Chapter 45: Empty House

After leaving Mujiao Town, Song Qingming headed north.

This time, Song Qingming was not in a hurry to travel. He walked and stopped along the way. When he came across interesting places, he would stop and play. It was the spring equinox, and everything was revived and flowers were blooming everywhere. This way, he saw many beautiful scenery he had never seen before.

Song Qingming made a secret resolution in his heart that if he succeeded in cultivation one day, he would definitely go out of Weiguo and take a good look at this world of immortal cultivation.

The last time he went to Fuyun Mountain Range, Song Qingming was so thrilling that he had no time to stop and appreciate the scenery. When he returned to Qinghe County from Guiyunfang, in order not to let his clansmen worry about his safety, he was also in a hurry to travel. He returned to Funiushan early and had no time to see the beautiful scenery along the way.

Twenty days later, he crossed Pingyang County and changed his route to the northwest. When he walked slowly to Guiyunfang, more than a month had passed. The entrance to the market was the same as three years ago, and people still had to queue up to verify their identities before entering. However, there seemed to be more monks guarding the gate than three years ago, and the interrogation was more detailed than last time.

After entering the market, Song Qingming asked around and found out that a group of demon cultivators had come to the Fuyun Mountains in recent years and had harmed many fellow cultivators. In order to prevent them from sneaking into the market, Xiaoyao Sect increased its patrol efforts.

Demon cultivators are cultivators who practice strange techniques from other worlds. After practicing these techniques, cultivators often change their minds and will do whatever it takes to achieve their goals. Some special techniques also have strange abilities to control others, and even blood sacrifices of mortal cultivators, which are against the way of heaven.

The cultivators in this world hate the demon cultivators. Once the traces of demon cultivators are found in Weiguo, Xiaoyao Sect will often go to war and wipe them out. However, demon cultivators are cunning and good at hiding among ordinary people in the mountains, which often makes these big sects work in vain.

Song Qingming strolled in Guiyunfang for a while. This market was not much different from three years ago. Soon he came to the shop where he bought the Taixu Sword three years ago, but he didn't expect that the scene in front of him made him a little depressed. The grocery store where he bought magic tools that year has now been replaced by a store selling various spirit beasts, and the owner of the store has also been replaced by a middle-aged man with a beard.

Song Qingming carefully checked and confirmed that he was in the right place, then he stepped forward and asked: "Boss, is the Daoist Li who was originally here still here?"

"Daoist Li, which Daoist Li? I don't have a Li here. Daoist you are looking for pills, right? But he sold this shop to me a long time ago. If you want to find him, just move forward a hundred steps and you will find him." The middle-aged man pointed to a pill shop across the street.

"Pills, wasn't this originally a grocery store?" Song Qingming looked at the direction he pointed, and his mind was even more confused.

After spending some time asking, Song Qingming learned that the "Li's Grocery Store" had long been deserted, and the store had now been changed to several owners.

Hearing this news, Song Qingming's heart trembled. He had already deeply experienced the mysteriousness of the Yuxuan Sutra. He wanted to come here to inquire about who the master who deposited the Taixu Sword was. I didn't expect that I seemed to come a little late. Now the place has long been deserted. I don't know if the original owner knew that there was a technique hidden in the sword.

Song Qingming asked around in the surrounding streets. He was not unfamiliar with the master and apprentice who opened a store here three years ago, but they only knew that the two were master and apprentice. It seemed that they were casual cultivators from other places and only ran this small store on weekdays. After asking around, no one knew where the two had gone. Now it seems that it will be difficult for him to find the answer to this question in a short time.

Even if they were worried that I would come to settle the account, they didn't have to move the whole store away. Seeing that it was getting late, Song Qingming left here a little disappointed and found an inn in the market to stay.

Lying on the bed, Song Qingming was still thinking about this matter. Now he even suspected that the two people had intentionally hidden this technique in the sword.

Now that he had inherited this technique and felt the mystery of the Jade Mysterious Sutra, if it was really the two people who had intentionally passed it on to him, they could be regarded as his teachers.

The next morning, Song Qingming left the inn early and came to the market again. Along the largest street in the market, Song Qingming came to a square on the east side of the market. At this time, many cultivators had gathered on the square. They were either in groups of three or five, or alone like him, staring closely at the center of the square.

This is the place where the monks' monster hunting missions are posted in Guiyunfang. There is a high circular wall in the center of the square. Posted on the wall are all the missions of hunting monsters and purchasing spiritual medicines, as well as various monster information.

From the first-level monsters in the early stage of Qi Refining to the second-level monsters at the peak of foundation building, as long as the first-level and second-level monsters near Guiyunfang are included, the magic power of monsters above the third level is equivalent to that of Jindan monks among humans, and they generally do not appear near Guiyunfang. They are all active in the depths of the Fuyun Mountains. Guiyunfang naturally does not dare to offer a reward for monsters of this level.

In these published information, not only the places where the monsters are active are marked, but also the characteristics and weaknesses are written one by one, and the valuable items on these monsters are specially noted. The reason for this is to facilitate the monks who take on the task to make some preparations in advance before departure, so as to better complete the task.

For this reason, Xiaoyao Sect also specially recruited a group of monks in Guiyunfang to go deep into the Fuyun Mountains to explore the information of these monsters, and then a special person collected this information together, and finally published it on this square according to the level, difficulty and other information of the monsters plus the corresponding reward spirit stones.

It is clearly stipulated in the market that any monk, whether a direct disciple of Xiaoyao Sect or a casual cultivator, can receive the reward spirit stones marked in the published task as long as he successfully completes the task and brings the required token here.

Guiyunfang is the largest market in the northern part of Xiaoyao Sect. There are no less than a thousand cultivators living in it, most of whom are independent cultivators. After taking on tasks in the market, these independent cultivators formed large and small monster hunting teams, and then went deep into the Fuyun Mountains to hunt monsters, which also brought Guiyunfang an unusually prosperous scene.

The reason why Guiyunfang did this was to attract more cultivators to hunt monsters here, reduce the number of monsters in the Fuyun Mountains, and make more preparations for future monster turmoil.

When he came here, Song Qingming had already inquired about some information in the market here. His purpose of coming here was to find a place where he could go out to hunt monsters and train himself.

After walking around the square for a long time, Song Qingming made up his mind and planned to start with tasks that were relatively simple for him. After finding a few relatively simple intermediate monsters in these tasks, Song Qingming was about to walk to the center of the square to take on these tasks, but a voice suddenly sounded beside him.

"Fellow Daoist, please stay for a while."