Dao Of The Salted Fish (Salted Fish Cultivator)

5. Exploration

After eating, Wen Zhihao explored the various items on his new body and found that the original owner indeed had a spatial item—a small ring tucked in one of the sleeve pockets.

Not that there was much in it: some low-grade spiritual stones, a few jade slips, and a spare set of clothing. He placed the food box (which still had some food) inside the ring’s space, dusted off his butt, and went to further explore the grounds of the great Golden Sun Sect.

The original owner had not seen the entire grounds—for one, he hadn’t known the kitchen’s location. Anyway, recalling these things from the original owner’s memory was not as clear as recalling it from Wen Zhihao’s own memory.

The Golden Sun Sect was very prosperous: it had multiple large buildings and pavilions, included expansive gardens, had its own river and surrounding mountains where some of the top cultivators resided. There were many smaller courtyards, and separate halls for things such as medical supplies, spiritual stones, weapons etc. In short, the Golden Sun Sect was like a university combined with a university-town.

It was a feast for Wen Zhihao’s eyes: the buildings were well kept in the ancient styles, with exquisite decorations and colours. The gardens were delicate and infused with natural and sculpted beauty. He only wished he had a camera to capture the sight because there were so many photogenic spots. His fingers twitched for his phone more than once.

Maybe he could figure out if there was a phone-like equivalent...But without any internet, what was the point?

The cultivators, for the most part, were also very beautiful and handsome, especially those with high cultivations, i.e. they had symmetrical faces, smooth skin, clean hair, youthful looks (aside from the ones that looked old on purpose), and robes that fluttered dramatically in the breeze. While there seemed to be two separate styles of robes for the men and the women, Wen Zhihao did see some cultivators wearing the opposite, and some other cultivators skipping the uniform entirely, wearing vaguely yellow/gold robes instead.

As the evening approached, though, more and more of those cultivators started appearing on the grounds. So Wen Zhihao returned to ‘his’ room.

The original Wen Zhihao was one of the older outer sect disciples. Unlike the inner disciples who had their own courtyards or lived in the spacious housing of their masters, the outer sect disciples were housed in the two large dormitory buildings. Each person had their own small room, which was necessary for any secluded cultivation.

Wen Zhihao’s room was near the top of the dormitory building, which had a lift powered by spiritual stones. The room itself was plainly furnished with a bed, cabinet, and low desk, and there was a very small private bathroom.

Wen Zhihao’s eyes went a bit disappointed when he looked at the wooden bed and hard ‘pillow’. He wanted the comforts of the 21st century!

He sat down at the low table and took out the items in the spatial storage ring. He munched on the last of the leftover buns and washed it down with the spiritual water, and mused on what he could do. Using the spare set of clothing as a pillow was his best bet. He could look for more cloth later to pad everything else out.

Then he went through the original owner’s jade slips. They were filled with complicated sword cultivation techniques...blah! Wen Zhihao finished university a few years ago, he didn’t want to force himself to study again.

With nothing else, Wen Zhihao cleaned himself up and got into bed.

Hm. Lying on his side was uncomfortable, but lying on his back was not too bad. The bed definitely needed upgrades though.

The rooms had good sound insulation spells; it was very quiet. In the quietness of the room, Wen Zhihao’s thoughts wandered.

If he transmigrated...then that meant his original body was likely dead, and the spirit of the current body was likely gone.

He couldn’t help but think. Would his divorced, estranged parents even care? It seemed that the original owner’s parents were even more absent. No one was close with the original owner, which meant Wen Zhihao didn’t need to pretend to be the original.

But more importantly, what about all his things back on Earth, like his beloved computer? His fingers twitched. He wanted his phone. He wanted to scroll, laugh at weakly amusing memes, and read long transmigration novels until he was tired enough to fall unconscious asleep.

If he died again in this world...would he return to his original world? No, that was too risky, because what if his body in the original world was dead, and not in a coma like in some transmigration novels….was this world a novel? But he had never read a novel that had a character with his name.

In that case, he needed to make sure that he wouldn’t get kicked out of the sect. Neither he nor the original owner knew how to make a living outside the provisions of the sect.

These thoughts spun round and round Wen Zhihao’s head, without a phone and internet connection to shut them up.

The only kind of reading material in the room were those jade slips that contained cultivation techniques.

Wen Zhihao really felt the agonising press of ‘last resort, nothing better to do’. Maybe it was like his university textbooks and lectures: if they’re so boring, maybe he could fall asleep while reading them? He got up from bed.

Wen Zhihao finally found a jade slip that wasn’t about sword cultivation—it was not in the spatial ring but rather left carelessly on the cabinet in the room. The reason was because this was a cultivation 101 sort of jade slip, containing the most basic of cultivation techniques: meditation.

There was a spark of interest in Wen Zhihao’s eyes. He quickly read over it, adding the information to his own memory. Then, he got back into bed, closed his eyes, and started to breathe in and out. His body automatically moved its qi in an act of muscle memory.

Breathing in and out was a lot like counting sheep jumping over fences, or dumplings in a bowl, except it was counting qi flowing in and out of his meridians. His focus on the movement of qi and the counting slowly suppressed Wen Zhihao’s chaotic thoughts, and at an unknown time, he fell asleep.