Chapter 387 – Training and Daily Life at Dawn Manor, an Encounter With the Emperor Before the Mass Grave - Part 2

That afternoon.

After lunch, Li Yuan skimmed the fifth rank beast-taming manual and fifth rank footwork skill he’d swiped from the Holy Tree Temple, hoping to break in fast. Bored with reading, he decided to make a trip back to Gemhill County again.

Today’s target was the mass grave ghost domain.

Memories resurfaced at once, ashen-yellow earth, a cavernous pit, clouds of flies, stinking corpses, and over that macabre reality a shimmering mirage.

The mass grave was special. The more ghost domains Li Yuan saw, the more unique this place felt.

A single-entity ghost domain’s strength sat between fifth and fourth rank. Because dense Yin energy made it nearly indestructible, a peak fourth rank master was needed just to suppress one; to disperse it outright would require someone like Li Yuan.

Yet the mass grave ghost domain kept spewing

exceptional

ghost servants who retained their living memories and power. When the pit had only just appeared, it had already produced a sixth rank ghost servant.

So many years had passed, and Li Yuan still had no idea what had become of the mass grave ghost domain.

He had even asked Yan Yu. She told him that no shop with the name

mass grave

had ever appeared on the ancient ghost street in Hidden River Province. That in itself was odd enough to make Li Yuan’s skin crawl.

Yesterday he had blown up the carpenter’s workshop with ease, so why not pay the mass grave a visit today? Before leaving, he warned his family that he might be gone for a few days. Then, as casually as if out for a stroll, he reached Gemhill Hill and from there slipped into Autumnlake County.

Back again, General Mammoth who used to guard the place for him was long gone and the barriers he’d once set over the pit were nothing but dust.

It was April, with wild flower petals fluttering everywhere.

Li Yuan sat beneath an old mountain tree, gazing across over six kilometers at the mass grave. In the old days the mere sight of that place would have made his toes clench. Now it felt...ordinary. Yet its Yin-soaked illusion still hid its secrets; even now he couldn’t see through it.

From outside it looked like a string of cottages beside a murmuring brook, a little home beyond the white clouds.

Because the grave was so peculiar, Li Yuan didn’t charge right in. He simply watched and watched.

On the first day, three groups entered the mass grave. Shortly after, three people emerged, their combat power sitting at eighth, eighth, and sixth rank.

Days two to five passed without any activity.

On the sixth day, two fifth ranks walked out in one breath.

Back in the day, that alone would have wiped out everyone in sight.

If a fourth rank steps out,

Li Yuan mused,

this won’t fit any strength curve I’ve ever seen.

Then again, who said the mass grave was a single-entity ghost domain merely because he once suppressed it at sixth rank? At most, it had been weak in the beginning.

The more he brooded, the more sinister the place felt. If he couldn’t crack the riddle, then so be it. He left a scout bird every five kilometers as a watcher, then tugged on the thousand-mile thread and headed back to Dawn Manor.

Apart from the carpenter’s workshop and mass grave, there was also the flower shop.. He planned to leave it alone for now.

˙·٠✧🐗➶➴🏹✧٠·˙

In the manor’s kitchen, Jing Shuixiang was in an apron stirring a pot. The petite elder was truly spooked after the conversation from a week ago. She’d quit cultivating altogether and now cooked every single day.

Li Yuan crept up behind and hugged her close.

“Eek!” She jumped, hips twitching, but in this house only one man could

ambush

her like that. She glanced back, saw him, and murmured, “Not here...”

Knife still chopping, she added softly, “My nerves are a wreck. I haven’t skipped a single day’s cultivation since I began, and now that I’ve stopped I feel lost.”

Li Yuan enjoyed the furtive thrill of holding her right there in the kitchen. Breathing in the scent of her hair, he asked, “Where’s Her Highness, the Yin Consort? Has she stopped cultivating too?”

Jing Shuixiang froze, then groaned. “What kind of title is that?”

“Just a pet name.” Li Yuan chuckled.

She caught his meaning and answered in kind, “Temple Master, Huayin and Yao Jue have stopped practicing as well. They’re helping found the new Bladeseekers.”

“Temple Master?” Li Yuan nearly choked. “What in the world?”

Jing Shuixiang beamed. “Just a pet name. Aren’t you Qing Hancheng now too?”

He shut his eyes for a moment, feeling the woman in his arms. Strange, less than a week had passed, and she was changing already, from a haughty lioness to someone who could joke. Perhaps setting cultivation aside was doing her good.

Grinding his teeth in mock ferocity, he said, “Fine, but I’m not Qing Hancheng. You may address me as The Great Khagan!”

She rolled her eyes like Cui Huayin. “You’re impossible.”

“If they insist on renaming the Bladeseekers,” he said, “let’s call it the Five-Tiger Gate-Breaker Palace.”

She hesitated. “Are you serious...?”

Hmm... Guess my naming sense could still use a bit of work.

Li Yuan inwardly thought. Then he replied with a smile, “On second thought, you three should choose whatever names you like.”

Names were just labels anyway.

After checking in on Jing Shuixiang, Li Yuan wandered outside to pay Xue Ning a visit.

Xue Ning spent all her time with the daughters-in-law and a gaggle of grandchildren.

Noble ladies had never needed to mind children. Their wet-nurses had handled everything back at the Holy Tree Temple. So when the Ping'an’s wives suddenly had to do the job themselves, chaos reigned.

Xue Ning bustled about. She cooked, wiped noses, and even carried the little ones off to pee.

Li Yuan felt sorry for her, but the happiness on her face made him drop any thought of butting in.

Instead he slipped into the secret chamber and opened the two manuals he had fetched, a fifth rank beast-taming skill and a fifth rank movement skill.

The beast-taming manual was called King of Beasts. Master it and he could not only command fifth rank demonic beasts but also cow any lesser beasts into obedience.

To

command

meant the beast truly listened. He could share intentions, give precise orders, and move as one with it. To

cow

meant a whole pack would trail after him, obeying simple calls like attack or defend. But let his aura falter, and they would scatter like a rabble.

The movement skill was Phantom Body. If the sixth rank Hidden Breath and Concealment merely bent light to cloak him in darkness, this new skill was downright uncanny. If he channeled his shadow blood properly, every ray of light and every sound wave would slip through him as if he were never there.

Both skills were notoriously hard, requiring prerequisite sixth rank skills at the Master level first.

Qing Hancheng had owned these skill manuals for centuries. Naturally, he had mastered them.

Until now Li Yuan had thought Qing Hancheng had only learned Phantom Body. But the fourth rank follow-up to King of Beasts was titled the Crimson Garden.

He suddenly realized that Qing Hancheng might have been also a high rank beastmaster as well, a secret no one had guessed.

As for why Li Yuan was so sure Qing Hancheng had mastered Phantom Body, he clearly remembered that the man had vanished right under his nose during their duel. No sense could find him until Li Yuan used his

flame

to detect signs of life.

Such a man, hiding so many secrets, had still died to another’s scheme.

The thought sobered Li Yuan.

Candle lit, he read in silence until night fell.