Chapter 0359: Entering the City
Shen Xingyao and Shen Xingyu had taken their leave.
Wu Yu joined the line of a hundred people or so. The crowd gradually advanced forward.
This was clearly not the first time the people in the line with him had come to Yan Huang Imperial City. As he chatted with them, Wu Yu found that in general, the ones who were able to enter Yan Huang Imperial City were at least at the Jindan Dao Realm.
Depending on your cultivation level, your monthly contribution toward Yan Huang Imperial City would differ. For instance, if you were at the first tier of Jindan Dao, you only needed to pay 50 Golden Essence Pills a month.
Of course, to someone who was at the first tier of Jindan Dao, this was a considerably large fortune.
Most people were unable to remain in Yan Huang Imperial City for a long time. The usual visitors to this place consisted of those who wanted to win a large fortune by gambling, those who wanted to achieve a breakthrough using Yan Huang Imperial City's Ancient Spiritual Qi, and those that wanted to buy or seek out rare, precious treasures and immortal essence materials.
There were also those who met up with friends here and those that came to peddle their wares.
In any event, Yan Huang Imperial City was essentially the capital of the realm of cultivators. It was similar to Capital Wu in the Dong Yue Wu Kingdom, where many civilians traveled over land and water to visit.
A place like this was very different from the exclusive Shushan Immortal Sect. Over here, fish and dragons jumbled together and people of all sorts were present. The hustle and bustle around the city was extraordinary, and you could find whatever was within the limits of your imagination.
The closer he got to the city gates, the clearer Wu Yu's vague sense of the boundless Ancient Spiritual Qi became. Yan Huang Imperial City was located within a fading immortal fog. In fact, this immortal fog was formed by the concentration of Ancient Spiritual Qi. After lightly breathing in this fog, it would pass through your body without any obstructions, and seemed to purify your heart and lungs in the process. Even though the immortal fog here was not very dense, its effects were comparable to the effects of the Clear Sky of Shushan.
This highly concentrated Ancient Spiritual Qi was Yan Huang Imperial City's most important asset.
Rumors said that the source of Yan Huang Imperial City's innumerable wealth and riches was the payment that it collected from the cultivators within the city.
In order to not look like an inexperienced bumpkin, Wu Yu did not stare and gawk around too much.
"The Lunar Flower Sword Sage and her husband are prominent figures. Once they've found out that I've entered Yan Huang Imperial City, they'll just wait for me on the outside. It'll be too shameful for them if they went to the far east only to find someone to threaten me. If news about that leaked out, they'd become the laughingstock of the whole divine continent. Their only option is to assassinate me. If they were to kill me in plain sight, the Ursae Sword Immortal would not be pleased. He is the Sword Immortal that saved my life after all."
As for whether Nangong Wei truly wanted to take his life back then, Wu Yu never found out the answer. He did not want to know it either, since things were over after all.
"From now on, I'll only look to the future!"
After a short time in the queue, it was Wu Yu's turn. He had to fill in a form. After which, the Yan Huang Immortal Army soldier guarding the city would record down some numbers. This was Wu Yu's first time visiting, so this procedure took slightly longer than usual. He was no longer a Shushan disciple anymore, hence he did not indicate that he was from the Shushan sect on the form. He had left that part blank instead. Nonetheless, Yan Huang Imperial City did not probe further. There were many other visitors who came to Yan Huang Imperial City without being part of any sect.
Wu Yu just looked like an ordinary eighth tier Jindan Dao cultivator. After he finished recording down more details, he was allowed to enter. If he were to ever visit again, this procedure would be slightly faster next time.
As he walked through the city gates of Yan Huang Imperial City, a wave of spiritual qi surged toward him and gave him a refreshing sense of immortal enlightenment. After that, clamorous sounds rang out from the entire street. After Wu Yu entered the gates, his vision cleared up quite a lot, and he was able to see his surroundings better. This was indeed a flourishing and vast capital city. There were elegant and exquisite buildings and an endless number of royal courts and pavilions of different types. The street was at least 100 zhang wide, and there were people both walking on it and riding on their immortal treasures in the air. Within Wu Yu's field of vision, there were at least a thousand cultivators around.
