Purple Mist Dao Master-Chapter 186 - 167 ’Mutual Teaching and Learning’ Level Up: Mastering 100 Beasts!

Chapter 186: Chapter 167 ’Mutual Teaching and Learning’ Level Up: Mastering 100 Beasts!

"Meow~"

The next day, Yan Chuan opened the door and saw the civet cat from yesterday carrying a black rat to the doorway, then it hopped away into the woods and disappeared.

"This cat is sensible, it’s a courtesy for becoming a student."

Wang Zhengyi happened to see this scene and couldn’t help but laugh.

Yesterday, Yan Chuan was teaching boxing, and the civet cat came to listen, with its movements resembling the Tiger Form, surprising everyone. Unexpectedly, early this morning, the cat actually delivered a black rat as a thank you to Yan Chuan.

A black rat can yield about two taels of meat, worth half a qian, or about thirty to forty wen, equivalent to almost half a day’s income for an ordinary escort master or martial master in Guangling City.

If one came every day, it would be easy to earn one tael and five a month.

"This cat is quite human-like." Yan Chuan also smiled, teaching the civet cat was unintentional, and receiving its gratitude and present was a pleasant surprise, making him start the day in a good mood.

Yan Chuan asked Jin Yutang to take the black rat to be handled, and Wang Zhengyi could not help but sigh: "’Nanyue Lake’ and the surrounding mountains are overrun with black rats year-round, they say there’s no end to them, but these black rats are clever, digging and hiding deep. Even if they come out, they’re quiet and run fast, not as easy to catch as I had originally imagined."

Knowing is easy, doing is hard!

Before coming to Nanxiong City, Wang Zhengyi had heard that ’black rat meat’ was a specialty of Nanxiong City. Hearing that ’Nanyue Lake’ was overrun with black rats, he had thought they were everywhere and that he could easily catch a bunch. But in fact, even for seasoned hunters who dive in and out of the Nanyue Lake area, hunting ’black rats’ is not easy—

Finding burrows!

Sealing burrows!

Capturing rats!

All require skill.

A slight mishap, and a day is wasted.

Even if caught, post-processing, skinning, meat preparation, and sales channels all pose problems. Theoretically, a black rat can yield two taels of meat, which can be sold for half a qian, meaning a jin of black rat meat can sell for four qian silver. But this is the final price at the ’sales terminal’, the ’ex-factory price’ from the hunters’ hands would need to be lowered to two qian per jin to be sold in bulk, or there would have to be fixed customers, directly delivering to customers to avoid middlemen earning a price difference, raising the price to three qian per jin or even higher.

"A jin of black rat meat."

"Requires hunting at least eight black rats."

"In these ten days, I’ve hunted fewer than eight black rats in total."

Wang Zhengyi smiled wryly, "Turns out hunting beasts in ’Nanyue Lake’ isn’t that easy either."

Hunting beasts!

Hunting rats!

Sounds grand, but when it comes to execution, it’s exceedingly difficult!

Not only ’black rats’, but other valuable alien beasts, each seems to have become refined and are too difficult to hunt.

Wang Zhengyi had been in Nanxiong City for more than ten days, but besides some ordinary beasts and a few black rats, he only luckily hunted an alien beast rabbit.

Beast hunting is too hard!

"But I’ve heard hunters, who’ve gone deep into the mountains, say that ’Nanyue Lake’ seems off lately, seeing black rats killing each other, this is a sign that the ’Black Tide’ and ’Beast Tide’ are about to erupt."

"Maybe soon."

"Maybe by the year’s end."

"Surely there will be a ’Black Tide’!"

Unlike the people of Nanxiong City, who see ’Black Tide’ and ’Beast Tide’ as terrifying catastrophes, with each eruption bringing massive disaster threatening the survival of Nanxiong City, Wang Zhengyi was different. Having no emotional attachment to Nanxiong City since he was from the Great Yan, his heart secretly hoped for the arrival of the ’Black Tide’ and ’Beast Tide’. In the utter chaos and slaughter of ’rat versus rat’, ’rat versus beast’, ’rat versus human’, and ’beast versus human’, countless black rats and alien beasts would surge forth, becoming a disaster, a fortune, an opportunity.

