Chapter 2

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Translated by Nanming

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Chapter 2


Cheng Qian left with Muchun Zhenren.

Muchun Zhenren was thin and emaciated in a tattered hat, just like three sticks propping a head. He led Cheng Qian by the hand, like the ringmaster of a traveling troupe leading his newly recruited actor.

Although Cheng Qian remained a child in appearance, he already had a heart of a young man.

He walked in silence, but he couldn't help looking back in the end.

There, he saw his mother, carrying a basket on the back and face blurred by tears. He saw his younger brother, fast asleep in that basket. He saw his father as well, standing silently in the shadow, eyes fixed on the ground as if he was sighing.

Cheng Qian drew back his sight quickly as there was nothing to be nostalgic about. The road ahead was uncertain just as the boundless dark.

Basically, there were two ways of journeying. One was called "traveling", the other was called "roaming".

Following his master, Cheng Qian was drowned in heresies and sophistries, not to mention he had to eat in the wind and sleep in the dew, which was even worse than "roaming".

Speaking of cultivation and seeking Tao, Cheng Qian had heard a little about it.

There was once an excessive number of whimsical people following the trend of cultivating and seeking Tao.

During the late emperor's reign, sects big or small began to spring up all over the country like mushrooms. Any Tom, Dick or Harry, as long as he was blessed with descendants, would use all his connections to get his kids into those sects for the purpose of cultivation. Nevertheless, besides some tricks like "breaking the stone on one's chest", it was never heard that anyone had made real achievements.

At that time, there were more alchemists than cooks, more people chanting than farming, to such an extent that for years there was nobody reading books or practicing martial arts, giving rise to charlatans who didn't work.

Allegedly in the heyday of cultivation, as many as twenty sects were set up in only a county, while a county was no more than ten Li from east to west. They would collect ill-gotten wealth and recruit disciples in the name of cultivation, with some fake books on cultivation methods bought from peddlers.

God knows whether the Heavenly Gate [1] could hold them or not, if such people all ascended to immortality.

Even bandits would like to join in the tide. They changed their gang names from "Black Tiger Gang" and "Hungry Wolf Association" to "Breeze Temple" and "Profundity Hall". What was more ridiculous, they would play tricks like "fetching from boiling oil" and "fire breathing" before mugging, and the victims often got so scared that they would be robbed voluntarily.

The late emperor was primarily a soldier with short temper. He felt that at this rate, the country would collapse most surely. Thereupon, he issued an edict that all "immortals" rampaging through the countryside, whether true or fake, be arrested and banished to the military.

But before the world-shaking edict had found its way out of the palace, ministers of the imperial court got wind of it. They were shocked out of bed and queued up in front of the audience hall overnight — low-ranking officials in the front and high-ranking officials at the back, getting themselves ready to crash into the pillars before the hall. They were determined to admonish the emperor at the risk of their lives, lest he offend the immortals and ruin the longevity of the dynasty.

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