Chapter 501 (5): Some Principles Are Natural and Right

Chen Ping'an stood still with the hiking pole in his hand. He had naturally held back when unleashing the slightly modified Heavy Cavalry Formation Shattering Technique coupled with the Inch Movement Talisman that he had used after shattering the formation and entering the temple, or else the person who had confidently offered to give him a free hit would have ended up becoming an undutiful son, forcing his white-haired parents to farewell their black-haired son. Of course, it wouldn't be strange either if these Dao partners still appeared youthful, since it was very normal for cultivators in the mountains to maintain a youthful appearance even if they were hundreds upon thousands of years old.

The reason that Chen Ping'an had held back was naturally because he wanted to "modestly" ask Du Yu about the two unique talismans afterward.

As for the petrified youths nearby, they were coincidentally knocked unconscious by the violent ripples of Chen Ping'an's fist aura.

The flippant young man standing on the divine altar had further been struck by Du Yu's leg and knocked unconscious, suffering an even more miserable fate than the other young men in the courtyard.

Everything had been calculated perfectly.

However, the execution had only required a single punch.

𝕗𝚛𝚎𝚎𝐰𝗲𝗯𝗻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Only the young man sitting beside the campfire remained conscious but dazed.

Chen Ping'an glanced at him and said, "Do you not know how to play dead?"

The young man hurriedly fell backward and cocked his head, not forgetting to roll his eyes up and stick his tongue out at the same time.

Chen Ping'an smiled and asked, "Miss Canal Master, you don't mind that I damaged your statue, do you?"

As he said this, he flicked his sleeve and swept a young man away as if he were rubbish, sending him slamming into the wall. There was the soft sound of bones being pulverized into dust.

The canal master who was responsible for the water fortune of the stream felt as if her bones were about to crumble as well.

"It's okay, that's no worry at all," the canal master hurriedly said in a quivering voice. "Everything is fine as long as Esteemed Immortal is happy. To say nothing of breaking in half, it's okay even if the statue is smashed into smithereens."

"What in the world is going on with Imperial Accompanying City?" Chen Ping'an asked.

The canal master bent down slightly and held up an immortal cup that was shimmering with treasured light, saying, "Esteemed Immortal, you can drink some wine as you listen to me slowly explain the situation."

Chen Ping'an smiled and replied, "Even Du Yu didn't fall for this trick of yours, so what makes you think that it will work on me? In any case, are you not aware of why his junior brother misses you so much? You should at least use a smarter method even if you're truly seeking death. Do you think I'm easy to trick because my fist skills are elementary and my experience in the world is lacking?"

The canal master hurriedly put away the cup, but an intense chill suddenly erupted near her temples. Afterward, she felt excruciating pain as she was smacked to the ground, with her knees sinking into the earth.

Her soul was swaying, and it was as if she had been tossed into a cauldron of boiling oil. The canal master forcefully endured the tormenting pain, with her teeth chattering as she said in a severely quivering voice, "Please forgive me, Esteemed Immortal, I beg you to please forgive me. This lowly maidservant won't dare to seek death again."

Chen Ping'an waved his hand and said, "My surname isn't Du, and I don't have any bad blood with Verdant Bamboo Lake. I'm just a normal passerby. If it weren't for Du Yu insisting on dragging me into this and giving me a free hit, I wouldn't have wanted to enter the shrine in the first place. Now go on and tell me what you know about the secrets pertaining to Imperial Accompanying City. If there are things that I know you're aware of but you pretend to be oblivious to, then I'll have to have a good discussion with you regarding the rippling cup that you've purposely hidden inside your sleeve, and whether it's actually a bonded item that's used to hold enchanting soup and romantic fortune."

The smile on the canal master's face was worse than a crying expression.

This young wanderer was clearly one hundred times more difficult to deal with than Du Yu!

The canal master trembled in fright as she slowly explained the calamity befalling the neighboring Imperial Accompanying City.

Chen Ping'an secretly observed the expressions of the two maidservants out of the corners of his eyes as he listened to her explanation.

Sure enough, the godly body of Imperial Accompanying City's city god was about to crumble. The city god had reached a dead end in the Dao of deities, and facing collapse at the very end was the logical consequence. However, just like humans feared death, city gods also feared collapse. As such, the city god of Imperial Accompanying City had tried everything in his ability, first building the correct relationships and then exhausting all of his accumulated wealth to request a promotion from the imperial court, one that went against etiquette.

However, the results were not ideal, and this was caused by a past event that people hadn't cared about very much at the time, but was still having significant effects up until today. One hundred years ago, there had been a bloody and unjust case of an entire clan of scholars being massacred, and in the end, it had appeared to the commoners and officials of the imperial court that justice had finally been served. However, this was far from the case in reality, and the officials of the city god temple had also failed to understand that the consequences would be so severe and far-reaching. Otherwise, the situation today would have been completely different.

