Fang Tong composed himself with practiced ease, wiped the cold sweat seeping from his forehead, and hurriedly turned sideways to lead the way.
Mo Fan nodded and followed at an unhurried pace, Mo Yan trailing silently behind him.
The two passed through the noisy streets of the Greenwood Market, heading all the way toward the market's outskirts.
Near the edge of the market, in an abandoned, dilapidated courtyard, the other two members of the Group had been waiting for a long time.
The moment Fang Tong pushed open the courtyard door, Mo Fan's gaze swept over these two like a radar.
On the left was a bone-thin male cultivator with high cheekbones, his eyes as sinister as a venomous snake hiding in the dark.
He was playing with a peculiarly shaped black short blade in his hands.
A faint blue-black hue showed under his fingernails—clearly a ruthless character proficient in unorthodox poison arts and hidden weapons. A genuinely dangerous type.
On the right was a rather scantily clad, middle-aged woman.
Although she was past her prime, her face was carved with the marks of hard years.
She exuded an extremely cheap and pungent smell of rouge and powder, and held a yellowing talisman between her fingers. She looked like a half-baked talisman master.
The two stood very close. Their body language revealed a tacit understanding unique to a desperate pair of lovebirds living on the run; they were clearly a couple.
"Old Fang, you're finally back. Is this the helper you found?"
The sinister male cultivator named Wu Feng looked up.
Seeing Mo Fan's bronze muscles and fierce leopard-skin cloak, a trace of secret joy instinctively flashed in his eyes.
However.
This secret joy lingered on Wu Feng's face for less than half a second.
When his gaze crossed Mo Fan's shoulder and saw the black-clothed swordsman following behind, Wu Feng's expression changed drastically.
The hand playing with the short blade paused abruptly. He reversed his grip in an instant, guarding his chest dead tight.
The "Third Lady" (San Niang) beside him acted like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, letting out a sharp scream.
The talisman between her fingers instantly lit up with a dangerous red glow.
"Old Fang! What is the meaning of this?!" Wu Feng stared dead at Mo Yan, his voice pitching up sharply.
Seeing the situation about to spiral out of control, Fang Tong proved himself a seasoned veteran of the market.
He immediately took a step forward, glaring at the two with extreme severity.
His eyes were full of warning and oppressive pressure, forcibly halting their idiotic aggro response before it could go any further.
"Stand down, stand down! This is Brother Lu Xiaoqi, a top-tier expert I just recruited!" Fang Tong laughed it off, frantically winking at the two while making the introductions.
"As for this brother in black, he is Brother Lu's... friend. He won't take a cut of our bounty and is helping out for free! Keep your eyes sharp and manners on; don't go offending someone you can't afford to offend!"
Hearing the words "won't take a cut," Wu Feng and San Niang exchanged a glance.
Although the open hostility in their eyes receded slightly, that bone-deep apprehension and suspicion couldn't be erased. They slowly lowered their weapons and forced out stiff, unconvincing smiles as a greeting.
This hastily assembled, makeshift outfit was permeated from the very beginning with the stench of mutual distrust, feeling like it could fall apart at any second.
After a brief rest, to avoid the scorching daytime heat and the prying eyes of the crowds, the four decided to set off under the cover of night.
Linshui Village was located in a desolate, treacherous area at the very edge of the Azure Cloud Sect's territory, hundreds of miles away.
Even for cultivators like them, traveling on foot would take two to three days.
The long night, the barren mountains and wild ridges. Trekking over mountains and valleys along the way was the truest test of a cultivator's foundation.
In just half a day's time, Wu Feng and San Niang—two typical traditional spell cultivators—were already panting heavily from exhaustion, having to frequently slap Lightness Talismans on their legs just to barely keep up with the team's pace.
Fang Tong, the old hunter, was still breathing relatively steadily, but he was profusely sweating.
But Mo Fan, walking in the middle of the formation, made these three increasingly alarmed the more they looked at him.
This seemingly young "Lu Xiaoqi," relying on his monstrous physical body, walked this rugged mountain path as if strolling on flat ground.
Let alone panting heavily, he hadn't even shed a single drop of sweat!
What made their hair stand on end even more was the man in black following behind Mo Fan.
He hadn't spoken a single word the entire trip, nor used any talismans. He was like a ghost unburdened by gravity, his feet seemingly gliding across the ground.
No matter how fast they walked, he floated along eerily without ever falling behind.
This unfathomable stamina and bizarre follower made Fang Tong and the others increasingly apprehensive of Mo Fan's true strength.
By the time they made camp, they didn't even dare to breathe too loudly.
The morning of the second day.
The team passed through a few desolate mortal villages.
Looking through the shadow of his hood, Mo Fan saw scenes even more miserable than Greenwood Town. The low thatched huts were dilapidated.
The mortals squatting at the village entrances were all sallow and emaciated, wearing rags that barely covered their bodies.
They looked at the passing cultivators without awe in their eyes, only a starving, numb, and hollow dead silence.
"Why is it this bad?" Mo Fan frowned slightly, asking almost offhand.
"Sigh, Brother Lu, you cultivate bitterly deep in the mountains year-round, you don't know the suffering of the bottom tier."
Fang Tong sighed, used to the sight, and took this opportunity to ease into conversation.
