The Path to Immortality Begins with the Life-Extending Lamp

Chapter 101: The world is bustling with people seeking profit
"Among the Five Immortal Sects, the Three Overseas Sects, and numerous lineages, those who can attain the Purple Mansion Dao Foundation are all exceptional individuals with dragon-like bearing and phoenix-like elegance."

"Do you all really look down on yourselves so much, let alone the path you're on?"

Li Qing slightly raised his right hand, stopping the actions of the many heroes, and looked at the bandit cultivators pushing the mountain, and sneered.

The immortal sects have five branches, and the unorthodox lineages are countless. They may be obtained from within the universe or sought outside of it. But those "bandit cultivators" who are willing to tie their fate to plunder and fighting are truly short-sighted.

Kill? What path can you forge by killing? Numerous spirits roam the twilight realm, their sharpness unrestrained, leaving behind only karmic consequences. Isn't this just giving others ammunition to reap the rewards?

Having amassed a great deal of wealth and left evidence of wrongdoing everywhere, he is nothing more than a free-range "pig"!
On the main deck, the Taoist soldiers and wandering knights, seeing that Li Qing had spoken, slowly approached the center of the ship, keeping a watchful eye on the giant beast while protecting the leaders.

"I have a gift for you, fellow Daoist. I hope you will not refuse it!"

Upon hearing Li Qing chuckle again, a pale-faced, arrogant god slowly emerged from the cabin.

It had paper bat wings on its back, and was sixteen feet tall. It threw the pale skull in its palm, which landed squarely on the back of the old turtle.

This is the head of that bald Purple Mansion cultivator. He offered his skull to the Southern Dipper in order to borrow lifespan. At this moment, even the life soul of that Purple Mansion cultivator has dissipated, and there is no trace of life force on the pale skull.

This move can only be described as a serious provocation!

However, the Purple Mansion Daoist on the Mountain-Pushing Old Turtle was not angry about this.

He glanced at the young man indifferently, then used his magic to summon the skull. Upon closer inspection, it was indeed the fierce-looking man.

A fire dragon coiled around the ship, with soldiers protecting it on both sides. He was practicing the Yin Fire Technique. Was this his source of confidence?

"Hmph! I know there are hundreds of people on your ship, so you must have some skills."

"They lured Xu, the fierce man, onto the ship in an instant and surrounded and killed him, even obliterating his flesh and soul. They must have either established a heretical altar or possessed forbidden artifacts of the ghost path, right?"

"Now that the Dragon Whale has left, I'm afraid the two captains of your ship are not in good condition and will no longer have time to take care of you."

"You can't save this ship's cargo!"

The Taoist Yu'ao raised his hand and took the Xuan Shui Flag, his words exerting an invisible pressure on everyone on the ship.

In his view, with the dragon whale gone, the two ship captains might not be able to return alive. Even if they could barely escape Wang Hou's control, it would surely end in a miserable way!

At this moment, this ship, whose value is estimated to be in the tens of millions, is like food on a plate, ready to be taken at any time.

"That's not necessarily true!"

Li Qing flicked his right finger, and the mysterious Yin Qi gathered at his fingertip, giving rise to a ghostly fire within the stone. A chilling aura spread, making even his voice seem to drop several degrees in temperature.

Using only the flickering chill as a guide, he surveyed the surrounding wandering swordsmen and soldiers, and said in a deep voice:
"This whole affair started because this bandit was greedy for money. How can you gentlemen be willing to bow down to him? Come with me to Lixu Continent and deliver your goods..."

"If we're talking about resources, wouldn't it be better for a hundred of us to board the Beast Taming Immortal Sect's entire beast-ferrying vessel than to just sit here and waste our time?"

This statement, though crude, is not without merit.

Even if those two ship owners were indeed robbed, the ship's meager supplies and treasures, amounting to only ten or twenty million... even if Li Qing wanted to take them himself, he would never give them up so easily.

If things get serious, it's not like he lacks the ability.

The six Ding, six Jia, and twelve tyrannical gods each stood in one direction, and the Jiazi Linglong Cloud and Rain Domain was instantly flooded.

Li Qing gently placed his right hand on the storage gourd at his waist. A faint, mysterious aura spread out like a dark cloud, causing frost to slowly condense on the ship's planks. An increasingly terrifying aura rose from the young man's body.

In that instant, the Taoist Yu'ao seemed to see in this man's silver-gray pupils a vast expanse of white bones and a noisy, chaotic place, as well as the Six Heavens Ghost Palace of Taihao!
"The ghost Taoist priests of Lingnan?"

The Taoist's pupils contracted slightly, showing great apprehension towards the otherworldly, yin energy origins.

