The departure in the morning was a quiet one. There were no grand speeches, no gathered armies and no tearful farewells at the docks. Li Yu simply told Hu Jian and Lin Tao that he was going to see a bit more of this world.

Li Yu contacted his followers as well to let them know he is going on his own to see the world. He wasn’t sure where he was going yet, only that it would be around the central continent and if their paths happened to cross he would treat them to food.

Some insisted on following him but he told them that he wanted to explore on his own. Something he had never done before. He wanted to experience this world in several different ways and being by himself made that easier.

He left Clearwater City not by flying on a sword or tearing through space but by walking out of the southern gate with a simple bamboo staff in hand and a coarse traveling cloak over his shoulders. To the casual observer, he was just another mortal traveler, perhaps a failed scholar or a wandering doctor.

Viridius was most likely right. His soul was a riverbed and it was currently shaped only by the recent trauma, war and fighting that he had been in. If he wanted to hold the ocean, he needed to widen the banks. He needed to remember what the world felt like when it wasn't burning and most importantly he needed to understand himself and his souls.

Li Yu arrived in the town of Red-Mist Basin. It was located in a humid valley known for its geothermal vents and agricultural soil that was far too rich in Fire Qi.

The town was famous for one thing: Spiritual Spice.

Li Yu sat at a wobbly wooden table in an open-air stall. The air was thick with a red haze that wasn't mist, it was vaporized chili oil. People around him were weeping openly as they ate, snot running down their noses, yet they kept eating with fanatical devotion.

"You sure about this, stranger?" the stall owner asked. He was a burly man wearing a mask over his nose and mouth, holding a pair of tongs. "The 'Dragon’s Regret' isn't for tourists. We usually reserve it for cultivators who lost a bet or want to train their fire resistance."

Li Yu smiled confidently, tapping the table. "I have a strong constitution. A vegetable cannot hurt me. Bring the largest bowl."

The owner shrugged and his eyes crinkled with pity. "Your funeral, scholar."

Five minutes later a bowl was placed in front of Li Yu. The broth was a violent glowing magma-red. It bubbled ominously. Floating in it were noodles and peppers that looked like shriveled angry demon fingers.

Li Yu picked up his chopsticks. ‘This must be an exaggeration to draw in people to try. I see all these people around me eating this and while they look like they are in slight pain, they are enjoying immensely,’ he thought smugly.

He took a large bite right away.

For three seconds, nothing happened. He tasted savory beef, some herbs he recognized and a pleasant warmth.

‘See?’ Li Yu thought. ‘It is merely—’

Then, the bomb went off.

It didn't start in his mouth. It started within his body. A wave of heat exploded in his chest, rushing up to his face with the force of a Lightning strike. His tongue didn't just go numb; it felt like it had packed its bags and left his body to escape the abuse.

Li Yu’s eyes widened. His skin flushed a deep and alarming crimson. Sweat instantly beaded on his forehead, soaking his hair.

"Water," Li Yu wheezed, his voice a bit higher than usual.

"Milk," the owner corrected, slamming a jug of Spirit-Goat milk onto the table. "Water just spreads the oil and makes you regret being born."

Li Yu drank the milk with a desperation he hadn't felt since fighting the Xylarri. Tears streamed down his face unbidden. The heat was much more intense than he had thought and with no cultivation and a body suppressed as much as he could to be like a mortal, the pain was all over.

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"Is it good?" the owner asked, grinning beneath his mask.

"It hurts," Li Yu gasped, taking another bite because the flavor beneath the agony was incredible. "It feels like I am eating a botched alchemy pill!"

Li Yu looked just like all the others around him as he finished the bowl. By the end he was soaked in sweat, his lips were swollen to twice their size and he felt a strange vibrating high. He paid the owner double and bowed respectfully to the owner and to the empty bowl. Afterwards he staggered off to find an inn to rest.

As he walked he realized something. He was laughing to himself. In that bowl of soup wasn’t the complicated world that he had slowly learned of or the agendas of divine beings. It was just a man versus some peppers, and any other wick spices that the owner had put in there.