"A cultivator's city sure is different!"
Upon closer inspection, he noticed that almost every building had a spirit design included in its structure. Some of them served to consolidate the building's structure, some served to deter outsiders from entering, and others served to obscure the building from plain view in other to conceal it. These complicated and gorgeous spirit designs were the reason these buildings constructed in this floating city looked so majestic, grand, and magnificent.
As far as the eye could see, this confident city was gold and jade in glorious splendor. Under the rays of the sun, the golden immortal fog lingered, and countless cultivators were darting about within with their divine poise and sagelike features. The imperial courts in the fantasies of commoners from The Three Thousand Immortal Kingdoms surely had to be this spectacle right now!
The fact was that these cultivators with powerful mystiques were practically immortals to ordinary people. Their only weakness was that they could only live until around 400 years old, which was much less than what demons could reach.
Wu Yu was both stunned by and in reverence of the scene before him. He rode his sword through this gigantic city. It was a large as a third of the entire Common Sword Domain after all and was extremely dense at that. It would be impossible to completely travel through it in just a short time, so Wu Yu simply viewed the flowers from his sword as he took a fleeting glance in passing at the various sights and sounds in order to get a taste of Yan Huang Imperial City's flourishing state.
He found that most of the buildings had spirit designs with very strong concealing properties. For instance, as he flew over them on his sword, he was unable to clearly see what was going on in the courtyards within the palaces and pavilions.
Other than this, there were many shops along the street. These shops were selling immortal treasures, immortal essence, talismans, precious treasures, and all other sorts of mystical and rare goods. Some of them even had four spiritual marks, yet they were displayed openly in public without any concern of being snatched away by others.
There were many other shops that were purchasing goods at a low price and selling them at a higher price in order to earn the difference from arbitrage.
The shopkeepers were all from the outside as well, so, of course, they had rented their storefronts from Yan Huang Imperial City. Every month, they would have to contribute a far larger sum than other visitors.
Besides the shops, there were other large-scale facilities as well. Whatever was present in the Shushan Immortal Sect was present here as well. This included the Immortal Battleground, Immortal Pair Hall, and Mortal Arena among many others. There was even a place that was similar to the Demons' Abyss to train. Additionally, whatever could not be found in the Shushan Immortal Sect could also be found here. In a nutshell, as long as you were rich enough, it would not be difficult to find whatever you wished for within Yan Huang Imperial City.
Wu Yu did not even have a single immortal treasure on him now. This made him envious of the many immortal treasures haphazardly displayed in front of the shops he passed by as he rode along the street.
Even though he took special care to appear indifferent, he was looking around like a country bumpkin that had just entered a city. He was completely unable to hide this, and many cultivators came out to greet him. They asked him whether they would like to buy their immortal treasures and continued to brag about how the immortal treasures they were holding onto were treasured objects that had a glorious history and so on…
After handing over the monthly payment of 500 Golden Essence Pills, he only had the few spiritual immortal treasures that his doppelgangers used. They were not worth much at all.
So when he came across these cultivators, he just rejected them and immediately took his leave.
"Are you kidding me? Why would you come to Yan Huang Imperial City if you don't have a single cent on you? Go take a walk."
In fact, after Wu Yu walked around the city, he found that there was a more crucial problem in hand. He did not have anywhere to stay yet. He had no lodging, so even though he had some materials on hand to refine Golden Essence Pills, he surely couldn't do that in the middle of the street…
Furthermore, with no lodging, did this mean that he had to cultivate on the street?
