Dream-Eye Blood Scripture
Luck was, without a doubt, the last thing he could cling to after being dropped naked and alone into the world of Yeonhwa Seonrok.
"Hmph. Face like a dog's ass, but damn if you don't have a knack for finding herbs."
A pouch of wages hit the ground in front of Han Yuhyeon. Everyone else had received theirs hand to hand. Only he got this treatment.
Even though he brought back the best herbs, and more of them than any other forager, he was the one they looked down on the hardest.
I bring back good herbs. That's it. What the hell does my face have to do with anything?
Han Yuhyeon spat the curse inside his head. Even he had to admit, though—when you looked this bad, maybe it did have something to do with it.
"Hehe. Thank you, Elder."
He showed not a flicker of offense, bowed at the waist, and picked up the pouch.
"Just looking at your face twists my qi and blood. I can feel a heart-demon coming on. Get lost."
"Yes, sir. Understood."
No point hanging around for another gob of spit. Han Yuhyeon hurried out of the Medicine King Hall of the Baekun-pa.
He knew the Baekun-pa well enough. It was a sect in Yeongil-ju, the lowest-tier region in all of Yeonhwa Seonrok. Myeong-wang-bong, where the White Cloud Sect sat, had never been rich in spiritual energy to begin with.
Planting roots in a place like that made the Baekun-pa a weak cultivation sect of little influence.
As an Easy-difficulty starting point, most of its members were cultivators stuck in the early stages of Qi Condensation.
Of course, to Han Yuhyeon—still a mortal who had never learned a single technique—even the one-star Qi Condensation cultivator who had just thrown his wages at him was a monster all the same.
Landing on an Easy start is luck in its own right, I guess.
Start a run on Transcendent difficulty and you could spawn in some insane region already crawling with Nascent Soul and Soul Formation freaks.
If he had begun in a place like that with this face, some cultivator might have decided he spoiled their appetite and turned him into a human meatball on the spot.
By the laws and ethics of South Korea, that would have been unthinkable. In the spite-soaked world of Yeonhwa Seonrok, it was entirely plausible.
Han Yuhyeon returned to his dwelling—a hut, if you were being generous. It was a half-ruined shack set apart on the mountainside, not anything that deserved the word "home."
He opened the pouch the White Cloud cultivator had given him. Blue stones filled it to the brim: spirit stones, the currency of the Yeonhwa Seonrok world.
Spirit stones were graded by the purity of the spiritual energy they held. The ones Han Yuhyeon had scraped together so far were the lowest grade, dull and dim. Given that the lower realm around the Baekun-pa was a tutorial zone starved of spiritual energy, that was only natural.
He still had no idea why he had fallen into this damned world. What he did know was that survival—here or back home—started with money.
"This should be enough for the month."
He opened a chest and poured in the spirit stones from the cultivator. A month of posing as a White Cloud herb-gatherer, all in one pile.
Rough count: three hundred. Enough for a beggar to scrape by for two months.
If the other beggars and the occasional cultivator hadn't shaken him down now and then, he would have cleared five hundred—but who was he going to blame? He was the one who had set his default stats with no bone structure, no stamina worth mentioning, and zero charm to win anyone over.
Not that he regretted it. Luck was a stat that only got more valuable the further the game went.
Weak bones, dull insight, a pathetic spiritual root—those could wait. The real problem right now was lifespan.
In Yeonhwa Seonrok, lifespan was fixed. The only way to extend it was to cultivate and break through realms.
And Han Yuhyeon's default lifespan was…
Twenty-seven.
He had started at twenty-one. That left him six years. Another side effect of dumping everything into Luck.
Reaching even Qi Condensation would push a lifespan past a hundred, so he wasn't panicking yet. The problem was that he currently could not cultivate at all.
There were basically two ways into the path of a cultivator.
First: awaken a spiritual root on your own and become an unaffiliated rogue cultivator.
Second: join a sect or clan, take their support and training, and become a cultivator under their banner.
