The annual bloom of the twisted forest ectacle, but not for the reasons one might expect.

  When the leaf cos atop the talon-like branches bloomed, thousands of giant seeds would fly off like dandelions, each with a queeipede rva ging on snugly.

  No opportunistic predator would let su opportunity slip, for each seed and queen rva recious cultivation resource!

  When the cos turned pink and were on the verge of blooming, thousands of flying spirit beasts would flock over like vultures cirg a dying animal.

  But there was no such thing as a free lunch.

  tless tipedes would also swarm to the treetops to protect the cos. Warrior tipedes would even sprout wings and soar into the skies to sughter as chasing the flying seeds! If not for the presence of the tipedes, the beasts would rip into the cos before they even blossomed.

  Ying Shi mentiohe above as he briefed the disciples, now all awake.

  Mohei gasped.

  "Those warrior tipedes are so scary, but they still fly? What type of tipede has wings?!"

  Ying Shi ignored him and tihe speech; Baiyun patted Mohei on the shoulder to fort him.

  The pn was simple.

  Each day, Fei An would be sent to iigate the ditions of the forest. If the cos were turning pinkish, it was her cue to immediately return a the situation. Then, the eeam would rush over in the carriage a up camp, waiting for the chaos to unfold.

  The hunting party would be split into two groups, one for looting, and another for invading the again.

  Yingtao, Baiyun and Jingfeng would ehe once again to locate Lifesap, while the rest of the team would gather the corpses falling from above.

  Yingtao would be in charge of navigating with the pass and fighting off warrior tipedes if it came down to that. Baiyun was chosen for his sharp senses, proven by how he detected the warrior before even Yingtao herself. Jingfeng was chosen for his expertise in scouting and his ability to lighten and dampen their footsteps with wind.

  It wasly a bad sele, but Baiyun couldn't feel but shoot Ying Shi a questioning gnce. He decided to voice a question he had on his mind from before.

  "Is that Lifesap really that important?" he asked.

  Ba the caverns, he was so focused on using the pass and searg the surroundings that examining the Lifesap with divihread slipped his mind.

  Ying Shi nodded.

  "Somewhat. It's a valuable material, but if I wao, I could easily just buy it right off the market. Some sellers have captured other Twisted Forests aermihe tipede popution. They harvest rge quantities of Lifesap daily because of that, so the price is affordable."

  "But our has a tradition. While it will support us with cultivation materials, for breakthroughs, all ingredients must be gathered by our own efforts. Elder sister needs Lifesap as one of the materials to assist her breakthrough."

  Baiyun spped a hand to his forehead.

  Another pesky "warrior " making trouble for their desdants! He had seen more than enough of sus in his past life, g their desdants o be tempered by trials and hardships.

  Ridiculous, it was only gambling on the lives of their desdants! Talented saplings were rare to begin with, and besides, what heartless bastards would send their desdants off into life ah enters? There were better ways to hone bat skills aal fortitude without such terrible sequences.

  "Young master Ying Shi!"

  One of the guards who distracted the warrior tipedes called out.

  "It sounds like you didn't mao collect much Lifesap earlier? And Sanguang seems to be badly ioo. What exactly happened down there?"

  Yingtao sighed, befiving a brief summary of the disaster.

  There was a moment of silence as the guards entered a daze.

  Baiyun frowned. Why were they ag like it was the biggest sho the world? Even if the warrior tipedes were supposed to guard the queen, it shouldn't be that odd for a few of them to wander around the from time to time.

  "It unched a metal spike? Since when could warrior tipedes do that?" the g guard frowned.

  "They shouldn't be smart enough to learn teiques of their own. We o report this to the Beast Association." anuard said.

  Wait. The warriors weren't supposed to know such a teique?

  Baiyu deep into thought.

  bat teiques and spells were far too plicated to create and use without years of dedicated study, something impossible for the less intelligent spirit beasts. But ieiques were nature's saving grace. With them, even pletely mindless spirit pnts could use powerful spells, abilities imprinted into their very nature from birth by evolution!

