Author's Note:This chapter is a bit shorter than the last few, serving as a bridge to the next major arc. Please leave a comment or review with your thoughts, and if you're enjoying the story, consider dropping some Power Stones!
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The Shop of Ice smelled of old parchment and lingering frost.
Hai Bodong stood behind the counter, surrounded by chaos. Boxes were stacked haphazardly, some open, some sealed. Storage rings lay scattered among piles of treated hide, dried ink pots, and rolls of canvas. He was categorizing everything with the meticulous frustration of a man who had spent decades accumulating treasures he could no longer keep hidden. He had piles for everything: genuine regional maps, scam duplicate copies he sold to gullible mercenaries, obscure parchment records, and a massive pile of unverified journal scraps.
"Scraps go here… journals there… duplicate maps to the fire…" he muttered, his voice rough. He picked up a bundle of blackened parchment, hesitated, then tossed it into a wooden box with a heavy thud. "Useless anyway."
The rusted bell above the door chimed.
The door creaked open. A gust of dry desert wind pushed grains of sand against the threshold.
Hai didn't look up immediately. "Shop's closed. Come back tom—"
He stopped. The presence stepping across the threshold wasn't a customer. It was familiar, yet… denser.
Hai lifted his head. His eyes narrowed, scanning the young man standing in the doorway. Ren. Alone - a massive, highly undignified sigh of relief escaped the Dou Huang's lips.
"Oh… Tintin. You finally came." Hai Bodong grunted, fully turning around. He peered past Ren out into the street, just to be absolutely sure the terrifying snake-woman wasn't looming in a blind spot.
"And alone?" Satisfied, he muttered to himself, "What is with the youth these days? You set a time, you arrive at that time. Basic courtesy."
He whispered to himself, shaking his head. "What's with the youths these days? Not coming to said time? Nearly gave this old man a heart attack thinking the Queen decided to tag along."
Hai left his work, bending down to lift a heavy treasure box from beneath the counter. "Well? Don't just stand there letting the heat in. Close the door."
"Things happened in the tribe, Old Hai," Ren said casually, leaning against the counter. He watched the old man for a second, hesitating slightly, before letting out a small sigh. "Well... you know what? The peak Dou Huangs in the tribe. All of them broke through to Dou Zong."
Hai Bodong, who was in the middle of unlocking the heavy iron clasp, froze.
He didn't just stop moving; he stopped breathing. He slowly lifted his head, his eyes wide with absolute, unadulterated disbelief. "Dou Zong?" He blinked. "Those four elders? All of them?"
Ren walked forward, casual, and lifted the box from Hai's still hands. "Hmm. All of them."
He didn't mention the Commander. There was no need to break the old man's mind completely, nor was there any compulsion to share every detail. Ren reached over the counter and gently pulled the wooden box from the old man's paralyzed grip. He popped the lid open. Inside lay a massive, flawlessly rolled scroll of thick, textured beast hide.
Ren's gaze lingered on it. His ability triggered silently.
[Item Name: Pan-Continental Cartographic Atlas]
[Tier: 5]
[Quality: 87%]
[Enhancement Slots: 0/5]
[Description: Crafted by a Dou Huang expert cartographer. A comprehensive atlas detailing physical terrain layers, political boundaries, reference points, caravan routes, roads, street views, climatic weather patterns and ley-line irregularities.]
Ren lifted the scroll, feeling the texture. "Oh, good. Leather is from a Rank 5 beast?"
Hai broke free from his trance, his expression shifting instantly into that of a seasoned salesman. "Yes. Yes, an Earth-Core Sand Wyrm. Can withstand extreme heat without curling. Durable. Resistant to moisture and tearing and Qi degradation, and it holds ink like—"
Then the disbelief crashed back over him. He leaned across the counter, eyes sharp. "How?"
"How? Senior, I already told you. It's good," Ren said, smoothly unrolling a section of the atlas. "But really, with your recovered strength, you could have easily hunted a Rank 6 beast for the canvas."
