However, if the world is godless, why is Ru Xin telling me to read all of this?
Li Qingshan was not surprised by the fact that Ru Xin had managed to guess his identity as Northmoon. He was not Superman, who only needed to take off a pair of black-rimmed glasses and change into a set of tights with an “S” to fool the reporter that was the female protagonist forever.
Either there was something wrong with the female reporter’s head, or she had never really taken a man like him seriously. As someone who liked her, Superman’s tastes sure were not particularly impressive.
Li Qingshan personally believed his tastes were much better. Ru Xin’s intelligence was quite rare in the world. She had purposefully made a fuss to lead him here, digging up a great pile of books for him to read. Surely she could not say something like:
Hey, I know who you are! Becoming a water god is so great, but it’s just a pity you were born too late! You know about it now, but it’s forever beyond your reach! Hehehehe.
Hold on!
Li Qingshan’s expression suddenly became rather strange, as he imagined Ru Xin saying something like that complacently, he felt like she was actually capable of doing something like that.
He coughed gently and dismissed these random thoughts. He calmed down and continued flipping through the books.
By dusk, the sunlight had become an orangey-red, casting long shadows of him on the floor.
Li Qingshan finally reached the last book, and he became even more eager. If he could refine a body of water and turn it into his water dwelling, his cultivation speed would definitely increase drastically. And, with his geographic advantage, even if Golden Core cultivators came to make trouble, he could deal with them easily. He could go on the attack as opposed to being on the defence.
“Hmm? What’s this?”
……
“Oi, Ru Xin, what are you trying to do? Are you fooling with me?”
It was already late. Li Qingshan arrived on Benevolence island, looking for Ru Xin in her alchemy room to denounce her. Disappointment and anger filled his face from finding absolutely nothing.
“Ah, you’ve finally noticed! How clever!” Ru Xin chuckled as if she had succeeded with her scheme. However, she felt rather disappointed inside.
“So you already knew!” Li Qingshan flew into a rage before calming down again and smiling.
“Knew what?” Ru Xin asked in exasperation.
“I was…”
“An idiot.” Ru Xin interrupted him.
“I’m going to go to the Chan Monastery of Deva-Nāga with Xiao An.” Li Qingshan did not lose his temper. He only sighed gently.
“Why?” Ru Xin gazed at the cauldron before her and asked in an unconcerned manner, but her heart shuddered slightly.
“Actually, I wanted to tell you back then in the library. This is the best choice for Xiao An. Not to mention that I’ve offended my superior, so I kind of can’t remain in the Clear River prefecture anymore.”
“You read all the books I gave you?” Others might have had no idea which superior Li Qingshan had offended, but Ru Xin knew very well. She became rather flustered inside for some reason.
“I read some of them, but they seem to be useless, so I guessed you were playing a trick on me. Sigh, if only that were possible. That way, I would be able to hold off that superior of mine.”
“You idiot!” He was clearly just one step away.
“Forget it. I’m not going to get mad at you today. Actually, there’s something I want to tell you before I leave.” Li Qingshan’s gaze suddenly became filled with tenderness.
Ru Xin’s gaze met his before shifting away again. “What about those books?”
She would not make any attempt to persuade him to stay, but at the very least, she had to make him understand the current situation completely. This idiot!
“They’re still in the library!”
“That’s good then. Wait for me here. I’ll be right back.” Ru Xin had specially told Sun Fubai to stow the books away and prevent anyone else from touching them if Li Qingshan failed to read through all of them.
“Hahahaha, who’s the one being fooled now?” Li Qingshan suddenly laughed aloud and raised his right hand.
……
An hour earlier, he noticed something thin inserted between the first page and the front cover the moment he opened the last book. It seemed like water or ice, completely transparent, and it was jagged, shaped like a dragon. It formed a simplistic but impressive glyph.
Li Qingshan could tell with a single glance that it was anything but ordinary. However, it did not even give off a sliver of spiritual qi, and it was extremely delicate. If he had not flipped to this page, he would not have discovered what the book was hiding.
“Don’t tell me this is?”
Li Qingshan’s eyes lit up. He looked around, and only after confirming that no one was around did he channel a sliver of spiritual qi into the ice glyph.
The ice glyph immediately began to move, raging like the rivers yet also coiling like dragons and snakes. Under the glow of the setting sun, it seemed to be alive.
Sure enough!
Li Qingshan picked up a book he had just read through and flipped to a certain page. There was a description on there.
“The Mountain God Seal is like metal, while the Water God Seal is like ice and jade. They are both shaped like dragons.”
Combining the information from so many books, a rough, blue image gradually appeared in Li Qingshan’s head.
After forging the cauldrons of the nine provinces, no one was able to condense god seals anymore. Afterwards, the world became godless.
However, this was not absolute. With how many mountains and bodies of water there were in the world, there would always be some god seals that managed to slip by. Because they came from the same origins as the cauldrons of the nine provinces, they could not be suppressed.
However, while they could not be suppressed, the nine cauldrons could sense these actions of stealing from their “network”. Once caught, the empire would definitely punish those people with an iron fist.
However, this lead to another question. This god seal might not necessarily be condensed in the Clear River prefecture, so could it still be used here?
There was no answer to this question. He only gained a complete understanding of the history, rise, and fall of the existence of gods from all the books he had read, but they did not go into detail about the usage of god seals.
And, using a god seal in this day and age was clearly an act of treason. Even if books like that did exist, they would not be present in the library.
“Looks like the answer is right here!”
