Chapter 391
Chapter 392: A Completely Different Alien City
Dragging a long tail of Fox Fire, the silver Nine-Tailed Fox dove into the thick atmosphere of Sentinel Silence, and Immortal Yuan Hao and Xuan Che followed behind on Sword Flight like falling stars. They began to slow near the equator and soon ran into a massive field of heavy clouds.
The clouds rushed in like endless curtains. The deeper they went, the darker it became. Sunlight faded behind the cloud deck as the Nine-Tailed Fox carrying Yu Sheng threaded the depths of a cumulonimbus full of water vapor and tiny ice crystals. Irene clung to Yu Sheng’s arm like a koala, her eyes wide as she stared past the Demon Fox’s back: the wind howled, bright arcs of lightning split the clouds, thunder boomed, and sudden flashes lit up sheets of rain that poured down like an ocean rolling through the sky.
This planet has cold, dry poles, but the equator sits under an almost never ending rainy season. A thousand years ago, pioneers came for rich ores and raised the first arrays and mines under pounding storms. Many of those huge extraction works are idle now, yet their main frames still stand, stubborn and strong in the equatorial deluge, stabbing up like monuments into the clouds.
Most of the cities built later rose around those ancient giant extraction stations. They squat like ant nests in the vast shadows of Refining Towers and orbital elevators.
The Demon Fox burst out from under the cloud base, cut through the rain, and flew toward the largest equatorial city: Ink City.
A colossal structure like a sky-piercing Giant Tower flashed past nearby. On its flanks, rusted conveyors and a maze-like piping system still clung to the frame. More towers of the same kind stood between mountains and plains, and jaw dropping cable webs and ancient transit tracks ran across land and sky, linking tower to tower. Some tracks dipped to the ground and tied into a great city raised among twelve Refining Towers.
Lights still burned on most of the old Refining Towers. In the rain-dark that felt like night, those lights formed glowing columns that connected ground and sky. Now and then a medium Celestial Ship or some odd small flyer cut through the rain, using those lights as beacons to follow the lanes in and out of the city’s airspace. It looked busy.
Foxy copied the traffic. With Yu Sheng’s cue, she slipped into a lane and approached an air checkpoint. A large ring-shaped facility floated beside an extension platform of one Refining Tower. The ring was built from glowing rune bricks, its pieces drifting in a loose pattern. Cultivators in black rain capes stood in midair, watching the flow of craft and sword-riding Immortals pass through the ring into Ink City.
Those rain-caped Cultivators wore badges of the Ink City Aerial Control Bureau and wide black Bamboo Hats. Light shimmered along the hats’ rims, forming energy fields that kept off the sharp cold rain. The ring itself logged all traffic entering Ink City’s airspace and performed basic security checks. If anyone tried to bypass the rings, the City Protection Array would trigger and soldiers would give chase.
Yu Sheng’s group cleared the checkpoint easily. A silver Nine-Tailed Fox plus two Sword Flight Immortals, one riding a Chainsaw Sword, drew some stares, but nothing more.
They had just passed the ring and were about to descend when a sudden commotion made them stop.
A rune stone set in the ring flared and shrieked an alarm. Two rain-caped Cultivators rushed forward and blocked a middle-aged man in a gray short shirt who stood on a Flying Sword, hair messy and attitude loud.
The middle-aged man kept arguing. Irene poked her head out from under Yu Sheng’s arm to peek at the platform and said with shining eyes: “There’s gossip!”
Yu Sheng turned to look, arriving just in time to hear one of the rain-caped Cultivators cut the man off in a stern voice: “No drinking and Sword Flight, and no Sword Flight while drinking. Fellow daoist, the stone shows you’ve been drinking. Arguing won’t help. Come with us.”
The man in gray glared, clearly unwilling to accept it: “I am a Wine Sword Immortal! I’m officially registered with the Grand Void Spiritual Axis Sect as a Wine Sword Immortal, do you get it? Drinking is part of my cultivation! I have a license!”
The two Cultivators traded a quick look. After a short pause, one said: “Then show us your documents.”
Calling himself a Wine Sword Immortal, the man handed over a Jade Token.
The Cultivator poured spiritual power into the token, checked it, and shook his head: “That’s even worse, fellow daoist. Your registered transport as a Wine Sword Immortal is a Purple-Gold Gourd, not a Flying Sword.”
Scratching his hair, the Wine Sword Immortal looked embarrassed: “I left the house in a rush and grabbed the wrong thing from my daughter. I’m on my way to find her and swap back for my gourd.”
“You should go in by land then,” said the Cultivator, still shaking his head. “Your vehicle doesn’t match your permit. Fellow daoist, you’ll have to come with us.”
