Chapter 3: This Venerable One's Shige

>>warning: violence/gore involving children

Hm… since his soul had been transported back in time, maybe his cultivation had come along for the ride too?

Mo Ran recited an incantation and felt the spiritual energy in his body rush forth. It was abundant, but not strong. That was to say, his cultivation had not carried over.

No matter. He was smart and perceptive, and blessed with innate talent; he could just cultivate all over again, it was no big deal. Rebirth was a blessed event of unparalleled proportions, some small imperfection was perfectly normal. Thinking so, Mo Ran quickly rearranged his gloomy and fierce expression into one more appropriate for a sixteen year old youth, and cheerfully headed back toward his sect.

It was the midst of summer. Horse-drawn carriages sped past, wheels rolling, and no one paid any attention to the sixteen year old Mo Ran.

Only the occasional village woman, taking a break from tending the fields and looking up to wipe her sweat, would notice this exceptionally handsome youth and stare a bit.

Mo Ran returned the stares with a smile and no restraint, until those married women blushed bright red and looked away.

Mo Ran arrived at Wuchang Town around evening. The town was close to Sisheng Peak, the towering peaks in the distance framed by clouds lit on fire by the blood-red sun. He touched his empty stomach and headed into a restaurant. Glancing at the menu and knocking on the counter, he placed a quick order. "Shopkeep, a pounded chicken, a plate of beef tripe in chili sauce, two catties of soju, and a plate of sliced beef."

This area was a popular rest stop, and it was currently bustling with activity. A storyteller was on the stage, shaking his fan and telling the story of Sisheng Peak in an animated manner, spit flying everywhere.

Mo Ran picked a private room by a window, and listened as he ate.

"As I'm sure everyone already knows, the cultivation world is divided into the upper and lower cultivation realms. Today we'll talk about the greatest sect in the lower cultivation realm, Sisheng Peak. Did you know that a hundred years ago, our Wuchang Town was a poor and desolate place due to its proximity to the entrance of the demon realm? No one dared to go out after dark. If they really needed to travel at night, then they had to shake an exorcism bell and sprinkle incense ash and paper money while chanting, 'people barred by mountains, demons barred by paper' while passing through as quickly as they could. But these days, our town is bustling and flourishing, no different from anywhere else,

and it's all thanks to Sisheng Peak's care. This righteous sect stands right at the gate to the demon realm, between the boundary of yin and yang. Even though the sect was only established not that long ago…"

Mo Ran had heard this history so many times that his ears had damn near grown calluses, and so he started glancing around outside the window instead. It just so happened that right then, there was a stall set up below where several strangers from out of town, dressed in cultivator garb, were carrying a cage covered with a black cloth as they performed streetside tricks.

This was much more interesting than the storyteller's tale.

Mo Ran's attention was drawn over.

"Come one, come all! Take a look at these pixiu cubs, fierce mythical beasts tamed by us to obediently perform tricks and even do math! It's not easy travelling to perform chivalrous deeds, everyone spare some tips and stick around. Come watch the first trick——pixiu abacus!"

The cultivators ripped off the black cloth with a flourish to reveal a couple of human-faced, bear-bodied monsters in the cage.

Mo Ran: "......"

Just meek fuzzy bear cubs like these?? And you actually dared claim that they're pixiu???

That was quite the bullshit right there, only donkey brains would believe that.

But Mo Ran's views were widened soon enough, as twenty, thirty donkey brains gathered to watch, cheering and clapping, drawing the attention of everyone in the restaurant as well, making things quite awkward for the storyteller.

"The leader of Sisheng Peak right now is a man known far and wide for his strength and brilliance——"

"Nice!! Again!!!"

Encouraged, the storyteller glanced toward the owner of the voice, only to find a customer whose face glowed red with excitement, but whose gaze was locked onto the street performers below, not on himself.

"Oh? The pixiu is doing math on the abacus?"

"Wow, quite impressive!"

"Good show! Make the pixiu toss apples again!"

The entire restaurant was laughing, everyone gathered by the windows to watch the scene below. The storyteller pathetically tried to carry on: "The master is best known for that fan of his, he…..."

"Ahahaha, that light-colored pixiu wants to eat the apple, look at it rolling around on the ground!"

The storyteller wiped his face with a towel, his lips trembling from anger.