Obviously the second path was overwhelmingly better. Cultivation demanded an absurd amount of resources—spirit pills, spirit medicines, artifacts, heart methods, cultivation arts.
Lower-level cultivators couldn't gather those alone, which was why belonging to something mattered.
Sure, some walked the rogue path once they reached Golden Core and could more or less look after themselves—but everything was hardest at the start. Through Qi Condensation and Foundation Establishment, faction backing was essential.
"Haaah."
Han Yuhyeon looked into a cracked mirror. Shattered face, shattered glass. A perfect pair. One glance and the sigh came out on its own. That was how hopeless the face was.
In the world of Yeonhwa Seonrok, first impressions were decided by the Charm stat. With the absolute worst Charm imaginable, catching anyone's eye enough to enter a sect was impossible.
He had kept gathering herbs, trying to worm his way into the Baekun-pa's good graces. All he got back were looks reserved for insects.
Even if he swallowed his pride and tried the rogue path, someone with a spiritual root as pitiful as his could train in a place thick with spiritual energy and still barely form a dantian—if at all.
And around Myeong-wang-bong, every pocket of dense spiritual energy was locked down by the local overlord, the Baekun-pa. Get caught absorbing qi on another faction's spiritual land and you could lose your head without a word of protest.
Finding a true spiritual land meant leaving White Cloud territory entirely—and at his current level, never mind a demonic beast; one tiger would take him apart.
For now, do what I can.
Han Yuhyeon pocketed a few spirit stones and left the hut. He meant to stock up on food at the market while he still could.
He kept a wary eye on his surroundings the whole way, fingers worrying the storage pouch sewn inside his sleeve. Ordinarily you kept spirit stones in a convenient storage pouch—but the pouch itself could be stolen, so he hid it.
In this damned xianxia world, bandits, shakedown thugs, demonic beasts, or just vicious animals could appear anywhere, anytime.
Fortunately, he reached the market at the foot of the mountain without meeting a soul. Only when people came into view did he finally let out a breath of relief.
"Hey, Ugly Flower! Scored another haul today?"
A knot of figures called out from the street. Ragged clothes, a reek that hit from ten paces—beggars, the same as him.
Han Yuhyeon humbly admitted he had popped the champagne too early. Getting down the mountain unharmed was nice, but a crowded market was not the same thing as safe. In this world, a threat could come anytime, anywhere.
Even the nickname was a jab—ugly-looking beggar. He kept his face carefully blank.
"Came up empty. Spiritual energy on Myeong-wang-bong must be thinning out. Not even a single bellflower, never mind real herbs."
"Haha. That so?"
The easy laugh did not match the tension in the air. Two of the beggars darted in and pinned his arms, one on each side.
"H-hey! What are you doing?!"
Han Yuhyeon put on a panicked voice. The beggar in front smirked.
"I heard it from Daoist Ak over at the Medicine King Hall. Today was the day you brought in the most herbs, wasn't it?"
"…"
Daoist Ak—the cultivator who always tossed Han Yuhyeon's wage pouch like trash. This bastard in front of him had known the pouch was fat and come looking on purpose.
"Shake him down!"
Han Yuhyeon twisted and fought; he was not going to stand there and be robbed. The beggars swarmed him and started beating.
With his default bone structure and stamina so low, he could not even guarantee a win one-on-one against any of them. Under a group beating he had no chance at all.
"Agh—damn it! Hey! That hit bone, you son of a bitch!"
"Shut up, you ugly freak!"
Beggars brawling in the middle of the street, and the merchants and cultivators passing by never thought of intervening. They watched with interest instead.
The cultivators went further—pulling out spirit-recording stones, the local equivalent of cameras, and giggling as they captured the whole scene.
"Somebody help! These beggars are straight-up robbing me!"
Han Yuhyeon screamed. No one moved. Average xianxia morality really did sit a whole abyss below South Korea's.
Clubs, fists, and feet tangled over him in a blur. He curled up like a pill bug, but the beating went on.
