Chapter 56
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 56
Chapter Title: Fortuitous Encounters and Enlightenment Come Suddenly
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I headed to the Golden Stream Escort Agency's branch in Jiangxi Province.
The moment I gave my name and said I wanted to send a letter, the branch manager came rushing out.
"Oh, it's Scholar Cheon himself! The Nangong Family Matriarch specially contacted us, saying to treat you with utmost care. Please, come inside."
"No need. Excessive courtesy only breeds resentment. I'll just drop off the letter and go. Deliver this to the village chief named here. The slash-and-burn farmers will relocate then, so please send escorts to ensure they move safely. Here's the commission fee."
"No, no. With the Matriarch's instructions, we can't accept payment for this..."
I shook my head.
"If you insist, I'll feel too uncomfortable to use Golden Stream again. Escorts aren't cheap, especially not just one or two."
"Understood. We'll handle the costs, and return any surplus."
"That's more like it."
It was a bill of exchange for a hundred taels.
"Just bring them to Hwayeong Village in Hwayeong County first."
"Yes, we'll prepare and dispatch soon."
Relocating the slash-and-burn farmers would take at least a month, so I hustled to secure housing for them in advance.
While scouting for abandoned houses or decent properties nearby, I noticed something odd.
"Why is this place deserted?"
Finding homes for the farmers wasn't hard.
Hwayeong Village in Hwayeong County—the land now mine—was littered with derelict houses.
I hadn't counted precisely, but there had to be over a hundred.
'Is this why they gave me this land?'
No way they'd just hand over fifty thousand pyong for free.
I entered a village inhabited only by the elderly, too old to relocate elsewhere, and asked,
"Why is this place so empty?"
"Hm? You're an outsider."
"Yes. All these ruins seemed strange."
"Ah, Hwayeong Village has long been infamous for its bad feng shui."
"Bad how?"
"Ghosts haunt it day and night—it's notorious for that."
"Ghosts?"
"You look skeptical, but stay a few days and you'll see. Locals call it the Ghostly Domain."
"Then why haven't you elders left?"
"We've lived our lives; ghosts don't scare us. But the young ones all fled. Even if the village seems populated, it's just us old folks. They all went to nearby counties."
Listening to the elder, I grasped the village's issue.
'Ghosts? But it doesn't seem like some prank. He says it was like this even in his grandfather's time... Accumulated over years into this Ghostly Domain. What's the cause?'
While surveying homes fit for the farmers, I realized I'd stumbled into something unrelated.
I'd planned to secure houses, then head to Namcheong in the capital province to check on my sworn brothers from the Murim Alliance.
One reason for coming to Jiangxi was to learn about my Murim Alliance comrades' well-being.
But I set that aside; this needed resolving first.
Otherwise, ghost panic would erupt even after the farmers arrived.
High experts and young talents from unorthodox sects gathered at Hyuncheon Gate.
The sixtieth birthday martial tournament selected warriors for the Royal Martial Exhibition, so no one took it lightly.
I loathed crowds, so I left my group at Yeongbin Pavilion and went out alone, telling the three guards to protect them.
After entering my land, I examined the flow of vital energy.
I knew claims of bad energy often tied to leylines.
Riding slowly, the soil was fertile, a river provided water, and it was prime land.
Groundwater ran deep, unlikely to affect surface dwellers via leylines.
'So why the ghost rumors?'
No graveyards—the usual ghost story trope.
Over two days on horseback checking vital flows, I found something unusual.
Near Poyang Lake, potent spiritual energy registered.
'Why such intense spiritual energy here?'
Since awakening to spiritual energy, I'd never felt it envelop me like this.
'Just an ordinary village...'
Ruins now, but shops proved past prosperity.
Circulating my three spiritual energies to probe, realization dawned.
'Ah! The spiritual energy is so dense it clumps, shimmering and flickering—people mistook it for ghosts.'
Where spiritual energy pooled thickly, it rose like heat haze, mimicking writhing human forms.
Especially at dusk.
To the unaware, unmistakable phantoms.