Li Yu continued his journey, moving through the vast forests that separated the major provinces. The trees here were ancient and their needles sharp as daggers.

He was walking along a dirt path when the air suddenly shimmered.

"Halt!" a voice boomed.

From the tree line, a dozen figures leaped out. They rode on glowing low-grade flying swords that sputtered and sparked. They wore mismatched robes emblazoned with a crudely stitched scorpion.

"You have entered the territory of the Red Scorpion Sect!" the leader announced. He was a middle-aged man at the 5th Stage of Qi Condensation, holding a glowing talisman that looked like it might explode in his own hand if he squeezed too hard. "Pay the toll or face the wrath of our 'Venomous Sting' technique!"

Li Yu stopped and leaned on his staff. He looked at the 'sect.' They were clearly rogue cultivators, dropouts who had formed a gang to bully mortals.

"I have no money," Li Yu said.

"Lies!" The leader pointed his talisman as him. "Hand over your storage bag!"

"It contains three dry buns and a change of socks," Li Yu said. "You are welcome to the socks. They are quite worn."

"Insolence!" the leader screamed. "Brothers, attack! Formation of the... uh... Stinging Circle!"

The bandits threw their hands out. Beams of weak yellow Qi shot toward Li Yu. Some threw small fireballs. One guy just threw a rock because he panicked.

Li Yu didn't move. He didn't even raise a shield.

The attacks didn’t even reach him as they dissipated like smoke hitting a wall. The rock somehow made it through and bounced off his shoulder harmlessly. Li Yu looked down at the rock and wondered how it got to him. ‘Did my body treat it so harmlessly that it didn’t even stop it?’ He thought.

Li Yu then sighed. He raised one finger and increased his spiritual pressure on the area.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The 'Red Scorpion Sect' dropped out of the air like stones, face-planting into the dirt. The leader yelped as his talisman fizzled out as it was crushed into the mud.

Li Yu walked over to the leader who was struggling to lift his face out of the dirt.

"Your stance is terrible," Li Yu critiqued. "And your 'Venomous Sting' is just a basic technique for sending Qi outside the body. You should lower your elbow when you channel."

"You... you are a Senior Expert?" the leader wheezed, realizing his mistake. "Forgive us! We are blind! We thought you were a scholar!"

Li Yu released the pressure. The bandits gasped for air, scrambling to their knees and bowing so fast their heads blurred.

"We will leave! We will move to another mountain!" the leader cried.

"No," Li Yu said. He reached into his robe and pulled out a small booklet. It was a basic manual on the 'Flowing River Sword Style' , a low-tier technique he had picked up from someone that he had killed in the past. Since it was a sword technique he never learned it..

He tossed it to the leader.

"Stop robbing people. It’s inefficient and risky," Li Yu said. "Learn this. Hunt spirit beasts. Sell the parts. You'll make more money and you won't get killed by a passing eccentric. You’ll also be doing more good in this area."

The leader stared at the manual as if it were a heavenly scripture. "Thank you, Senior! We will change our ways! We will become the... uh... Flowing River Sect!"

Li Yu walked away, shaking his head. He heard them arguing over who got to read the book first before he was even out of earshot.

Li Yu had let them go because he sensed no traces evil of bloodlust or killing intent on them. Not even the kind one gets from simply killing to protect oneselves. They were different and felt very different. This was clearly a group of failed cultivators who banded together and were now trying to survive. They most likely did rob some people but never killed anyone.

‘It’s strange that I can somehow feel like they never killed anyone out of malice. It isn’t just through detecting their bloodlust or killing intent. I can somehow ‘feel’ it, in my very soul that they haven’t truly done great harm. But why? Where is this feeling and confidence coming from?’ he thought to himself.

What he didn’t know was that feeling was coming from the tiny thread of Karma Law that was floating around the fishing hook in his Ocean of Qi. Even though it was tiny and he had just barely touched upon it, it was enough to detect those that were so much weaker than he was.

Inside his Ocean of Qi, the Fisherman let out a soft and amused huff by Li Yu’s actions.