"We're at the absolute edge of the Azure Cloud Sect's territory now. Not to mention the barren land, there are also frequent beast hordes triggered by low-tier Spirit Beasts fleeing from the forest."
"It's incredibly difficult for these mortals to even guarantee basic survival here. They are purely kept alive by the meager relief grain handed out by the Azure Cloud Sect once a year."
He shook his head.
"In the cultivation world, mortals without Spirit Roots have lives cheaper than grass. They are nothing more than a free-range ant colony kept by the sect."
That night, the four lit a campfire on a sheltered, dry riverbed.
To further probe Mo Fan's background, and also to show off his own worldly knowledge, Fang Tong began to hold court by the firelight, spinning tales from his experiences traveling far and wide in his youth.
Using a branch, he casually drew a massive circle in the dirt, laying out an extremely vast picture of the Mystic Realm for Mo Fan.
"Brother Lu, don't let the Azure Cloud Sect's dominance over this ten-thousand-mile radius fool you. Sure, we manage hundreds of millions of mortals."
"But looking at this entire Cangqing Province, the Azure Cloud Sect is merely one of the 'Hundred Sects'."
Fang Tong smacked his lips, a flicker of genuine awe for the vast world flashing in his eyes.
"On this Central Continent, those who truly stand at the pinnacle of power and rule over myriad living beings are the unfathomably deep Great Xia Imperial Family!"
"And under the Imperial Family's command, the high-and-mighty First-Tier Tributary Three Sects!"
Mo Fan poked the campfire impassively, looking casual, but actually committing every single word dead into his memory.
"Our Azure Cloud Sect's most powerful ancestor is only at the Nascent Soul stage, right? Heh, within those First-Tier Three Sects, there are legendary Soul Transformation ancestors presiding who can move mountains and fill seas!"
Fang Tong lowered his voice, as if afraid of disturbing the gods.
"The central hub of the Great Xia Dynasty—the Dragon Capital—that is where all the world's fortune converges, a true realm of immortals!"
"There, Foundation Establishment disciples wouldn't even dare breathe loudly walking down the street. At most, we'd serve as hired muscle for those wealthy, noble clans."
"Only Golden Core true Daoists barely have the qualifications to sit at a table and eat a hot meal in the Dragon Capital!"
"Of course, where there are immortal holy lands, there are forbidden death zones."
Fang Tong pointed toward the distant borders, a flash of fear in his eyes.
"The edges of the Great Xia territory, such as the Valley of Ten Thousand Corpses, or the Demon Beast Domain deep within the Hundred Thousand Mountains... those are true no-go zones for the living!"
"Devil cultivators run rampant inside, and great demons carve out territories. Let alone us, even if a Golden Core elder walked in there, it would be ten deaths and no survival."
Fang Tong boasted eloquently, even passingly mentioning the other domains overseas, but it was clear he was just a bottom-tier rogue cultivator relying on hearsay, and the details were thin.
But this was enough.
Listening to this intel, amidst the dancing firelight, Mo Fan made an extremely clear, concluding summary in his heart.
So that's how it is.
The Azure Cloud Sect, which had seemed so vast and dominant—was merely a small tile on the outer edge of the Great Xia Dynasty's map.
The outside world was a hundred times vaster than he imagined, and ten thousand times crueler!
After more than two days of arduous trekking.
At dusk on the third day, the team was less than a day's journey from their final destination—Linshui Village.
To prepare for the unknown, bizarre evil spirit in the village, Fang Tong raised his hand signaling the team to stop, proposing they rest overnight on a sheltered, barren hill to go in fresh.
"Everyone rest well tonight, recharge your batteries. Tomorrow morning, we'll enter the village and get the lay of the land."
This kind of makeshift rogue cultivator squad inherently possessed zero trust.
After the four silently finished gnawing their hard dry rations around the campfire, they scattered with extreme tacit understanding.
In this crisis-ridden wilderness, they were like a pack of mutually distrustful wild dogs, pitching their simple tents far apart from each other.
As a couple, Wu Feng and San Niang naturally squeezed into one tent; Fang Tong was on the far left; Mo Fan, bringing Mo Yan, occupied a high point on the far right.
The night gradually deepened.
Inside Mo Fan's tent.
Not long after, an extremely rhythmic, incredibly loud snoring sound came from the tent, seeming exceptionally abrupt in the quiet wilderness.
But in reality.
Inside the tent, Mo Yan sat in the corner resting with his eyes closed—actually controlled by a wisp of Mo Fan's split consciousness, serving as the final physical line of defense.
Meanwhile, Mo Fan's main body quietly activated [ Death Vision ] in the darkness.
Hmmmm—
The grayish-white God's-eye perspective instantly penetrated the thin tent fabric.
Like an omnidirectional radar with zero blind spots, it captured all minuscule energy fluctuations, down to the flight paths of insects within a hundred-meter radius.
Midnight.
The night was late. The campfire outside had burned low, reduced to a few smoldering red embers that crackled softly now and then.
The surrounding wilderness was eerily quiet; even the chirping of autumn insects had completely vanished.
And amidst this dead silence, where even the wind seemed to have stalled.
From the tent shared by Wu Feng and San Niang.
A whispered conversation, so faint it was barely audible, emerged.
"San Niang..."
It was Wu Feng's sinister, raspy voice, carrying the cold, coiled killing intent of a viper.
"This mark we picked up... seems like it might be a bit... thorny."