Serpent-Goat Broadsword

The sun set just before I made it back to Gyorei Cave, and I ended up having to walk through the mountains in the moonlight.

“This is rough. If I didn’t have Lone Awakening Eye, I would have been stuck and unable to move.”

There was only a little grass and a few trees, but they too carried qi. If I raised the sensitivity of Lone Awakening Eye to its limit, I could sense that faint qi and have the path emerge in my mind.

When I got back, I decided I would make a lantern. A lantern was a portable lamp. When I finally reached Gyorei Cave and returned to my room, I set down my luggage, then took the Serpent-Blade Goat hide, the oil lantern, and some salt and went outside.

Under the light of the oil lantern, I rubbed salt into the Serpent-Blade Goat hide and cured it with salt. A leatherworker had taught me that doing this would prevent it from rotting.

I had preserved the Thunder Bear hide the same way and taken it into town, where I had it processed into a high-quality fur and sold it. Since Thunder Bear fur was rare, it sold for the high price of forty-two gold coins.

The next morning, when I went to morning practice, Elder Shanshi did not come. I heard he had gone to the royal capital, Luogan, on business. Among the direct disciples who remained, the oldest was a Taoist practitioner named Ryuuho. Ryuuho had reached the Fourteenth Tier of the Qi Refining Stage and had come to the point where he could enter the Spirit Formation Stage with just a little more progress.

However, Ryuuho had no talent for martial arts. He could defeat most inner disciples simply by using the physical strength enhanced by his high level of qi. But he could not defeat Kanru, whose qi level was close to his.

“While Elder is away, I will instruct you.”

When Ryuuho said that, Yulong frowned. Seeing Yulong’s face brought the same question to my mind yet again. Why had Yulong been able to become Elder Shanshi’s direct disciple?

Even if someone lacked talent in martial arts like Ryuuho, it would not be strange for him to become a direct disciple if he had talent for qi. But Yulong had no talent for martial arts or qi, and on top of that, he had no talent for effort either.

There were about four direct disciples like that. I had heard rumors that wealthy families’ sons were allowed to enter the sect in order to help run Gyorei Cave. It was probably one of those adult arrangements.

Even back in my previous life as a detective, those adult arrangements had existed close at hand. But I had not been the type of detective burning with a sense of justice, so I ignored it and made my own efforts to aim higher.

It felt nostalgic, remembering the time when I had thought that unless I rose high within the police organization, I would not be able to do what I wanted. But there was no such thing as a police force in this world.

In order to do what I wanted in this world, there were probably two paths: become a royal official and aim higher, or aim to become an immortal Xian and transcend everything. But the path of becoming an official resembled the life I had led as a detective, so it did not appeal to me.

“Yulong. You look dissatisfied. Is there something you want to say?”

“No, nothing.”

“Then we’ll start with the basics.”

Ryuuho seemed to like practicing Heavy Yin Qi and Floating Yang Qi, which were the basics of Heavy Resonance Sword.

“Yulong, your switching between Heavy Yin Qi and Floating Yang Qi is too slow. What are you going to do if that’s the best you can manage?”

It seemed Yulong disliked basic practice.

When morning practice ended, I went to see Elder Min. Elder Mon was there as well, and the two of them were talking.

“Well, if it isn’t Kou. Did you get the Serpent-Blade Goat horns?”

Elder Min asked me. The names of Elder Min and Elder Mon were similar, which made them confusing. However, when I saw the two of them standing together, they felt like opposites.

Elder Mon gave the impression of a bewitching beauty, while Elder Min felt like a dependable older sister figure. Elder Mon turned a dangerously alluring gaze toward me.

“Oh my, did you go hunting Serpent-Blade Goats?”

“Yes. I properly obtained the Serpent-Blade Horns too.”

I took the two Serpent-Blade Horns out of my pack and handed them to Elder Min. Elder Min accepted them and nodded in satisfaction.

“As promised, I’ll make you a Serpent-Goat Broadsword.”

After that, I observed Elder Min making the Serpent-Goat Broadsword. Just like when she had made the black steel short sword for me, when Elder Min struck the heated Serpent-Blade Horn with her hammer, that part moved like a snake’s muscles and changed shape. She taught me that this method was called “spiritual forging.”

“It’s a technique where you pour in spiritual power and qi at the same time and process it into whatever shape you want. Amazing, isn’t it?”

Even though Elder Min was the one actually doing it, Elder Mon said it in a bragging tone.

“So in the end, you really do need spiritual power, huh?”

Elder Min laughed as she brought down the hammer.

“There’s also a method called ‘qi refining forging’ that uses only qi. But if you want to process something hard like a Serpent-Blade Horn, you have to at least reach the Eleventh Tier of the Qi Refining Stage.”

I was still at the Ninth Tier. I would have to train a little more and raise my qi level. While I was thinking that, the Serpent-Blade Horn had changed into the shape of a wide blade.

The blade of that broadsword was rectangular like a vegetable knife partway up, but only the tip formed a sharp triangular edge. It was nearly twice as thick as an ordinary sword, and the blade length was about forty centimeters.

I tried holding the finished broadsword blade. It was quite heavy, but once a long shaft was attached to complete it, it would probably become easy to use.

“Thank you very much.”

She was still going to finish it, but I thanked her first.

“By the way, Kou, you have Thunder Bear claws, don’t you?”

“I do, but what about them?”

“You said before that if there were materials I wanted, you’d gather them for me. So I want the wool of a Silver Sheep.”

A Silver Sheep was a sheep-type yōma with silver-shining wool.

“But hunting Silver Sheep is supposed to be forbidden, isn’t it?”

Many people wanted Silver Sheep wool, and because so many Taoist practitioners hunted them, their numbers had apparently fallen to the brink of extinction. That was why Sect Leader Wei had decided to ban Silver Sheep hunting.

“That’s right.”

“Have their numbers increased enough for hunting to be permitted?”

“This time, the idea is to obtain only the wool without killing the Silver Sheep.”

“And the Thunder Bear claws are related to that plan?”

“Yes. We’ll use Thunder Bear claws to make a weapon called a ‘lightning spike,’ and by applying Demonic Horn Warhammer Art to channel a lightning strike into it, we’ll shear the wool while the Silver Sheep is paralyzed.”

A lightning spike was a weapon similar to a warhammer or a pickaxe, and at its tip was a stabbing implement like an ice pick. Apparently, the plan was to stab it in and paralyze the target with the lightning generated from the Thunder Bear claw.