Chapter 94: From Now On, Hand Over Spirit Stones to Me Every Year!

Formation arrays and restrictions shared some similarities, but an array required treasures or magical implements to serve as its core, and once it was laid down, it usually could not be moved. Unless one used an array disc, but array discs were far more expensive than ordinary arrays.

A restriction, by contrast, was created by imprinting hand seals onto certain objects in order to achieve a specific effect. It could be considered a kind of array, though with even greater limitations.

The Treasure Pavilion on Lotus Terrace Mountain was identical in style to the one in Wandering Immortal City. When Gu Changqing entered and saw that the one inside was actually a man, he immediately lost all interest in idle chatter and went straight to the point. “I need a formation for setting up an abode!”

“Is fellow Daoist looking for a gathering array, or one for defending the abode?” asked the cultivator in the pavilion.

“A defensive one!”

“The most basic is the Three Talent Array. Depending on the array flags, its effects vary greatly. A little better would be the Six Harmony Array... Aside from that, there are also the Five Elements Array, the Reversed Five Elements Array...”

Gu Changqing asked about the prices, and sure enough, the array flags were not cheap. The cheapest set of Three Talent Array flags cost about a hundred spirit stones, but even an early Qi Refining cultivator could break through them in half an hour.

Sets like the Reversed Five Elements Array cost over a thousand spirit stones, and some even ran into the several-thousand range.

After thinking it over, Gu Changqing decided the matter of buying array flags could be put aside for the moment.

As for what level of array he could afford, that would depend on how generous the cultivators of Spirit Vulture Peak were!

“I’ll come back later.” Gu Changqing tossed out a remark, then stepped outside and asked Daoist White Elephant, “Where is Spirit Vulture Peak?”

After pointing out the direction, Daoist White Elephant said, “Now that senior brother has entered the sect, I still have other matters to attend to, so I won’t accompany you there.”

He did not want to get dragged into Gu Changqing’s affairs.

“Remember, if anything good comes up, remember to call me!” Gu Changqing said as he draped an arm over Daoist White Elephant’s shoulder and walked off.

“Absolutely!” Daoist White Elephant gritted his teeth.

“Give me a few message talismans. Once I’ve settled on an abode, I’ll send you a message talisman!” Gu Changqing added.

Daoist White Elephant had no choice but to hand over two message talismans. After all, those too had to be bought with money.

“Let’s go!” Gu Changqing patted Daoist White Elephant on the shoulder, then strode grandly toward Spirit Vulture Peak with a bright smile on his face.

Li Youling followed closely behind him. When they crossed the chain bridge, she looked a little frightened, too scared to glance downward, and she clenched her teeth as she followed Gu Changqing across.

The chain bridge was halfway up the mountainside. After crossing it, Gu Changqing saw two cultivators standing not far ahead.

One was about thirty years old, dressed in a blue robe, with a long beard, looking like a scholar.

The other was a red-robed girl who appeared to be only fifteen or sixteen.

The scholar smiled and nodded at Gu Changqing. “Fellow Daoist looks unfamiliar. Are you here to find someone?”

“Yes,” Gu Changqing said with a broad grin. Then, with a sudden burst of speed, his body shot forward like an arrow, charging straight at the two of them.

The scholar only smiled and flicked a bead at him.

“Hit!”

The girl, meanwhile, directly sent a white silk ribbon whipping toward Gu Changqing.

Gu Changqing summoned the Turtle-Snake Eight Trigrams Lamp above his head, and a red light enveloped him in protection. From his sleeves flew a long sword and a short sword, both bringing with them gusts of陰风 as they slashed toward the two.

The bead landed before Gu Changqing and instantly exploded. A cloud of blue smoke billowed out, and within it a human face formed, snapping toward him, only to be blocked entirely by the Turtle-Snake Eight Trigrams Lamp.

As for the girl’s silk ribbon, it remained outside the red light, unable to advance even an inch.

Gu Changqing’s mind flickered, and the red radiance cast by the Turtle-Snake Eight Trigrams Lamp surged outward by over a meter, directly forcing the white ribbon apart.

“It’s a defensive magical item!” The two of them were driven into constant evasive movement by the twin swords. At first they had worn cold smiles, waiting for their talismans and treasures to take effect.

Even if Gu Changqing had used defensive talismans, the ribbon should have bound him, and the blue smoke should have drugged him into a stupor.

