After Igneel landed, Lin Fan walked a bit before reaching a town.
The guards of this town didn’t even bother stopping him from entering since this was a small town in the middle of nowhere.
Or rather, this was a town that was on the edge of a small kingdom known as the Yao Kingdom known as Winding Stream Town.
It was just a small kingdom that only existed because it was in contested lands. This was a place that didn’t have enough natural resources even for its people, so there was no need for the other countries to invade this Yao Kingdom.
They even kept it and left it alone because it made the perfect buffer zone for them.
The other countries used the Yao Kingdom as neutral land to not only create a zone for trade, but also a zone so that no one would be able to invade each other without notice. If there was a country that tried anything, they would have to go through the Yao Kingdom first and would be found immediately.
As such, the Yao Kingdom was able to survive all this time, even though it was poor because of the lack of natural resources.
Though that wasn’t strange considering the strange shape of the Yao Kingdom.
The natural resources that were in these lands were taken by the other kingdoms and the Yao Kingdom was left with this strange shape. The lands that were left for the Yao Kingdom were the lands that didn’t seem like they were worth anything.
Since the Yao Kingdom didn’t have any natural resources to depend on, they didn’t have anything to export.
They even barely had enough to support the livelihoods of their citizens.
The one thing that they relied on to support themselves was trade.
It wasn’t that they exported things, but rather they took a fee for trading between countries.
Since they had a position between these different countries, they were able to use it to their advantage as being a place for the different countries to trade with each other. Though most of the time, that meant that most of the trade that happened in the Yao Kingdom was illegal.
Still, this was how they supported themselves, so it wasn’t as if it was going to stop any time soon.
That was why the guards didn’t care about Lin Fan entering the town.
They didn’t care about anyone entering the town since they knew that most of the trade that happened here would be illegal.
If they were to stop that, the Yao Kingdom’s economy would collapse and the people would suffer.
Even before that, the guards would no longer be paid for guarding the town.
In this world, the most important thing was oneself and then one’s family.
If they couldn’t even afford to feed themselves, there was no way that they would be able to act civil. There was no way that they would act as guards if they couldn’t feed themselves, they would have become bandits instead.
Though when he passed through the gate, Lin Fan did pass some money to the guards.
He wasn’t the only one that did this, everyone else also passed money to the guards.
This was considered the entrance fee to the town.
Once he entered the town, Lin Fan went to one of the bars that was near the gate.
He didn’t even bother finding a place to stay first, he just went directly to the bar since that was the best place to gather information.
After ordering a drink, Lin Fan sat down at one of the tables.
This wasn’t a table that was in the back nor was this a table that was in the front, this was a table that was in the center of the room. It was actually right in the center of the room, so one might think that this was a conspicuous spot, but that wasn’t the case.
After all, this was a table that was surrounded by other tables and many other people.
One said that the best place to hide a tree was in the forest.
So the best place to hide a human was in a place where there were many other humans.
Only if they had an appearance that was exceptional would they stand out in this crowd, but Lin Fan was wearing a disguise right now. His face was the most forgettable face in the world, so it wasn’t as if he would stand out at all.
This allowed him to easily hide himself in this crowd.
With his senses as a cultivator, it was easy for him to pick up on the conversations around him. Though most of these conversations just weren’t useful to him at all since they were normal conversations.
“Your wife found out, didn’t she?”
“Yes and now I’m in the dog house…”
“You’re saying that you took that girl from the other bar home last night? How did it go?”
“He, he, she really was something else…”
It was just the normal kind of thing that people would talk about in times like this.
There was no information that Lin Fan wanted about the Divine Blood Fruit at all.
Or at least that was until he heard something that caught his attention.
“You’re saying that there’s been movement on White Frost Mountain lately?”
The moment that he heard mention of this, Lin Fan immediately focused on the people that were talking about this.
That was because the White Frost Mountain was the place where the Divine Blood Fruit was supposed to be.
It was also the place that he wanted more information on.
If there was something happening at White Frost Mountain, there was no doubt that it would be related to the Divine Blood Fruit that he was here to collect.
So of course he wanted to know more.
“It’s not that there’s been movement, it’s just that there have been some strange people gathering there.”
“Strange people? What do you mean?”
Strange people…people that were under the Five Great Sects?
“Well these people have been wandering around the White Frost Mountain hunting spirit beasts. It isn’t that they’re exactly strange, it’s just that there’s no reason for them to hunt spirit beasts like that. The ones that are on White Frost Mountain aren’t even that valuable in the first place.”
“What do you care about these strange people? If they want to waste their time, what does it matter to us?”
“It just feels like something is off…Do you think that there’s some kind of treasure on White Frost Mountain?”
“Even if there was, would there be anything for people like us?”
Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.
He could immediately tell what the ‘strange people’ that these two were talking about were doing.
They were most likely people dispatched by those under the Five Great Sects to clear out the White Frost Mountain ahead of time. At the same time, it was very likely that they would start chasing people away from White Frost Mountain when the time came.
They were just like Lin Fan, they had come here early to prepare to fight for the Divine Blood Fruit when the time came.
But the method that they chose was different from Lin Fan’s method.
Still, the fact that he knew that they were here was a very important piece of information in the first place.
As long as he knew that they were here, he would be able to find out what they were planning and eventually steal from them.
As such, the most important thing for him to do right now was scout out the area around the White Frost Mountain before the time came. He still had around three weeks since it only took him a day to come here by traveling on Igneel.
Before he could leave though, there was something else that caught Lin Fan’s attention.
“Did you hear about the strange things happening by the stream?”
When he heard this, Lin Fan couldn’t help stopping himself from calling the waiter to settle his bill and focused on this conversation.
“You mean the rumours about the strange creatures? Why are you bringing that up?”
“I’ve heard that it wasn’t strange creatures, but rather there were humans that were wandering around the stream.”
“Psh, you’re just thinking too much.”
“I don’t think so…I’ve heard that they’ve been doing some strange things at night by the stream.”
“If you’re so worried, why don’t you go check it out?”
“You think my wife would let me? She would kill me before that happened.”
“Ha, ha, right, you were a whipped man, weren’t you?”
For some reason, there was a part of Lin Fan that was a bit hurt because of this.
But the reason he was paying attention to this in the first place was because he felt that there was something there.
He didn’t know why he felt this way, he just felt like there was something that was off about this rumour.
It was just a good thing that this was a place that was nearby, so he could check it whenever he wanted.
In that case…it was best to do it tonight.
There was a reason why this town was called Winding Stream Town.
It was because it was beside a stream that was called Winding Stream.
While this could be nothing, Lin Fan didn’t think the same thing.
He felt that there was more than met the eye in this matter and wanted to check it out personally.
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