Chapter 62: Rumors Travel Fast

By the next morning, the worked stone beneath Red Cliff had already become an ancient ruin.

Lin Yuan discovered this while carrying breakfast to a table.

A cultivator near the window was explaining the story to three merchants.

"They found a buried entrance beneath the road."

Lin Yuan stopped.

"No, they didn’t."

The cultivator looked up.

"What?"

"They found a section of worked stone."

"With formation markings."

"Three grooves."

"Exactly."

Lin Yuan stared at him.

The cultivator hesitated.

"Possibly formation markings."

"Possibly tool marks."

One of the merchants frowned.

"So there’s no entrance?"

"No."

"Treasure?"

"No."

"Ancient sect?"

"No."

The merchant looked strangely disappointed.

Lin Yuan set down the bowls.

"What they actually found is written on the Association notice."

He returned to the kitchen.

Xiao Lan was standing near the counter trying not to laugh.

"Ancient ruin?"

"Apparently."

"That was fast."

"Yesterday it was a piece of stone."

Su Mei passed behind them carrying a tray.

"By tomorrow there’ll probably be a dead immortal inside."

Lin Yuan looked at her.

"Don’t give them ideas."

Outside, Wu Jian had encountered the same problem.

A new line had been added to the bottom of the route notice.

NO TREASURE OR RUIN HAS BEEN CONFIRMED.

Qiao stood in front of the board with his hands behind his back.

"That makes it sound like there might be treasure."

Wu Jian slowly turned toward him.

"It says there isn’t."

"It says it hasn’t been confirmed."

"Because it hasn’t."

"Exactly."

Wu Jian closed his eyes for a moment.

Lin Yuan walked over carrying a cup of tea.

"You look tired."

Wu Jian pointed at Qiao.

"Take him."

"No."

"I’ll pay you."

"Still no."

Qiao looked offended.

"I own a respectable business."

Neither man answered.

By midmorning, three cultivators approaching from the east had already heard the rumor from travelers on the road.

They stopped in Blackstone specifically to ask about Red Cliff.

They weren’t merchants.

They carried travel packs and weapons, and none seemed particularly interested in Blackstone itself.

One of them stopped outside Wandering Cloud Tavern.

"Which road leads to the buried ruins?"

Lin Yuan pointed toward the Association board.

"Read that first."

The man read it.

His expression changed slightly.

"So there isn’t a ruin?"

"No confirmed ruin."

"But there could be one."

"There could also be dirt."

The cultivator looked west.

"How far is Red Cliff?"

Wu Jian stepped over before Lin Yuan could answer.

"If you’re planning to travel west, report to the route station first. The wagon road is unsafe, and the damaged area is unstable."

"We’re traveling on foot."

"Then you’ll receive the same warning with fewer wheels."

The three cultivators eventually moved toward the Association table.

Lin Yuan watched them go.

Jiang Heng stood beneath the tavern awning nearby.

"This will get worse," he said.

Lin Yuan sipped his tea.

"The road?"

"The rumor."

"That’s encouraging."

Jiang Heng looked toward the notice board.

"Worked stone beneath a collapsing road is enough."

"For what?"

"For people to imagine everything they want."

Lin Yuan considered that.

"How long before someone adds a hidden inheritance?"

"Someone probably already has."

From Qiao’s shop, a voice called out.

"I heard it might be a sealed inheritance!"

Lin Yuan looked at Jiang Heng.

Jiang Heng shrugged.

"Too slow."

The rumors weren’t the only thing changing Blackstone.

By noon, the market ground looked different.

Several wagons that had been preparing to travel west remained parked near the edge of the settlement.

Their owners had begun unloading smaller bundles instead.

High-value goods that could be carried by hand were being separated from heavier cargo.

One merchant hired two cultivators to carry several sealed cases west on foot.

Another left his wagon and Ironhoof Beast in Blackstone while taking only what he could fit into a storage bag.

Gao Rui watched the activity from outside his storage shed.

"This could become troublesome."

Lin Yuan glanced at him.

"Businessman complaining about business?"

"Business is good."

Gao Rui pointed toward the growing line of parked wagons.

"Too many wagons sitting here for days isn’t good."

Lin Yuan understood the point.

Animals needed feed.

Wagons needed space.

Merchants who couldn’t move became impatient.

Wu Jian had already started directing new arrivals away from the main road so traffic through Central Blackstone remained clear.