  But could such a mutation happen so abruptly? ges to ieiques only happened over many geions.

  A teique like the metal spike was not simple. Creating matter wasn't possible at this cultivation stage, so some form of material shifting was involved, likely from its exoskeleton. Then, it would o be fired with force befitting that of a Core Shaper.

  Metal trol, spike formation and velocity. This seemingly simple teique was actually an amalgamation of at least 3 other teiques.

  plicated innate multi-part teiques normally inated from several ces.

  Baiyun imagined a hypothetical beetle, evolving a simir spike-shooting teique.

  The hypothetical beetle had a metallic shell that grew stronger and stronger with every molt. But after mauries, the shells would grow too powerful to molt, f older beetles to be trapped and crushed to death by their own shells.

  tless years passed before a new geion of beetles mutated an ieique that let them morph their shells to fit their body, finally esg their evolutionary curse.

  These beetles eventually entered a triew predator, excellent at grabbing onto their bodies. The teique underwe another mutation, allowing the beetles to expel specific parts of their shell to escape their predator.

  They would learn to morph their shells into spiker shapes as well, making them tougher to prey on. Every new geion would be a little better at bsting off their shells, until eventually, they unched with enough force to be lethal.

  Such a voluted process, for a mere spike firing teique…

  It was an absurdly slow process that took millions of years at the bare minimum.

  The warrior tipede randomly mutating a new ieique made no se ossible that specific warrior had enlightened enough to bee intelligent, but it would first require a teacher. And even then, learning the basics of spell theory took years! sidering Ying Shi's hunting party had been raiding the for the past 3 years, that didn't seem to add up either.

  It made no sense for the warrior tipede to suddenly learn a eique. But Baiyun didn't have enough information to guess how that ossible. Something was off.

  "ht! Guards, salute to Baiyun!" a guard suddenly said, interrupting his thoughts.

  The guards all stood up and showed their gratitude, catg him off guard.

  "Baiyun, you've done us a real solid this time. Sanguang is a young master of the Stormseeker , and it would have been a major i if he had died."

  Letting their young masters enter dangerous territory, then throwing a fit if they died... that sort of behaviour from s was all too familiar to Baiyun.

  "I'm sure the young master has already rewarded you, but the least we as guards do is show our thanks."

  A guard who had ehe tipede perked up.

  "Oh. You see that ring on his hand? Master Ying Shi was generous enough to reward him with it!"

  "As expected of the young master!"

  Baiyun ughed awkwardly as the guards began to talk excitedly.

  If they would just leave him alohat would be the best thanks he could receive. Being in the spotlight was exhausting.

  ...

  The briefing ended soon, but the disciples began to discuss as the carriage rattled on.

  Baiyun did not find much of what they said important, but a small detail caught his ear. Sihey were staying in a nearby town fhly 2 weeks, Ying Shi would take a quick trip back to the sect to try to request the aid of an elder once more.

  If a Soul elder had bee, the warrior tipede Yingtaled so much to take down would be crushed in mere seds. There would have been no sut, nor major damage to the forest.

  But Baiyun wasn't going to pin, since he got a good artefact out of it. He stared at the Thousand Wills ring with satisfa. It wasn't particurly strong but it would be very useful.

  Mohei suddenly tapped him on the shoulder and pointed out of the window.

  "Baiyun, look! We're almost at the town!"

  "I thought looking outside made you dizzy?" Baiyun asked.

  "Eh? Now that you mention it..."

  Mohei's face suddenly turned pale and he backed away with his hands clutg his stomach. Baiyun shook his head.

  Outside the window, a town came into view. It was small and simple, sisting of many 2-storey white buildings with bck tiled roofs. A river cut through its midst and passed through a maone al.

