Chapter 614: The List

Chapter 616: The List

What could be inside?

Mo Hua’s eyes lit up, curiosity surging.

That Boss Jiang—within a pile of rambling, disorganized notes—had actually hidden some unspeakable secrets…

Moreover, he had sealed them first, then encrypted them. Such elaborate effort, clearly meant to avoid discovery—there had to be something valuable hidden within!

Mo Hua’s lips curled into a sly smile, eyes squinting.

He wanted to crack it open and see for himself.

Zheng Fang had once explained the difference between sealing and encrypting.

Sealing involved constructing uncertain magnetic patterns to create a layer of blank “fog-like magnetic ink” to obscure the text.

Encryption, however, was a method of “disguising” the text.

More precisely, it meant twisting the Secondary Thunder Runes, altering the magnetic flow, and tampering with the fixed and unfixed “conventions,” so that the text would appear altered—essentially, disguised.

What one saw on the surface was not the true content of the jade slip.

“To decrypt it, you must decipher the ‘encrypted runes,’ correct the distorted Secondary Thunder Runes, and restore the jade slip’s true text…”

In other words, it was about correcting the “conventions” between fixed and unfixed magnetic patterns.

The key still lay in the Secondary Thunder Runes…

Everything a cultivator did left traces.

Encrypted jade slips were no exception.

As long as Boss Jiang had used “encrypted runes” to view the true contents of the jade slip, those runes would produce magnetic flow—leaving behind traces.

Other cultivators might not perceive those traces, but Mo Hua—whose divine sense had already undergone a qualitative transformation and who could combine both deceptive and deductive calculation—could.

It was the same principle he had used to “unseal” the jade slip.

By sensing the traces and inferring the Secondary Thunder Runes, then cross-matching them against the known runes, he could uncover the actual encrypted runes.

Decrypting, however, was more complicated than unsealing.

He had to observe the jade slip and sense the magnetic patterns—something that couldn’t be deduced atop the Dao Tablet.

Therefore, he couldn’t spend too long on it.

Otherwise, his divine sense could become overloaded and torn apart by the deceptive and deductive currents, causing real damage.

So it would take much more time.

Mo Hua patiently endured, working step by step, slowly deducing each magnetic flow.

Fortunately, the sealing runes and encrypted runes on this “diary” jade slip belonged to the same category. After over half a month, Mo Hua finally decrypted the true “encrypted runes.”

He let out a long sigh of relief.

After his first successful decoding of a sealing rune, this was also his first success in decrypting encrypted runes!

His library of Secondary Thunder Runes had grown richer.

His mastery over Thunder-Magnetic Arrays had also advanced another solid step.

Though, he couldn’t help but wonder—if he continued learning like this, to the absolute extreme… what exactly could he achieve?

Mo Hua frowned, pondering.

To fully perceive magnetic flow and master the Secondary Thunder Runes was akin to possessing countless keys.

In that case, wouldn’t all the sealed and encrypted jade slips in the world become meaningless to him?

Could he eventually plunder the inheritance of the entire cultivation world?

“…That’s terrifying…”

Even Mo Hua didn’t dare imagine it further.

He shook his head and put aside such “delusional fantasies,” returning to tinkering with Boss Jiang’s “diary.”

Zheng Fang had once told him everything about the decryption process.

Mo Hua recalled it, then sank his divine sense into the jade slip, condensing a Secondary Thunder Rune from free-flowing magnetic ink—one he had worked hard to decipher.

He used this Secondary Thunder Rune as the “encrypted rune” and layered it over the characters that had magnetic flow traces.

The Secondary Thunder Current generated by the encrypted rune seeped through the surface magnetic ink into the uncertain magnetic patterns, then flowed into the foundational layer, correcting the distorted magnetic flow caused by the disguise—“correcting the deviation to restore the truth”—and thus forming a true bridge.

Within the jade slip, the text of Boss Jiang’s diary began to distort and twist, then finally stabilized—revealing the true face beneath the disguise.

