Chapter 49 Failing to Make Money

Pan Yun had drawn a considerable number of talismans and decided to take them down the mountain to sell. Along with the talismans, she also dug out several books on physiognomy.

There were not many books on physiognomy in Sanqing Taoist Temple—only two, in fact. However, the Spiritual Realm recorded a wealth of knowledge regarding face reading.

For the first eight years of her life, Pan Yun had never been troubled by matters of livelihood, so she had never seriously studied the art of physiognomy. Yet, drawing from Xuanmiao's experiences at the Prince of Zhou's estate, she had come to a realization: face reading was even more lucrative than alchemy and medical arts.

Of course, she had also observed Tao Ji's role at the Prince of Zhou's estate. Although there were resident physicians to compete with, combining a bit of alchemical and medical knowledge with the skill of physiognomy would yield even greater profits.

Besides, the greatest specialty of Sanqing Taoist Temple was, after all, alchemy.

In their daily lessons, physiognomy and talismans occupied just a single class, while the rest were entirely devoted to alchemy and medical arts.

Moreover, the permanent resident Taoists in the temple were Wang Feiyin, Tao Ji, and Xuanmiao.

Xuanmiao had been in prolonged seclusion and had not stepped out once. The physiognomy and talisman-making they were taught by Wang Feiyin were only the most rudimentary basics; so far, she had mastered every single talisman he had taught.

Tao Ji took Tao Yanbai down the mountain to practice medicine every few days, and even when he occasionally stayed behind in the mountains, it was to gather herbs. Their teacher for alchemy and medicine was still Wang Feiyin.

Truly, opening her eyes in the morning meant seeing the Senior Brother, and closing them at night still meant seeing the Senior Brother.

No matter who one chose as a master, Tao Ji had said, it made no difference, because Wang Feiyin was the one teaching everyone.

Pan Yun stirred her bowl, mixing the rice and vegetables together so the rice would taste a bit more savory. She shoveled large mouthfuls into her mouth and asked her daily routine question: "Has the Fourth Senior Sister come out of seclusion yet?"

Miaozhen replied, "I cast a divination, and the Fourth Senior Uncle will emerge this afternoon."

Pan Yun then announced, "I'm going down the mountain with the Fourth Senior Sister tomorrow."

Miaozhen and Miaohe both turned their heads to look at the Senior Uncle sitting not far away, facing the cliff.

The Junior Sister's remark clearly wasn't addressed to them, but rather to the Senior Uncle.

Sure enough, the Senior Uncle, who had been eating attentively, glanced over at them and asked, "What are you going down the mountain for?"

"One, to pick up letters. Two, to make money for His Reverence, our Master."

The first reason could easily be delegated to Tao Ji and the others who went down the mountain, but the second...

The excuse was so righteous that Wang Feiyin couldn't find a reason to refuse on the spot.

Yet, reflecting on it, this child was different from Miaozhen and Miaohe—she was precocious, and the skills she possessed were rather eclectic. Her cultivation could not be handled in the exact same way as Miaozhen and Miaohe's, so he nodded and said, "Very well, you may go."

Upon hearing this, Miaohe immediately picked up her rice bowl and squeezed in beside Wang Feiyin, looking at him with pleading eyes. "Senior Uncle, I want to go down the mountain too! I... I can lead the way for the Junior Sister and keep her company."

Miaozhen said nothing, but she also picked up her rice bowl and stepped forward, gazing imploringly at Wang Feiyin alongside Miaohe.

Wang Feiyin: ......He knew it. Pan Yun's appearance was the greatest challenge to his educational philosophy; one of the greatest trials in human existence was not suffering from scarcity, but suffering from inequality.

Meeting the gazes of the two children, Wang Feiyin gritted his teeth and said, "Alright, all of you go."

Miaohe and Miaozhen let out a cheer, cradled their rice bowls back to their original spots, squeezed tightly against Pan Yun, and happily continued eating.

Miaozhen's calculation was dead accurate; that very afternoon, Xuanmiao indeed emerged from seclusion.