"No, forget the canvas!" Hai slapped the counter. "About the Dou Zongs! How did they all breakthrough in one month? "
Ren kept his eyes on the map, tracing the borders of the Black-Corner Region. "With the Heavenly Flame. They used it as a catalyst for a bloodline evolution, just as Queen Medusa did. By the way, the street-view details you added here are fantastic. Pretty much everything I asked for."
Hai Bodong wanted to process the map compliment, but his brain was entirely derailed. "Yes, as you asked, quality canvas, every detail... It is probably my absolute masterpiece—if only I had focused on a single aspect. Now it's just a crude collection of everythi—" He caught himself, glaring at Ren. "Don't change the subject! So they used the flame as a catalyst instead of absorbing it like a normal alchemist?"
A bitter chuckle escaped him.
"And I didn't notice that day, you know…" He gestured vaguely at his own chest, where the seal had been. "I was… distracted."
The old man's face scrunched up into a sour, deeply pitiful expression as he gestured wildly with his hands.
Ren actively wanted to change the topic. He closed the atlas.
"You included everything," he said. "Terrain, climate, political lines. It's thorough."
Old Hai shook his head.
"If I'd focused on one aspect, it would've been a masterpiece," he muttered. "Now it's just a crude collection of everything."
He recovered, a desperate, greedy glint appearing in his icy eyes.
"So... you still have that flame, right?" Hai Bodong leaned in over the counter. "Is it possible for me to advance without absorbing it? Just using it as a catalyst?"
Ren let out a relieved chuckle. "Huh. Don't know, Senior. They are like half-beast. After evolution, they turned into full snake. Also, I don't think a Heavenly Flame would be very compatible with you, being an Ice Dou Qi cultivator. You'd likely just melt your own meridians. But regarding the map—it's perfect. Exactly what I expected."
Hai Bodong deflated, his shoulders slumping. He let out a long, heavy sigh. "Forget it. Leave it. It's already good that I regained my original cultivation. I chased shortcuts once and wasted decades."
He turned back to the counter.
But now he was no longer sorting.
With a frustrated sweep of his arm, he grabbed the remaining scraps from the counter—blackened edges, faded script, duplicate copies—and shoved them heavily into another box without categorizing them, taking his disappointment out on the parchment.
Ren watched him for a moment, preparing to say goodbye to the disappointed old man. Then, his eyes caught something amidst the pile of scraps Hai had just discarded.
It was a scorched fragment of parchment, blackened at the edges. The script was faded, barely legible. But seeing the distinct, jagged border and the faint, strange pattern etched into the material... a memory sparked in Ren's mind.
He remembered the hidden cave in the ancient cliff at the outskirts of the Magic Beast Mountain Range. He remembered standing next to Xiao Yixian, staring at the loot boxes. Months ago. Back then, he had scanned an identical, seemingly useless Tier-1 scrap and completely dismissed it, leaving it on the floor. It had offered no immediate combat value.
Back then, survival had been the only measure of worth.
'A setting for Xiao Yan,' Ren realized.
He hadn't thought much of it at the time. But now, having confirmed the Protagonist and observing how the "plot" seemed to leave breadcrumbs across the continent, seeing this fragment here made a strange sensation prickle at the back of his neck. It wasn't just a map. It was a destined path.
Ren reached out and pulled the scorched fragment from the pile before Hai Bodong could crush it into the box. "Senior, what is this?"
Hai Bodong glanced at it dismissively. Back when they had first met, the old man had introduced Ren to the concept of Heavenly Flames, hoping to trade information for his freedom.
"That?" Old Hai grunted. "Years ago, after attending the grand convention between the empires, I came to the Tagore Desert. I obtained that fragment by pure accident deep in the sands. It doesn't seem to be a map of anything useful. I couldn't decipher it, so I threw it in the junk pile."
He snorted softly. "Back then I thought it might be related to Heavenly Flames."
Ren had a distinct feeling this fragment was worth more than just a random treasure hoard.
