’ll be rewarding you with spirit medicines such as Earth Cleansing Pills.”