Verdant Bamboo Lake was neighbors with Imperial Accompanying City, and the lake lord who had jurisdiction over the one lake, three rivers, and two canals was deeply involved with the matters of the city. As such he was privy to many secrets.

For example, the scholarly clan had accumulated merit and virtue for many years, and the plaque inside the ancestral hall of the clan residence had almost been about to birth an incense person. However, they had suffered tragic misfortune in a single night, with not even their pets and livestock being spared in the massacre. The city lord had been infuriated, and he had ordered the petty officials of his various divisions to investigate this matter.

In the end, however, the investigations had surprisingly circled back to his own city god temple. As it turned out, the main official of the Yin Yang Division, the leading subordinate from the leading division of the city god temple, had colluded with a shackle and chain general, an official with a similar rank to the subordinate county lieutenant.

The main official of the Yin Yang Division had assumed human form without permission and disguised himself as a handsome young man, after which he had tempted and assaulted a young woman of the scholarly clan. Meanwhile, the shackle and chain general had taken a fancy to the incense person who was yet to completely take form, hoping to use it to bribe a cultivator from the mountains so that he could obtain a position in the city god pavilion of a provincial city, being promoted to the lofty position of martial judge who was above the six divisions and only below the city god.

As such, the shackle and chain general had blackmailed the main official of the Yin Yang Division and forced him to help. The two officials should have been responsible for maintaining peace and prosperity in the prefectural city, yet they had ended up recruiting a group of criminal bandits from the cultivation world into the city, asking them to massacre everyone in the scholarly clan. Of course, the main official of the Yin Yang Division had already privately kidnapped and hidden away two beautiful women, keeping them in a secluded residence in some desolate region outside the prefectural city.

So be it if this were all, and the city god wouldn't have fallen to such a terrible position if he had slightly bent the laws and favored his two subordinates, giving them much lighter punishments. However, the city god who had already been skilled at fishing for fame during life had, on the surface, asked the ghost officials of his six divisions to assist the local officials in hunting down the criminal bandits, executing them on the spot without mercy.

Afterward, the city god had secretly acquitted the main official of his Yin Yang Division and executed the shackle and chain general who had sought to serve a higher-ranking city god. As for the two women who had been hidden outside the city, they had naturally failed to escape the clutches of death as well.

Unexpectedly, however, a child in the clan had been playing hide-and-seek with a maidservant, and he had been hiding between two partition walls at the time. The maidservant had been extremely loyal to the clan, and she had purposely let herself be killed near the partition walls, allowing her to use her body to hide the entrance. This had allowed the young boy to eventually flee from Imperial Accompanying City. After a dozen or so years, he had received help from a senior who was friends with his clan, and he had eventually been able to change his name and passport and thus use this new identity to place second in the imperial examination.

Ten years passed, and he had enjoyed a smooth rise through the imperial court and become the prefectural overseer, at which time he had started to review the case pertaining to his clan. Following the clues and traces, his investigations had eventually led him to the city god temple of Imperial Accompanying City.

Afterward, another tragic case had naturally taken place. Compared to the public and widely-known nature of the past massacre, however, the death of the prefectural overseer had been far quieter and attracted much less attention. When the imperial court received news of the prefectural overseer's death, it had appeared like nothing more than a loyal official passing away due to illness.

The prefectural overseer should have enjoyed a long and illustrious career in the officialdom, and he had never gotten married, nor had he had any scholarly attendants or maidservants. He had assumed the position of prefectural overseer alone, and he had eventually left the world alone as well. It was as if he had detected the danger surrounding him in the prefectural city a long time before his death, and he had already accepted death as his fate when secretly sending a letter to his good friend in the imperial court of the capital.

On the final day of his life, he had returned to his ancestral residence which had already become an abandoned ghost residence for many years. That night, he had taken off his official garb and put on mourning clothes to show respect to the dead. He had then offered incense and kowtowed in respect, after which... he had also died.

In reality, the ghost officials of the city god temple's six divisions had already surrounded the entire prefectural office before he had walked out, with the day and night wandering deities personally acting as door gods. Scholarly judges and martial judges had also been hiding beside the prefectural overseer in his office, watching him closely with threatening looks in their eyes.

And thus, there hadn't been a single person on the streets when the prefectural overseer had walked to his residence, not even a single night watchman.

After eliminating the root of the problem, the city god of Imperial Accompanying City had discovered a crack on his godly body three years later.