Mo Hua leaned in eagerly.

As he read on, his expression grew increasingly intrigued.

These words…

Were they… a “list”?

Row after row—every name was a nickname used in the cultivation world:

“Poison Rakshasa, Fire Foreman, Golden Arhat, Young Master, Human Butcher, Bloodwoodcutter, Yin Lightning Son, Lady Miao, Ghost-Faced Fiend, River-Crossing Dragon…”

Each name reeked of street lore and sounded completely shady.

Judging by these names, the cultivators on this list were at least criminals—and many were likely evil or demonic cultivators.

Mo Hua was stunned and muttered in his heart:

“So looks are deceiving… Boss Jiang really has such a wide social circle?”

“But something doesn’t add up…”

These nicknames were seriously fierce, and the cultivators behind them definitely didn’t seem like friendly folks. How could they possibly have any connection with a guy whose name sounded as bland as ‘Boss Jiang’?

“These people… may not have been his acquaintances…”

“Could it be that this list was something Boss Jiang stumbled upon?”

“Or maybe… he picked it up after straying into dark paths—murder, arson, scams, swindling—he might’ve heard of them along the way?”

“Or perhaps… they’re all part of the same organization?”

“What kind of organization would that be?”

…

Mo Hua couldn’t figure it out.

Besides, there was still one crucial issue.

This “list”… didn’t seem particularly useful if he just kept it to himself…

“Hand it over to the Dao Tribunal in exchange for merit points?”

But he hadn’t actually caught any criminals. There was no concrete achievement. And since there hadn’t been a formal bounty or mission issued, even if he turned it in, he might not get any merit for it.

What if the Dao Tribunal asked how he got the “list”?

What was he supposed to say?

That he’d been kidnapped by traffickers, then slaughtered them, killed Boss Jiang, looted his storage ring, took his Broken Gold jade slip, used his mastery of the Primordial Magnetic Array to crack the “sealing runes,” break the “encrypted runes,” and found this list?

Yeah… that entire sequence probably couldn’t be shared with the Dao Tribunal.

And if he lied, he’d have to come up with an airtight whopper—one tiny slip and he’d be exposed.

Even if it counted as “justified self-defense,” the Dao Tribunal might let it slide, but they’d still probably tag him as a “high-risk individual” and keep him under close watch.

That would make his future endeavors a lot more complicated.

“But if I don’t hand it over, what am I supposed to do with this list I went through all the trouble to decrypt?”

Mo Hua lay on his bed, arms behind his head, staring at the ceiling, eyes blinking thoughtfully.

Suddenly, a flash of insight struck him, and his eyes lit up.

Names, aliases…

As the saying goes: “A person’s name casts a shadow like a tree.”

There are no wrong nicknames—only names that are too accurate.

Like that Bald Vulture.

Mo Hua didn’t know the guy’s real name, but since he was called the “Bald Vulture,” he was probably bald, and his head even had a Four-Symbol Vulture Pattern Array etched into it.

“Bald.” “Vulture.”

Not a word of that nickname was wrong.

So this list, with so many aliases, was likely drawn from the cultivators’ physical features, techniques, Dao arts, or signature combat styles.

Like “Poison Rakshasa”—probably a poison specialist.

“Fire Foreman”? Definitely someone who cultivated fire-type arts and techniques.

“Golden Arhat”? Arhats usually referred to body cultivators—throw in “gold,” and it likely meant he cultivated some metal-element body protection technique, like a “Golden Bell Shield” spell.

“Young Master”? Probably some silk-robed, womanizing playboy cultivating some heretical dual cultivation technique…

…

In other words, every one of these cultivators likely carried some form of inheritance!

To make a name for themselves in the talent-saturated, sect-dense, heritage-rich Qianxue Prefecture region… and even leave a nickname behind in the underworld…

That meant the inheritances they carried had to be quite exceptional!

Boss Jiang’s “list of criminals” could just as easily be considered a—

List of inheritances!