"Well, I will figure it out," Ren said, casually slipping the scorched parchment into his spatial ring alongside the grand atlas. He looked at the old man, his tone shifting from casual banter to something more sincere. "I actually plan to head to the Central Plains soon. So, this may be goodbye, Old Hai."
Hai Bodong paused his packing. The frustration bled out of him, leaving a quiet, solemn respect. "The Central Plains. A wider sky for monsters like you. Well... don't forget this old man later."
"Speaking of which," Ren continued, tapping the rolled atlas on the counter. "I've heard the basics, but do you know the exact details regarding the Spatial Wormholes to the Central Region?"
Hai Bodong's expression darkened immediately. He leaned his forearms on the counter, his icy eyes locking onto Ren with utter seriousness. "I do. And the route takes you straight through the Black-Corner Region. I strongly advise you to tread carefully. That place isn't just a transit zone; it's a lawless meat grinder. Human life is cheaper than dirt there. It's a haven for exiles, murderers, and tyrants. Even Dou Wangs die in the gutters if they flaunt their wealth."
Ren simply nodded, entirely unfazed. For a Tier-5 equipped assassin and a peak Dou Zong, a "lawless wasteland" just sounded like a duty-free shopping mall. "Where exactly is the Wormhole located?"
"You need to head to the western side of the region," Hai Bodong explained, tapping a point on the rolled-up map. "To Black Emperor City—Hei Huang City. It's controlled by the Black Emperor Sect. And don't let the title of 'city' fool you. Its scale is massive. From a certain point of view, even the Jia Ma Empire's capital cannot compare to it. The things that flow through its black markets... the capital couldn't even dream of possessing them."
"A gateway city," Ren mused.
"Exactly," Hai Bodong nodded. "But stepping into the Spatial Wormhole isn't like walking through a doorway. To survive the spatial turbulence, you'll need to secure passage on a 'Spatial Boat.' Even then, it is a treacherous, one-month journey through the void just to reach the borders of the Central Plains."
Ren processed the information, adjusting his mental itinerary. "Understood. Thanks for the warning, Old Hai."
Hai Bodong crossed his arms, leaning against the wooden crates. "And what about your reward for breaking my seal? I gave you the maps, but I still owe you a favor as a Dou Huang. If you leave the empire, who is going to use it? Do you have any family or friends here? I may not be at the absolute peak of this region anymore….., but I am still a powerhouse."
Ren looked at him a little longer. reached into his spatial ring, retrieved a small, flawlessly carved jade bottle, and tossed it through the air.
Hai Bodong caught it reflexively.
"Here. It's a Tier 7 pill," Ren said casually, as if he had just tossed the man an apple. "I don't have any immediate use for it now."
Hai Bodong's hands trembled violently as he stared at the glowing, energy-rich pill visible through the translucent jade. A Tier 7 pill. In the Jia Ma Empire, this was a mythical object that could start a continental war.
It was the spare from a pair he had synthesized months ago—the twin to the very pill Yun Yun had consumed to shatter her bottleneck and finally step into the Dou Zong realm.
"Also," Ren continued, his voice steady and clear. "My name is Xiao Ren. I am a member of the Xiao Family from Wu Tan City. I don't have any immediate family there... but if you ever pass through, or if you come across him, just look out for Deacon Xiao Guwen. He took care of me here and there when I was younger."
Old Hai slowly tore his eyes away from the mythical pill and looked at the young monster standing before him. The grumpy, cynical old man offered a deep, serious nod.
"Alright," Hai Bodong said, his voice thick with gravity. "Consider the Xiao Family under my protection, Xiao Ren."
Just as the words left the Dou Huang's mouth, the rusted bell above the shop's door chimed.
Ren turned. A youth dressed in the dark, practical robes of a traveler stepped over the threshold, a heavy black ruler wrapped in cloth strapped to his back.
It was Xiao Yan.
Ren observed him silently for a moment. The boy's face was weathered by the harsh desert sun, but the real change was in his eyes. The defensive, prickly arrogance that had clung to him back in Wu Tan City was completely gone. In its place was a sharp, refined clarity—a tempered steel conviction. Ren wondered what exactly had happened to him to forge that look.
