Netherworld Painted Skin Scroll

Chapter 309 Fireworks
“You planted the seed of calamity for the God of Destiny, causing the world to suffer in order to suppress it. I suspect that this is why the rules and destiny of the world have changed.” Mei Qiulu thought for a moment, “I can’t say whether this change is a blessing or a curse. Right now, it seems to be a blessing—the God of Destiny grows very quickly. I think in a few months, this thing will grow within a thousand miles of the Great Calamity Mountain. If the people know that they can use suffering to catch it, not only can many people be fed, but people can also live a happier life.”

“As for the calamity… this thing is called the God of Fate.” Mei Qiulu sighed. “I didn’t name it. I knew it was called that when I saw it, and so did they. I thought about asking them to change their way of speaking, but then I realized it was pointless. Even if these people changed their way of speaking, the people of the world would still call it the God of Fate.”

"Do you remember the seed of calamity you planted in it? It cannot survive the calamity unless the people of the world are well-fed and content—I suspect this is one of its means of surviving the calamity. It nourishes the world with itself, and nourishes the world with the power of destiny."

Li Wuxiang frowned: "Then its incense offerings will only grow stronger!"

Mei Qiulu looked at him and reached out to rub his brow: "Don't frown. Frowning will leave marks. You're such a handsome young man. Don't be afraid. If you can defeat it once, you can defeat it a second time. I am currently at the first level of Yang Shen, the Departure from the Mortal Realm. I have thirty years left, and maybe I can reach the second level, the Foundation of Godhood. If I am lucky enough to reach the third level, the Pure Yang Realm, then there will be even less to worry about."

"As for you, the three stages of the Nascent Soul realm are Spiritual Beginning, Transformation, and Divine Connection—you don't even know if you qualify as Spiritual Beginning, do you?"

Senior Sister Mei spoke casually, but someone who unleashed such a sword strike that intimidated the Six Departments certainly had the right to speak so casually. Li Wuxiang felt relieved, and just as he was about to frown, he touched his brow: "Hmm, I'm quite the beggar."

"A beggar?" Mei Qiulu was taken aback, then laughed. "Don't talk nonsense. You're already a god-king. Your situation... Nascent Soul is the gathering of three flowers at the top, but you were forced to achieve it by taking a shortcut. Speaking of which, I'm in the same boat, but I have a solid foundation, so I'm much better off than you."

“It’s not that it’s beyond repair. You’re cultivating the Great Calamity Sword Scripture, and eventually you’ll have to condense a physical body. But your Golden Entanglement is also a Demon King’s physical body, which is actually better as a foundation for your physical body than the Nascent Soul body you’ve cultivated. That’s why you’re progressing so quickly. If you ask me… Li Wuxiang, you could learn from those Corpse Demons.”

"Oh ah?"

"Find the original artifacts of the thirty-six sects. If you can't find the original artifacts for the time being, use true artifacts or treasure artifacts to replace them and complete your physical dragon body. I will eliminate the Blood God Sect first. Whatever they ask me to get, I will send it to you. I am at ease knowing that the original artifacts of each sect are on you."

"Once you have formed a dragon body, since this thing is a magic weapon of various sects, it will still retain its divinity, and you will have completed one of your transformations."

"Senior sister... Ninth Young Master is still alive."

"I suspect he has something he can't say. Otherwise, he wouldn't have gone into hiding, nor would he have failed to find his physical body for three thousand years. But even if he comes to take you in the future, don't be afraid, I'm here."

Having a domineering senior sister to back him up is a good thing, and Li Wuxiang also thinks her idea is good. But if the Ninth Young Master really comes to ask for it... well, let's talk about it later.

No, no, no, it's not something we'll talk about later. There will definitely be a solution, there will definitely be a solution, there will definitely be a solution!
Li Wuxiang nodded: "Okay."

"You yourself are one of them, and this third one, I guess you have some tricks up your sleeve. Did your body just leave by itself that night?"

