"Spirit Master, sir, you… you two…'
Seeing Yu Yan and Xiao Wu walk out of the forest, the caravan leader—who, for various reasons, had not fled—stared dumbfounded at the pair who had emerged unscathed.
"A Senior is cultivating in seclusion in the forest. When that Fallen Soul Master offended him, the Senior casually killed him."
"In short, there's no danger now. Let's hurry back to Suotuo City; no one knows if more Fallen Soul Masters will appear."
Knowing exactly what had stunned the man, Yu Yan offered a fairly plausible explanation, cleared up his doubts, and urged him to reorganise the caravan and set off as soon as possible.
"We're truly grateful to that Senior."
The caravan leader kowtowed several times toward the forest, then stood and loudly announced the good news that the Fallen Soul Master had been eliminated.
The survivors in the caravan, hearing the welcome tidings, were so moved that some wept tears of relief.
Under the leader's supervision the caravan soon resumed its journey toward Suotuo City.
On the road, the physically sturdier Yu Qingfeng woke first. Glancing around and then at the scenery slipping past the window, he looked curiously at Yu Yan, hoping for an explanation.
Yu Yan repeated the story about a Senior who had slain the Fallen Soul Master.
Although Yu Qingfeng felt something was off with the tale, he could find no real flaw in it. If it hadn't been the Senior, could Yu Yan and Xiao Wu have killed the Fallen Soul Master themselves?
Back in Suotuo City, with business to attend to, Yu Yan temporarily took leave of Yu Qingfeng and his wife. After finding lodgings with Xiao Wu, he began combing the streets for Flender's little shop.
Suotuo City lies on the southern plains of Balak Kingdom. As the kingdom's second-largest city and its granary, it is vast, and Flender's shop proved harder to locate than expected.
Night fell; having failed to find the place, Yu Yan and Xiao Wu returned to their inn and settled down to study the Little Fish Meditation Technique together.
The Little Fish Meditation Technique was originally the Han family's Meditation Technique. Xiao Wu felt that since it now belonged to them, calling it "Han family" sounded odd.
So she renamed it the Little Fish Meditation Technique.
Yu Yan had no real objection—only a small grievance that his own surname didn't come first.
Xiao Wu's reason was simple: "Little Fish" sounded better than "Fish Little".
After saying the name aloud twice, Yu Yan accepted it.
The technique's entry stage had two steps: first, visualise a lake of mercury; second, draw threads to form a stream.
Unlike ordinary Meditation Techniques that merely demand calm, this one required the cultivator, while serene, to picture in the mind a vast, mirror-smooth lake of liquid mercury—the hardest part, impossible for those lacking talent.
Two whole pages were devoted to examples of how to visualise the mercury lake.
Once the first step was achieved, one used mental force to draw filaments of mercury while absorbing natural spirit power, producing thread-like spirit power, then guided these threads along an extraordinarily complex set of micro-pathways through the Meridians at high speed.
The route was no ordinary grand cycle but a mesh of tiny, interlaced tracks, even including dead loops, designed to maximise flexibility and precision in spirit power flow.
Drawing threads into streams was a gradual, skilful process demanding not talent but immense patience.
After grasping the principle, Yu Yan and Xiao Wu sat beneath the moonlight and tried to visualise the mercury lake.
The technique was difficult; mastery would not come in a single day.
After more than three hours of meditation Yu Yan gained only modest progress and fell asleep… The next morning he resumed the hunt for Flender's shop. Eventually he found it on a street lined with clothing stores.
Flender's shop stood out from its neighbours.
Its sign showed a sword, a hammer, and a Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon.
Were the Upper Three Sects to learn someone had turned their Titled Douluo emblems into shop signage, who knew what they would think.
The door stood open, the interior dim. Yu Yan signalled Xiao Wu, and they walked in together.
A man lay in a rocking-chair in the centre of the shop, about forty, powerfully built; the chair creaked under his weight.
He had a long face, protruding chin, wide cheekbones, flat features and a hawk nose—his face looked rather like an insole.
Square black-rimmed crystal spectacles completed the odd picture.
These unmistakable features told Yu Yan this had to be Flender.
Not handsome, average dress, a shrewd and slightly sly air—no wonder Liu Erlong hadn't fallen for him.
If a man like that could still win the heart he wanted, Yu Yan would feel obliged to eat something in a toilet.
After sizing Flender up, Yu Yan turned his attention to the shop.
Items hung on all three walls, many visibly damaged; nothing looked valuable.
His gaze swept past them and settled on a head-sized, yellowish crystal at the base of a wall.
plank crystal gold filament.
Found you.
"Are all of these spirit tools?"
Xiao Wu, who had just obtained a spirit tool, whispered to Yu Yan while eyeing the spirit power-emanating wares on the walls.
spirit tools always possess spirit power; if not yet bonded to a user, that power leaks outward.
She was amazed the shop contained so many.
"Hard to say. Unless you pick them up and inspect them, you can't tell real from fake. Plenty of things can emit spirit power fluctuations."
Yu Yan quietly explained, while also baiting Flender to speak so he could continue.
Flender had already sized the two youngsters up when they entered; afterwards he closed his eyes again.
At only level 75, Flender the Spirit Saint could not see through Xiao Wu's true identity.
"If you're not buying, you can't pick things up for a casual look."