Zhao State was a small country, like other small states in these vast Southern Shaanxi lands, yearning for the Eastern Lands, yearning for the Great Tang, yearning for Chang'an. This was the aspiration of the state's ruler, and also the hope of Zhao State's scholars. It was as if the Tang Tower in the capital, as tall as the imperial palace, could gaze upon Chang'an in the Eastern Lands, beyond a thousand mountains and ten thousand rivers.
It was the fourth month of the year, not exactly cold, and naturally not oppressively hot. A gentle breeze caressed the land, sweeping past the Northern Desert Qiang Di, blowing across the Eastern Lands of Great Tang, stirring up a fine mist of dust. In the twilight of the setting sun, it turned, swirling around Mount Daqing on the border of Zhao State in the Southern Reaches, and settled upon a young scholar sitting on this very mountaintop.
The young man was a little thin and frail. In his hand, he held a gourd. He wore a clean, blue scholar's robe and looked to be about sixteen or seventeen years old. He wasn't tall, and his skin was a bit dark, but his clear eyes revealed intelligence. However, his now furrowed brows made that intelligence seem introverted, and his expression held a hint of bewilderment.
"Failed the exam again..." The young man sighed. His name was Meng Hao, an ordinary scholar from Yun Jie County, at the foot of Mount Daqing. Some time ago, his parents had suddenly disappeared, and the family fortune they left behind was not substantial to begin with. He had studied a great deal over the past few years, and now he was utterly destitute.
"Three years of exams, three years of constantly poring over the books of those sages, I'm practically sick of them. Could it be that the imperial examinations are truly not the path for me, Meng Hao?" Meng Hao mocked himself, lowering his head to glance at the gourd in his hand. His expression was somewhat bleak.
"The hope of becoming an official, getting rich, and becoming wealthy is growing more and more distant, not to mention going to the Eastern Lands of Great Tang after getting rich... Among a hundred people, the most useless is a scholar." Meng Hao gave a bitter laugh, sitting on this quiet mountaintop, gazing at the gourd in his hand. His expression grew increasingly bewildered, that bewilderment carrying with it a fear of the future, a confusion about his own life. He didn't know what he could do later, nor where his future path lay.
Would there be a noble patron who would take notice of him? Or perhaps a young lady from a wealthy family would suddenly take a liking to him? Or would he still be continuously taking the imperial examinations years from now?
These questions had no answers. For a sixteen or seventeen-year-old youth, such bewilderment seemed to transform into a gaping, devouring maw, invisibly consuming him, leaving him somewhat afraid.
"Even a tutor in the county town only earns a few silver coins a month, not even as much as Uncle Wang the carpenter's shop earns. If I had known this, I wouldn't have gone to study in those early years; I would have learned carpentry from Old Uncle Wang. At least then I could have solved the problem of food and clothing later, better than having nothing at all now." Meng Hao fell silent.
"There isn't much food left at home, and the silver I had is almost all spent, with only a few scattered coins remaining. I still owe Steward Zhou three taels of silver. After this... what am I to do?" Meng Hao raised his head, looked up at the sky, and murmured softly. The sky was very blue, very vast, stretching far into the distance without end, just as he could not see his own future.
A long while later, Meng Hao shook his head. He took out a piece of paper from his bosom, looked at it seriously, then put the paper into the gourd. He stood up and forcefully threw the gourd towards Mount Daqing.
At the foot of Mount Daqing flowed a great river. Its waters did not freeze even in the bitter cold of winter. Legend had it that it flowed towards the Eastern Lands of Great Tang.
On the mountaintop, Meng Hao silently watched the gourd gradually drift away on the great river below, his eyes unblinking. It was as if he saw his own birth mother, saw the joys of his youth. That gourd carried his ideals, his surging dreams for the future. It drifted further and further, and he wondered who, on some future day, would pick up this gourd and see the paper inside.
It wasn't until several tens of seconds had passed that Meng Hao finally withdrew his gaze. He concealed the daze in his expression, took a deep breath of the mountain air, and determination shone in his eyes.