"that is--"

Mei Qiulu waved her hand: "You don't need to tell me about your own supernatural abilities. Do you think it will work?"

Li Wuxiang didn't want to create another Li Guichen or Li Sule. But he let out a sigh: "I think it's fine."

—We'll figure out a solution later.

"Hmm. With the three Hua gathered together, you are now a true Hundred-Mile Sword Immortal, ready to prove your Nascent Soul Realm." Mei Qiulu glanced at the swordsmen. "Let's go, let's go and have some fun. You deserve it after all this suffering."

Li Wuxiang nodded: "Okay!"

The two walked a few steps side by side, and Li Wuxiang said seriously, "Senior Sister, you said before that you were not suitable to be the leader, and I think you were wrong."

"Oh?"

"I've never been a high-ranking leader, but I think that a high-ranking leader doesn't necessarily have to be a master strategist. Having the ability to recognize talent is also very important, perhaps even more important? Some emperors... some people, once they have a lot of power, want to do everything themselves, but that's exhausting and they become blind to the ways of the world. Having the ability to recognize talent, knowing who can be used and who can't, might make things much easier and simpler."

“Lou He, Senior Brother Zeng, and I were all introduced to the sect by you, and I think the three of us are all quite good.” Li Wuxiang sighed. “Lou He is actually quite good too. I don’t think we can entirely blame him for what he did. He comes from the True Form Sect, and the original sect had a huge influence on him. But even so, he still became a swordsman, so I think he’s quite good as well. Oh, and Xiao Suo is good too.”

Mei Qiulu remained silent, lost in thought. Li Wuxiang then said, "The most important thing is that you dare to charge forward. You are full of vigor and will not be bound by the past."

Mei Qiulu then smiled and said, "You're pleading for Lou He."

"Hmm. Senior sister, please listen to me first—Lou He, think about it, cultivators in this world grow up in their own sects their whole lives. Everyone knows that a master is like a father or a mother. After he left the Taiyi Sect, he had no home, no mother, which is really pitiful. That night after he went out with me, he even said he wanted to come to my Sword Sect and become my disciple—Senior sister, he's like a lost puppy."

"Right or wrong, the mistakes he made are there, but he's already made amends, and he's already died. Actually, some people's mistakes might not be entirely their fault from another perspective. For example, someone might be kind-hearted, but their parents are wicked. Raised by such parents, they make a mistake, and even if they realize their mistake later, what can they do if time can't be turned back? If no one saves them, they're truly unlucky. If someone does save them, it's truly a blessing in disguise."

Li Wuxiang looked at her. Mei Qiulu silently took a few steps, and seeing that he did not look away, she sighed: "Rules are rules. Once I expel him, I can't bring him back, otherwise it would be a joke. But, alright, let me think about it some more."

“Speaking of this—” Mei Qiulu raised her hand, “These past few days, the magic power of your talisman has faded, and the two of them have turned back into paper, so I kept it. Don’t worry, they’ll be fine.”

"Ah, I'll do it again right away..."

"No rush, no rush, let's talk about it after tonight."

No rush? It must be uncomfortable for a soul to be attached to a talisman. I can understand if Senior Sister Mei wants to punish Lou He slightly, but Zhao Yu—

Oh, maybe he's angry that she almost got Lou He killed?
This isn't Zhao Yu's fault. But if Senior Sister Mei is truly angry... he's already pleaded for Lou He once, so he's too embarrassed to push his luck any further. Li Wuxiang nodded: "Alright."

The area around the two small sheds was bustling with activity; it had truly become a campsite. Li Ke and two other swordsmen were busy in the cooking shed, while others were piling up wood, and still others were splitting the timber into wooden picks and shovels.

Wooden tools weren't very useful, but they could release their true energy, so they were quite adept at digging holes in the ground. When Li Wuxiang walked over, dozens of thick wooden pillars had been erected next to the two sheds, presumably to be used to build the foundations. These logs had been felled by Mei Qiulu's flying sword outside the Great Calamity Mountain, which was comparable to a nuclear bomb; their surfaces were blackened, so even the work of preservation was unnecessary.