A quiet realization washed over Ren. He had deliberately walked some of the protagonist's destined paths—taking the Green Lotus Core Flame, disrupting early events—yet here Xiao Yan stood, looking stronger and more resolute than ever. The world, it seemed, had plenty of other paths left for the Child of Destiny. Ren felt a wave of relief that he wasn't completely replacing the boy, immediately followed by a slight, greedy twinge of disappointment that he might have missed out on other hidden opportunities.
Then, Ren's thumb brushed against his spatial ring. The Scorched Astral Record he had just bought for a single gold coin.
'Ah,' Ren realized, an internal smirk touching his mind. 'That was definitely another path set for him. Oops.'
POV Shift
For Xiao Yan, the walk to the map shop had been driven by a singular, burning purpose.
The encounter with Yun Yun and Gu He in Black Rock City had fundamentally shifted his worldview. The Three-Year Agreement was no longer about petty face or a broken engagement; it was a pure clash of martial convictions. To prove his path was truer, he needed absolute strength. He needed a Heavenly Flame.
Before resigning himself to returning to Wu Tan City to attend Jia Nan Academy, he had decided to make one last, desperate sweep. He came to Desert City's famous map shop to see if the eccentric owner had any records of other extreme heat signatures or anomalies in the deep sands.
He pushed the door open, catching the tail end of a sentence involving his own family name.
Xiao Yan paused, taking in the sight of the packed crates and empty shelves. Then, his gaze landed on the young man leaning against the counter.
Surprise flickered across Xiao Yan's face, quickly melting into a genuine, warm smile. He remembered Ren well. Back when Xiao Yan had been the clan's resident "cripple," enduring the sneers of his own family, Ren had been a polite guest who never once looked at him with pity or disdain. Xiao Yan didn't carry an ounce of transmigrator superiority; he just saw a friendly face from home.
"Brother Ren?" Xiao Yan asked, stepping forward and offering a sincere cupped-fist greeting. "It really is you. I haven't seen you since Wu Tan City."
Ren smiled easily, returning the gesture. "Xiao Yan. You're a long way from home. The desert suits you; you look a lot steadier than the last time we spoke."
"You could say I've had to learn a few hard lessons lately," Xiao Yan chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck. "I came looking for a map, but it looks like I'm interrupting—"
Deep within the black ring on Xiao Yan's finger, Yao Lao's soul violently shuddered.
'Xiao Yan,' Yao Lao's voice echoed in his mind, stripped of all its usual lazy humor. 'Do not make any sudden moves.'
Xiao Yan froze, his smile stiffening. 'Teacher? What is it? Is it an ambush?'
'Worse,' Yao Lao replied, his mental voice laced with profound, absolute disbelief. 'Look at the old man packing those boxes.'
Xiao Yan subtly shifted his gaze to Hai Bodong, who was currently ignoring him and tying a knot on a crate.
'He is a Dou Huang,' Yao Lao stated flatly.
Xiao Yan's breath hitched. A Dou Huang? Sweeping dust and packing crates in a rundown map shop?
'And your old acquaintance leaning against the counter?' Yao Lao continued, sounding as though he was severely questioning his own sanity. 'He is a Dou Wang. A solid, condensed Dou Wang. How did a kid reach that level in a few months?! And why is a random shopkeeper at the peak of this empire's strength?!' Yao Lao paused, the memory of their recent encounter with the Dou Zong Yun Yun flashing in his mind. 'Well, almost the peak. Seriously, Xiao Yan, what is in the water in this desert?! What happened to the power scaling of this world after I died?!'
Xiao Yan's heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs. 'BrotherRen is a Dou Wang?!'
When they had interacted back in the Xiao Clan, Ren had been a polite, mildly talented guest. Now, he was standing at a realm that clan leaders and empire generals dreamed of. The sheer impossibility of that growth rate triggered a sudden, sharp alarm in Xiao Yan's modern mind.
