Vessel of Worlds

One day, there appeared in the Penglai market a cultivator at the peak of late-stage Foundation Establishment, dressed all in black, his face entirely hidden beneath a black bamboo hat.

In a market so vast, of course, a hundred cultivators in such dress passed through every day. To the market's regulars it was utterly unremarkable—no one spared them a second glance.

This black-clad cultivator appeared repeatedly at pill shops, material shops, and text shops, spending upward of ten thousand spirit stones at a stroke—not staggering wealth, but very rich indeed.

And he was careful to a fault: each day he bought from only one or two shops, unrelated to each other and far apart; each purchase hovered around ten thousand stones; he surfaced in the market only once every few days; and his dress was never quite the same twice.

Even so, one young cultivator of merely early-stage Foundation Establishment noticed something amiss.

Few knew this young cultivator's real name, but many knew his sobriquet—the "Night Walker," a mocking name for a man who dared not show his face by day. His cultivation was mediocre and his strength ordinary. But in his youth he had chanced upon a beast cub and raised it into a mutated spirit beast—the Purple Cloud Marten—gifted beyond measure in its sense of smell. However a cultivator disguised himself, the marten could pick out his individual scent with ease. On the strength of that singular gift, the Night Walker made his living unmasking disguises and selling information in the market, earning modest fame and no small pile of stones—and a long list of enemies besides. Had he ever shown his face openly, or once left Penglai—where even his foes dared not strike—he would have been disposed of long ago.

Some time back, the Night Walker had taken a commission: his client handed him a scrap of torn clothing and asked his help finding its owner, who was very likely hiding somewhere in the great market.

It was the commonest sort of job he took. Practiced and easy, he dressed as an ordinary cloaked cultivator, let the Purple Cloud Marten take the scrap's scent, tucked the beast into his spirit beast pouch, and strolled openly through the market—paying special mind to any cultivator whose appearance was disguised. Should the scrap-owner's scent surface within dozens of zhang, the marten would tell him through their bond at once.

So he prowled the market day after day. The scrap's owner never appeared—but another windfall did.

One day his beast informed him that the black-clad cultivator a few zhang ahead, just emerging from a beast core shop, was the same man it had scented days earlier at a materials house. The dress differed somewhat between the two sightings, but by smell the marten was certain. At the materials house, that black-clad cultivator had spent upward of ten thousand stones on a great load of auxiliary alchemy materials. Now, at the core shop—a few discreet questions confirmed it—the man had spent another ten thousand and more on several rank-four flood dragon cores.

At first the Night Walker took him for nothing more than a wealthy man—for a peak late-stage cultivator to produce twenty thousand stones was uncommon, but hardly cause for astonishment. Then, by coincidence, he crossed the man a third time within days. This time the free-spending cultivator wore gray—but the marten's nose was not deceived. When the Night Walker watched him buy yet another ten-thousand-stone lot of flood dragon cores, certainty settled: this was no ordinarily comfortable Foundation Establishment cultivator. His fortune had to be immense.

He shadowed the man quietly, and by the marten's incomparable nose even traced him to his dwelling—a secluded spot midway up Jade Clarity Peak.

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Further deliberate watching turned up two more purchases in the market, each worth around ten thousand stones—and that shook him to the core.

Tens of thousands of spirit stones at will! Even an ordinary Core Formation cultivator might not manage that!

Greed kindled at the sight of wealth—but the man's cultivation far exceeded his own; a morsel like this was nothing an early-stage cultivator could swallow. So he simply sold the information to an old and familiar client: a middle-aged Core Formation cultivator.

This slightly balding Core Formation cultivator, hearing the tale, was deeply tempted. He promptly spun a series of beguiling pretexts to win the mysterious rich man's trust and lure him off the island. But no matter whom he sent, no matter the bait—treasures, elixirs, mountains of stones, thousand-year spirit herbs—nothing could coax the man a single step off Penglai. The target was abnormally wary besides, his flying artifact far too fast for any ambush near his dwelling—and the dwelling's protective restrictions so strong that even the Core Formation cultivator himself could not have shaken them quickly.

Thwarted, he stationed several disciples in rotating watches, day and night, near the mysterious cultivator's dwelling: the slightest stirring was to be reported at once. He refused to believe the man would stay on Penglai forever. The moment he left the island, there would be an opening—a quiet kill, and a fortune worth tens of thousands of stones swallowed whole.

What he had not reckoned on was this: from one month later, the man remained inside his dwelling and never stepped out at all.

And that state of affairs lasted thirty full years.

In those thirty years the balding Core Formation cultivator lost a little more hair—but never gave up his designs on the Jade Clarity Peak cultivator, keeping two disciples on watch near the dwelling at every hour, without pause.

Then, one day thirty years on, summoned by a disciple's panicked report, he rushed to the peak—and shortly thereafter departed in bottomless dejection.

The wealthy cultivator who had drawn all this attention was, of course, Andy.

On returning from Yingzhou, he had set about his final preparations for Core Formation. Even holding the Heart-Cleansing Pill and both superb liquids of heat and cold, he still lacked full assurance of success at the first attempt. If he failed, he would need everything ready for a second full cycle of the Primal Unity Technique.

Raw materials for great batches of Qi Condensation pills, auxiliary alchemy supplies, and certain beast cores he held in short supply—all had to be stocked in quantity.

Moreover, this seclusion would run for untold years, and he could not neglect the Ice-Wind Python and its vast potential. For its sake too he had to spend freely, buying flood dragon cores and the auxiliary materials for Dragon Transformation Pills wherever they could be found.

All of which meant an alarming outlay of spirit stones. To dull the attention it might draw, he had split his purchases across many visits and unrelated shops, holding each transaction near ten thousand stones—reasoning that the chance of discovery was remote.

The two months and more of purchasing had gone smoothly enough, and nearly everything he needed was in hand. Only—cultivators kept approaching him. Some invited him to hunt treasure together; some promised rich reward for a "small favor"; there was even a beautiful female cultivator who begged his aid with a tale of tragic circumstance and offered herself to him in payment. Men and women, cultivation high and low, dress of every kind—but all alike dangled tempting terms, and all asked things that would cost him barely the lifting of a hand.

Windfalls that hurled themselves at his feet, he naturally did not believe. All the more since none of these people knew his true identity—had never even seen his face. If they truly needed help, how had they come looking for him?

At first Andy paid it no mind. But as such encounters grew more frequent, he began to wonder whether he had been marked—and once his purchases were substantially complete, he simply sealed his doors and did not come out.

Andy settled the Ice-Wind Python—now preparing for its next molt and advancement—in the spirit beast room, then stilled his own heart and set about refining his mountains of raw materials into elixirs of every kind.

Several years on, he had produced a staggering stock: everything from Qi-Gathering Powder, Spirit-Clearing Pills, and Essence-Consolidating Pills for human cultivation, to rank-four Dragon Transformation Pills for the python.

And the python itself had long since molted successfully, advancing to a rank-three beast—the equal of a mid-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator.