Chapter 826: Digging up Medicinal Herbs
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Ordinary disciples like Su Wan’er and Wang Qian were not allowed to head into the cities. Once they left the mountain ranges where the sect was, they would be punished, and severely punished at that. If they showed progress in their training one day and joined the upper levels of the sect, then they would have some freedom.
Because the ancient martial arts sects were so strict, people with wild thoughts or evil intentions would find it very difficult to stand this kind of lifestyle in the deep mountains. Hence, many of these sect traitors who had defected from their sect appeared every year. After all, not everyone could endure such hardships and focus solely on practicing, living away from the material world.
The people who were greedy, lustful and ambitious could not stand the life of poverty within the deep mountains. Once they made some progress in their training, they would defect from the sect and head to the outside world to do as they pleased. It was precisely because of this that, although the Huatian Palace’s rule was strict, the Executors of the Four Major Palace Halls had always been busy. The number of defectors from the various ancient martial arts sects that were executed by the Huatian Palace every year was no fewer than five thousand.
Many ancient martial arts sects would not recruit people from the outside. There were even sects that did not accept people from the outside at all. They would mostly seek out disciples internally, for instance, among the offspring of the disciples within the sect. These children had never come in contact with the outside world, so they would not be fascinated by it.
Wang Qian was usually also very busy. She was just a disciple of the lowest level. Normally, aside from practicing, she still had a lot of chores. However, Wan’er was already in a precarious situation and would very likely be banished from the sect. Therefore, Wang Qian had resolutely decided to drop everything and do her best to help Wan’er complete the task. Luckily, she had just completed her own seven day period of gathering medicinal herbs, so she was free for the next few days. She could either get others to help her out with ordinary chores or just reject them.
“Wan’er, are you actually bringing him along?” Wang Qian saw Mo Wen following Wan’er, and she could not help but frown. She had disagreed with Mo Wen coming along yesterday. After all, gathering medicinal herbs was a technical job. Having more people did not mean higher efficiency. Even with her help, she did not have a lot of confidence in helping Wan’er overcome this hurdle. By bringing Mo Wen along, wasn’t that adding to their burden?
“Sister Wang Qian, Big Brother Mo wants to help me. Also, he is incredible. He can detect the scent of medicinal herbs from far away,” Wan’er said softly. She grabbed and swung Wang Qian’s hand playfully, putting on a look as she pampered this sister of hers.
In reality, Wan’er had no confidence in Mo Wen. After all, gathering medicinal herbs was no ordinary job. Those who did not know how to do it could not do it at all. She was also not certain whether Big Brother Mo was truly proficient in medicine. However, she could sense his good intentions. He truly wanted to help her. There weren’t many people that were kind to her, and she did not want to hurt his ego.
“Alright, let’s hope that our luck today will be better. Otherwise, you will be in seriously big trouble.” Wang Qian sighed as she looked helplessly at Wan’er. She did not look kindly upon Mo Wen. If it wasn’t for him, Wan’er would not be in such a dire situation. Wasn’t it enough that Wan’er had not asked him to repay her? Did he still have to come along and hold them back?
Wan’er said that he could detect the scent of medicinal herbs from ten kilometers away! Even bragging like this was going too far. Only Wan’er would believe such a tall tale. Wang Qian did not believe at all that Mo Wen truly knew how to gather medicinal herbs.
“Don’t worry. With me around, our luck will certainly be good,” Mo Wen said with no self-awareness, seemingly not noticing Wang Qian’s dissatisfied expression. He looked as though he could solve everything.
“I hope so.” Wang Qian rolled her eyes at Mo Wen. She snappily cursed inside, “Who would believe you?”
“Alright. Let’s go.”
Wan’er dragged Wang Qian along as she walked forward with big steps. She could tell that the atmosphere between Big Brother Mo and Sister Wang Qian was not quite right.
The Taihang Mountains were located in the eastern region of Hua Xia. The mountain range spanned many provinces and was an important geographical border for Hua Xia Country. Such a huge primeval forest naturally hid many ancient martial arts sects. The Five Tigers Sect occupied only a small area in the Taihang Mountains, but even so, this area was large enough for an ordinary person to be unable to cover entirely even if they wandered around for three months non-stop.
Wan’er was very familiar with the surrounding mountain forest. She had lived in this area since she was little. Gathering medicinal herbs was a common job for her, so she could very skillfully determine where there would be medicinal herbs.
Both Su Wan’er and Wang Qian kept walking forward, seemingly having no intention of stopping. It seemed as though they were not searching for medicinal herbs, but instead were rushing to somewhere.
“Where are you two going?” Mo Wen said casually as he followed them.
They had already walked for more than thirty kilometers. The two of them had actually not stopped even once, focusing instead on making their way. Unfortunately, the two of them had low cultivation and could not maintain their Qinggong to make their way through the mountain forest. They could only walk. Otherwise, in more than two hours, they could travel at least a hundred kilometers.
“Of course, we are going to find medicinal herbs. Do you know anything about gathering medicinal herbs? Did you think that gathering medicinal herbs was easy? That we could simply come across precious medicinal herbs and collect them just like that?” Wang Qian said snappily.