Mo Ran pursed his lips and smiled, leisurely calling out from behind the bead curtain, "Forget Sisheng Peak, tell a story from "Eighteen Caresses" instead, I guarantee it'll pull everyone's attention back."

The storyteller didn't know that the person behind the curtain was the young master of Sisheng Peak, Mo Ran himself, and gathered all the moral integrity he had to stutter out, "V-vulgar stories are not f-fit for an elegant hall."

Mo Ran laughed. "You're calling this place an elegant hall? How are you not embarrassed."

A burst of noise came from below.

"Ah! What a fast horse!"

"Must be a cultivator from Sisheng Peak!"

In the midst of the chatter, a black horse galloped from the direction of Sisheng Peak and broke into the streetside circus like lightning!

There were two people on the horse, one wearing a black bamboo hat and shrouded in a black cloak, covered so completely that it was impossible to tell their age or gender. The other was a thirty or forty year old woman, with rough hands and a weathered face.

The woman started crying as soon as she saw the man-bears. She scrambled off the horse and stumbled toward them, kneeling to embrace one of them in her arms, wailing, "My son!!! Oh, my son—"

The audience was stumped. Someone muttered while scratching his head, "Eh? Aren't these pixiu cubs? Why's this woman calling it son?"

"Maybe it's a pixiu mother?"

"Aiyo, that's quite something then, if the female can even take on a human form."

These villagers had no knowledge or experience, and were only babbling nonsense, but Mo Ran figured it out immediately.

Rumor had it that some cultivators out there liked to abduct children, rip their tongues out so that they couldn't talk, burn their skin off with boiling water, and then stick animal hides on their bloodied bodies so that child and fur became one once the blood had congealed, looking just like a monster. These children couldn't speak or write, and had no choice but to suffer the abuse and obediently perform tricks like "pixiu abacus"; any resistance would only earn them a beating.

No wonder he hadn't sensed any demonic energy, these "pixiu" weren't monsters at all, but actually living humans...…

While he was thinking to himself, the person in the black cloak whispered something to the cultivators, who flew into a fury. "Apologize? That ain't in my vocabulary!" "So what if you're from Sisheng Peak?" "Mind your own damn business! Beat him up!" They pounced on the black cloaked person for a beating.

"Aiyo."

Watching his fellow disciple get beat up, Mo Ran only let out a low chuckle. "How scary."

He had zero intention of helping out. He'd always loathed the righteous and meddlesome ways of his sect, even in the previous life. The lot of them rushed to throw themselves at any trouble that cropped up, like so many idiots. Even some minor inconvenience like Mrs. Wang's cat getting stuck in the tree was something to bother them with. The entire sect, from the leader all the way down to the servants, every last one of them was a dimwit.

There were so many unfair things in the world, what do you care? It was enough to tire a person to death.

"They're fighting, they're fighting! Hoh! What a punch!"

Inside and outside the restaurant, everyone gathered to spectate.

"So many of you ganging up on one person, aren't you ashamed!"

"Watch out behind you sir! Aiya! Close call! Wah——"

"Nice dodge!"

These people loved a good fight, but Mo Ran didn't care to watch. He'd seen plenty of blood-letting; the events currently unfolding were like a fly's buzzing to him. He lazily dusted peanut crumbs off his clothes and got up to leave.

Downstairs, the cultivators and the black cloaked person were at a stalemate, swords swishing. Mo Ran crossed his arms and leaned against the restaurant's door, took one glance and clicked his tongue in annoyance.

What a disgrace.

Everyone from Sisheng Peak was a fierce fighter, each the equal of ten men, but the black cloaked person was a pathetic fighter. Even when dragged off the horse, surrounded and kicked, the person was still holding back.

They only called out politely, "Honorable men speak with their mouths, not their fists. I'm trying to reason with you, why won't you listen?!"

Cultivators: "......"

Mo Ran: "......"

The cultivators were thinking, the hell? This person's already so soundly thrashed and still preaching that nonsense? He must have mantou for brains, empty inside?

But Mo Ran's face changed abruptly, his head spinning for a second. He held his breath, eyes wide with disbelief——that voice…

"Shi Mei!" Mo Ran shouted and rushed forward, agitated. He let loose an attack filled with spiritual power that instantly knocked away five of the jianghu cultivator swindlers, and knelt on the ground to help up the black cloaked person who was covered in muddy boot marks, and his voice couldn't help but tremble slightly——

"Shi Mei, is that you?"