"No matter what, whether it's studying or working, one must... live." Meng Hao's character was inherently like this: intelligent yet resilient. If not for that, he wouldn't have been able to live alone until now after his parents left.
Meng Hao looked up at the sky. The resolve in his eyes deepened, and he was about to head down the mountain.
Just then, a faint sound suddenly drifted up from below the cliff. The sound was so weak, as if about to be scattered by the wind, almost imperceptible when it reached Meng Hao's ears.
"Help... Help..."
Meng Hao stopped in his tracks. After a moment of bewilderment, he listened carefully again. The cry for help became a little clearer as he focused.
"Help..."
Meng Hao quickly took a few steps to the edge of the mountaintop. Looking down, he immediately saw a crevice halfway down the towering cliff face. Someone was sticking half their body out from there, their face pale with terror and despair, shouting.
"You... are you Meng Hao? Help! Scholar Meng, save me!" The person sticking out from the cliff face was also a young man. He immediately spotted Meng Hao, and his expression instantly turned to one of joyful surprise, as if finding a ray of hope in utter despair.
"Wang Youcai?" Meng Hao's eyes widened. He looked at the young man on the cliff face. He knew this person; it was Old Wang the carpenter's son from the county town.
"You... how did you get here?" Meng Hao glanced at the crevice below the cliff face; it was extremely steep, making it impossible for anyone to climb down. Even a slight lapse in attention would send them plummeting into the great river below.
Especially with the river's swift currents, falling in would mean certain death.
"It's not just me, there are a few others from nearby counties too. We're all here! Brother Meng, don't talk, quickly save us!" Wang Youcai spoke hurriedly, perhaps having leaned out too far. As he finished speaking, one hand flailed in the air, and if his companions behind him hadn't grabbed his clothes, he would have slipped. The fright made Wang Youcai's face even paler.
Meng Hao saw the urgency of the situation. But he had come up the mountain alone, and without a rope, there was no way to rescue them. He turned his head and glanced at the vines covering the mountainside, his eyes lit up, and he immediately began searching.
His body was originally frail, and it took him the time it takes for two incense sticks to burn to find a vine long enough. Panting, he quickly coiled the vine and returned to the edge of the cliff. He called out Wang Youcai's name below while bending down to lower the vine down the cliff face.
"You still haven't said, how exactly did you get down there?" Meng Hao asked as he lowered the vine.
"We flew!" It wasn't Wang Youcai who said this, but an eight or nine-year-old boy sticking out next to him. This boy was robust and healthy, and he spoke loudly.
“Nonsense! What's this 'flying' you're talking about? You can fly, so why aren't you flying now?” Meng Hao scoffed, giving the vine a decisive tug forward.
“Don't listen to his rubbish! We were captured by a woman who can fly, and she said she wants to take us to some sect to be odd-jobbers.” Wang Youcai quickly interjected, fearing he might provoke Meng Hao into retracting the vine.
“More rubbish! Flying? That's a legendary Immortal! Who would believe that?” Meng Hao paid him no mind, thinking to himself that he had once read in ancient texts about many stories of people meeting Immortals and becoming wealthy, but such things were just stories to fool people.
Seeing the vine had reached the cliff crevice, where Wang Youcai caught it, Meng Hao suddenly felt gusts of chilling wind behind him, as if the surrounding temperature had instantly plunged back to winter. His body shivered, and when he instinctively turned his head, he immediately gasped in surprise, almost losing his footing and plummeting down the cliff.
A pale-faced woman of indiscernible age, clad in a silver robe, stood there expressionlessly, gazing at Meng Hao. This woman was exquisitely beautiful, yet her ashen face and chilling aura gave her the distinct impression of having just crawled out of a tomb.
“You possess some talent. Since you've found your way here yourself, consider it your destiny.”
This voice grated on his ears like bones rubbing together. The woman's gaze, in particular, seemed to hold some strange power, causing an instant chill to spread through Meng Hao's entire body the moment he met it. It was as if he held no secrets before this woman, his whole being laid bare.
