At this moment, in the Marshal's Residence in Green Mountain Pass, Marshal Hong was sitting alone in the head seat of a large wooden chair in the spacious living hall. He leaned back, looking up at the ceiling, his round eyes constantly darting about. One hand stroked his chin as he was lost in thought.
"The guards over there have reported that Li Yan was summoned into Ji Wenhe's room this morning. He must have been formally accepted as a disciple. The next step should be to begin his cultivation." A voice came from a corner of the hall. It was near one of the four thick pillars that could only be encircled by one person. Looking closely, an unusually stocky man stood there, his body partially merging with the shadow of the pillar. He was not tall and wore a coarse black robe, piled there like the base of the thick pillar itself.
"The fact that he didn't make the boy become his disciple immediately last night already surprised me. Given how his health seems to be getting worse, it's amazing he can still be so unhurried," Marshal Hong said, still staring at the ceiling without looking over.
"Senior Brother, can you tell if he is truly unable to suppress the poison in his body, or if he is just pretending?" the man in the black robe asked.
"It's nine-tenths likely to be true. Whether it's the usual reports from the guards or the fact that he has been relentlessly searching for a disciple for years, it doesn't seem fake. But even so, our chances of winning by force are slim. Even with his current condition, his martial arts are such that even if we two combined our strength, we would still not be his match," Marshal Hong continued.
"Senior Brother, don't exaggerate so much. Although his martial arts have reached the Transformation Realm, firstly, he needs to divert a lot of his internal energy to suppress the poison in his body. Secondly, we two brothers have also been at the peak of the Peerless Master realm for over ten years. We are only a step away from the Transformation Realm. With our combined strength, it's not necessarily impossible to capture him," the man in the black robe said in a gruff voice.
"Junior Brother, that is the last resort. What I'm thinking about now is how to start with that boy. His last disciple never came out of the Strategist's Manor after entering, making it very difficult to get close to him. He died a violent death in just over a month. What I'm thinking now is, did he really die from improper cultivation? Or is it as he himself said, that his technique cannot be cultivated by those without a special constitution? If it's the latter, wouldn't all our efforts be in vain?" Marshal Hong said, still looking at the ceiling, his brows tightly furrowed.
"Senior Brother, there is no cultivation technique in the martial world that cannot be cultivated. Even poisonous and evil techniques can be cultivated by those who possess them. It's only a matter of suitability, not whether one can or cannot cultivate it. I have never heard of an internal energy technique having requirements for a person's constitution. Take our own sect's techniques, from the low-grade to the profound ones. If they were given to the sect's disciples, which one of them couldn't cultivate it? The only difference would be the speed of their progress," the man in the black robe said, also frowning.
"What you've said is exactly why I'm unwilling to give up. Even if it were the martial arts of an evil sect, if we wanted to cultivate it, it wouldn't be impossible. It's just a matter of whether it's worth it. His excuses are likely because he is unwilling to pass it on to outsiders. But what is so special about this Li Yan and the last disciple? I tested the boy's meridians with my internal energy at the drill grounds yesterday. They were very ordinary, even worse than many of the young men in the army. Yet he has been searching among hundreds of thousands of people for years. This is what I cannot understand." Silence fell upon the hall once more.
A moment later, he turned to the man in the black robe and said, "Junior Brother, right now, it doesn't matter on what basis he accepts disciples, or what he accepts them for. But he will have to teach this new disciple some techniques. What we need to do is to get as close as possible to this Li Yan and then obtain these techniques from him. With our insight, we will definitely be able to see some clues from these techniques. Then we can make further plans."
After a period of silence from the corner of the hall, the sound of footsteps gradually rose and then faded into the distance. Marshal Hong remained seated in the large chair, silent. The hall was so quiet that one could hear a pin drop.
In the evening, in Li Family Village in the Great Green Mountains, Uncle Chang and his son Li Wei were returning from the fields as usual. Although the harvest after the locust plague was already set, some of it had been salvaged. Farmers have a deep affection for their grain, like a loving mother for her wandering son. Every grain is the result of hard work, something the great lords could not understand. Every family in the village still went to their fields every day to tend to the little that was left.
Uncle Chang always came back before dusk, while the sky was still bright. When he got home, his wife and fourth daughter would have already prepared a simple dinner. They had to finish their meal before it got dark to avoid having to light the oil lamp for a long time. Times had been tough these past few years, and they had to save on lamp oil.
Since Li Yan left yesterday, the atmosphere at home had been oppressive. "My dear husband, should the village chief be back today?" Li Yan's mother asked her husband, her face full of sorrow. She hadn't touched her chopsticks, watching as the others listlessly ate the yams in their bowls.
"I say, woman, why are you chattering on like this? You've been asking this and that since noon yesterday. I've told you so many times that a round trip takes at least two days, and that's if things go smoothly. Just eat your meal in peace." Li Yan's father looked up, his face also filled with impatience and frustration. He tapped his bowl with his chopsticks, making a "ding ding" sound.
