Chapter 496

The ink lines on a grey-white stone slab settle into a terrain map. At its center lies a heightened land with a very gentle slope, no cliffs and a tunnel-like opening, marked Di Qiu, with swamps and forests around it and a river at the southwest corner. Four lines below baffle Fang Yuan: light in the soil, shine up to a hundred thousand feet high, swimming in the sky for a hundred li and praising plum fragrant snow. He is still sure the riddle-like lines are definitely clues left on purpose. ^{ch. 496}

After the map fades and the slab turns white, Fang Yuan still recalls every detail at extreme clarity, because painting idea Gu was once used on the slab to etch scenery into a Gu Master’s memory. His appraisal methods, using Gu from Ge tribe’s inventory, proved the key to the slab’s secret. The slab is a counterfeit whose maker also used other Gu, spending much effort to find an inheritor. Fang Yuan judges it a Gu Master’s inheritance. ^{ch. 496}

He shows little joy. Some inheritances were destroyed long ago, others were taken, and some are traps meticulously laid by twisted Gu Masters seeking revenge. Too busy to drop his plans for a vague inheritance, and unable to find Di Qiu from the map alone, Fang Yuan soon forgets it. ^{ch. 496}

In the following days, using Gu from Ge tribe’s warehouse, he fails twice, then refines the rank three eagle wings Gu he bought at a market in Ge tribe camp into rank four eagle rise Gu. Fang Yuan keeps the Gu as a trump card. ^{ch. 496}

Ge Guang brings news. Ma tribe has completely absorbed Fei tribe and is central to the Tian Chuan heroes assembly, and Fang Yuan is sure it plans to fight for the Imperial Court throne. Nu Er tribe’s representative at Meng Qiu is a rank five Gu Master, Nu Er Tu. In Cao Fu’s Zhao tribe, Zhao Lian Yun, Ma Hong Yun’s wife and a future wisdom path Gu Immortal, is still a young girl. ^{ch. 496}

Fang Yuan vaguely recalls that Ma tribe won tough battles against the Huang Jin family’s tribes but was weakened by great losses. Hei Lou Lan encircled it and relented before the blizzard. Ma tribe then submitted to Hei tribe and gained the right to enter the Imperial Court, where Ma Hong Yun obtained a partial Immortal Venerable inheritance in the Eighty-Eight Edge Treasure Building. ^{ch. 496}

Ge Guang adds that Liu Wen Wu and Hei Lou Lan are the strongest at Yu Tian and that only Ge tribe remains at crescent lake, so unless they set off now they may arrive too late. The higher-ups do not know Yu Tian will be a huge contest. Fang Yuan calls the tribe stable only on the surface. As the Yu Tian contest has just reached its climax, he decides to go first to onion valley. ^{ch. 496}

Onion valley is a wide valley of green onions. Its famous rank two onion explosion Gu is red like fire, and its intense odor makes wild beasts irascible and likelier to attack people, so the valley is much more dangerous than crescent lake. Fang Yuan says he bred wolves there long ago, and they should have matured and expanded. Ge Guang understands, as feeding the wolves has strained his tribe, and Fang Yuan adds that more wolves will give Ge tribe greater authority at the assembly. Ge Guang nods and asks when they set off. Fang Yuan answers today. ^{ch. 496}