Moreover, his accumulated virtue was surprisingly unable to mend this crack, and he was forced to watch on as it slowly grew larger and spread across his body.

And thus, there was the peculiar black mist enveloping Imperial Accompanying City today.

Chen Ping'an listened quietly, and a hint of schadenfreude appeared in the canal master's voice as she offered a conclusion on the city god temple's fate, saying, "Calamities created by oneself can't be escaped — this is a most familiar phrase to those in the city god temple. How laughable. In fact, there's even a large stone abacus displayed inside the city god temple, telling people to remain vigilant with the phrase: The deities are evaluating your every move."

Chen Ping'an finally opened his mouth, asking, "Was that secret letter to the capital blocked by the city god temple?"

The canal master shook her head and replied, "No, it wasn't. According to the explanations of the lake lord, the prefectural overseer was extremely careful and meticulous with what he did, so his secret letter was indeed delivered to his good friend in the capital. However, nothing came of it for some reason, and the imperial court is still oblivious to these matters after so many years.

"However, the recipient of the letter enjoyed a smooth journey through the imperial court, and he eventually reached the position of head minister of the Ministry of Justice. Afterward, his clan also continued to prosper, with his descendants enjoying extremely good scholarly fortune and results in the imperial examinations, six of them becoming hand-picked scholars. The current leader of the clan is also an esteemed governor."

"Including Du Yu, why have so many cultivators traveled to Imperial Accompanying City now?" Chen Ping'an asked. "It can't be that they're here to offer assistance to the city lord seeing that he's so upright and has made so many friends in the mountains, can it?"

The canal master who had obediently remained standing in the same spot the entire time lowered her voice and looked up as she replied, "The feng shui of Imperial Accompanying City is especially strange, and following the appearance of the commotion at the city god temple, it appears like they're losing the ability to hold onto a peculiar treasure. A column of treasure light rises from the prefectural city every time there's a full moon and whenever there's a heavy downpour or heavy snowstorm at night. This treasure light originates from a prison and soars into the sky.

"Many lofty immortals from the mountains have visited Imperial Accompanying City to investigate this matter over the past years, but none of them have managed to pinpoint the location of the peculiar treasure. However, a skilled geomantic cultivator conjectured that this is a natural treasure nurtured by the mountain fortune and water fortune of the province for several thousand years.

"However, the aura of resentment and murder in Imperial Accompanying City is far too strong and persistent, so this treasure is no longer willing to stay in this prefectural city. It's because of this that there are signs of an extremely rare treasure appearing in the world."

Chen Ping'an squinted his eyes and said, "I've already learned about so many shocking truths after asking you a few casual questions, and so many powerful cultivators and capable individuals have traveled to and from Imperial Accompanying City on the winds and clouds over the past several years. In fact, it's entirely likely that there are many cultivators who have settled down in the city during this time to wait for the treasure to appear. However, has not a single one of these esteemed immortals attempted to seek justice for the murdered scholarly clan?"

The canal master faltered upon hearing this, and she was genuinely astonished this time and not feigning surprise. She then murmured in reply, "Seek justice for what purpose? Won't it become even more difficult to obtain that peculiar treasure if one offends the city god temple?"

Chen Ping'an took off his bamboo hat and gazed up at the night sky, scratching his head and remarking, "Is that so? That's a very reasonable explanation."

Some quiet rustling traveled over from the wall behind the divine altar.

The canal master felt a rush of wind sweep past her, and she furiously turned around to look back.

The young wanderer charged through the divine altar and split it in half, causing plumes of dust to explode into the surroundings. The Ghost Axe Palace's Du Yu had already regained consciousness and was silently preparing to make a move, but the young wanderer directly grabbed him by the neck and violently slammed him into the ground.

When Chen Ping'an stood up again, Du Yu had already ceased breathing and was as dead as dead could be.

At this moment, the canal master felt an ice-cold chill envelop her body even though she was a water deity. It was as if she had fallen into an icy cavern.

Chen Ping'an turned around slightly and looked at her.

His face was expressionless.

His eyes appeared dark and profound like a deep well, and it was as if there were a flood dragon swimming in its depths, yearning to rise to the surface and stick its head out to take a look at the world beyond the well.

The canal master wanted to step back and hide from the young wanderer, but it was as if her feet were firmly planted in the ground. She could only lean back slightly, and only by doing so could she seemingly avoid being directly scared to death.

For some unknown reason, however, the young wandered suddenly smiled and stood up straight the next instant, patting his hands and putting his bamboo hat back on. He adjusted it with two fingers and said with a faint smile, "Cultivators from the mountains avoid getting involved with the mortal world and refrain from attracting karmic fate. This is completely natural and right."