After having a light meal, she bathed and changed her clothes. It wasn't until she finished her evening devotions that she learned she was expected to take three children down the mountain the next day.

Xuanmiao: ......

Wang Feiyin explained, "Old Master Qian of Yushan County has fallen ill and his condition has lingered without healing. The Third Junior Brother has taken Yanbai to see him and won't be returning to the mountain for the next few days, so this matter falls entirely to you. Besides, the three children are growing up; it's time to take them out to see the world."

Xuanmiao responded, "I wasn't planning to go very far, only to Dayuan Dock."

Dayuan Dock was the largest nearby settlement and served as the township center. Every fifth and tenth day of the lunar month held a major market; tomorrow happened to be the tenth, exactly a market day.

There was an expedited courier station located there, and all mail for this vicinity was delivered to that spot.

Taking Pan Yun along wasn't a bad idea either, since this trip down the mountain was intended to collect any letters inquiring about the Pan family's second branch.

Going down the mountain required an early start. Long before the hour of *mao*, the three children were awakened. After a quick wash, they shouldered the bamboo backbaskets they had packed the previous night and set off.

Xuanmiao instructed Pan Yun to walk at the very rear, while she herself took the lead at the front to guide the way, explaining, "We are the elders, and our martial arts are better than theirs."

"I know, it's about cherishing the younger generation and protecting the weak." It was the exact same logic behind why she had been shielded in the center by Tao Ji and Xuanmiao when they first climbed the mountain.

The group of four carried their backbaskets down the mountain.

Though Miaozhen and Miaohe were young, they had practiced martial arts and cultivation from a very tender age. Their physical prowess was not much inferior to Tao Yanbai's, and since they frequently gathered herbs in the mountains, their stamina for traveling mountain trails was every bit as good as Pan Yun's, whose cultivation had already yielded results.

They followed Xuanmiao smoothly all the way to the foot of the mountain, moving at a remarkably swift pace.

It was still pitch dark when they descended, though some villagers had already risen. Xuanmiao led them through the settlement amidst an unbroken symphony of crowing roosters and barking dogs.

A household situated right by the roadside poked their head out to look, catching a faint glimpse of Xuanmiao in the hazy morning mist, and hurriedly called out, "Is Daoist Master Xuanmiao heading out?"

Xuanmiao acknowledged with a nod, "Going to Dayuan Dock for the market."

"My, you're setting off awfully early."

Xuanmiao replied briefly, quickly leading the three youngsters past the village.

Once the first rays of dawn broke, the sky brightened with astonishing speed, and within moments, they could clearly see the path beneath their feet.

By the time they reached Dayuan Dock, day had completely broken.

Pan Yun had never been to Dayuan Dock before; she hadn't passed through this way when she first arrived.

There were plenty of people heading out early in the morning just like them to attend the market. When they entered the village, the marketplace was already bustling with activity, and a steady stream of people carrying shoulder poles was converging from all directions.

Food stalls abounded.

Shops were sparse here, and the paths were flat stretches of mud and grass where anyone could set up camp. Consequently, food vendors had arrived before dawn to claim their spots. The steamers for steamed buns and mantou were billowing with hot steam, the rich fragrance of fine white flour drifting incessantly into people's noses.

The noodle stall had already brought its broth to a boil, and the vendor was earnestly kneading dough.

There was also a dedicated pastry stall where the vendor rolled out massive flatbreads and chopped up braised meat right on the spot before customers' eyes, waiting for buyers to purchase meat pies.

Miaohe came to a complete halt right by the meat pie stall and refused to move another step.

Xuanmiao said, "Let's get breakfast first."

She seated herself at the noodle stall, yet tossed a handful of copper coins to Miaohe, telling them, "The three of you go together and buy some other treats."

Miaohe happily accepted, put down her backbasket, grabbed Miaozhen with one hand and Pan Yun with the other, and bounded off.

