Chapter 12
Chapter 12: The Golden Butterfly's Origins, the Six Divine Abilities, and the Thirty-Six Heavenly Mechanisms and Seventy-Two Earthly Manifestations
Joining the Golden Butterfly Manor was not without its benefits.
Those benefits came in the form of certain minor spells that appeared useful on the surface but were, in truth, mediocre at best.
Jiang Linxian had once heard Lady White speak of spells and divine abilities.
After demons awaken, they sense the flow of spiritual energy and power throughout heaven and earth. To adapt to their environment, compete for resources, and ward off natural enemies, they instinctively feel out methods of harnessing the energy around them—such as controlling mist, accelerating the growth of plants, and absorbing the essence of moonlight.
For cultivators, this was also the second stage of practice: the mastery of spells.
But divine abilities were different—they were more akin to a form of innate talent and fortune, something one could hope for but never chase.
The most renowned were the Buddha's Six Divine Abilities: Heavenly Eye, Heavenly Ear, Heavenly Feet, Past Life Sight, Mind Reading, and Leakless Sight.
And in Taoism, the Thirty-Six Heavenly Mechanisms and the Seventy-Two Earthly Manifestations.
If one were to liken power to martial strength—
Divine abilities were like the inner mastery of a peerless martial expert: even a fallen leaf or a drifting petal could wound, triumph achieved without technique.
Spells were like refined combat forms or weapons—capable of defeating enemies, yet ultimately unable to withstand one who had truly mastered inner cultivation.
Divine abilities, furthermore, were divided into the greater and the lesser.
Not even a thousand-year Great Demon—let alone a ten-thousand-year Demon Lord—was guaranteed to possess even a single lesser divine ability.
Among the great Buddhist and Taoist schools, divine abilities were the most closely guarded of all inherited legacies.
No matter how powerful a spell, how could it compare to a divine ability?
To say nothing of the great divine abilities among the Heavenly Mechanisms—abilities like Conformation to Heaven and Earth.
****
The Golden Butterfly King laughed coquettishly.
"You're quite an obedient one. Newcomers to the manor are usually assigned to mountain patrol, manor guard duty, or tribute collection… but for you, I'll give an extra chance to choose."
"My king, I choose—"
"Don't be in such a hurry to choose. Go for now. The Toad Captain will tell you tomorrow; there's no rush to decide then."
The Golden Butterfly seemed to have grown weary, waving her hand to signal the two of them out.
They exited the Inner Sanctum.
Jiang Linxian calculated inwardly—he had intended to choose mountain patrol.
Mountain patrol would allow him to quickly familiarise himself with the surrounding terrain, while giving him a chance to observe whether any nearby hilltops were home to a lone elderly man who enjoyed tending a vegetable garden or some such figure.
But now it seemed the Golden Butterfly King held him in rather high regard.
The Red Toad Sprite, for instance, had not even been granted an audience with the Golden Butterfly King—it had simply been assigned to guard the gate.
And so, Jiang Linxian settled into the Golden Butterfly Manor.
****
The next day.
The Toad Captain sought out Jiang Linxian and informed him that there was no longer any need to make a choice—he would serve concurrently as both mountain patrol and head of the Demon Palace.
The Demon Palace was also called the Ruyi Palace. Located directly beside the Golden Butterfly King's bedchamber, it served as a place to receive guests.
In other words, Jiang Linxian had become the steward of the Ruyi Palace.
But the Ruyi Palace required no steward in truth—the position itself had no real duties. It was, essentially, a role that had been created from nothing.
When he was not on mountain patrol, he was free to remain in the Ruyi Palace and cultivate.
From then on—
Jiang Linxian spent half his time fulfilling his mountain patrol duties and the other half remaining in the Ruyi Palace to cultivate.
****
5 years passed in the blink of an eye.
During this period, Jiang Linxian was summoned by the Golden Butterfly King on several occasions, but each meeting amounted to nothing more than hollow words—cultivate diligently, achieve Manifestation soon, and similar platitudes.
The rest of his time was spent familiarising himself with the Golden Butterfly Manor and the surrounding territory.
The Seven Absolute Mountain fell within Yunan Road, bordering the Sichuan-Shu region.
To the south lay Lancang Ruins—an ancient ruin cluster deep within a great marsh, suffused with miasma. A Great Demon was said to dwell there—rumoured to be a Flood Dragon.
To the north was Lanruo Temple in Guobei Prefecture; further north, a Cloud Ridge Ancient Path wound between the realms of the living and the dead, connecting to Wrongful Death City.