Unfortunately, ’Black Tide’ and ’Beast Tide’ are uncontrollable, not necessarily arriving before February.

"After February, as everything comes back to life."

"The ’Black Rats’ will not lack food, another eruption would have to wait until winter approaches by the end of the year."

Wang Zhengyi looked in the direction of Nanyue Lake, silently hoping. He once served in the Danhu Royal City Black Armor Army, where he received a jin of ’black rat meat’ daily, a jin of ’fishing toad meat’ monthly as a centurion, and a jin of ’mystic snake meat’ annually. All these alien beast meats were incredibly valuable, greatly aiding the increase in strength. If he fared well in the team, he could hunt higher-level alien beasts during off-duty, earning more, eating more, and progressing in strength faster.

This is one of the reasons why martial artists worldwide want to join the armies of the Six Great Royal Cities.

But now, all these benefits were gone.

Wang Zhengyi had returned to his original state, living the hard life once again, and naturally yearned for a ’Black Tide’ and ’Beast Tide’ to bring him immense wealth.

Yan Chuan was different—

"I have the ’Mutual Teaching and Learning’, as my boxing skills improve, the efficiency of ’Tiger and Leopard Thunder Sound’ will be higher, and my ’Bone Training’ will progress faster."

"This is a fundamental enhancement."

"Once the foundation is solid, as soon as resources are in place, I can soar to the skies and achieve great progress in no time!"

And now.

Starting today.

Yan Chuan planned to slow down the frequency of teaching boxing in the Immortal Valley, wanting to divert some energy to Nanyue Lake, focusing on the fierce and alien beasts in the mountains beside the lake.

Man follows the earth, the earth follows heaven, heaven follows the Dao, and the Dao follows nature!

Yan Chuan sought to—

"Mastering Hundred Beasts!"

...

The morning sun rose.

Yan Chuan left the Divine Doctor Valley, venturing alone into the mountains.

Saying ’alone’ wasn’t entirely accurate. Though he hadn’t accompanied Wang Zhengyi, Huo Zhen, Jian Rong, Shao Yancong, nor brought along Yu Jinpeng, Jin Yutang, there was a civet cat, slinking stealthily behind him.

Sometimes hiding behind trees, sometimes burying its head in fallen leaves, when Yan Chuan turned his head, it would stop, when Yan Chuan walked forward, it followed.

One, two, three, wooden man, no talking, no moving allowed!

Quite amusing.

Yan Chuan didn’t mind, letting it follow.

"Dragon, tiger, monkey, horse, chicken, falcon, swallow, snake, alligator, lame beast, eagle, bear."

These are the ’Twelve Forms’, Yan Chuan pondered, "I want to master all beasts, the ’Dragon Form’ is hard to find, the ’Golden Rock Earth Dragon’ is said to be a ’dragon’, but it’s fundamentally different from my ’Dragon Form’."

It’s not just the ’Dragon Form’ that’s hard to find.

Even the other eleven forms, although seemingly common, reaching Yan Chuan’s standard isn’t so simple.

"Even though I have ’Mutual Teaching and Learning’, the language barrier makes it incredibly hard to teach a tiger the ’Tiger Form’ or a monkey the ’Monkey Form’, like speaking a fool’s dream."

"Only if this civet cat has Spiritual nature, understands humanity, and is assisted by the 75% comprehension efficiency fueled by ’Mutual Teaching and Learning’, and the focus on martial arts provided by ’Experience’, there may be hope."

As for ordinary wild beasts—

"Roar!"

In the deep mountains, a roar of a tiger was heard.

"No way."

Yan Chuan released a ferocious tiger, shaking his head.

Non-alien beasts like ordinary animals or birds might be taught, but it requires a lot of time, energy, and quantities to make the ’force produce miracles’.

That is a ’miracle’.

...

After drilling in the mountains for a day, Yan Chuan encountered tigers, taught monkeys, caught swallows and snakes, and even interrogated eagles and bears.