"You went to the fields early in the morning and only came back after a whole day to say just these few words. How is that asking this and that all the time?" Li Yan's mother muttered under her breath.
Li Wei looked at Li Xiaozhu, who happened to be looking at him at the same time. At first, they had also wanted to ask a few questions, but seeing the situation, they didn't dare to say any more. In fact, they also knew that even if they asked, their father wouldn't know the answer either. They just felt that even if the words led to no conclusion, talking about it would make them feel a little better.
Just then, a sound of footsteps came from outside, and a resonant voice floated in. "Uncle Chang, I'm back, I'm back, haha!" Hearing this voice, everyone in the room's spirits lifted. It was Li Guoxin's voice. A clatter of tables, chairs, bowls, and chopsticks followed as several people rushed out of the house.
Looking at the overturned stools and chairs, the chopsticks thrown haphazardly on the table, and the half-eaten yams left in the bowls, Li Yan's mother looked at the three figures who had gone mad and spat, "You old fool, weren't you the one who wasn't in a hurry? You're rushing like you're trying to get reincarnated." Then she also stood up and hurried outside.
Outside, Li Guoxin was walking towards Li Yan's house, followed by a group of village children and a few villagers. Before he even reached the door, he saw three figures fly out of the house. A closer look revealed that it was Uncle Chang and his two children, followed by a slightly rushed Li Yan's mother. Seeing Li Guoxin, Uncle Chang quickly stopped. Li Wei and Li Xiaozhu also came closer. Uncle Chang took a breath, then forced a smile. "Guoxin, you're back! Come, come in for some water, we can talk slowly."
Li Guoxin looked at Uncle Chang's face, which was trying to appear calm but was filled with anxiety. He couldn't help but laugh again. "Haha, Uncle Chang, I won't go in. I just got back to the village, and the cart is still tied up at the front. I haven't even been to Li Yu's or Li Shan's house yet. I came here first. After I'm done here, I still have to go and inform their families."
Hearing this, Uncle Chang nodded repeatedly. "Of course, of course." He then looked at Li Guoxin with Li Wei and Li Xiaozhu, their faces full of anticipation.
Li Guoxin was currently patting the heads of a few village children who were running around him. "Go, go, go, hurry back and tell your parents to come to my house later to get the things they wanted." A group of children heard this and happily ran off, shouting "oh, oh..." Some ran home, while a few ran to the other villagers who had come with him. These villagers, whom he had met at the entrance of the village, were standing by with their arms crossed or patting their children's heads, listening with interest to the news the village chief had brought back from the city.
After the children had left, Li Guoxin turned to look at Li Yan's family, who were forcing smiles, not daring to rush him. Li Guoxin's expression turned serious. "Uncle Chang, the reason I came here first, before even going to their two houses, is because I have some incredibly good news to tell you."
"Oh, Uncle Guoxin, what good news?" Li Wei interjected. The other three also looked at Li Guoxin with faces full of tension and hope. The few villagers around also quieted their children and moved closer, forming a small circle.
Seeing this, Li Guoxin no longer kept them in suspense. "Uncle Chang, the feng shui of your ancestral graves must be incredibly good. Li Yan went to the city this time to enlist in the Aegis Guard, but who would have thought..." Li Guoxin then recounted the events in the city, adding some details about Strategist Ji's deeds and background so that they would understand the standing of the person Li Yan had sworn allegiance to.
As he spoke, more and more villagers had gathered around. When they heard this, they were first stunned into confusion, then the crowd erupted like a pot of boiling water, with all sorts of discussions breaking out. Uncle Chang's family was frozen on the spot, in disbelief. Li Yan had actually been accepted as a disciple by a great lord whose fame was even greater than Marshal Hong's? Did this Strategist Ji really have such abilities? But seeing Li Guoxin's confident demeanor, the crowd chose to believe him. Mountain folk had seen little of the world; the village chief was the highest official they knew. If a minor official from the town came by, it felt like the emperor himself had arrived. By the same token, mountain folk were also simple and honest, and they had always trusted the village chief's words.
"Oh my god, oh my dear god, oh my god..." Li Yan's mother stood in the crowd, muttering to herself as if in a dream. After his initial shock, two streams of tears flowed down Uncle Chang's old face.
In the Strategist's Manor, the door to Li Yan's room had been closed since he finished lunch. The small black wooden plaque was hanging on the handle outside.
After lunch, Li Yan did not choose the empty room next door as his cultivation chamber. He felt that his own room was just fine. He hung the black wooden plaque, closed the door, pulled out a chair, and sat at the table. He picked up the small wooden figure and carefully went over the cultivation path of the "Breath Guiding Technique" in his mind. He then carefully confirmed the paths of these routes on the wooden figure and went over the technique's incantations in his head one more time. He did not want to end up like his senior brother.
He did this for about the time it takes for an incense stick to burn. He then put down the small wooden figure, sat cross-legged on the wooden bed, and began to cultivate according to the incantations. He had decided in his heart that if he felt anything was wrong, he would stop immediately.
What he did not know was that the cultivation he began today would change the course of his entire life, setting him on a long path of seeking.