Mo Hua’s thoughts suddenly cleared up.

Time to raise the stakes.

Why only fleece righteous sects?

Evil cultivators have wool too, and it’s just as pluckable!

As long as he could catch them, “persuade them with reason,” and ask where their inheritance came from, then he wouldn’t need to waste merit points buying techniques anymore.

He might even earn merit by catching them!

A total win-win!

As for how to choose which inheritance…

Mo Hua already had a plan.

Whatever type of spell or inheritance he wanted to learn, he’d go hunt down evil cultivators with matching elements from the list.

If he wanted to learn fire-type arts, he’d target criminals whose aliases included “Fire,” “Flame,” or “Blaze.”

If he wanted metal-type spells, he’d look for names with “Gold,” “Diamond,” or “Golden Arhat.”

For water-type techniques, names like “Water,” “Wave,” “River,” “Fish,” or “Flood Dragon”…

…

It’d be like flipping through a spell catalog—target acquired.

Of course, whether he found a suitable technique still depended somewhat on luck.

But even if he didn’t, he’d at least earn some merit for catching them.

Mo Hua’s big eyes gleamed brightly.

“Boss Jiang… was a great guy!”

This list was practically a second Merit Record Book!

Now the only questions were—what kind of spell to start with, which criminal’s name to call out, how to find them, and how to accept a mission…

He’d need to sort out the details carefully.

Once everything was in place—he could start the “roll call.”

Mo Hua held the jade slip tightly, and a smile crept onto his face.

Boss Jiang might be dead, but he didn’t know that the diary he left behind had turned into a “Death Diary.”

…

What spell should he start with?

After half a day of deep thought, Mo Hua decided—he should first learn a more complete concealment technique.

Useful for both attack and retreat. Great for escaping too.

His current concealment spell was far too unreliable.

The one he learned originally could only be cultivated by those with pure water spiritual roots.

He had minor five-element roots, which did include water, but they were mixed—so his stealth wasn’t very complete. Sometimes his hand or head would still show.

Only after combining it with a concealment array was it finally usable.

But now that he had built his Foundation and entered one of the Eight Great Sects—the Great Void Sect—his future opponents wouldn’t be just common cultivators. Most would be troublesome criminals and evil cultivators. He needed to upgrade his stealth game.

Mo Hua began flipping through the list.

Cultivators skilled in stealth were usually thieves or bandits. Their names might include “Hidden,” or something like “Magic Hands” or “Star Snatcher.”

After searching for a while, Mo Hua finally found his first lucky target:

Hidden Second Brother.

No description—just the name. But Mo Hua had a gut feeling this guy was a stealth expert.

Target locked.

Next step—find this Hidden Second Brother…

But how?

Mo Hua frowned.

Should he start… with the Dao Tribunal?

Mo Hua furrowed his brows. Start with the Dao Tribunal?

He was just a low-ranking disciple of the Great Void Sect. The Dao Tribunal wouldn’t even know who he was…

He did have a bronze waist token from the Dao Tribunal.

But that token was unofficial—issued by the Dao Tribunal of Tongxian City, a remote second-rank Immortal City in the Lì Prefecture. Over here in Qian Prefecture, it might not even be recognized.

Besides, even if he managed to find Hidden Second Brother, he’d definitely need help capturing him.

Otherwise, as a mere early Foundation Establishment cultivator, he probably couldn’t handle an old fox like Hidden Second Brother on his own.

After thinking it over, Mo Hua concluded that there was really only one option: take on a mission.

He’d need to try his luck and see if the sect’s Reward Register happened to list a mission targeting Hidden Second Brother.

The people on Boss Jiang’s list were all criminal cultivators active in or near the Qianxue Prefecture.

If Hidden Second Brother had been up to no good, the Dao Tribunal would surely be watching him.

With limited manpower, the Dao Tribunal would very likely push bounties to the sects.

That way, Mo Hua could “legitimately” take on the mission to capture Hidden Second Brother—and while doing so, fleece him for his concealment technique inheritance.

