My best friend asked me if I was still doing system tasks.

Luo Hanying said weakly, "I can't go on, Mother Tea. I'm just too tired. Let's find a city to rest for a day. Anyway, the Guangxu Secret Realm hasn't opened yet, so even if we rush there, it won't make a difference."

Ruan Chayan's cultivation level was higher than Luo Hanying's, which is why she could last longer. Now that she heard that Luo Hanying had reached her limit, she realized that she was also tired, and she immediately agreed to Luo Hanying's suggestion.

Ruan Chayan opened the map and said, "Hang in there a little longer. There's a city called Qiuxi ahead. We can rest there for a day or two, recover, and then continue our journey."

Luo Hanying quickly cheered up and said happily, "Okay, okay, I'll persevere a little longer."

The two landed outside the city, still dressed as they were from Lianpo City. Because of the scarcity of resources in the Western Barbarian Divine Continent, the entrance fee was always two or three low-grade spirit stones higher than in other places, and Ruan Chayan had already prepared it.

Luo Hanying followed Ruan Chayan a few steps closer to the city gate and subconsciously asked, "Are there so few people here? Why isn't anyone queuing to enter the city?"

Ruan Chayan's heart tightened: "If you put it that way, I feel like something's not quite right here."

"It can't be what I'm thinking, can it?" Luo Hanying mouthed "Taibai Pavilion?"

Ruan Chayan held Luo Hanying's hand tightly: ["I don't know. Just to be safe, let's stay away from the city."]

"Hey! Are you two going into the city or not? It's four low-grade spirit stones each."

One of the guards at the gate said impatiently, "There's only one Qiuxi City within a hundred miles. If you don't want to be attacked by monsters in the wilderness, you'd better hurry up and hand over the spirit stones to enter the city. What are you dawdling about?"

Ruan Chayan didn't want to enter the city in the first place, and upon hearing this, she was even more reluctant to go in: "So many spirit stones? We are just independent cultivators, can't you make an exception for us?"

Her original intention was to leave quietly, but another guard picked his ear and said, "There are poor people everywhere. We go hungry even though we eat government food in this godforsaken place. For your sake, give each of you three low-grade spirit stones."

Luo Hanying immediately put on her dramatic act, pitifully pulling on Ruan Chayan's arm and saying, "Sister, let's forget it. We still need to use our spirit stones to buy pills."

"If we have to give away six low-grade spirit stones just to enter the city, we might as well rest in the wilderness for the night. If we're lucky, we can even save those six low-grade spirit stones."

The two guards: ...What if you're unlucky and get killed instantly? Why didn't you mention that?

Just as Ruan Chayan and Luo Hanying turned to leave, four people flew out from the city. Each of them was at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm. Their swords flashed and flew towards Ruan Chayan and Luo Hanying, unleashing their ultimate attacks without any warning.

Luo Hanying exclaimed "Damn it!" and hurriedly moved away with Ruan Chayan, whose face was pale.

Just as Ruan Chayan was about to break the seal of the pill and restore her cultivation to the Nascent Soul Realm to fight, a barefoot monk in the mid-Nascent Soul Realm, reeking of alcohol, appeared and used a swastika symbol to block the attacks. At the same time, he grabbed the shoulders of the two women and carried them away from the area.

The four men chased for a while before giving up.

The monk laughed loudly, "You two little girls are quite sensible, knowing not to cause this old monk any trouble."

Luo Hanying blurted out, "With a senior coming to save my life, of course I'll cooperate obediently."

Actually, her shoulder was very painful, and she really wanted to refuse this hardcore hitchhiking, but she didn't know how to refuse.

Ruan Chayan was also worried that her struggle would affect the monk's performance. If the plane crashed, wouldn't all three of them be injured?

The monk led the two to a place full of wind-eroded mushrooms and wind-eroded pillars. Behind a sheltered cliff was a cave with a mixed atmosphere.

As soon as the three landed, a woman cautiously emerged from the cave to greet them.

"Old bald monk, you went to Qiuxi City to rescue people again?" The middle-aged woman was dressed simply, with white flowers tucked into her hair and temples. She looked Ruan Chayan and Luo Hanying up and down. "Are you sure these two are alright?"

"Don't tell me this is another performance for you and that blind boy. If it happens again, I don't know if the old, weak, sick, and disabled will survive."

"Don't worry, pretty widow, there's absolutely no problem this time. I saw them coming from the east."

The monk pulled off the wine gourd from his waist, took a swig of wine, and then said, "If you two have any questions, ask the pretty widow. This old monk will go back and stay with the little blind man to help passersby like you."

After saying that, he hurriedly left, leaping across the rocks with a ghostly figure.

Ruan Chayan and Luo Hanying were completely bewildered, not knowing what was going on.

The woman spoke in broken Mandarin: "Come in with me, I'll tell you about Qiuxi City."

The two exchanged a glance: Should we go in or not? Should we listen or not? Let's go in, rest a bit, and listen a bit while we're at it.

The pretty widow's surname is Qiao. Because her husband died many years ago, she has remained a widow. She is pretty, so people jokingly call her the pretty widow. Her cultivation level is at the Great Perfection of the Golden Core Realm.

The monk reeking of alcohol was a drunkard, who had forgotten his Dharma name. Everyone called him the Wine Monk or the Wine Master, and his cultivation level was in the mid-Nascent Soul stage.

The blind man they were talking about was named Mu Qing. He was a half-baked Confucian cultivator, holding a tattered umbrella and blindfolded with a blue ribbon. His cultivation level was in the late Golden Core stage.

The three of them were the most powerful cultivators in the cave. Almost all of the dozens of people sitting or standing in the dimly lit cave were missing limbs, and nearly half of them were elderly people and children whose cultivation had not even reached the Great Perfection of Qi Refining.

After the events involving Taibai Pavilion and Canghai Realm were exposed to the public, the city lord of Qiuxi City ordered all the Taibai Pavilion disciples in Qiuxi City to be driven out, and also destroyed all of Taibai Pavilion's strongholds there, so as to prevent the people of Taibai Pavilion from sacrificing themselves to Qiuxi City when they were not paying attention.

This was a great relief to everyone, and the people and cultivators of Qiuxi City were delighted. They had thought that once Taibai Pavilion was driven away, nothing would happen, and they would all return to their normal lives.

However, half a month ago, the blind boy Mu Qing sensed that the spiritual energy in Qiu Xi City had changed, as if something was shrouding the city. Relying on his decent cultivation level, he begged the Drunken Monk to investigate together.

The two then discovered that the disciples of Taibai Pavilion had returned to Qiuxi City in disguise and set up an array they did not recognize. It didn't matter that they didn't know the function of the array, but they were very familiar with the black cauldron. So the two engaged in a fierce battle with the disciples of Taibai Pavilion, but suffered a crushing defeat.

Although the Drunken Monk was no match for the disciples of Taibai Pavilion, his skill in escaping was unparalleled. He led Mu Qing out of Taibai Pavilion's encirclement and arrived at Widow Qiao's inn.

It was at this time that Widow Qiao officially met these two people. Before that, she had only heard of a highly skilled monk who indulged in wine and meat and a kind-hearted blind young man in the city.