While her words still echoed, the woman flicked her sleeve, and a gust of green wind instantly swept Meng Hao up. Amidst Meng Hao's cry of alarm, he was carried along with the woman straight down the cliff. This sudden turn of events, like a bolt of lightning, left Meng Hao's mind utterly blank.
Upon reaching the crevice, the woman waved her hand, directly flinging Meng Hao into the gap. Amidst the howling green wind, she herself stepped inside. The moment she entered, Wang Youcai and the other two were so startled they stumbled back repeatedly.
The woman stood there silently, merely raising her head to glance at the vine dangling from above.
Meng Hao's body trembled, his heart pounding with tension. After scrambling to his feet, he quickly glanced around. The crevice wasn't large; its interior was quite cramped, with little empty space left after several people stood inside.
When his gaze fell upon Wang Youcai, he saw two youths beside him: one was the sturdy, healthy fellow, the other was fair-skinned and slightly plump. Both were now trembling, their expressions filled with terror, seemingly on the verge of tears.
“We were originally short one, so you'll join them.” The pale-faced woman, seemingly devoid of any emotion, no longer looked at the vine, but turned her gaze towards Meng Hao.
“You... who are you?” Meng Hao suppressed the terror in his heart. After all, he had read quite a few books and possessed a resilient character. Despite his fear, he knew he absolutely couldn't panic now.
The woman said nothing. She raised her right hand and waved it, and the green wind reappeared, howling as it swept up Meng Hao, Wang Youcai, and the others. Together with the woman, they flew out of the cave and soared towards the sky, vanishing in an instant. Only the towering Daqingshan remained, its silhouette gradually dissolving into the deepening twilight.
Meng Hao's face was pale. He saw himself within Lu Feng, then crossing the Heavenly Rift, flying rapidly through this world. The howling wind ahead rushed into his mouth, making it difficult to breathe, but a single word violently surged into his mind.
"Immortal?" He managed to hold on for several tens of seconds before he could no longer bear it. His vision went dark, and he fainted.
When he opened his eyes, he found himself on a patch of open ground on a green-stone mountainside. All around him, mountain ranges undulated, and the swirling mists were clearly not of the mortal realm. He could see some exquisite pavilions nestled among the mountains in all directions, and his face was filled with bewilderment.
Beside him, Wang Youtai and two other youths had now also woken up. They were all trembling with fear, looking at a woman who stood with her back to the four of them.
In front of this woman stood two men in green robes. They looked to be in their twenties, but their eyes were sunken and their pupils were green, a sight that filled one with dread.
"Senior Sister Xu has excellent methods," one of the two men said, flattering the woman. "Going out just once, and you've brought back four talented little ones."
"Take them to the menial labor area." The woman's expression was cold. She didn't even spare Meng Hao and the other three a glance. As she took a step, her entire body transformed into a rainbow, and she shot into the mountains, disappearing from sight.
At this moment, Meng Hao had recovered his composure. He stared in astonishment at the spot where the woman had vanished. In his eyes, an expression gradually emerged, one that had been absent from him for the past sixteen years. This expression made Meng Hao's heart immediately surge with excitement.
"Menial labor? This is for Immortals to do. It must pay quite well, right?" Meng Hao was filled with anticipation, because he had realized that the people here were not weak, nor were they out to harm him.
"Senior Sister Xu has already reached the seventh level of Qi Condensation and was granted a Wind Banner by the Sect Master," the other green-robed cultivator said with emotion. "She can fly even before reaching Foundation Establishment; it's truly enviable." Then, with a superior expression, he looked at Meng Hao and the other three.
"You, and you, follow me to the menial labor area in the south." As he spoke, this person pointed at Wang Youtai and a sturdy, healthy-looking youth beside him.
"Th-this... Where is this place?" Pointed at by that person, Wang Youtai's body trembled, and he stammered out the words.
"Reliance Sect."