Li Qingshan cast his gaze onto the last book with the Water God Seal again. At first glance, the book seemed no different from the others, just having been soaked in water before, and the material of the paper was rather different. Through the decorative designs of the first page, he could tell that the book should not have come from the library, but from Ru Xin’s personal collection.
Li Qingshan calmed down and read through it page by page. He discovered calling it a book was rather inaccurate. More accurately, it was a series of notes. It was the notes of a Hawkwolf guard who carried out missions in the Mist province.
It contained records of how a few daemons, demons, and monsters in the Mist province used this remaining god seal to refine the treacherous terrain there, claiming themselves to be kings. They were extremely difficult to exterminate.
Sure enough, according to the information recorded in the notes, god seals were only divided into Mountain God Seals and Water God Seals, but they were not limited to certain regions. As long as they released the spiritual qi of the mountains and waters they had refined, they could just use them elsewhere.
The Hawkwolf guard had complained plenty about this.
Li Qingshan beamed with joy inside.
The notes should have been quite old. By now, the Mist province had already descended into chaos, and the Hawkwolf Guard had already withdrawn their organisation to the level of commanderies. It was no longer clear who was exterminating who.
In other words, offices of the Hawkwolf Guard on the same level as the Clear River prefecture no longer existed in the Mist province.
That was expected. After several years of war, the Clear River prefecture had already withdrawn its lowest level of Hawkwolf Guard offices too, concentrating their strength in all aspects. If the war developed further, such that even Daemon Commanders like Spider Queen Lolth ran amok freely, then it would also make perfect sense to withdraw offices like the Hawkwolf Guard in the Clear River prefecture.
After reading the final page of the notes, Li Qingshan gained an inkling about the origins of the god seal.
There were many Water God Seals throughout the Mist province. They had not been left behind from before the age when the founding emperor established the nine provinces.
There were territories outside the nine provinces that could completely avoid the suppression of the great cauldrons of the nine provinces. They could condense god seals outside and then bring them to the nine provinces.
However, this was anything but easy to achieve. Condensing god seals required extremely great time and effort, frequently calculated using decades. If it were just for the sake of sale, it was a horrible idea where the losses outweigh the gains.
The Hawkwolf guard even suspected a connection to the Merfolk of the South sea, as Merfolk were naturally born with the other ability of controlling water, so condensing Water God Seals was relatively easier for them. At the same time, they had lengthier lives too. As it seemed, the Hawkwolf guard’s guess had been mostly correct.
Ru Xin happened to possess the bloodline of Merfolk.
Li Qingshan could also be regarded as a member of the Hawkwolf Guard, but never had he heard of something like this, probably because the Green province was a close neighbour of the Dragon province. If any daemon were bold enough to make trouble, probably even the Dragon King of Ink Sea would not allow it. However, now that the Treaty of Kings was falling apart and conflict sprung up everywhere with plenty of bloodshed, something like this was no longer a big deal.
He had even committed murder and arson, so why did he have to worry about stealing some resources?
“This sure is a great gift!”
If it were not for the fact that he was in the library, Li Qingshan was almost tempted to laugh out loud. If Ru Xin had been standing in front of him, perhaps he would have hugged her and kissed her a few times.
The spiritual stones he had given away, over ten thousand of them, were absolutely nothing in comparison to the value of the god seal. Even in the Mist province, a similar god seal could fetch an astronomical price, and they were probably even rarer in the Green province.
If Li Qingshan were to buy it, he would be more than willing to spend the sum even if it cost a hundred thousand or a million spiritual stones. Was there anything else that could increase his cultivation speed while ensuring his safety? Was there anything more important than that?
In hindsight, Li Qingshan realised that Ru Xin’s tricks were actually more like a test.
If he did not have the patience to listen to her, or he turned her down because he was stingy with spiritual stones, he would not have even gotten through the first story, so there obviously would not be a second story. If he ignored and dismissed her efforts, refusing to read through them one by one, then he would have missed out on the priceless god seal.
It’s right there. It’ll just depend on whether you have the patience or not.
Was obtaining her heart the same?
Li Qingshan stowed the book and god seal away. Then he explained a few things to Sun Fubai before rushing over to Benevolence island.
……
As Ru Xin gazed at the god seal in Li Qingshan’s hand, she had no idea whether she should be angry or happy.
If he had not read through all the books, why did he only visit now? Normally, she never would have fallen for this, but his farewell managed to throw her mind into a mess.
“Looks like even without a test, there’s still a prize for me! Lady Ru Xin sure is softhearted!” At this moment, Li Qingshan did not possess a single shred of might or malice that belonged to daemons. He was more like a child who had managed to steal some candy, extremely proud of himself.
“Since you’ve obtained it, you can hurry up and piss off. Stop interfering with my alchemy.”
Ru Xin waved her hand impatiently, like she was shooing away a fly. The red glow of the setting sun stretched from her cheek to her slender neck.
“Thank you!” Li Qingshan pulled her into his arms and embraced her firmly as he said with great seriousness.
Medicinal fragrance filled his mind, and her feminine figure filled his arms.
“I won’t leave the Clear River prefecture so casually. Even if I do leave, I will return. I have far too many attachments here.”
Before Ru Xin could respond, Li Qingshan let go of her and made his way out the door.
“How impressive.” Ru Xin snorted with disdain after being dazed for a moment.
At this moment, there was someone else on Benevolence island who had finally obtained her reward after a series of trials.
PS: Congratulations to “A Lifetime Following Fate, Fate Deciding a Lifetime” on becoming a new Sect Master. Dream Teller hereby gives you his best regards and endless thanks. I will definitely continue to work hard so that I don’t let you down. We’re in the final juncture of this month, so I once again ask you for monthly votes!