No native progressed that fast without a ridiculous cheat. A system. A golden finger.
Xiao Yan's eyes narrowed slightly. He had to know. If Ren was a fellow transmigrator, he could be an ally—or a terrifying, genre-savvy rival. Xiao Yan decided to throw out a probe. A massive cultural touchstone from early 2000s Chinese cinema that had echoed across the world, something no native cultivator could ever possibly decipher.
"It's good to see a familiar face," Xiao Yan said, forcing his posture to relax as he walked up to the counter. He leaned in slightly, his tone conversational, but his eyes locked dead onto Ren's. "Especially since finding a true path in cultivation is so difficult. Say, Brother Ren... I read a bizarre philosophical scroll recently. I was wondering if you knew the second half of the proverb: 'If a person has no dreams...' "
He paused deliberately, waiting for Ren to instinctively smile and finish the famous Stephen Chow quote: ...what is the difference between them and a salted fish?
Ren stared at him.
He didn't tense. He didn't smirk. He just tilted his head, a look of genuine, unfiltered confusion spreading across his face. Ren's brain was currently entirely wired for Dou Qi circulation and Xianxia logic, and more importantly, he hadn't been Chinese in his past life.
"No dreams?" Ren repeated slowly, his brows knitting together as he analyzed it. "A cultivator without ambition or conviction is highly prone to inner demons, but... no, I haven't heard that specific phrasing. Does it end with 'they are but walking corpses'?"
Xiao Yan stared at Ren's baffled, deeply serious expression for three long seconds.
Then, a massive, silent wave of relief washed over him. The tight tension completely drained from his shoulders.
'Not a transmigrator,' Xiao Yan thought, almost giddy with relief. 'Just a monstrous, terrifyingly talented local genius who takes martial philosophy way too seriously.'
"Ah, right. Never mind me," Xiao Yan laughed, a genuine, easy sound, waving a hand dismissively. "Just a nonsense quote from a bizarre, useless scroll I found. I'll throw it in the fire."
Ren watched Xiao Yan turn away, maintaining his polite, relaxed smile.
But internally, the gears in Ren's head suddenly violently locked into place.
The intense, unblinking stare. The weirdly specific phrasing. The immediate, massive wave of relief when Ren didn't know the answer.
'Wait a minute...' Ren thought, his heart skipping a beat as the meta-context slammed into him. 'He was testing me! That little punk is a transmigrator! Good thing I didn't know the exact thing he said... if he had hit me with something like "Rumi-chan, nani ga suki??" I would have instinctively answered and been completely busted!'
"Are you closing up for good, Senior?" Xiao Yan asked, turning respectfully toward Hai Bodong. "I was hoping to purchase a map detailing any other strange flame phenomena, extreme heat signatures, or highly concentrated fire energy in the deep desert before I head back."
Hai Bodong paused his packing and let out a dry, rasping snort. "Kid, just say 'Heavenly Flame.' Save us both the breath."
Xiao Yan flushed slightly, rubbing his nose. "Ah. Well, yes. Anything like that."
"There is only one in this desert, as far as my decades of mapping can confirm," Hai Bodong said bluntly, tossing a stack of blank parchment into a crate. "And it is no longer sitting quietly in the earth."
"It is currently with the Snake-People tribe. Queen Medusa to be exact," Hai Bodong continued. He paused, his icy blue eyes shifting to side-eye Ren with a deeply pointed, cynical look. "And considering she and those four ancient elders of hers are all Dou Zong powerhouses now... unless you possess the absurd, miraculous ability to march in there and seduce the Queen and her entire council, I strongly suggest you forget about it and move on."
Ren cleared his throat, suddenly finding the grain of the wooden counter utterly fascinating. 'Well... about that,' he thought, holding back a deeply inappropriate smirk. He had absolutely no intention of explaining just how literal that suggestion could be.
Meanwhile, Xiao Yan almost choked on his own saliva.