Focusing on the ground, I traced the vital flows.
"What's that?"
Sensing a massive underground channel like a waterway.
Different from groundwater; it felt artificial.
Following it toward Poyang Lake on horseback.
'Starts here.'
At a rocky spot in the lake, I checked water inflows.
Piled rocks formed a crag; waist-deep, I spotted a cave big enough for three adults.
No human traces.
Made sense—rocky waters swirled, barring boats.
Already soaked, I decided to explore inside.
First, gathering driftwood and reeds ashore, I made a torch.
Igniting it with flint, torch in hand, I entered.
Fortunately, water reached only waist-height for walking.
'Too uniform for a natural passage.'
Feeling vital flows eased my fear.
The Heavenly Martial Sacred Body fears nothing, but without sensing flows in darkness, water's path would terrify.
Nearly half a shichen in, I found a vast cavern.
Torchlight revealed staggering sights.
At the center, on a dry flat rock, a serpent thick as an ancient tree coiled.
Checking blood flow, I relaxed.
"No pulse—it's dead."
Two small horns on its head revealed its nature.
"Never dreamed I'd see a mangnyong from books here."
The mangnyong—common imugi, a spiritual beast.
"Failed dragonhood, died of old age."
Problem: its death turned this into Poyang Lake's spirit beast graveyard.
Torch sweeping, I saw more: a ten-thousand-year golden turtle, fish evoking ten-thousand-year spirit carp.
Corpses of thousand-year and century spirit carp too.
"Poyang Lake's spirit beasts all died here. Cavern above became the village. Dense spiritual energy caused ghost visions."
More time, more beasts: spiritual energy could sour to malign qi.
Overdense for humans, akin to poison.
Pausing, I focused inward.
Cavern brimmed with dense spiritual energy; my body absorbed it.
Heavenly Martial Sacred Body naturally draws it—I couldn't stop even if I tried.
Small amounts controllable, but this flood overwhelmed.
"Ugh!"
Surge tore at me like ripping flesh.
Hastily sitting cross-legged, I circulated Ghostly Scholar's Gu-yu Myeong-ok Heart Technique to control it.
Its essence tied oddly to Buddhism.
Gu-yu and Myeong-ok evoked Yama's realms.
Ghostly Scholar crafted it from death qi for reason.
Instantly, thirteen meridians filled, coiling beyond condensation.
"Urk!"
Fireballs searing thirteen points dazed my mind.
Desperately recalling the final incantation.
Another sutra verse; was Ghostly Scholar a monk?
'Trees discard flowers for fruit, rivers shed rivers to reach sea.'
Avatamska Sutra: Trees to flowers, flowers to fruit; rivers to rivers, rivers to sea.
Recalling it, I sensed bodily change.
'Applied to body: Discard dantian obsession for true inner force; inner force discards meridians for true power.'
Seven Stars Origin uses few meridians.
No fixation on others.
Esoteric circulation: let spiritual energy flow freely.
Its desired path.
'Don't bind to human-named meridians.'
Thus human power caps at triple jiazi.
Dantian holds only that much.
'Like caging a fine bird—it won't soar.'
Ghostly Scholar perhaps no mere death qi martial artist.
Awakened: discard dantian for true inner force, fixed ideas for true power.
"Ah! Ghostly Scholar studied natural qi!"
I'd misunderstood.
Alias and hell-themed arts fooled even me.
"All returns to oblivion via nature's force—from netherworld. He probed life's origin—not inner force, but spiritual power."
Now his arts clarified.
"That's why they suit Yeoseol perfectly."
Her body accepts natural qi seamlessly.
"I worried she'd obsess over ghost qi needlessly. Mountains tower, yet under heaven mere mounds."
My subtle arrogance vanished.
Thought mere sutra verse; he'd infused his insights.
That instant.
Liberation surged through me.
Spiritual energy raced freely body-wide.
"Yes, flow unbound. Discard flowers for fruit, rivers for sea!"
Cells dissolving in ecstasy, I entered rapture.