The Wine Sword Immortal fell silent.
The little stir at the checkpoint ended quickly, and Yu Sheng and Irene pulled their curious gazes away. On the way toward Ink City, Yu Sheng couldn’t help saying to the two Immortals nearby: “You run things pretty tight. I used to wonder what you’d do about a rule like ‘no Sword Flight after drinking’ when Wine Sword Immortals exist. So they need a license here?”
Immortal Yuan Hao, still drifting on his Chainsaw Sword, chuckled: “Of course. Otherwise some drink loving Cultivators would fly around drunk and crash into people. Then, when caught, they’d say they were Wine Sword Immortals. That would be chaos.”
Xuan Che added with a nod: “Exactly. The Dao has many paths, and anything in the world can lead to the Dao. Wine Sword Immortal is an ancient orthodox lineage under the Sect. But to walk this path isn’t easy. You need sharp insight, a fitting nature, some luck with worldly trials, and, in the end, a strong body.”
Yu Sheng blinked: “A strong body?”
Xuan Che nodded: “Yes, or else you might drink yourself to death before Foundation Establishment.”
Yu Sheng asked with a pause: “After Foundation Establishment you can’t die that way?”
“After Foundation Establishment, you can still drink yourself to death,” Xuan Che said with a straight face, “but there’s usually time to save you with an Elixir. Our Thousand Peak Spirit Mountain’s special Wine God Powder treats exactly this. We work long term with the great celestial breweries. They sell wine, we sell medicine. Every Cultivator who cultivates through wine is our customer.”
Yu Sheng was stunned: “Uh, is that even reasonable? I thought a Wine Sword Immortal should be free and easy, someone who has been tempered by mortal life and then settles naturally, you know, the kind of expert who has seen through the world. How did it become like this here…”
He trailed off, unable to organize a gentle way to say what puzzled him, but Immortal Yuan Hao already understood. The old hunk smiled and said calmly: “You’re right. The first one was like that.”
Yu Sheng fell quiet.
“But after the first person spends a lifetime to grasp that path, the second is different,” Immortal Yuan Hao said with a small shake of his head, sounding both thoughtful and at peace. “The Dao is very deep, and realization relies on fate, but practice can be repeated. What you describe belongs to a simple, early, pastoral time. For the Grand Void Featherwing civilization, that time ended thousands of years ago.”
Yu Sheng did not answer. He lifted his head and looked at the alien scenery in the pouring rain.
Refining Towers raised a thousand years ago rose into the clouds. A vast, bright city sprawled across the earth. A Celestial Ship marked Stellar Express dropped out of the clouds, packed with craft goods from the Alglade star region. In hazy Illusion Arts over the city, a video cast images of immortal peaks and auspicious clouds, a tourist ad sent from the faraway Capital Planet. [He felt a vague swell of emotion, but he could not tell what it was for.]
They landed in the great city. Many Immortal Ark Platforms stood among the forest of towers, and Foxy picked one at random and came down. On the walk from the platform to the street, she scooped up a mouthful of flyers.
There were hotel ads, duty free recommendations, supermarket deals, and even one boutique that offered fur care for Immortal Beasts. The last flyer came from a young clerk. When she saw a dazed looking Nine-Tailed Silver Fox coming down from the high platform, she froze, then bravely stepped up and slipped a leaflet to Foxy. It advertised a new tail-care promotion: one guest pays the price for only one tail, no matter how many tails they actually have.
Foxy wanted to go right away. Thankfully, Yu Sheng talked her out of it. The small shop had it hard enough already. If this silly fox showed up with all those tails, they might go bankrupt on the spot.
“This really doesn’t have the same style as Thousand Peak Spirit Mountain. The look and the mood are different,” Yu Sheng said, standing on a rainy street in Ink City and gazing at the traffic and misty towers. “If I ignore some architectural details, it even reminds me of Boundary City. People handing out flyers near the ‘parking lots’ and all.”
“If you want the truth, places like Thousand Peak Spirit Mountain, a sect headquarters, are the special case,” Immortal Yuan Hao said with a smile. “Everyone there is a Cultivator. Even in the Enlightenment Hall, everyone has already entered the Sect. But most people in the Featherwing star region have only basic training and very little power. By standards from outside, our ordinary people count as a bit extraordinary. Even so, cities where they gather are not the same as ‘immortal mountains.’”
“Where are we going next, benefactor? I’m hungry,” Foxy mumbled. With all the flyers in her mouth, her words came out mushy.
“Master already set up our lodging,” Xuan Che said at once. “It’s near the city center. There’s food there too.”
Foxy tilted back her head, chewed up the stack of flyers, and swallowed. Then she said with bright eyes: “Great, food first!”