The Hangzhou territory occupied a midpoint among all these locations, with Jinshan Temple standing watch over it, keeping the peace.
As for the Late Tang in which Pudu Cihang resided—
The Golden Butterfly King had once mentioned that the Late Tang of Yunan Road appeared to have been established by some prince or another.
The true Tang dynasty lay to the east, and one would first need to pass through Bashu to reach it.
These words faintly revealed that the Golden Butterfly King was not a demon native to these lands.
As for the Golden Butterfly Manor itself, there was little else worth noting.
The Toad Captain was a demon sprite who had cultivated for a hundred years; the Centipede Sprite commander had likely been cultivating for around two hundred.
Rumour had it that beneath the Golden Butterfly King's command, there was also a thousand-year wild boar demon.
Which meant the wild boar demon standing guard at the entrance earlier was probably a relative of that thousand-year boar.
Beyond that were only a handful of Great and Minor Demons.
For the Golden Butterfly King, such strength was far too weak—the recruitment offerings barely amounted to mortal wealth and glory, the sort of enticement fit only for tricking Minor Demons.
It reeked of someone protecting their food.
****
That day, Jiang Linxian led the Red Toad Sprite on their routine mountain patrol as usual.
The Red Toad Sprite had originally been assigned to guard the gate, but Jiang Linxian had later requested her transfer to join him on mountain patrol.
The Red Toad Sprite was deeply grateful for this, and had since stopped calling him the Serpent Demon entirely.
"Ribbit ribbit, Lord Serpent Immortal—that elder you asked me to look for, I've found one! But it's not an old man; it's an old woman. Lately she seems to be building a house on one of the hilltops."
Jiang Linxian's serpent eyes lit up.
"Oh? Take me to have a look."
Led by the Red Toad Sprite, Jiang Linxian arrived at a solitary hill nestled and surrounded by a cluster of mountains.
Atop this lone hill, among the trees and rocks, stood a small wooden cabin that had just been constructed.
The Red Toad Sprite pointed at the cabin.
"Ribbit ribbit, Lord Serpent Immortal, that's the cabin right there—but, strangely, when I came by just a moment ago, the wooden cabin wasn't there yet."
"Shall we go take a closer look? Ribbit ribbit."
Jiang Linxian shook his head. "Let's observe first."
In this desolate wilderness, not a soul could be seen for miles.
An old woman had come to the top of a hill and built a wooden cabin—finished within less than a day. Was this even a human?
No matter how one looked at it, something was off.
An elder of this age—never mind building a cabin alone, just climbing the slope would surely have taken tremendous effort.
And this was, on top of everything, a time of dynastic collapse, when mountain bandits ran rampant.
Who could be so utterly at a loss as to go off and live alone in some desolate wilderness?
Before long, an old woman with kind eyes and a gentle expression emerged from the cabin and began to work the land—planting seeds, drawing water.
The two of them crouched behind a boulder and watched in silence.
Jiang Linxian felt that everything seemed perfectly ordinary—and yet nothing about it was ordinary at all.
Sometimes, normalcy itself was a kind of abnormality.
Then something astonishing occurred: the seeds the old woman had planted began to sprout and bear fruit at a visible rate.
At this point, Jiang Linxian could make no sense of it whatsoever.
What in the world was this old woman—who moved like an immortal—doing here, and for what purpose? Could there really be some fortuitous encounter to be had in this forsaken wilderness?
It was as though she had deliberately chosen to come to this lone hill near the Golden Serpent Manor to plant those seeds.
As if she were waiting to be discovered.
Surely there was some crucial detail within all of this—only the Jiang Linxian of right now simply could not grasp it.
Several more days of continuous observation followed.
The old woman rose with the sun each day and rested when it set.
The bean sprouts grew into vines that slowly began to bear fruit. Judging by the shape of the fruit—it appeared to be mountain-shaped. Vines growing a mountain?
There was no need to keep watching any further.
"Let's head back to the manor and inform My Lady of the situation here."
Whatever risks there were, the Golden Butterfly King should be the one to step in and wade through them first.
"Ribbit ribbit, we can finally leave."
The Red Toad Sprite had long since grown impatient—had Jiang Linxian not kept a hand on her, she would likely have bolted back long ago.
After the serpent and the toad departed—
The old woman, still at her labour, suddenly turned and glanced back toward the spot where the two had been hiding.
But she made no move at all, and simply continued working.