LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 19: First time in the city
Yun Jhin knew where the city was as he devoured the memories of multiple people, even though some didn't leave their sects in their life, some of the others did travel before they settled down in their sects, with the help of those memories Yun Jhin immediately made a mental map that could lead him to the nearest city.
As he left the forest Yun Jhin realized that the city stood almost 1000 or so kilometers away from the forest entrance, it would take him almost 3 hours of running at his quickest speed to reach the city, but it didn't matter much for him, as long as he found what he needed in the city.
Yun Jhin running speed was quite normal for the body's cultivation realm, but as he used a technique his speed increased by quite a high deal, instead of reaching the city in 3 hours he would need 1 hour and a half now, Yun Jhin nodded to himself as he continuously used the technique without regards of the usage of his ki, after all, he had some food pills with him that he could use to quickly regain his ki, even though they wouldn't be useful to advance his cultivation with them they could increase the ki recovery.
As Yun Jhin approached the city he finally met with it, it didn't have any high walls protecting it, it looked a little like a village instead of a city, it seemed the place he got reincarnated in was a backwater place of the highest degree and one of the worse parts of the empire he currently lived in. Before he went to the apothecary to find if they have any of the plants he needed he first had to get his hands on some important information that he couldn't find in the sect patriarch's memories.
He found a rogue gathering quite quickly as the city locations were easily identifiable to him, the rogue gathering immediately became respectful after he unleashed his full cultivation base showing them that he was at the 4th stage of the heavenly realm, as strong as their city lord, the rogue captain immediately came forward and asked:
"What does this patriarch want with our small rogue gathering?"
Yun Jhin nodded at the man as he said:
"I just want some up to date information about the empire and nearby cities, as well as a map of the empire."
The rogue captain frowned as he said slowly:
"While information about the empire and cities is doable a map of the whole empire isn't something we little people could get our hands on, if you want one you would have to talk with the city lord."
Yun Jhin just nodded and waved one spirit stone in his hand, the rogue captain gulped seeing the spirit stone and he said quickly:
"The emperor is currently recovering after a war against our neighbor empire, his son has taken the crown and is doing a great job as a supplicant emperor, the nearby cities had high unrest as they heard about the emperor's injuries and it looks like they might riot soon, after all, the son is too young and most people don't think he could take care of the whole empire by himself, some say they should let the right minister take control of the dynasty until the prince becomes of age."
His eyes dilated as he looked at the spirit stone and continued:
"As for our small city, the city lord decided to not put himself in an awkward situation and didn't join any side as he remained neutral, Long Sunwing, the city lord is a banished royal from the imperial palace, he was banished due to unknown reasons to us small people, this is the most recent information we have, could I have my payment now?"
Yun Jhin nodded as he split the spirit stone into two and threw one part at the rogue captain, the rogue captain wanted to say something but Yun Jhin's words made his throat stop:
"You would have gotten one spirit stone if you would have a map of the empire, however, it seems your rogue guild is lacking, forgive me for not giving you the full payment, but if you want some more spirit stones you would have to do some jobs for me which you couldn't deliver."
The rogue captain started to sweat as he heard Yun Jhin's cold tone and he took the half of the spirit stone and retreated as he bowed and left hiding through the shadows. Yun Jhin shook his head as he looked back and directly went to the apothecary's location.
He would make sure he got his hands on the empire's map after he found if the apothecary had the plants he needed, as he walked around the small city he saw that most buildings were either dilapidated or directly broken down, most of the city's population was looking to be starving from their skinny bodies, beggars could be seen on the streets keeping their hands out, most of them gazed into a single place as they were dead, from time to time some patrols would come and take the beggars bodies away, most of the normal people would avoid the beggars, even the unmoving ones.
In the past, some of the beggars would go crazy and even eat human flesh, directly attacking their brethren to survive. After a short while of walking, Yun Jhin found the apothecary's place, it looked quite better compared to the other buildings, seemingly as if it was new, with the words 'apothecary' painted on a board above the entrance of the building, Yun Jhin entered the place and met with a young man who stood behind the desk, the young man had clean white clothes and a face mask over his face of the same color, mortals couldn't breathe in too many odors of different plants or else there might be a strange reaction that could happen in their body.
Yun Jhin immediately listed on all of the plants that he needed and waited for the young man to do the inventory, with good luck Yun Jhin got his hands on most of the things he needed the dragon flower, white ginseng, and undead worm flower, however, the highest quality maggot couldn't be found at the apothecary, it would most of the time be found inside either a high-quality corpse that has rotten for a long time or if a maggot was especially fed a type of body part until it burst apart when it burst apart there was a low chance it would lay its progenies, then if you were lucky one of those progenies would have a chance to grow into a high-quality maggot.