By then they could strip him clean from head to toe and toss him back to Lotus Terrace Mountain.

Who would have thought that the Turtle-Snake Eight Trigrams Lamp would block everything, and that the paired yin-yang soul swords were so fast that once caught, there was no escaping them?

Seeing the situation turn bad, the two hurriedly shouted, “Fellow Daoist, please stop! We were only joking with you!”

“I was joking with the two of you as well!” Gu Changqing said with a ferocious grin, lunging at them. His body, light in the air a moment ago, suddenly grew heavy, crashing down like a mountain collapse.

He threw a punch. The scholar only felt his gaze drawn to a black bead on the fist, and then the blow landed squarely on his face, sending blood spraying everywhere.

As the scholar was blasted backward, Gu Changqing grabbed his ankle and slammed him against a nearby rock, shattering the stone to pieces.

He followed with a kick to the chest, breaking most of the man’s breastbone, then turned and charged at the girl in red.

Already in grave danger from the entangling swords, the red-robed girl saw Gu Changqing coming and dropped to her knees at once, her expression pitiful. “Spare me, fellow Daoist!”

If this had been anyone else, their heart might have softened.

But Gu Changqing wore a savage grin and smashed a fist into her face, caving it in nearly to the skull as shattered bone flew everywhere.

Then he lashed out with a kick to her waist, snapping who knew how many bones.

Only then did he grab her back and throw her onto the ground beside the scholar in blue.

The brief fight had already drawn plenty of onlookers, more than a dozen in all.

“Who’s causing trouble on Spirit Vulture Peak?” A burly man pushed through the crowd to look over, and Gu Changqing immediately fixed him with a ferocious grin and lunged straight at him.

“We have no grievance with you!” The others, seeing such a ferocious brute arrive, quickly backed away.

After all, the eighteen peaks had more spiritual energy the closer one got to the summit, so the cultivators around the mountainside were not especially strong.

The burly man had never imagined that his shout would be answered by such a savage charge. His scalp tingled.

But he still had to keep up appearances. Gritting his teeth, he produced a thick-backed broadsword, and as soon as he struck, waves of blade light rolled toward Gu Changqing.

Gu Changqing sneered. The paired yin-yang swords danced up and down around the burly man, and the clanging in the air rang out without end. In just a short while, the man could no longer hold on. He hurriedly withdrew his blade, fell to his knees, and shouted, “Grandfather, spare me!”

The practiced ease of it even made Gu Changqing pause.

He had never seen anyone so decisive.

With a movement of his body, he appeared above the burly man’s head and drove a foot down.

The burly man had actually felt a surge of joy when the paired swords stopped.

But Gu Changqing’s next move changed his expression. The other man was the sort who would never let up once he had the upper hand. By the time the burly man tried to flee, it was already too late.

Boom!

The burly man’s entire head was stamped into the ground.

“Like this, and you still dare to stick your neck out?” Gu Changqing sneered and stomped down again.

Boom!

Only then did Gu Changqing haul the man up and toss him together with the scholar in blue and the girl in red. He searched them, taking off their storage pouches and opening them to look inside.

He then took out all the spirit stones and piled them together for a glance. There were a little over four hundred in total, barely passable.

He also took all the spiritual herbs and medicinal materials from their pouches, then threw the empty pouches back at them.

As for their magical items, he left those alone. He had to leave them some means of making a living so they could keep earning money.

“How many spirit stones can you make in a month?” Gu Changqing asked, giving one of them two more kicks.

“Please spare my life, Grandfather!” The burly man’s face was a bloody mess. Kicked awake by Gu Changqing, he knew he could not escape and simply sprawled on the ground.

The other two were in even worse shape. How many bones they had broken was impossible to tell, and they could only lie there groaning.

“I asked how many spirit stones you make in a month,” Gu Changqing said with a vicious grin.

“In a whole year... a little over a hundred...” the burly man muttered.

The other two were about the same.

“Damn it, you’re this poor and you still cultivate?” Gu Changqing snapped when he heard that, and gave each of them another kick, sending them coughing up blood.

“From now on, each of you pays me thirty spirit stones every year!”

After some thought, that was what he decided.

He did not care about that amount of spirit stones. What mattered was that he had to collect the money.

Otherwise, wouldn’t he have been beating them for nothing?

Gu Changqing glanced into the distance and saw quite a few people still watching. With a shift of his foot, they all hurried back into their abodes and no longer dared to peek.