Volume 1, Chapter 186 – An Unexpected Surprise

West City Temple, Qingzhou City.

After pondering for a moment, Shi Lan began asking Old Hongtou about the basic situation in the area.

The answers she got surprised her quite a bit. The place she was in now was a “continent” nearly ten thousand li across, surrounded on all sides by a boundless ocean.

This continent was ruled by a dynasty called Qianyuan. There were no experts who could move mountains and fill seas here, only a group of so-called martial artists of the jianghu, and even the strongest of them could only stand against a hundred men at most.

In the face of the Qianyuan Dynasty’s iron cavalry in blocks of a thousand riders, they would be defeated and driven back, so cases of “chivalrous men using martial strength to defy the law” were not very common.

When Shi Lan learned this, she carefully sensed the spiritual qi around her. As expected, it was extremely thin, almost nonexistent.

When she had just woken up earlier, she had simply assumed her cultivation was gone and that was why she could no longer sense spiritual qi. She had not expected the spiritual qi in this place to be so pitifully low.

The Qianyuan Dynasty had lasted for more than a thousand years and its rule was extremely stable. Several wise emperors in a row had worked diligently to strengthen the state. It was at its peak, thriving with vitality.

To control ten thousand li around her meant controlling this entire continent.

Within three years, for Shi Lan to bring this continent under her control, the first thing she would have to deal with was this Qianyuan Dynasty.

Difficult. Very difficult.

That was Shi Lan’s assessment. She was just a mortal now. With spiritual qi this thin and the system’s functions unusable, recovering her cultivation in the short term was clearly unrealistic.

“Grrr—”

The hunger in her belly pulled Shi Lan’s thoughts back. Over the course of their conversation, the sun had already slanted westward.

Old Hongtou and the other two slowly got to their feet. They needed to take advantage of the time when the sun was no longer so fierce to go beg for food.

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Watching the three of them shuffle away, Shi Lan’s thoughts began to drift.

The starting cultivation for the Yuqing Creation Art was the Innate Realm. Right now she couldn’t cultivate it at all and could only rely on the Jade Tempering Art and Vajra Divine Fist.

Cultivating the Jade Tempering Art required large amounts of blood and flesh essence or spiritual materials that replenished blood and qi.

The early stages of the Vajra Divine Fist put too much strain on the body. Before she trained the Jade Tempering Art to a certain level, she couldn’t practice it often.

“Grrr—”

Shi Lan frowned slightly and pressed a hand to her abdomen. It had been a long time since she’d felt this kind of hunger.

Her most urgent task now was figuring out how to pacify the temple of her five viscera.

After a moment’s thought, Shi Lan glanced around, then walked into the wilderness. She had nothing on her and really didn’t want to go begging, so she planned to look for wild fruits to fill her stomach first.

Even grass roots would do, as long as she got through this wave. Tomorrow, once she reached Qingzhou City, she could think of another way. It wasn’t as if she would really starve to death.

The wilds were bare and clean, with not a trace of wild fruit. It made sense. Anything easy to find had probably already been picked clean by people like Old Hongtou.

On the way, Shi Lan did see a few wild rabbits, but in her current state she was panting after a few steps. Catching those rabbits that darted like the wind was nothing but a fantasy.

After walking for nearly half an hour, Shi Lan came to a small stream. She drank until her belly was half full of stream water, which finally eased the hunger a little.

Shi Lan lowered her head and rubbed her face twice. The clear reflection in the water was slightly different from her previous appearance and not far off from how she had looked before her bone-washing and rebirth.

Among mortals, she would count as quite beautiful.

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Letting out a slow breath, Shi Lan took off her shoes and socks and stepped into the water.

The stream wasn’t very deep, just over her calves, and it was a bit chilly.

After rummaging for a long time among the pebbles at the bottom of the stream, Shi Lan returned to the bank.

A dozen or so shrimp about half a palm long and a crab weighing around three taels. That was her haul.

She couldn’t start a fire, but Shi Lan didn’t care. With practiced movements, she peeled off the shells and polished off everything.

The slight fishy taste didn’t affect her appetite at all.

With something in her stomach, the discomfort brought on by hunger gradually faded.

Taking a look at the darkening sky, Shi Lan set off back toward the West City Temple.

In the desolate countryside, there were bound to be hyenas and wolves. Staying outside was too dangerous.

The way back always felt shorter. Before long, Shi Lan had returned to the dilapidated temple.

There were a few more people inside now, all dressed as beggars, each curled up in a corner resting.

Old Hongtou and the lean youth were among them, but the thin middle-aged man was nowhere to be seen.

When they heard someone enter, the beggars huddled in the corners didn’t so much as stir.

Old Hongtou and the lean youth had not yet lain down. Seeing Shi Lan come in, Old Hongtou quietly waved her over.

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The two of them sat in a corner by the Buddha statue and had left a sizeable space behind them for her.

Shi Lan lightened her steps and walked over to them, softly offering her thanks before stepping onto the not-very-thick layer of straw and sitting down with her back to the Buddha statue.

Once she settled in, Old Hongtou and the lean youth shifted closer together, cutting her off from the other beggars.

Shi Lan closed her eyes to rest and considered how she should act once she reached Qingzhou City tomorrow.

This place was different from the Lingyang Realm and a bit like ancient China on Earth. The authorities’ control was very strict. Walking crooked paths and taking the shady route was not a long-term plan.

Just as she was deep in thought, Shi Lan felt someone lightly tugging on the hem of her skirt.

Opening her eyes, she saw the lean youth holding out a palm-sized oil-paper packet toward her.

The boy kept his head lowered, looking a bit shy. In the night, Shi Lan couldn’t quite make out the expression on his face.

“Steamed bun…”

If the surroundings hadn’t been so quiet, Shi Lan might not have heard his voice at all.

“Grrr—”

The noise coming from the boy’s own stomach was quite obvious.

Shi Lan’s mood improved a fair bit. She wasn’t that hungry anymore. After thanking him, she pushed the oil-paper packet back.

The boy didn’t take it. He shrank back a little and fell silent.

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Seeing his reaction, Shi Lan shook her head with a smile and unwrapped the oil-paper packet. The buns inside had long since gone cold.

Shi Lan picked up a bun and tore it in half. The filling was vegetable.

Reaching out, she held half the bun out to the boy. At first he didn’t move, but a few breaths later he couldn’t hold back and sat up.

Slightly flustered, he took the half bun from Shi Lan and devoured it in big gulps.

Shi Lan ate the remaining half in a few bites, then went back to thinking about the matter she hadn’t finished working through.

Suddenly, her brow twitched. She opened the system panel and tapped into the lottery section.

The lottery wheel still gleamed with golden light, but the lottery button was completely dark. Clearly, she couldn’t draw.

Shi Lan was a little disappointed. She had been hoping to use that intermediate lottery chance.

Just as she was about to close the system panel, her gaze paused on the system’s temporary storage, which was faintly glowing.

A moment later, joy flooded Shi Lan’s eyes.

In those ten basic lotteries earlier, she had drawn many items usable for Body Tempering and Innate Realm cultivation.

Shi Lan had thought they were useless and hadn’t even bothered to take them out to look. She had just tossed them into the system’s temporary storage for the time being instead of putting them into the Qiankun Bracelet.

Items drawn from the lottery could only remain in temporary storage for twenty-four hours.

They should have long since been reclaimed by the system, but thanks to that enormous time flow difference, they had been preserved.