Click.
The heavy concealed door eased shut behind him, sealing away Jia Fu's deep, penetrating gaze entirely.
Lin Mu stood in the corridor of the Three Star Cave's third floor and let out a long, slow breath — expelling the stale air that had been compressed in his chest.
Trading words with a supreme operator who had spent the better part of a lifetime clawing his way through the Southern Border's commercial world was more draining than fighting a Rank 2 Demonic Path cultivator to the death.
Every sentence, every glance, could have been a probe or a trap laid by the other side.
But fortunately, he had not only landed the tightrope walk without stumbling — he had used the intelligence advantage from the original story to turn the situation around with considerable elegance.
Lin Mu steadied his mind and took stock of the third floor.
Compared to the first floor's shoulder-to-shoulder chaos — the noise of a common market — the third floor was strikingly open and still. Soft, thick animal hides lined the corridor.
The few customers who moved through this space were without exception richly dressed, their bearing carrying the settled, mountain-like weight of those who commanded a region. Every one of them was at minimum a Rank 3 elder-level figure of some major power.
This was the Three Star Cave's rigidly enforced hierarchy.
Rank 1 Gu on the first floor. Rank 2 on the second. Rank 3 on the third.
The higher one climbed, the fewer the people — but the transaction values and the grade of the goods scaled upward in geometric leaps.
And to squeeze every last stone from a buyer's pocket, the Gu worms on display were not available indefinitely.
Rank 1 Gu had a bidding window of half a day. Rank 2, one day. Rank 3, two days. Only the most obscure, unwanted dregs sat on the shelves without a deadline.
This combination of "limited-time purchase" and "sealed blind bidding" was like an invisible blade, driving straight into the soft underbelly of every buyer with surgical precision.
It amplified anxiety to an extreme degree, forcing anyone who truly wanted an item to submit a bid far above its actual value — squeezing the caravan's profit margin to its absolute limit.
Paying eight hundred for the Liquor Worm was a slight overpayment. But to guarantee it without any risk, there was no other choice.
Lin Mu made his way down the staircase. As he passed the central display case on the third floor, his steps slowed involuntarily.
Behind the crystal dome — sealed beneath multiple layers of defensive Gu formations, half-veiled by lush green leaves —
A sphere no larger than a thumb, perfectly round, radiating a soft and pure silver-white radiance, floated in perfect stillness.
Rank 3 — the White Silver Relic Gu.
Its function was identical to the Red Iron Relic Gu, but its target was different. This one could directly elevate a Rank 3 Gu Master by an entire minor stage — with no side effects whatsoever.
Lin Mu glanced at the price placard beneath it.
Starting bid: thirty thousand Primeval Stones.
Gulp.
His throat moved. Thirty thousand was only the opening price.
Given the nature of sealed bidding, and the extraordinary level of enthusiasm today, the White Silver Relic Gu's final transaction price would almost certainly exceed fifty thousand Primeval Stones.
"My ten-thousand-plus stone fortune might let me walk sideways among Rank 1 and Rank 2 circles. But in front of true heavyweights like these, I do not even qualify to make a sound."
The illusion shattered instantly. That faint, floating sense of wealth that had crept in was crushed by the brutal reality of these prices.
In the Gu world, never think yourself rich. The resources of a higher tier are always a bottomless pit.
He shook his head, pulled his gaze away, and descended quickly to the second floor.
The second floor was the trading zone for Rank 2 Gu worms.
His second core objective for this visit — the Red Iron Relic Gu, the one that could vault him instantly to Rank 2 middle stage — was somewhere on this floor.
Looking at the Black Blood Stockade Deacons and wandering cultivators crowding around him, arguing over Rank 2 Gu worms and filling out bid slips with red-eyed intensity, Lin Mu was just about to push into the crowd and find the Red Iron Relic Gu's display stand.
Then —
His feet stopped dead, as though nailed to the floor.
A wave of intense, visceral dread surged up his spine like a striking viper, flooding through his entire body in an instant.
Beneath the bamboo hat, Lin Mu's forehead broke out in a dense, cold sweat.
"Wait. Something is wrong."
Every alarm in his mind began screaming at once.
In the original story, Fang Yuan had not purchased the Rank 2 Red Iron Relic Gu until the seventh day of the Jia Clan Caravan's stay — after liquidating his family assets.
And before that, Fang Yuan had also purchased a Liquor Worm.
"Liquor Worm... Red Iron Relic Gu..."
The cold realization crashed through Lin Mu's mind. He finally understood what catastrophic, potentially irreversible mistake he had nearly made.
His current needs were nearly identical to Fang Yuan's during the Qing Mao Mountain arc.
If today, in the Three Star Cave's ledger, the name "Lin Mu" appeared not only as the buyer of a rare Liquor Worm, but also as the buyer of an expensive Red Iron Relic Gu —
Then, several months from now —
When the Jia Clan Caravan finally reached Qing Mao Mountain after a long and arduous journey, and a young man named Gu Yue Fang Yuan, with a strikingly similar level of purchasing power, once again bought from Jia Fu's caravan another Liquor Worm and another Red Iron Relic Gu —
What would that look like to a supremely sharp, extraordinarily perceptive merchant like Jia Fu?
A duplicate answer sheet.
The back of Lin Mu's robe was already soaked through with cold sweat. "This is a fatal duplicate answer sheet — one that spans time and distance."
