Starting as a spiritual plant master, may I eventually become the master of all lands.

Chapter 98 Daishan

To the north of Daicheng, there is a majestic mountain called "Daishan", a place of outstanding natural beauty and undulating terrain.

Mount Dai is quite famous in the mortal world. Emperors performed the Fengshan ceremony, scholars gathered, and ordinary people worshipped there—even people from other small countries came to visit because of its reputation.

Song Chuan walked on foot through this sacred mountain for ordinary people, playing with a small stone in his hand.

This stone is not a locust stone, but rather the swallow stone found in Song Chang's storage bag; it is the kind of swallow stone produced in Yanshi Ridge.

In the Qi dialect, swallows are also called "Yi Niao" because their calls sound like "Yi Yi". Therefore, this stone is also called "Fei Yi Shi".

Unexpectedly, Song Chang had a piece of it, and it had very few impurities. It had several natural swallow patterns on it, in the shape of spreading its wings and flying. It was actually a high-grade earth-based material!

The Song family was involved in the stone quarry at Yanshi Ridge after Song Chang established his foundation, so it seems they obtained it during that period.

Song Chuan guessed that this strange stone was one of the spiritual items that Song Chang had prepared for Song Jun to exchange for Foundation Establishment Pills.

Song Chang's storage bag contains the family's spirit item pavilion, where the most valuable items are second-tier spirit items. This strange stone is already a third-tier earth-type material, making it the most valuable.

He took the stone, knowing it would be helpful in his future cultivation of the "Earth Primordial Essence Technique." As for all the items and collections of the main branch of the Song family, they were all distributed to the other two branches.

He even gave Song Chang's top-tier flying sword to his great-aunt's descendants.

As I walked forward, I would occasionally look around. The pines and cypresses were lush and green, especially the Selaginella tamariscina, which stood tall and imposing.

Daishan is right next to my hometown, but I've never had the chance to visit it.

Before long, he arrived at a very secluded place, where he saw dozens of ordinary people wearing tall black hats and long black robes, kneeling and worshipping a flag in front of them.

Beneath the flag were several offerings, all of them small spiritual fruits, and even seeds of rare plants. For mortals, finding these things was quite difficult.

Song Chuan was slightly surprised by what he saw.

The flag was embroidered with a bird with long, narrow tail feathers and bright colors, which looked just like the legendary phoenix!

The common people of Qi have a long-standing custom of worshipping birds. It is said that in ancient times, Qi belonged to a large tribe called Dongyi. This large tribe was further divided into many small and medium-sized tribes, each with a bird as its totem.

Later, for reasons unknown, the Dongyi people gradually disappeared into the annals of history. However, they left behind many interesting myths and legends about birds.

Even today, many ordinary people in the State of Qi still consider themselves "barbarians".

Song Chuan watched the somewhat bizarre bird-sacrificing ritual for a while, shook his head, randomly chose a direction, and slowly walked away.

After walking for half an hour, they came to a pavilion ahead, where about ten people were sitting or standing. These people were all Qi Refining stage cultivators, and a few of them seemed to be discussing something.

"Is the Song family truly without anyone left?"

"How could this be fake? I have some connections with Song Qi from that family. I went to Biquan Mountain to find him, but there was no one there. Even the protective formation of the mountain had been removed."

"That's strange, everything's gone too?"

"Of course, I searched for ages but couldn't find a single spirit stone."

"There's only one possibility for this: the Foundation Establishment cultivator has perished," said a middle-aged man who looked quite experienced.

"You mean Song Chang is dead?"

The middle-aged man nodded.

"That makes sense. A second-tier spiritual vein is not something that a Qi Refining cultivator can protect."

"No wonder I saw people from the Hanging Gourd Pavilion earlier; they were probably there to investigate the Song family."

"It's been three days, and they've found out nothing. Does a sect as powerful as the Suspended Gourd Pavilion even care about the Song family's life or death?"

"That's not necessarily true. There's a Song Jun in the main branch of the Song family who is a disciple of the Suspended Gourd Hall."

"I think you're overthinking it. Unless Song Jun is a genius in the Suspended Gourd Pavilion, even if he's a disciple, the Suspended Gourd Pavilion generally won't interfere in family matters."

"The Song family has three branches. It's said that the people in the main branch are very shrewd in their dealings."

"Yes, that's brilliant!" At that moment, a voice suddenly rang out from outside the pavilion.

The group of people talking suddenly noticed a young man standing there, who looked like he was at the eighth level of Qi Refining, and he was smiling.

They were quite surprised that no one noticed this person coming over; they must have practiced some kind of breathing concealment technique.

"I'm sorry to bother you, Meng Hong, a rogue cultivator." With that, the young man turned and left without entering the pavilion.

This person's words and actions struck them as rather strange. After he had walked away, someone pointed at him and said, "He looks very unfamiliar, unlike any rogue cultivator from Daicheng."

"He also has insect sacs, so it seems there are some kind of spirit insects inside. His storage bag is also quite bulging."

"We're not cultivators, why should we care about this? Let's continue talking about the Song family."

The crowd started chattering again.

Two of the cultivators exchanged a glance and silently walked out.

"Those two people were also a bit unfamiliar."

"You just realized they arrived early? I thought they were acquaintances of some fellow cultivator, but it turns out we don't know each other!"

"In the future, everyone should ask about the origins of such gatherings to avoid spreading rumors that could cause trouble."

"Those two wouldn't have any designs on that kid, would they?"

"What's it to us? Keep going, besides the Song family, has anything else major happened lately?"

"What's the rush? The Song family matter isn't over yet! How will the main branch be exterminated?"

Coming down from Daicheng, the road was lined with ordinary people heading into the mountains, their veins constantly flowing.

Flower-selling girls, tea stalls, traveling peddlers, incense vendors—it was quite a lively scene, giving Song Chuan a glimpse into the lives of ordinary people.

They leisurely entered Daicheng and arrived at Changshaoju, which had changed its signboard. It seemed that the three of them hadn't returned after participating in the Kongsang adventure. They wondered which of the three of them could achieve Foundation Establishment.

He walked out of the city until he reached the grove where he had picked the King Corpse Flower years ago, and then stopped.

Wow, they really know how to shop!

"You only choose to go to places frequented by ordinary people, are you out of your mind?"

Two cultivators at the ninth level of Qi Refining appeared, their faces filled with anger.

Song Chuan glanced at them and said indifferently, "You're in such a hurry to show me the scenery. Your accents don't sound like they're from Baiquan County, nor do they sound like they're from other parts of Qi. Tell me, where did you come from?"

"Hey! Bullshit! Whether in Jing Kingdom or here in Qi Kingdom, I've never seen anyone so calm about dying," one of them said.

"Oh? People from the Kingdom of Well!" Song Chuan narrowed his eyes and looked at them with his arms crossed.

The three southernmost prefectures of Qi—Hexi, Sihu, and Zaolin—all had parts that bordered the northern part of Jing.

The fact that these two people had traveled all the way from Jing Kingdom to Baiquan County puzzled him.

It's not that Qi can't have cultivators from other countries, but this Jing Kingdom, I heard Chi Ying Shu say last time that it's almost becoming a barren land. Are these two just here in Qi to make a living by robbing cultivators? Aren't they a bit too far away?