It would be better if he could find a tomb with a cultivator of the same stage as him, that would make him save a lot of time, as the young man packed Yun Jhin's plants and gave out the price Yun Jhin frowned, the price would almost take away all of his spirit stones but he didn't say anything as he paid for it in full, he didn't have the strength to go against the empire yet, he wasn't even a ki cultivating expert yet so he could only adhere to the law, however, if he could have he would have stolen the whole apothecary, unfortunately, he didn't have the space mirror that he used to strut around with. In his previous life if he saw something he liked he would throw it in the mirror's space!
Yun Jhin left the apothecary, then directly went to the city lord's house, he didn't waste any time as the guards at the front pointed their sabers at him and inquired why did he approach the lord's house when his cultivation base aura struck the guards and made them whimper like dogs, they immediately entered the courtyard of the house and came back with the captain of the guards who bowed and said:
"Might I inquire why is this hero coming to the city lords house?"
Yun Jhin didn't beat around the bush and said that he had been in closed-door cultivation for a long time and he needed some fresh information that only the city lord would know. The captain left and came back after a few minutes then invited Yun Jhin in.
The city lord was a spirited middle-aged man with a strong figure, he had a small beard on his face and long black hair tied in a ponytail at his back, he wore normal official clothes which consisted in a big yellow robe with the words of 'city lord' on them.
The city lord warmly invited Yun Jhin to tea inside his house and said:
"What do respect do I commend for the corpse refining sect patriarch to visit my humble abode?"
Yun Jhin didn't bother with the formalities and said directly:
"You should know that I don't usually leave my sect, I just want some information about the empire and the map, it would be helpful for me if you didn't know I already subdued the other two sects near me, the sword devil sect and the fairies sect."
The city lord nodded his head seemingly knowing what happened, after all, he still had scouts inside the woods who would report on the happenings of the sects, sects were most of the time lawly abiding the empire but the strongest sects would look down on 'mortal empires' such as the one that Yun Jhin lived in currently and invade them just for the disciples to have a good time, most of the elders would look down on the treasures of such empires and they would keep the powerhouses of the empire in check while the disciples would run amock.
As Yun Jhin waited for the man to explain the situation in the empire he suddenly heard a dark chuckle coming from the man's mouth:
"Don't you feel a little bit lightheaded, Sun Sisheng?"
Yun Jhin drank the tea the city lord offered and his eyes narrowed as he looked insides his host body, it was a chunk of poison that he immediately eliminated, Yun Jhin narrowed his eyes as he looked at Long Sunwing and said:
"Nice, very nice, I see why you were exiled, however unfortunately for you such weak poisons don't work on me, it seems I was a fool trying to work this peacefully, *sigh* well the dynasty can't blame me."
Long Sunwing looked confused as he looked at Yun Jhin's host and he was ready to attack with a hidden weapon when Yun Jhin spat a senbon needle out of his mouth which impacted the man's throat and killed him, the body snatcher then refined the man into a corpse and slung him over his shoulder, since he decided to take things like this he would take them to the end, but based on the way the man was exiled and isolated to such a shit place nothing would happen to Yun Jhin, he would maybe even get rewarded, the royal house forbade siblicide in the open but that didn't mean the siblings couldn't hire someone to kill each other.
After he looked around the city lord's house Yun Jhin left with a spatial bag full of spirit stones and some high-quality food pills, also a new possible corpse king, as they were both at the level 4 he could rush the corpse king creation at the cost of a cultivation stage, it wasn't worth to do so with stage 2 and 1 experts so he ate their bodies before. Their strength would reduce too much and even peak 9th stage earthly realm rookies could deal with such corpses.
The guards looked horrified as they saw Yun Jhin leave the house with their boss slung over his shoulder like a bag of potatoes, the dark grey skin of their boss indicated that he was now an undead!
Yun Jhin smiled as he devoured the man's soul and got his memories, he now knew exactly how the empire worked, even though he was a low-ranking imperial he still had some good information about the inner circle of the Long empire.
The guards didn't dare to attack Yun Jhin as he already killed their boss so they could only look to the other side when Yun Jhin walked by them and whistle, Yun Jhin liked how the guards kept their place and patted both of them on their shoulder and said:
"Good job keeping watch, your city lord had great guards, you are however now relived of your posts."
He threw half a spirit stone to each and went to his way, with the number of spirit stones he got right now one spirit stone didn't mean anything to him, he just felt happy that he got a spatial bag and the information he needed directly without any problems so he decided to make a good act out of his infinite benevolence.
As he left the city behind him, Yun Jhin continued to absorb the memories and see how the man offended his superiors and make sure there will be no problems in the future.