Of course, there were many places to stay in Yan Huang Imperial City. They were known as immortal cultivation inns. The name clearly implied that for one to stay there, they would have to spend money. Even the most simple and crude of these dwellings located in the worst parts of the city cost at least 10 Golden Essence Pills a day. With such exorbitant prices, it seemed like the majority of cultivators within the earliest three tiers of Jindan Dao would not be able to afford to stay in Yan Huang Imperial City for too long a time.
Right now, even if Wu Yu were to sell all the valuables he had on him, he would not be able to obtain 10 Golden Essence Pills in exchange.
"If you don't have anything on you, it's certainly true that you're not able to cultivate." Wu Yu originally wanted to purchase some items, but he wanted to be slightly more settled before he did so. At this time, he arrived at a lively area. Before him was a cluster of palaces that were gold and jade in glorious splendor. The antique jade bricks and tiles gave the place an air of nobility and grandeur. In every five steps was a new building, and in every 10, a pavilion. All these structures had the aura of spirit designs surrounding them. These spirit designs either concealed these structures or accentuated how the visible ones looked.
Wind Flower Snow Moon Palace
These words were inscribed on a plaque at the entrance to this place.
Upon noticing this, Wu Yu recalled that the mountain of his senior brother Mo was called the Wind Flower Snow Moon Peak. He had even hired 100 or so beauties to be “servants” there just to warm his heart and delight his eyes every day…
However, the truth was that this Wind Flower Snow Moon Palace was not the same type of place, despite having a similar name. If Wu Yu guessed correctly, this was a place that was like the Immortal Battleground.
Wu Yu felt dispirited that such a place was named like this.
However, he had his eye on this place. As of now, there was no one who knew him here. Even though he was only at the eighth tier of Jindan Dao, his battle prowess far exceeded this level. He had a feeling that once he entered this place, he would definitely be able to make a fortune!
At the present moment, wealth was of utmost importance to Wu Yu!
As such, he did not think about it much more and directly walked toward the Wind Flower Snow Moon Palace. Along the way, there were many people going to and fro. This was definitely the liveliest place that Wu Yu had seen thus far.
The moment he entered this palace that was gold and jade in glorious splendor, he saw that the interior was even more magnificent. Perhaps due to the mystical transformations of the spirit design, the inside was also far larger than the outside. The other end of the place could not even be seen.
The place was split into an upper and lower level respectively. On the lower level was a large number of sealed arenas, whereas the upper level was a betting and viewing area for these fights. This betting area was where this place differed from the Immortal Battleground. While fights were going on below, the people on the upper deck were able to place wagers on the outcome of these battles.
From the moment he entered, Wu Yu found that the rowdy cheers from the upper level made it far livelier than the lower levels.
There were more people betting on fights than actual fighters themselves.
Within Yan Huang Imperial City, private duels were forbidden. Therefore, this was one of the few places where battles could happen. This made this place bustling with noise and excitement, and there were tens of thousands of people here.
Right after Wu Yu entered, a young, fairy-like girl dressed in a simple yet elegant robe immediately came up to great him. She was pretty, with delicate features, and in a polite tone she said, "Greetings, esteemed friend of dao. This is definitely your first time here, so I'll be responsible for introducing the Wind Flower Snow Moon Palace of our Shangyuan Dao Sect to you. You can address me as Feng Er. May I ask if this friend of dao wants to head to the upper deck's betting area, or the lower deck's battle platforms?"
Instead of betting on others to win, Wu Yu much preferred relying on his own abilities, so he enthusiastically told Feng Er, "I naturally want to go to the battle platforms."
Feng Er gave a knowing laugh as she muttered to herself, "Yet another idiot who wants to earn a huge fortune on his first visit to Yan Huang Imperial City."
Wu Yu's mind was on other things. He never expected this place to be part of the Shangyuan Dao Sect's business. The Shangyuan Dao Sect probably had to contribute a significant amount to Yan Huang Imperial City in order to use such a large space to operate this Wind Flower Snow Moon Palace.
The Shangyuan Dao Sect had definitely invested a lot of money into this place. Even this Feng Er was at the fourth tier of Jindan Dao despite being so young.