A coincidence once could be called fate.
But a shopping list this specific, this obscure, this expensive, appearing twice in a short span of time — that would ignite the suspicions and imagination of a man like Jia Fu beyond all control.
And far more terrifying than Jia Fu was Fang Yuan himself.
Fang Yuan was a reincarnator carrying five hundred years of memory. Jia Fu might only suspect.
But if Jia Fu, in the course of some conversation with Fang Yuan, happened to mention offhandedly that "a few months ago at Black Blood Stockade, a young man named Lin Mu bought the exact same combination as you" —
With Fang Yuan's near-demonic intelligence and his instinct to treat every shadow as a threat, he would deduce in an instant that the timeline of this world had been disturbed.
He would realize immediately that Black Blood Stockade harbored a massive unknown variable — someone who knew the future, possibly another reincarnator.
"Once Fang Yuan sets his sights on me in advance, every advantage I hold becomes a joke. He has a hundred ways to destroy me from the shadows without ever showing his hand."
Lin Mu drew a slow, deep breath and forced his hammering heart to steady.
"Smother it. This threat must be strangled in its cradle, completely and without exception."
"I cannot purchase the Red Iron Relic Gu myself, under the name 'Lin Mu.' I must find a proxy buyer — someone Jia Fu absolutely does not know, someone who cannot be traced back to me — to acquire this Gu worm quietly."
"And the timing of the purchase should be shifted away from today as well."
Decision made, Lin Mu did not spare the second floor's display cases so much as a glance. He turned and walked out of the enormous Rank 3 tree house without looking back.
He found a deserted corner, removed his bamboo hat, and pressed his fingers hard against his aching brow.
He looked back at the vast campsite he had orchestrated from nothing — at the stalls raking in fortunes because of his planning.
"I have been far too conspicuous lately."
Lin Mu smiled bitterly and reflected in silence. From manipulating the outcomes of the competition behind the scenes, to openly amassing wealth and managing the caravan campsite, to just now sitting across from a titan like Jia Fu and matching wits with him face to face.
All of this had seriously violated the principle of restraint he had always held to.
He knew perfectly well that moves like these would draw the attention of those above him — it was no different from snatching chestnuts from a fire.
But he had no other choice.
"Rank 3 peak..."
Lin Mu looked up at the grey, overcast sky above Black Wind Ridge, and seemed to see a pale white bone scepter hanging directly over his head.
From the moment the Black Bone King's inheritance had taken root inside his Aperture, he had been running a race against death.
White Bone Stockade's Patriarch, Li Mang — that Rank 3 peak Demonic Path powerhouse — was like a live explosive that could detonate at any moment.
Lin Mu had no idea how wide the detection range of the scepter in Li Mang's hands truly was.
He had no idea when Li Mang might use the cursed "inter-stockade friendly competition" as cover to slip inside Black Blood Stockade.
The moment Li Mang's scepter swept over him — or the secret of his inheritance leaked even a fraction — facing a Rank 3 peak cultivator in a frenzy, his current Rank 2 initial stage strength left him with absolutely no chance of survival.
"The time left to me is genuinely running short."
Lin Mu clenched his fists, feeling the faint red Primeval Sea within his Aperture. "I must convert the wealth in my hands into real combat power at the fastest possible speed. Even if it draws attention from the clan's upper echelons, that is a price worth paying."
"As long as I can obtain the Red Iron Relic Gu. As long as I can refine the Four-Flavor Liquor Worm."
"I can hammer my way to Rank 2 upper stage — or even peak — in a brutally short span of time."
"And at that point, even without revealing my hidden cards, my open cultivation level alone — Rank 2 upper stage — would give me every right to stand in Black Blood Stockade's elder council."
In the Gu world, reputation, wealth, and status were all hollow. Only absolute strength was the sole currency of survival.
Hah...
Lin Mu exhaled slowly and at length, feeling a deep exhaustion settle into his mind from the relentless overexertion.
He had just spent the time on the third floor trading blows of wit and nerve with Jia Fu.
Now he was waging a shadow war across time against a future Fang Yuan within the vast, tangled web of the timeline.
And all the while, he had to guard against Li Mang's potentially imminent arrival — a killing blow that could fall at any moment.
This level of sustained, crushing mental strain was making even Lin Mu, a transmigrator, feel the edges of his limits.
"I can't keep grinding through everything by sheer force of thought alone. I'll need to find a way to get my hands on a Wisdom Path Gu worm at some point, to give my mind some support..."
Lin Mu muttered the self-deprecating thought, then settled his bamboo hat back into place.
Since the Red Iron Relic Gu could not be purchased directly, and the half-jar of bitter wine promised by Jia Fu would not be ready for another three days, his business at the Three Star Cave today was complete.
There was no reason to linger in this place and draw further attention.
He turned and walked with long strides toward the busier Inner Ring and Middle Ring markets.
He had a large reserve of Primeval Stones in hand.
His next task was to purchase a set of practical, standard Rank 2 Gu worms from the outer merchants and wandering cultivators — a full replacement for the Rank 1 Gu he currently carried, which had already fallen behind where he needed to be.
And there was one more matter, even more pressing than that —
He needed to begin an aggressive search, and if necessary, pay a premium, to acquire the core materials for refining the Blood Attraction Gu.
Because that was the only key to unlocking the Black Bone King's Rank 5 inheritance — and the power to rewrite his own fate entirely.