  Upstream, grouchy fishermen held los and prodded for fish. Further down, elderly folk stood knee-deep ier as they scrubbed away at clothing.

  As the carriage drew closer, an old man jogged up to it. He grinned with squinted eyes and showed his crooked teeth as he waved.

  The speeding carriage came to a stop beside him and stirred up clouds of dust in its wake, but the old man didn't bat an eye. He even tried to pat the bull, but it turs head away and huffed in displeasure.

  As Ying Shi opehe door, he spoke.

  "Oh, hello again! Is it that time of the year again? Time passes so fast these days..."

  "It's a pleasure to meet you, old Lu. We will be stopping by for the few weeks." Ying Shi said politely. "Now, if you'd excuse us."

  He got off the carriage in a hurry, being for the team to follow.

  "Ah... Don't be so cold, young man!"

  Ying Shi passed one of his guards a chessboard. The guard looked a little dismayed, pointing to himself for firmation, only to receive a firm nod.

  The g guard sighed and walked to the old man.

  "Old Lu, would you like to py a game of chess?"

  "Ah! Hahaha! I used to be known as the Dragon of the Chessboard ba the day. e, let me show you my moves!"

  Baiyun eechless as the old man dragged the unwilling guard away. To think Ying Shi had a side like this to him! Hah... seeing youths treat the fellow elderly like pests was saddening.

  Ying Shi led the disciples across stone pavings and arrived at their destination, a humble inn. It looked identical to the other buildings, save for its 4-storey height. If not for the oval sign of bck wood hammered above the door with the inn's name engraved in gold, it would have been easy to mistake it for merely a rger house.

  He pushed the door open with a creak.

  They entered a rge room where an old man was slouched on a ter, fast asleep. All around were unbelled doors, as well as a circur staircase that led further up behind the ter.

  As Ying Shi's footsteps echoed, the old man suddenly jolted awake, his eyes growing wide.

  "Young master Ying Shi! Wele bay humble inn!" he said with a huge smile. "Excuse me while I prepare the keys!"

  He ducked uhe ter and rummaged through several drawers noisily, a bead of sweat rolling down his temple. A notebook was tossed into the air and nded on the ter, followed by the g of several brass keys with numbers on them.

  "There is o hurry. Take your time." Ying Shi said.

  More and more keys piled oable, until the innkeeper popped back up, wiping his sweat off with a hand.

  "Well, I 't have you waiting, I? Ahaha!" he ughed. "Huests, here are your keys. Feel free to head to your rooms immediately!"

  "Thank you."

  Ying Shi tossed a bag of tokens to the old man, who hurriedly poured them out and began to t excitedly.

  Baiyun frowned. For an innkeeper, he had no manners.

  To the disciples and guards, this was an everyday sight. They merely took their keys and began to head upstairs. But Baiyun's eyes were drawn to the tokens on the ter.

  Each of them had rims of metallic metal that made them stick together ly. On their backs, each had a simple carving of a pavilion. Without a doubt, those were tokens of the WanLi.

  Baiyun could still remember the enormous map Ying Shi had taken out during the first meeting. This town had caught his eye previously with its ridiculous name, "Forest Tortoise".

  It was located quite a distaside WanLing, far from sect territory. Yet, they still used the WanLi's currency?

  Baiyun found that quite intriguing.

  The dullest expnation would be that WanLing owhis vilge; it wouldn't be unusual for a rge sect. But a stra feeling told him this wasn't the case.

  What Baiyun found iing was the possibility that WanLing was iial enough for their currency to be widely accepted even iside world. With their strange magic rims, it would certainly be hard to make feries of. A currency backed by a powerful sect also offered far more assurahan a mortal bank could ever provide.

  There was even a tiny possibility that WanLing had power over the try, but it was unlikely. Most sects with such power had branches all over their try, which WanLing cked.

  Baiyun rubbed his . If it was as he thought, he was sure the influence of the WanLi would prove useful to him iure somehow.