When Li Ke saw him, he shouted, "Hey, senior brother, senior brother, why don't you prepare dinner tonight? I heard you're a great cook!"

Li Wuxiang's cooking skills weren't exactly top-notch, but in his previous life he had lived a life of refinement, so even if he wasn't particularly particular about the food he prepared, it was still better than what these swordsmen, who were used to eating and sleeping in the open, had. He didn't know when his reputation as a master chef had spread, but seeing how excited these people were, he was infected by their joy and smiled, "Alright, let me see what they have to eat."

He went into the shed and found that there were more ingredients than he had expected, which must have been gathered from the surrounding woodlands in recent days.

The first thing you notice are the most common seasonings—wild garlic, wild onions, wild cilantro, and ginger. He learned his culinary skills from online home-style recipes and uses these three ingredients the most, so seeing them makes him happy.

In a flash, he spotted a plump fish—it looked like a carp, but had no scales, eight whiskers around its mouth, and a row of pale blue spots on its body. It was about half an arm's length long and was being kept in a tank carved from glass. He was stunned: "Where did this come from?"

“We caught them in the woods,” Li Ke said with a grin. “There’s a river in the woods, a newly emerged one. There should be an underground river nearby, it used to be underground. That night when you and Senior Sister Mei were here, the underground river must have collapsed, and it emerged from the woods to the east. There were even these fish in it. They’re a bit fishy, ​​though. We’ve eaten more than a dozen of them in the last few days—”

Seeing the distressed look on Li Wuxiang's face, Li Ke immediately said, "Hey, it's alright, there's plenty more. It's just that we found it too fishy and went to eat Siming. When they first appeared, you could knock out several of them with one stick in the river."

Li Wuxiang rubbed his hands together: "If it's done properly, it won't taste fishy. When you're preparing the fish... never mind."

He had taught Xue Baoping how to properly prepare fish, and that's when he thought of her. The swordsmen probably wouldn't bother listening to such things, so he didn't bother explaining either.

In his previous life, he quite enjoyed eating fish, but he had little appetite here, so he stopped bothering to cook after leaving Jinshui. However, a few nights ago, countless pieces of flesh and blood sprouted within him, which unexpectedly reminded him of what it felt like to be human. Now, upon seeing this fish, he felt a renewed appetite.

There was fish, and then there was meat. The swordsmen had piled up a small heap of the fish they'd caught over the past few days by the shed. There was also staple food. Next to the heap of fish was a pile of yams. Li Wuxiang looked around again and found a whole jar of oil skimmed off when cooking the fish near the stone stove. It looked just like lard. He licked it—because the fish meat was supposed to be salty, and this oil was surprisingly salty too; no wonder they didn't eat it.

It was rare to find such a place with all the necessary cooking utensils and ingredients. Li Wuxiang neatly tied his hair up and said to Li Ke and the other two swordsmen, "You two help me out—"

As soon as he finished speaking, the three of them turned and left. Li Ke laughed as he walked away, "We've been cooking for days, but we're not doing that work now that you're here. Senior brother, we're going to move some wood. Wait for dinner!"

Alright. Li Wuxiang pondered for a while and came up with a plan.

The two pots in the small shed were both carved from glass stone, large enough to stew three heads. Because they were carved with flying swords, the inside of the pots was covered with dense, tiny sword marks, making them non-stick. However, these pots couldn't be used for frying, because the fire underneath couldn't be set too high—this kind of glass stone must contain a lot of impurities, and if the temperature was too high, it would probably crack.

We need to make a stew. This is perfect; it's convenient for a large group, and fish tastes delicious when stewed.

Li Wuxiang first took the fish out of the large vat, and it stopped moving when he flicked it with his finger. Then, he washed a bunch of yams three times in another pot, added water, and started simmering them over a low fire.