It would all come down to a bit of luck… and “fate.”

Over the next few days, whenever Mo Hua had spare time between classes and meals, he’d open his Great Void Token and keep a close eye on the Reward Register, flipping through each mission one by one.

Anything that mentioned bandits, stealth, or concealment—Mo Hua would mark it immediately.

But such missions were rare. After flipping through them for eight or nine days, he still hadn’t found anything promising.

One afternoon, after eating his fill, Mo Hua was chatting in the disciples’ quarters with a few fellow sectmates.

There was the big guy Cheng Mo, the sword cultivator genius from Lì Prefecture named Situ Jian, Zheng Fang from the Zheng Clan in Zhen Prefecture, and a few other disciples he got along well with.

Mo Hua was telling them stories.

He spoke of the terrifying beasts in the Black Mountain.

How dangerous and thrilling beast hunters’ lives were.

What zombies were like.

What a “walker corpse” was, what an “iron corpse” was, what a “bronze corpse” was, and how one could become a “Corpse King.”

What a full-blown corpse tide looked like when it flooded the mountains.

He also shared tales of desolate wildernesses, evil cultivators who captured souls, demonic cultivators who devoured people…

He had these pampered scions of aristocratic clans—who had barely ever left home—completely stunned.

Cheng Mo’s jaw dropped as he murmured,

“Mo Hua… you’re not making this up, right…”

Mo Hua shrugged, “Believe it or not.”

His throat dry from talking, Mo Hua picked up a teapot and gulped down several mouthfuls.

Cheng Mo still looked skeptical. “How old are you? You’re telling us about beast hunting, corpse tides, evil cults… You’d have to be blowing smoke…”

“Think what you want.” Mo Hua couldn’t be bothered.

“You are lying…”

“Then why were you just now listening so intently?”

Cheng Mo was stumped. He was skeptical—but Mo Hua’s storytelling was so vivid, so immersive, it felt completely real.

Situ Jian had also been listening intently, but suddenly remembered something.

“Speaking of beast hunting…” he said, “you know the sect does allow beast hunts, right?”

“The sect? Hunting beasts?” Mo Hua blinked. “That’s a thing?”

“You didn’t know?” Situ Jian asked, puzzled.

Mo Hua shook his head.

He’d been a rogue cultivator before this—his first time in the Qianxue Prefecture, his first time joining a sect. No one had told him any of this.

Wenren Wan had mentioned a few things, but she couldn’t possibly cover everything in detail—some stuff was bound to slip through.

Mo Hua asked, “Where do you hunt beasts?”

Situ Jian replied, “In Qianxue Prefecture, there’s a place called Demon Refining Mountain. Tons of beasts live there—left there intentionally by high-level cultivators. It’s for disciples to train in Dao arts and team up to slay monsters.”

“But… it’s a bit far.”

“New disciples aren’t allowed in Demon Refining Mountain. You need to be at least mid-Foundation Establishment.”

“There are also many rare beasts inside. Their materials are highly valuable, used specifically to forge spiritual tools—especially spirit swords…”

“Forging swords?!”

Mo Hua’s eyes lit up.

Situ Jian also looked excited. “Yeah. I heard that some spirit swords must be forged using the bones of beasts from Demon Refining Mountain in Qianxue Prefecture…”

Mo Hua nodded slightly, thinking of the Broken Gold Sword Art inheritance he had—it included techniques for sword forging.

Specifically how to forge the sword tools needed for sword control techniques…

He was about to ask more when suddenly—his heart skipped a beat. It felt as if something he’d long been hoping for had finally happened.

Concealment technique!

Mo Hua immediately opened his Great Void Token—and sure enough, a batch of new missions had appeared!

Among them was one mission that, while it looked plain on the surface, practically glowed in Mo Hua’s eyes:

“Bounty issued by the Dao Tribunal of Qianxue Prefecture…”

“A strange ambush-slaying case…”

(End of this Chapter)