She had said that Mo Wen had come along purely to cause trouble and that he did not know anything about gathering medicinal herbs at all. Otherwise, people who usually gathered medicinal herbs would know that it was impossible to gather medicinal herbs around the entrance to the sect. The medicinal herbs that had once grown there had most likely been gathered up by other people long ago. Right now, it was winter, not spring. Within a radius of fifty kilometers around the Five Tigers Sect, there were almost no medicinal herbs to be gathered.
“Big Brother Mo, are you tired?”
Wan’er looked at Mo Wen with a look of concern. Big Brother Mo was injured and did not practice ancient martial arts. He was just an ordinary person. He could not stand rushing at such a pace for such a long distance.
“If you are tired, head back on your own. Luckily, right now we have not gone far. You can still make it back now. If you follow us much further, you may end up walking one or two hundred kilometers. You’d better think carefully whether you can walk that far. Don’t expect two little girls to carry a big man like you back.”
Wang Qian could not wait for Mo Wen to give up halfway. If he was smart, he would head back on his own. If so, no one would hold anyone back. Wan’er was already having a hard time. Why had he come along?
“I am not tired. It’s only one or two hundred kilometers. That’s easy,” Mo Wen said with a smile. One or two thousand kilometers was no issue for him, let alone one or two hundred kilometers. Although he was injured, his physical strength was far more than ordinary people could imagine.
“You’re talking big. If you overexert yourself now, don’t end up crying later. I’m only leading the way; I’m not in charge of bringing you back.”
Wang Qian could not stand people who bragged like Mo Wen. He was clearly overexerting himself, and yet he pretended it was not an issue.
“Sister Wang Qian…” Wan’er tugged at Wang Qian’s sleeve and looked at her with a pitiful look.
“Alright, alright, I won’t say any more,” Wang Qian said helplessly.
“Miss Wang, you don’t necessarily need to travel so far to gather medicinal herbs. Truly valuable medicinal herbs mostly grow in weird, hidden and dangerous places. No matter how far you walk, you will not necessarily find the good stuff,” Mo Wen said with a smile.
Traveling a thousand kilometers for medicinal herbs was essentially nothing, but that was if they were targeting an extremely rare medicinal herb. In the past, he had traveled across ten thousand mountains and various dangerous lands for a special stalk of medicinal herb. In the end, he had finally found it.
But for gathering medicinal herbs like this with no target and goal in mind, they did not need to travel so far. They could just gather up what was around them. The reason why Wan’er and Wang Qian did not gather medicinal herbs around this area was that the medicinal herbs that were easy to find had all been gathered up by others. They also could not find the medicinal herbs that were in hard to find places.
But Mo Wen was different. With his familiarity with medicinal herbs, medicinal herbs that were slightly hidden away could not escape his eyes at all. Moreover, he still had Deified Soul Power, which was a godly skill for finding medicinal herbs.
“You say it so logically. If you can, find a stalk of a medicinal herb.” Wang Qian rolled her eyes at him. Who did not know how to spout words to fool others? After all, she was certain that Mo Wen was here to cause trouble.
“Wan’er has a thirty-year-old zhu ling near her foot. You are stepping on medicinal herbs, yet you travel hundreds of kilometers to find them. Aren’t you making a detour?” Mo Wen said with a plain smile. He could understand why Wang Qian did not acknowledge him. After all, in his current condition, he was like a beggar claiming to be a billionaire. It was hard for anyone to believe.
“You are spouting nonsense, aren’t you?” Wang Qian looked suspiciously at Mo Wen. She thought that Mo Wen was talking arbitrarily. But from his expression, he seemed serious and enthusiastic.
Also, this sort of lie could be seen through immediately if it was fake. No matter how thick-skinned and shameless a person was, they would not utter such a lie so easily at a time like this.
“Really?” Wan’er said, exceptionally astonished as she looked at the ground near her feet. Aged zhu ling was a rather precious medicinal herb. She had never gathered thirty-year-old zhu ling before. The environments that zhu ling grew in were somewhat special. They grew under pine trees, but their exact location was very hard to find. Also, not every pine tree had zhu lings underneath them. If one could not determine where the zhu lings were, they could only dig up the ground within a radius of five meters around the pine tree to find them slowly.
However, they would only do this after confirming that there was zhu ling underneath the selected pine tree. If there was no zhu ling, even if they cleared the land within a radius of a hundred meters, they would not find any.
Pigs could find zhu lings hidden under the pine trees due to their unique sense of smell. Hence, zhu ling was also called the pig agaric. Usually, people would bring along a trained pig to search for this type of medicinal herb. They utilized the pig’s sense of smell to roughly locate the zhu lings.
“You can find out once you try digging. It is located about one meter beneath your feet. It’s not really deep. You can easily find it,” Mo Wen said with a smile.
Wan’er did not hesitate. She took out some tools from the large bamboo basket and started digging immediately. She was skillful in digging since she had been doing the same thing for half a month. Digging was not a strenuous activity for her; she was an ancient martial art practitioner after all.
A thirty-year-old zhu ling was a rather precious medicinal herb. If Su Wan’er could dig one up today, she would complete one-third of today’s task instantly. The completion of the task given by the sect was not measured by the number of medicinal herbs collected. Instead, it was measured based on the quality of the medicinal herbs. A stalk of high quality medicinal herb was equivalent to the work of a day.