"You fucking bastards…"
His thin voice never reached them. His vision swam and darkened.
"Over already? Beggars these days have no spine—won't even beat a man to death. Tch…"
The cultivator's tongue-click, still filming every blow with his spirit-recording stone, was the last thing Han Yuhyeon heard before consciousness went black.
Han Yuhyeon opened his eyes. Absolute black—nothing to see. He tried to sit up; not a finger or toe would move. He tried to speak; no voice came out.
Right. The beggars beat me unconscious.
The last memory finally surfaced. The beggars would not have kidnapped him. This was outside consciousness—a dream world.
Sleep paralysis? He stared blankly into the dark. Something rose slowly out of it. Looking closer, it took the shape of an old book.
On the cover, characters were written: Dream-Eye Blood Scripture. That seemed to be the book's name.
I've seen that name before…
He dug through his memory. It came quickly. When he had customized this damned character, the no-grade innate trait he had first laid eyes on was called Dream-Eye Blood Scripture—Mongan Hyeolseo.
He wanted to see what was inside. The cover turned of its own accord, and the contents appeared. What he found was absurd.
Beneath those half-incomprehensible rules, products unspooled in a long list.
…A shop?
Item names and prices were written in red. It was unmistakably a game-style shop UI.
Han Yuhyeon kept turning the pages of the Dream-Eye Blood Scripture. The shop carried consumables like invisibility talismans, elixirs that raised spiritual root like Flame Oil, martial arts like the Heaven-Breaking Fist Art, and innate traits like Heaven's Intent Secret Affinity—everything.
Funds on Hand: 250 Lowest-Grade Spirit Stones
At the bottom it even showed how much he currently held. With spirit stones alone, he could buy all of this.
So the Dream-Eye Blood Scripture trait… is this shop?
But the prices were wrong. Han Yuhyeon had used the in-game markets; he knew. A superior invisibility talisman went for at least five hundred lowest-grade spirit stones. The Heaven-Breaking Fist Art needed three thousand.
Even more absurd: items you could never buy in the game—things that raised the spiritual root stat, like Flame Oil, or innate traits like Heaven's Intent Secret Affinity—were sitting right there for sale.
Is this just a dream?
It was ridiculous enough that it very well might be—but nothing to lose. Han Yuhyeon decided to buy something, anything.
No need to overthink it.
The most basic requirement for cultivation was a heart method. Without one, you could not draw spiritual energy into the dantian.
The shop listed many heart methods. Without hesitation he chose the Great Void Primordial Chaos Scripture—Taeheo Honwon-gyeong. It was the most expensive one he could afford, and genuinely powerful in its own right.
Honestly, it shouldn't even be showing up this early.
You would never see it in Yeongil-ju, where the Baekun-pa sat. The Great Void Primordial Chaos Scripture was a reward for an extremely difficult quest in Hyoweol Province—a region full of Foundation Establishment and Golden Core cultivators. At two hundred fifty lowest-grade spirit stones, the price was a joke.
The moment he resolved to buy it, the clatter of spirit stones knocking together rang in his ears.
Funds on Hand: 0 Spirit Stones
The funds listed in the Dream-Eye Blood Scripture updated at once. The open book slammed shut, and Han Yuhyeon felt his mind being sucked outward.
His eyes snapped open. A night sky dense with stars. The hour was late; the market was closed, and no one was nearby. True to this spite-soaked xianxia world, he had passed out on a main road and no one had lifted a finger.
Didn't expect them to.
That hardly mattered. Han Yuhyeon fumbled inside his sleeve. The storage pouch looked so old and shabby that even the beggars had not bothered to steal it. Carefully he opened the mouth and reached in.
Last time his hand had found only emptiness. This time, something like a book rose into his mind.
He whipped his head left and right, confirmed he was alone, and drew it out. On the front of the book, against all reason, were the words: Great Void Primordial Chaos Scripture.
"…Holy shit."
Han Yuhyeon murmured it, dazed.