"But you must know that this place is still more than seventy miles away from the ruins. Your banners are torn and your ships are difficult to sail. Do you really think you can reach the shore?"

"With eighty miles of vast ocean waves, I only need to use my Mountain-Pushing Turtle to sweep you all into the seabed. No matter if you are a descendant of a great clan or a prodigy of a sect, how could you possibly overturn the sea and the heavens?"

The outer sea itself represents mystery and the unknown. If he fails to reach the Purple Mansion realm, how long can he fight in this vast seabed?
Heaven has its own rules, and the sea has its own constraints.

Even if the elders of the Lingnan White Bone Path came, they wouldn't be able to leave safely with this ship.

But as soon as the threat ended, the Taoist priest changed the subject again:
"Since you are so adamant, I can refrain from probing your identity and give you that face."

“We are merely following General Danghai’s orders. You have left five million Daozhu on your ship so that my fellow disciples can return and report back. We will immediately retreat and never bother you again.”

"Whether your ship's captain is alive or dead, five million is the bottom line!"

On the East Sea's Pushing Mountain Turtle, the Purple Mansion Daoist faced the sea breeze, holding the Water-Dividing Treasure Flag in his hand, his aura becoming increasingly fierce. Behind him, more than twenty naval Daoists also unleashed their treasure lights, showing a posture of fighting to the death at the slightest disagreement.

Five million, is it still the same demand of five million Daozhu?

On the ship, many heroes unleashed their magical weapons without the slightest fear. Just now, Li Jun had already killed a Purple Mansion cultivator, so the combined strength of the hundred of them might not be afraid of this person!

Li Qing hesitated for a long time, her expression shifting between light and dark.

If he were to become greedy and summon the Ghost Mother, she could instantly turn this entire sea area into a deadly wasteland, making it impossible for either the Purple Mansion Daoist or the East Sea Mountain-Pushing Turtle to survive.

The price was that all the wandering knights and Taoists on this ship would die indiscriminately in that dark and ghostly realm, for the Ghost Mother never showed any mercy to anyone other than Li Qing.

In this way, he could collect all the treasures and provisions on the entire black ship by himself.

But Li Qing disdained to do that!

With his abilities, he wouldn't lack suitable resources at all, let alone the fact that the various Daoists on this ship had truly been kind to him. "You keep talking about five million Daozhu in resources?"

"I don't know if you Taoists on the sea have found mountains of gold and silver, or if each of you has a treasure bowl. A Zifu family in a prefecture can only earn two million Daozhu in three years, and even the head of the Five Directions Immortal Sect can't easily come up with five million Daozhu."

"If they knew how magnanimous the overseas Taoists were, who wouldn't want to purge them?"

"This ship of supplies and treasures includes items from the Yang family of the East Sea, the Li family of Pengguo, items specifically requested by the Seven Star Pavilion, and perhaps also offerings to the Tai Xuan Sect of Yunlu Mountain in Chaojiang Prefecture."

"Ha! You really think you're lucky enough to take it?"

Pei Jiu himself once said that he only earned one or two million Daozhu after a trip over the past six years. Perhaps there was some concealment involved, but Li Qing believed that it would not exceed three million Daozhu at most.

The rest were all based on prices agreed upon by various families and sects long ago. For example, the Five Immortal Sects restricted the circulation of Taiyue Mountain-shaped Dao Zhu, which was anchored to Jiuhua Spirit Gold, both domestically and internationally.

The Seven Star Pavilion and Taiyi Dao demanded that many ship crews bring this item from the East Sea Immortal City at an inflated price. But this item itself came from the Five Directions Immortal Gates, so how could they not know that?
For example, the sword blanks smuggled by Peng Kingdom can bypass the laws of the Allied Cultivation Alliance and be sold openly in various countries, earning nearly three times the profit...

This is the significance of the Black Ships' existence; these are the behemoths of the East China Sea and the open sea, playing a card-changing trick beneath the calm surface.

"You don't need to worry about that. My Lord Wang controls the two rivers and shoulders the sea. He has the ability to handle it all!" Daoist Yu'ao said nonchalantly.

But as it sneered, the forelimbs of the giant tortoise had almost climbed onto the ship, intending to sink them completely into the sea.

"Give it to him!" Li Qing snorted coldly, and the Cloud and Rain Ghost Domain covering a radius of two miles suddenly twisted, as if a ripple had appeared on a water mirror. Looking at the ship in it, it had already moved dozens of feet out of thin air.

However, the Cloud and Rain Domain of Jiazi Linglong is currently only capable of this much!
Upon hearing this, the wandering knights and Taoists on the ship were taken aback at first, but quickly reacted. Pei San'er reached into his sleeve and took out the several mustard seed pouches that Pei Jiu had failed to give out earlier, and hurriedly threw them into the sea.

