Treasure Brass Toad

Jia Fu enters Gu Yue village on Qing Mao Mountain seated on a Treasure Brass Toad at the head of the merchant caravan. ^{ch. 39} On a later visit, a Treasure Brass Toad again leads his caravan onto the mountain; Gu Yue Bo notes that Jia Fu is quite early that year. ^{ch. 109}

Appearance

The toad is two and a half meters tall with an entire body orange-yellow. Its back is thick with warts and knots, like the bronze nail lumps on ancient city gates. ^{ch. 39}

Form

The toad is two and a half meters tall and orange-yellow over its whole body. Its back is thick with warts and knots, compared in the text to the bronze nail lumps on ancient city gates. Thick ropes bind goods to that back so that, at a glance, it looks as if the toad carries a giant backpack. Jia Fu sits cross-legged on its head or back and stays steady while it hops; at the peak of a hop his height levels with second-floor windows, and on the ground he still sits higher than the first floor of the bamboo houses. The streets that were spacious for people become packed and narrow around it, as if a beast has pushed into the bamboo houses. ^{ch. 39} It has the same height and orange-yellow body when Jia Fu rides it into the village again. ^{ch. 109}

Smaller caravan toads follow behind. They look similar but are cow- or horse-sized and also carry people and merchandise. ^{ch. 39} Those lesser toads are not named Treasure Brass Toads.

Mount use

On the mountain road the Treasure Brass Toad covers about a hundred meters with every hop. That leaping gait is what lets it ignore precipitous and narrow path limits that would hinder ordinary travel. Jia Fu and his crew ride it when they leave Gu Yue village after the Jia Jin Sheng investigation, keeping to the mountain trail rather than cutting through Qing Mao Mountain, because a monster horde could still threaten even a rank four Gu Master. Wind and a rising-and-falling view mark the ride as the toad hops away until trees cover the party. ^{ch. 59}

Refinement link

When Fang Yuan sells a Mudskin Toad won in Jia Jin Sheng’s rock-gambling den, he states that Mudskin Toad is a rare rank two Gu and the necessary main Gu in refining the Treasure Brass Toad. Mudskin Toad is priced at five hundred primeval stones, with a yellow-soil feed. ^{ch. 42} Chapter 42 does not state the Treasure Brass Toad’s own rank, feed, or other refinement materials.