But the results were minimal, not as touching as teaching the civet cat the ’Tiger Form Eight Skills’ the day before.

At sunset.

Yan Chuan returned to the Immortal Valley, having spent a day in vain, but he didn’t give up, turning around to find Fan Zhong and Zang Qi, who were lingering in the valley—

One was a young swordsman practicing the ’Flying Sand and Stone Thirteen Forms’, wholeheartedly pursuing martial arts.

One was a hot-tempered and straightforward old man practicing the ’Fire Dragon Fist’.

Yan Chuan sought out the two and asked, "Do you guys know the prices of horses, donkeys, and mules in Nanxiong City?"

"Master Yan, I don’t know."

Fan Zhong shook his head, being obsessed with practicing martial arts, he knew little about these things.

But Zang Qi, rich in life experience, answered without hesitation: "The prices of ordinary war horses and Qinghua mules are about the same, around five taels. Donkeys are two or three taels, while ordinary yellow-maned horses, depending on their appearance, can range from fifteen taels, twenty taels, to even thirty or fifty taels. As for the higher-grade green-maned horses, they’re exclusive mounts for the ’Green-maned Riders’, each worth a hundred taels."

Zang Qi looked at Yan Chuan: "What do you want to buy?"

"I can’t afford it."

Yan Chuan shook his head.

The prices of livestock in Nanxiong City were exorbitantly high; even a donkey cost two or three taels, equivalent to a month’s earnings of an ordinary escort master or martial master in Guangling City.

"Buy me some chickens." frёeweɓηovel.coɱ

"And get an ordinary yellow-maned horse."

Yan Chuan took out over twenty taels of broken silver from his pocket, which was all the money he carried with him.

"Got it!"

Zang Qi asked no further questions, took the money, and said joyfully, "I’ll head into the city tomorrow morning to find what’s worth your money."

Judging people by their martial techniques.

Yan Chuan trusted Zang Qi, believing he wouldn’t resort to inferior goods or take the money and run.

"Thanks, old brother!"

Yan Chuan expressed his gratitude.

...

And so, a few more days passed.

Yan Chuan sometimes wandered in the mountains, at other times healed and taught boxing in the Immortal Valley.

But this time, the ones receiving boxing lessons weren’t just humans, but also—

...

"Chickens?"

When Fu Zhe entered the Immortal Valley with nine others, they immediately saw someone with a loud voice teaching boxing. This person stood with their back to the entrance, flanked by people on both sides, with a yellow-maned horse tethered in the courtyard, a civet cat at the side of the woods, and in front of him, there was a chicken pen, filled with roosters, hens, domestic and wild chickens clucking continuously, running without stop.

"Chickens are creatures of wisdom and strategy, inherently good fighters with independent skills, scratching techniques, plumage display, early annunciation, and courage in fighting."

"Raise the chest and lower the waist to practice chicken legs, cycle through the lower abdomen and Dantian; raise the knee, aim at the bosom, stamp with strength, discovering profound mysteries during the applied footwork."

"The key to practicing the ’Chicken Form’ lies in lifting the head and raising the chest, channeling spirit to the crown, lifting legs and flipping feet, advancing by grinding the shins. True Qi stored inside, winning with wisdom over courage, stamping with strength, legs quick, and feet agile."

...

Fu Zhe watched as the person trained and taught, the ’Chicken Form Boxing’ was done in a ceremonial manner, glancing at the chicken pen, he couldn’t help but laugh. He saw a turkey within the pen, fiery red all over, standing on one leg, its eyes staring intently at the person practicing boxing, seemingly entranced.

"This person!"

"This chicken!"

Fu Zhe first found it amusing, then his eyes lit up, noticing that the turkey’s focus was no coincidence. Its single leg supported its entire body, subtly signaling the profundity of Pile Skill. If ’independence’ and ’stance’ were coincidences, then this chicken’s frequent shifts of position, leaning against and away, leaning backwards and forwards, were—

"Iron Mountain Lean!"

...