Deep inside the black ring, Yao Lao went completely, deathly silent. 'Five Dou Zongs?! In a backwater desert tribe?!' The old alchemist had just accepted that power scaling was getting weird, but an entire faction of Dou Zongs in this region was enough to make his soul tremble. 'Xiao Yan. We are leaving the desert. Today. Right now. Do not even look at a snake on the way out.'
'Agreed, Teacher,' Xiao Yan replied instantly, violently discarding any lingering, desperate fantasies he might have harbored about sneaking into the snake-people's territory to see if they left any scraps of the flame behind.
"But," Hai Bodong grunted, dusting off his hands, "since you are Little Ren's family, If you need assistance in the Capital later, look for the Mittel Family. I'll probably be there."
Xiao Yan blinked.
"Mittel Family?"
"our influence stretches across the Jia Ma Empire," Old Hai said. "Auctions. Trade. Information."
He waved it off.
"Mention my name."
Xiao Yan was genuinely surprised by the heavy favor. He looked at Ren, realizing that his fellow clansman had somehow earned the absolute respect of a Dou Huang.
"Thank you, Senior Hai. Thank you, Brother Ren," Xiao Yan said, offering a deep, respectful bow to them both. He straightened up, ready to accept that the desert was a dead end. "I won't be heading to the Capital right away, though. I'll be enrolling in Jia Nan Academy soon. Is it far from the Capital?"
Hai Bodong raised an eyebrow. "Jia Nan Academy? Yes, it's quite a trek. You're heading entirely out of the empire."
Xiao Yan blinked. "Out of the empire?"
"If you walk a few hundred kilometers east from the Jia Ma Empire's border fortress, you will pass through several small, chaotic countries and neutral tribes," Hai Bodong explained, tracing the invisible route on the dusty counter with his finger. "Once you cross them, you will enter a very special, infamous territory known throughout the continent as the Black-Corner Region."
Ren, who was quietly listening, perked up slightly. That was his destination, too.
"The Black-Corner Region?" Xiao Yan repeated, committing the name to memory.
"It's a lawless meat grinder. A haven for exiles, murderers, and the worst scum the continent has to offer," Hai Bodong said grimly. "And located smack in the middle of that bloody territory, right where the Jia Ma Empire's borders intersect with two other massive empires, is Jia Nan Academy."
"Three empires," Xiao Yan murmured. "A neutral ground."
"Safe for learning. Dangerous for living," Hai corrected. He began to roll a map back up, his movements slower now. "Take this one. On the house."
Xiao Yan caught the scroll as Hai tossed it across the counter.
Hai Bodong crossed his arms, looking at Xiao Yan with a stern, warning gaze. "The Academy itself is an absolute sanctuary. An ancient behemoth that even the empires don't dare provoke. But to get to its gates, you have to survive walking through the Black-Corner Region first. Keep your head down, kid. Don't flaunt your wealth, and don't trust anyone who smiles at you there."
Xiao Yan's expression hardened into a serious nod, his tempered conviction shining through. "I understand. I'll be careful."
He adjusted the heavy black ruler on his back and offered one last cupped-fist salute. "Senior Hai. Brother Ren. May our paths cross again under a wider sky."
"Safe travels, Xiao Yan," Ren smiled warmly.
As Xiao Yan stepped out of the map shop and disappeared into the bustling desert streets, Yao Lao's voice echoed in the boy's mind.
'That Xiao Ren... he is a terrifying monster, Xiao Yan. To have a Dou Huang casually offer the Mittel Family's protection just because you share a last name with him...' Yao Lao sighed. 'You must train harder. The world is vastly larger than Wu Tan City, and the geniuses are everywhere.'
'I know, Teacher,' Xiao Yan thought, his eyes burning with renewed determination. 'Next stop... Jia Nan Academy.'
Back inside the shop, Ren watched the door close, perfectly content.
The protagonist was safely on his way. The timeline was intact enough for comfort. And Ren?
Ren was heading to the exact same lawless meat grinder. But unlike Xiao Yan, who had to survive it, Ren was looking forward to emptying its vaults.