Chương 30: Chapter 29

He resumed packing meat until the gathering sack approached the limit of what its repaired seams could tolerate. The canvas stretched ominously. Ling Tian stopped. His body could carry more. The bag could not. Supply-chain bottleneck. He tied the opening securely. Only then did he remember the reason he had entered this plateau in the first place. Ling Tian looked toward the stone overhang. The Crimson Starpetals remained there. So did the Blood-Iron Root.

He had nearly allowed several hundred kilograms of dead animal to distract him from the actual procurement objective. Unacceptable. Ling Tian lifted the blood-heavy sack and moved toward the brambles. The scratches no longer concerned him much, but he still avoided pushing through carelessly. Damaging himself because he was in a hurry would accomplish nothing. He used the bronze scabbard to hold the thorny vines aside. Behind them, the protected soil came into view. Five Crimson Starpetals.

Ling Tian's expression improved. The plants were mature and remarkably intact. Their purple leaves spread in clean star-shaped patterns, while the crimson veins beneath them carried enough Verdant Qi to remain obvious even without broad perception. The Blood-Iron Root grew beneath and between them. At first, only the upper section was visible. Dark reddish-brown bark. Thick. Ridged. The root disappeared deep into a seam of mineral-rich soil beneath the overhang. Ling Tian crouched. This part required patience.

He set the bloodied meat sack far enough away that nothing dripped onto the herbs, then cleaned his hands as thoroughly as possible using water from his flask and a spare scrap of cloth. High-value botanical inventory did not need boar blood as a complimentary coating. He began with the Starpetals. The extraction method had become familiar. Identify the root spread. Loosen the surrounding soil manually. Use tiny external Earth Qi vibrations only where the dirt remained too compact. Do not shake the plant itself.

Do not rush. The first Starpetal came free intact. Then the second. Ling Tian wrapped each separately in damp leaves. By the fifth, the clean cloth pouch at his waist was nearly full. Good. Then came the Blood-Iron Root. It was more stubborn. Much more. The root had grown directly into a fractured seam in the rock. Fine rootlets threaded through small pockets of soil, while the main body descended deep enough that pulling it directly would almost certainly break the lower section.

Ling Tian expanded his Earth perception around it. Interesting. The surrounding stone felt different. Not dramatically. The root's presence appeared to have altered the Qi density in the immediate area, with Earth and Verdant energies overlapping tightly through the mineral seam. No time for a full study. He memorized the observation. Then started loosening the structure. Small vibrations. Pause. Check. Another pulse. The stone did not crumble. Good. He shifted the frequency slightly. More soil released.

The process took several minutes. Ling Tian remained acutely aware of the fresh carcass behind him and the possibility that something much larger might currently be following the smell toward the plateau. That did not justify damaging the product. Rushing would merely convert danger into lower profit. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. Eventually the root moved. Ling Tian gripped the upper section carefully and drew it from the seam. More emerged. Then more. His eyebrows rose.

The main root was nearly as long as his forearm, thick near the top and branching into several dense lower tendrils. Dark red sap glistened where one tiny rootlet had broken. Mostly intact. Good enough. Ling Tian wrapped it separately. His inventory was now ridiculous. Five Crimson Starpetals. One Blood-Iron Root. Several large portions of Ironspike Boar meat. Samples of hide. One probable beast core. And one sealed ancient bronze weapon still pretending to be diseased timber. The morning had escalated.

Ling Tian stood and reopened his perception. Nothing close. That was not permission to remain. He hauled the meat sack over one shoulder. The weight settled heavily across his back. Much heavier than his normal gathering load. Earth Qi spread through his frame to compensate. Ling Tian adjusted the herb pouch at his waist, secured the beast core beneath his tunic, and took the bronze weapon in his free hand. Then he looked once at the remaining carcass. Most of the animal was still there.

Hundreds of kilograms of usable material. Leaving it behind felt terrible. Ling Tian did it anyway. Trying to recover everything would require multiple trips. Multiple trips meant repeated exposure. The blood scent was already spreading. There was a point where refusing to waste assets became refusing to understand risk and he had reached it. Ling Tian turned toward the lower ridge. He did not sprint immediately.

Running full speed across unstable upper terrain while carrying a sack heavy enough to affect his balance was how a successful hunt became a fatal transportation incident. He moved fast. Controlled. The first crevice came into view. Ling Tian slowed, checked his footing, and crossed it carefully. Only after the terrain widened did he accelerate. The plateau disappeared behind him. So did the herbs' sheltered overhang.

The dead Ironspike Boar remained where it had fallen, already becoming part of Crimson Peak's food chain. Ling Tian descended. The weight across his shoulder was enormous. His legs worked harder. His breathing deepened. For the first time since beginning the month-long training cycle, carrying capacity felt like a meaningful limitation again. Oddly reassuring. Limits remained. He simply had to keep finding them.

Ling Tian moved toward the lower trails with the bronze club in one hand and enough blood-soaked inventory on his back to make any passing gatherer reconsider approaching him. The hostile takeover had succeeded. Now came the considerably less glamorous part. Asset transportation. And unlike the Ironspike Boar, gravity remained undefeated. — By the time Ling Tian reached the lower gathering trails, the sack across his shoulder had become considerably less impressive and considerably more irritating.

The repaired canvas held far less than the Ironspike Boar had offered, but Ling Tian had packed it until the seams began making structural arguments. Thick cuts of meat, several strips of hide, and a considerable amount of fat pressed heavily against his back.

