Chapter 672

Three days later, Fang Yuan wakes, his soul calm and steady. He notes that a zombie’s soul destabilizes more easily than a living body’s, and only sleep, not a brief rest, restores it. The best cure for an agitated soul is Bewitching Lake’s water from Obsession Death Domain, recorded in The Legends of Ren Zu and praised by Verdant Great Sun, but Fang Yuan has none and would not dare drink it regardless. ^{ch. 672}

Two dealings with Lang Ya land spirit earn him sixty immortal essence stones. He spends much of it in treasure yellow heaven, buying starlight firefly Gu, three killer moves, and a group of old hairy men. The moves are spring star rain, icy yarn and six-nine stardust. His month’s buying, the small swamp Gu and pine island Gu for the Spring Autumn Cicada seal included, comes to twenty stones, leaving him thirty and a half. His green grape immortal essence is more strained: his second deduction and the cicada seal cost seven beads, leaving him two, a dangerous margin against Immortal Crane Sect’s approach that would let him use myriad self only twice. Fang Yuan converts fifteen immortal essence stones into green grape immortal essence, raising his beads to seventeen while his stones fall to fifteen and a half. ^{ch. 672}

The Spring Autumn Cicada crisis is now eased, and his alliance with Hei Lou Lan has relieved his predicament further. A new problem remains: feeding his nine Immortal Gu. They are Fixed Immortal Travel, Woman’s Heart, Cleanse Soul, Connect Luck, Rising Azure Cloud, Worldly Wave Trace, Calamity Beckoning, Delight in Water and Mountain, and Spring Autumn Cicada. Most Gu Immortals hold none. Nine of them are a great boon, and a huge burden. ^{ch. 672}

Investigating finally turns up what each Gu needs to eat. Calamity Beckoning needs six headed snake blood, Rising Azure Cloud needs cloud dragon scale and wind scythe bird eyeballs, and Woman’s Heart simply feeds on women’s hearts, growing stronger the more it is fed. Delight in Water and Mountain needs earth qi, water qi and laughter stones, Worldly Wave Trace underworld jellyfish and deepsea lightning eels, Cleanse Soul over ten thousand white lotus giant silkworm Gu, and Connect Luck sand from a worldly sand gull’s resting area. Spring Autumn Cicada needs no feeding, but Fixed Immortal Travel, fed a year ago for a theoretical six years that shrinks with use, is close to needing food again. Calamity Beckoning, just refined, is already weak, while Delight in Water and Mountain and Worldly Wave Trace, fed well for years inside Imperial Court blessed land as parts of Water Pavilion, are not. Cleanse Soul, Connect Luck, Woman’s Heart and Rising Azure Cloud, only half-fed while hibernating in the true inheritance secluded domain, are now awake and extremely hungry. Fang Yuan has already left Rising Azure Cloud with Lang Ya land spirit, and left Landscape as Before and Man as Before with Tai Bai Yun Sheng. ^{ch. 672}

These materials are rare and often monopolized, so stones alone cannot buy them. Short on time, Fang Yuan buys them in treasure yellow heaven anyway, since keeping his Immortal Gu alive matters more than the traces this leaves for wisdom path Gu Immortals to find. He is known as Eight Arm Immortal, unconnected to Hu Immortal blessed land. Lang Ya land spirit, Hei Lou Lan and Fairy Li Shan turn up nothing useful: Lang Ya’s laughter stones are used up, and the hundred deepsea lightning eels sent to Fairy Li Shan from eastern sea years ago all died in her care. ^{ch. 672}

This reminds Fang Yuan of eastern sea, richer than central continent, where recent turmoil offers huge opportunity. Thinking of Lan Xu blessed land, he decides, and summons Tai Bai Yun Sheng. Asked about his cultivation, Tai Bai Yun Sheng reports repairing Lang Ya’s cloud soil and rivers for immortal essence stones, then buying the killer move nine cloud ring and float ball tea seeds. Fang Yuan approves, since float ball tea suits his time path heavy blessed land. Tai Bai Yun Sheng plans to add jade hummingbirds once the tea grows, funded through his own Landscape as Before. He notes the danger of public exposure: they are the last survivors of Imperial Court blessed land’s fall, already suspected by northern plains’ Gu Immortals, and the witness Ma Hong Yun has vanished. Fang Yuan then states his true intention: eastern sea would be a good place for Tai Bai Yun Sheng to go. ^{ch. 672}