Fang Yuan continued to recite poem after poem, inevitably claiming victory in this round of the tournament.
He and Bai Ning Bing were awarded the maximum 12 points for this round and went to await whatever the next challenge was supposed to be.
Fang Yuan glanced at the prize shop once more now that it had been updated. Something that he was highly interested in was a Wisdom Path Immortal Gu Worm, or a recipe for the same. Although it did not have Unravel Mystery Immortal, if he had any other proper Wisdom Path Immortal Gu, he might be able to engineer a similar killer move to Unravel Dream for future use.
As for the refinement path formation that he was looking for in order to parallel-refine the Spring Autumn Cicada, he didn't see it on the list, but it might appear later on if he requested it. Either that or he might have to outright win this contest and become the blessed land's master.
It wasn't like there was nothing of value. On the contrary it could be said there was too much. There was even a Gu House available in the prize shop. One could buy either the formula for it or the Gu House itself. It was called the Refinement Cauldron, a Rank 5 Refinement Path Gu House. It had the effect of preventing the death of the core gu worm used within a refinement, as well as greatly improving the odds of whatever refinement was being performed. Rank 2 gu were nearly guaranteed to be refined, while Rank 3 gu could be refined as easily as Rank 2, and so on...
Unfortunately, it only worked for refining mortal gu, but that was to be expected of a Rank 5 Gu House. The issue with trying to create a similar Refinement Cauldron at Rank 6 and higher was the density of dao marks in different gu worms. They would end up clashing with each other, and the complexity of trying to create a Gu House of that nature would increase exponentially, while its effectiveness would decrease because of the conflicting dao marks.
***
Meanwhile, in the Northern Plains, preparations were ongoing for the upcoming ten year blizzard and Imperial Court Contest. Every ten years, a massive blizzard would embrace the entire region, killing almost everyone who did not have a blessed land or grotto-heaven to hide under, or who had not managed to enter the Imperial Court.
One of the many tribes within the Northern Plains was called the Zhao tribe. The Zhao tribe was currently undergoing preparations for the impending conflict.
Within the Zhao tribe was a girl by the name of Zhao Lian Yun.
In Fang Yuan's past life, she had eventually ended up becoming a person of great importance within the Zhao tribe, influencing their survival by speaking to her father, ensuring they lived to see the end of the Imperial Court contest. He knew of these details from a biography that had been written on her life later on.
She would also end up becoming one of the wives of Ma Hong Yun and would ascend to become a Rank 6 Wisdom Path Gu Immortal.
Fang Yuan recalled Ma Hong Yun as one of the luckiest people who had ever lived. Before Fang Yuan had discovered the Luck Path, he would have simply chalked it up to chance, but now he realized that the young man was simply someone born with extraordinary luck. If there was a candidate from whom he would want to steal luck, it would absolutely be that person! Sadly he had yet to perfect any such methods. He was still going over the properties of Dog Shit Luck Gu - while it was certainly enlightening in the end it was after all, just a single gu worm.
Not to say that he hadn't seen any results. After all, clues were usually the most useful the less one knew. Much like solving a jigsaw puzzle, one had to find the corners first, then the outline, and then slowly fill it in the middle. And the thing was that the pool of Luck Path material for him to go over was so scant that he could do little else than clutch at this like a lifeline.
What Fang Yuan did not know, however, was that Zhao Lian Yun was an Otherworldly Demon much like himself whose soul had been transmigrated into the Gu World, which explained her extraordinary intellect even at a young age.
And the moment for that transmigration had just arrived.
The young girl felt a shiver crawl down her spine, and her eyes went blank for about three seconds before she returned back to normal. She stumbled on her feet before finding her footing.
"Is something wrong?" her caretaker asked.
"No," she answered, looking around. She felt like she had been deeply spooked for some reason or another. But there was nothing there... the young girl naturally felt scared and began crying, thinking that some kind of ghost was haunting her.
The soul which was supposed to overwrite her own did not succeed like Heaven's Will had planned.
Instead, Thieving Heaven Demonic Venerable's formation activated, diverting the incoming transmigrating soul and overriding the soul of another similar young girl located within Fang Yuan's own immortal aperture.
Fang Yuan did not know about the whole deal with this person being Zhao Lian Yun, but now that he had another Otherworldly Demon in his possession, he reached out to the young girl in question.
He altered her parents' memories so that they thought their daughter had drowned while playing at sea, before taking her to the same isolated island within his aperture where he kept AE-3048-195.
The girl in question told him that she was named Sun Lei, a name she carried from her past life before transmigrating, and that was the name she decided to keep even now. There was no meaning to her taking on a new identity after transmigrating. There was no one around for her to fool.
It was a good thing that she was far more intelligent as well as cognizant of her circumstances than AE-3048-195. It would take her a while to grow up to the point where she could open her aperture, but with the accelerated time within his aperture, that wouldn't be too long. With that said, so long as he was within Tian Ji's blessed land, this difference was decreased as time within the blessed land itself was slowed down.
"Ah, Lord Immortal, don't worry, I'll definitely work hard for your sake," the girl told him when he explained what was going to happen to her.
Fang Yuan didn't even have to use direct methods like Enslavement Gu on her, she understood her position right away and would soon set to work making more Rank 0 gu worms for him. Fang Yuan couldn't risk letting her remain with her original family and had to snatch her away immediately; with her status as an Otherworldly Demon she could cause quite the nuisance and ripple effect on the Fang Yuan Continent.
Of course, this meant that the history of the Gu World itself was altered without Fang Yuan even knowing about it, reducing the usefulness of his reincarnation. Now that the original Zhao Lian Yun was truly a child and wouldn't have the mindset she otherwise would have, it was likely the Zhao tribe would not make it during the Imperial Court Contest, and that Zhao Lian Yun would never become a Wisdom Path Gu Immortal.
'Good,' Fang Yuan thought to himself, turning his attention away from the internal workings of his aperture and back toward the ongoing tournament.