The clean pouch containing five Crimson Starpetals and the Blood-Iron Root remained tied separately beneath his tunic, while the probable beast core occupied another wrapped pocket where it could not contaminate anything or unexpectedly decide to become interesting. Blood still leaked through the sack. Not much. But Enough to create a dark stain that had spread across the back of his tunic during the descent, and occasional drops marked the stone behind him. Ling Tian found the trail deeply unprofessional.

The weight itself was manageable. His Earth Qi reserve reinforced the spine, hips, and legs whenever the load shifted, allowing him to descend terrain that would once have been difficult even without cargo. That did not make the sack weightless, and Ling Tian was quietly pleased by the limitation. Carrying capacity still existed. Balance still mattered. His body had improved enormously without becoming exempt from logistics. He slowed before the outer approaches to Hua City.

Entering at full speed while covered in blood and carrying a sack large enough to contain a dismembered adult would attract exactly the sort of attention he spent most of his life avoiding. Ling Tian looked down at himself. The assessment was not encouraging. Blood on the tunic. Blood on both forearms. Dust across his face. Tar-covered bronze club in one hand. Heavy sack over one shoulder. He looked less like an herbal gatherer and more like the only survivor of a poorly regulated murder.

Ling Tian considered washing first. Then looked at the meat. No. Fresh Spirit Beast meat sitting in mountain air while he worried about presentation was an inefficient allocation of priorities. He adjusted the sack and walked toward the gates. The guards at Hua City's outer boundary barely qualified for the title.

Two men sat beneath a faded awning beside the crumbling stone arch, one eating something from a wooden bowl while the other watched incoming carts with the exhausted suspicion of someone paid too little to investigate anything complicated. The second man noticed Ling Tian. His gaze moved from the blood to the sack. Then to the ugly bronze stick. Ling Tian kept walking. The guard opened his mouth. Ling Tian prepared several explanations. The guard closed it again.

Apparently whatever question had occurred to him was not worth the paperwork. Excellent institutional culture. Ling Tian entered Hua City. The wet market struck him with its usual mixture of noise, humidity, smoke, animals, shouting, spices, sweat, and questionable sanitation. The difference was that people gave him considerably more room than usual. A woman carrying vegetables saw the blood and stepped aside. Two laborers stopped arguing long enough to let him pass.

A young pickpocket Ling Tian noticed near one alley entrance took a single look at the dripping sack and selected a different customer. Unexpected benefit. Perhaps blood was a viable form of crowd management. Ling Tian headed directly toward Auntie Mei's stall. He had no intention of carrying high-value herbs around the market longer than necessary. The food and ordinary supplies could wait until the fragile inventory had been converted into something easier to hide.

Auntie Mei was grinding dried yellow root when he arrived. The stall looked unchanged from his previous visits. Herb bundles hung in orderly rows behind her. Ceramic jars lined the shelves. A faded cloth protected the more delicate stock from direct sunlight. Ling Tian stopped in front of the counter. Auntie Mei continued grinding for another two seconds. Then she smelled him. Her nose wrinkled. She looked up. The pestle stopped. Ling Tian watched several possible emotions compete across the old woman's face.

Concern lost first. Confusion lasted slightly longer. Suspicion won.

"Ling Tian."

"Yes, Auntie." Auntie Mei slowly set the pestle down.

"Before you put anything on my counter, I want you to answer one question." Ling Tian waited.

"Is that human blood?"

"No." Auntie Mei's shoulders loosened by an almost imperceptible amount.

"Good." She pointed toward the sack.

"Then why do you look like you were thrown through a butcher's shop?"

"Mountain logistics."

"That is not an answer."

"It is the most accurate summary." Her eyes narrowed. Ling Tian lowered the sack carefully onto the ground beside the stall. It landed with a wet, heavy thump. Auntie Mei stared at it. Something inside shifted. The old woman looked back at him.

"What is in there?"

"Meat."

"What kind of meat?" Ling Tian hesitated for exactly long enough to make the next answer less convincing.

"Boar." Auntie Mei stared. Ling Tian maintained a neutral expression. The old herbalist leaned slightly over the counter and studied the dark-gray hide visible through one poorly tied section of the sack. Then she looked at the metallic bristles protruding beside it. Her gaze returned to Ling Tian.

"Boar."

"Yes."

"Interesting boar." Ling Tian said nothing. Auntie Mei slowly crossed her arms.

"Where?"

"Upper ridge."

"How far upper?"

"Far enough."

"That is also not an answer."

"I know." The old woman looked at him for several seconds. Ling Tian had learned that attempting elaborate lies around Auntie Mei usually made the situation worse. She had spent longer surviving Hua City than he had been alive in either body, and probably possessed enough experience with desperate gatherers to recognize fabrication by breathing pattern alone. So he gave her something technically plausible.

"I found the carcass fresh." Auntie Mei's eyebrows rose.

"Fresh."

"Very."

"Still warm?" Ling Tian considered the blood on his sleeves.

"Yes." The old woman stared at him. He stared back. Neither acknowledged the obvious problem with the explanation. Eventually Auntie Mei sighed.

"Your father lied better."

"That sounds hereditary."

"He also knew when to stop talking." Ling Tian nodded.

"Useful skill."

"Learn it." He did. Auntie Mei looked at the sack again but did not continue asking. Ling Tian appreciated that. Whether she believed he had found an Ironspike Boar carcass abandoned moments after death, or whether she had simply decided profitable customers were entitled to selective privacy, the result was the same. Business resumed.