She even shared her little insights with Pan Yun: "I love going down the mountain with the Third and Fourth Senior Uncles. The Third Senior Uncle is soft-hearted; if you plead with him a bit, he'll take us to all sorts of places. The Fourth Senior Uncle is generous—she gives us money no matter what we want to eat."

Pan Yun asked, "What about the Senior Brother?"

Miaohe replied, "The Senior Uncle is good too, but the Senior Uncle has no money."

Faced with Pan Yun's puzzled expression, Miaozhen explained, "The Senior Uncle lacks financial luck. Whenever money touches his hands, some unexpected accident always happens to cause financial loss."

"Is that so?" For some unknown reason, Pan Yun felt a faint ripple of unease.

To practice the Dao was, in essence, to make oneself infinitely close to the Dao, which was why Daoists placed special trust in their intuition, believing it to be hints bestowed by the heavenly mandate.

Pan Yun caught hold of this sensation, yet could not quite figure out the reason behind it.

It wasn't until after she had eaten and drunk her fill that she set out her neatly folded talismans beside the small stall run by Miaohe and Miaozhen.

Passersby would cast curious glances, but that was all—they would merely take a look and walk on.

On the other hand, the assorted medicinal herbs that Miaohe and Miaozhen had bundled up sold quite briskly, providing a steady stream of income.

Pan Yun rested her chin in her hands, sitting to one side to watch them.

Generously, Miaohe offered to split her earnings half and half with her.

Pan Yun wasn't about to take money from two young children and pushed the coins back, asking, "Does nobody here buy talismans?"

Miaozhen answered, "With no illness, no disaster, and no malevolent spirits acting up, why would anyone waste money on talismans?"

Pan Yun glanced over at the medicinal herbs they were selling. "Then these herbs..."

"They're all herbs for purging toxins and cooling fevers. People take them in the summer to refresh the mind and prevent heatstroke," Miaozhen explained. "We sell them like this every summer; even the apothecary shops in Yushan County come to us to buy herbs, and the nearby villagers all know about them, so they buy from us."

"Besides, the people of Mount Sanqing frequently come down the mountain to practice medicine, and everyone knows our medical skills are excellent and our herbs are top-notch," Miaohe added. "Junior Sister, I think trying to sell talismans here won't work. There aren't any demons, ghosts, or monsters anywhere near Mount Sanqing, so people simply have no use for these things."

Pan Yun asked, "Why aren't there any demons, ghosts, or monsters?"

The two of them answered as if it were the most natural thing in the world, "Because we have the protection of the mountain deities, of course."

This caught Pan Yun completely by surprise.

In her past life, ghosts and monsters ran rampant, and talismans were the easiest items to sell.

Pan Yun's talismans were of exceptional quality; she only had to list them online, and they would sell out in no time. Yet here, she couldn't sell a single one!

Pan Yun looked up, channeled spiritual energy into her eyes, and used her innate ability to observe the people in the village. She discovered... there really wasn't the slightest trace of dark, ominous aura.

Even if there were impoverished and struggling people, it wasn't because they had suffered from supernatural misfortune—they were simply born into hardship. Such people might benefit from a physical enhancement talisman to reduce illness and bodily wear caused by hardship, but even a good-luck talisman would be useless to them.

Because the local populace was impoverished as a whole; no matter how good one's luck was, one wouldn't simply walk out and stumble upon a pile of silver. Besides, that kind of wind-fall luck was built upon someone else's misfortune, and she never drew that sort of talisman.

Her good-luck talismans merely helped people bypass accidents tainted with misfortune; they could never pull unearned windfalls straight out of thin air.

Yet, hardship itself was no accident.

When it came to talismans, if one could not produce immediate, miraculous results, who would spend money on them?

Even if they bought them, they would suspect they were fakes, and in a state of disbelief, the efficacy of the talismans would be halved.

Silently, Pan Yun packed up her pouch of talismans and murmured, "I was wrong. I shouldn't be trying to sell talismans here. I ought to go to a major city, like Kaifeng Prefecture or Guangxin Prefecture."