Then he washed the other pot clean and slowly heated it over a low flame while he went to prepare the fish.

All the internal organs were discarded. Only scallions, ginger, and garlic are used to remove the fishy smell; the internal organs cannot be kept.

He then used a dagger to scrape off the mucus from the skin, and then removed the fascia that originally covered the internal organs, revealing the spine underneath.

The fish was large, and its blood was bright red. He poked at the spine and sides with his dagger, and blood flowed out from near the bones. He let it flow, then removed the iridescent membrane on both sides of the fish's ribs, removed the gills, and cut off all the fins, roots and all.

After scraping off the mucus, draining the blood, and removing the inner membrane and fins, there's little source of fishy smell left.

Li Wuxiang had originally intended to chop off the fish head—he really disliked seeing the fish's unseeing eyes when it died while eating it. But thinking that perhaps someone would like to eat the fish's face and eyes, he left it.

By this time, the steam in the pot heated over a low flame had evaporated, so he scooped in two spoonfuls of oil and made the firewood burn brightly. When the oil started to smoke, he carefully placed the fish, which had been scored, into the pot—the smoke rose, and the sound of oil splattering filled the air. Li Wuxiang felt as if he had been transported back to the small kitchen in Jinshui Town.

This pan is really good; even without coating the fish skin with a thin layer of flour, it fried to a golden brown on both sides and didn't stick to the pan at all.

Li Wuxiang took the fried fish out. The oil from frying the fish was fishy and couldn't be kept, so he poured it out and scooped out two more spoonfuls.

The water for boiling yams hadn't boiled yet, so he sat cross-legged on the ground peeling wild scallions and ginger. As he picked out the white parts of the scallions, he sighed, thinking how nice it would be if there were some Sichuan peppercorns—adding a little Sichuan peppercorn to the oil at the bottom of the pot would make the fish less fishy and enhance the flavor.

When he had almost finished peeling the scallions, he caught a glimpse of a swordsman walking into the shed from the back. He assumed the swordsman was there to get a drink of water, so he ignored him.

But the swordsman walked to the water vat, scooped out a little water with a wooden ladle to wash his hands, and did not drink it. Instead, he squatted down next to him.

Just as Li Wuxiang was about to turn to look at him, he saw a slender hand reaching out in front of him. He opened it and saw a handful of peppercorns soaked in water lying in the palm.

"We found it on the way."

He turned his head sharply and saw Xue Baoping.

He had imagined the scene of their reunion many times. If it were Xue Baoping, the little girl from Jinshui, she would probably cry when she saw him and rush over to hug him. He planned that he would hug her for a while and quickly say some sweet words.

He knew he was relatively emotional compared to others in the world, but he also knew that these emotions were quite reserved. He didn't know what to do if Xue Baoping really kept crying—he knew many ways to comfort a crying girl, but he didn't want to use them on her.

But now Xue Baoping is smiling with her lips pursed. Although her eyes are slightly red, her smile is sly.

In that instant, Li Wuxiang felt that the whole world had shrunk. The vast, boundless world, full of bloodshed and turmoil, suddenly shrank to just a small shed and a stove inside.

Other sounds disappeared in an instant, leaving only the crackling of firewood, the bubbling of boiling water, and the gentle breeze rustling through the tender grass.

He grasped Xue Baoping's hand and held it gently for a while: "Did you come back with Senior Sister Mei and the others?"

"Yes. We happened to run into them on their way back around noon."

Where is Lao Zeng?

"There it is."

Xue Baoping pointed into the distance. Li Wuxiang turned his head and saw Zeng Jianqiu standing next to the log stack with his hands on his hips, laughing at him. The other swordsmen were also watching them and laughing.

He beckoned to Zeng Jianqiu, then turned his face and took the peppercorns from Xue Baoping's palm.

"So you two were just watching me from afar?" Li Wuxiang chuckled and pinched her cheek, feeling a strong yet subtle flow of air from his chest. "I'll settle the score with you later. Let's cook."

(End of this chapter)