The next instant, a continuous drizzle fell over the Cloud and Rain Domain. The almost tangible dark clouds and mist, blown by the gale, transformed into a hundred-foot-high cloud sail atop the ship, propelling it towards the shore...

If it's possible to avoid direct confrontation, the best course of action is to conceal the existence of the Demon Mother!
Li Qing had a very pleasant time during this period. He was not known as the "ghostly Li Qing" and did not receive many strange looks. He also saw a lot of things during his time in the outer sea.

If this person truly wishes to leave, that would be for the best.

Clouds and rain, ghosts and demons swirled around the ship, riding the wind and waves into the desolate land. The seventy-mile sea area was unobstructed. Indeed, the Taoist Yu Ao never pursued them again!

At this moment, gazing at the dark clouds that were riding the waves and heading into the distance, the Purple Mansion Daoist on the Mountain-Pushing Turtle scooped up the mustard seed bag and entered it with his divine sense. It was indeed full of precious materials and spiritual objects.

"Ten thousand bundles of spirit paper, rotten silver from the East Sea, the essence of five metals, red silk spirit bamboo... approximately three million one hundred thousand baht. These guys are quite shrewd!"

Yu Ao Zifu shook his head and chuckled softly.

Three million worth of rare materials from the South is indeed worth five million in this Lixu Continent.

"So cunning? How are we supposed to repay Lord Wang? Senior brother, I can lead a few junior brothers to dive underwater and drill into the bottom of that ship, completely..."

Among the naval Taoists at the rear, a young man with a sharp and capable appearance immediately stepped forward and volunteered.

He and his fellow disciples, numbering over twenty, all came from the same lineage, each belonging to a folk lineage in the East China Sea. They were masters of navigating the waves, each possessing the ability to travel hundreds of miles on the water. If a fight were to break out, no matter how clever the ship might be, it would be useless.

"Huh? Repayment? When did I say I was going to repay anyone?"

The Purple Mansion Daoist looked at his junior brother, who was eager to make progress, and sneered.

"Old Ghost Wang fled from Donghai, his family fortune was wiped out. This time, Taoists Ma and Lü were coerced by him, and they must be resentful. With the death of Xu's man, he has few capable men left under his command!"

"Chasing the tide at sea is like rowing against the current; Old Wang is already nearing the end of his life."

"Even if you and I, fellow disciples, were to work under his command for another ten years, would we still be able to earn five million Dao Zhu?"

As the mysterious immortal disciple on the ship said, five million Dao Zhu is no small amount; many noble families in the Purple Mansion would need to work hard for one or two decades to accumulate that sum.

Black ships at sea handle large sums of money, but most of the goods are already owned.

With five million Daozhu in hand, who cares about some pirate leader or some old ghost Wang?

"Let's first head to the borders of those kingdoms, to Chen and Yan, and exchange all these southern spiritual materials for overseas spiritual items. We'll become black market ship owners for a while, and when we return to the East Sea, these five million will be the capital for us brothers to open up our Dharma lineages!"

"Everyone must sign a blood oath, and must not make a fuss about it. They must remember that the five million was stolen by that Marquis Wang, and has nothing to do with us."

"Everyone here has a share of the resources and materials, which can be used for your cultivation and the refining of magical artifacts!"

Upon hearing this, the twenty or so naval Taoist priests frowned with worry, but after hearing what followed, their gazes suddenly turned ardent, and they all peered at the mustard seed pouch in the Taoist priest's hand.

One of the boys, however, seemed slightly worried and said in a deep voice:
"Senior Brother, that Marquis Wang is extremely ruthless. How could he let us escape unscathed? He will surely retaliate against us afterward. We must be on guard!"

The world is bustling with activity, all driven by profit; the world is bustling with activity, all driven by profit. This is often the case for wandering cultivators at sea.

These bandit leaders rely on their ruthlessness and reputation to survive on the seas. How easy is it for them to make money?

“Overseas is not his territory, we can just go around it.”

"As for revenge? On this trip, you and I will bring the whereabouts of this old ghost Wang as a gift, and submit a formal letter to the Dragon-Raising Lord of Linchuan Prefecture."

"Old Ghost Wang, does he still dare to go back to the East China Sea?"

Taoist Yu'ao sneered.

Ever since he witnessed Bai Langjiao's death, he had already had a plan in mind: with the old ghost wall collapsing, the monkeys would scatter, and even he himself would be in dire straits.

Five million taels of grain—that's a gift from heaven; to refuse it would be to suffer the consequences!
"Let's go south to the State of Chen. Before my master died, he told you all to follow me. How could your senior brother ever mistreat you..."

(End of this chapter)