The Travelers’ Market helped.

Its ground stayed firmer than the surrounding dirt, and the marked trading spaces kept people from spreading wherever they pleased.

But it hadn’t been designed as a permanent caravan camp.

Lin Yuan looked toward the western road.

"How long will merchants wait?"

Gao Rui shrugged.

"Depends on what’s in their wagons."

He nodded toward one caravan.

"Grain? They might turn around."

Another.

"Medicine or valuable materials? They’ll find another way."

"And if the road stays blocked?"

"Then people adapt."

Gao Rui smiled faintly.

"That’s what merchants do."

A porter passed between them carrying a wooden crate toward the storage shed.

Gao Rui followed.

Lin Yuan remained where he was.

Blackstone had grown because people passed through.

Now, for the first time, a large number of them couldn’t.

That created a different kind of problem.

Shortly after lunch, the Association worker on the watch platform called down to Wu Jian.

A group was approaching from the east.

Four people walked beside two pack beasts.

Unlike the treasure seekers from earlier, they carried little that looked suited for fighting.

One man had coils of measuring cord hanging from his pack.

Another carried several long iron rods.

The woman at the front held a round bronze instrument protected inside a wooden case.

Wu Jian was already moving toward them.

When they entered Central Blackstone, he greeted the woman first.

"You made good time."

"We were already working along the eastern route when the Association’s first report reached us."

Lin Yuan looked at Jiang Heng, who had followed him outside.

"Friends?"

"Association surveyors."

"You know them?"

"No."

"Then how do you know?"

Jiang Heng nodded toward the equipment.

"Most treasure hunters don’t bring measuring cord."

Fair.

Wu Jian led the group toward the route station.

A few minutes later, he waved Lin Yuan over.

"This is Surveyor He."

The woman gave Lin Yuan a brief nod.

She appeared somewhere in her thirties, with her hair tied tightly behind her head and dust covering the lower edge of her brown traveling robe.

"You’re the owner?"

"Of the tavern."

Wu Jian added, "And most of the central land."

Surveyor He looked around Blackstone.

Her eyes paused on the watch platform, market ground, shops, and inn.

"This place grew quickly."

"So people keep telling me."

Wu Jian handed her copies of the recent route reports.

She read them without speaking.

Unlike most travelers, she didn’t react when she reached the part about worked stone.

After finishing, she looked up.

"The road damage concerns me more than the stone."

Qiao was passing the route station on his way back to his shop when he heard her.

"What if the stone is an ancient ruin?"

Surveyor He looked at him.

"Then it will still be there after we determine whether the road is going to collapse under us."

Qiao considered this.

"Very practical."

"Thank you."

"It wasn’t a compliment."

"I don’t care."

Lin Yuan immediately liked her slightly more.

Wu Jian pointed toward the bronze instrument she carried.

"Can that tell you what’s happening underground?"

"Not by itself."

She opened the wooden case.

Inside rested a flat bronze disk covered with several rings and a thin needle at its center.

"The compass can show disturbances in nearby spiritual Qi. The probes help us compare the ground along the damaged section."

"Can it detect an earth vein?" Lin Yuan asked.

"If there’s a strong enough disturbance."

"An old formation?"

"Possibly."

Qiao leaned closer.

"Treasure?"

Surveyor He closed the case.

"No."

Qiao stepped back.

"Disappointing instrument."

She ignored him.

Surveyor He looked toward Jiang Heng.

"You were near the damaged area yesterday. Could you tell where the disturbance was coming from, or how deep it was?"

"Not clearly."

"Was the Qi concentrated anywhere?"

Jiang Heng thought for a moment.

"No. Disturbed would be a better word."

Surveyor He nodded once.

That answer seemed more useful to her than the rumors about ancient ruins.

"We’ll inspect the road tomorrow morning."

Wu Jian looked west.

"On foot?"

"Of course."

"The ground near the fissure has already shifted more than once."

"Then we’ll stay away from the edge until we’ve checked it."

Her tone made it clear this wasn’t her first damaged road.

Lin Yuan felt no urge to volunteer.

Apparently neither did Qiao.

"You should definitely investigate carefully," Qiao said.

Surveyor He looked at him.

"You’re welcome to come."

"I have a shop."

"Convenient."

Qiao left.

The arrival of actual surveyors should have reduced the rumors.

It didn’t.

By late afternoon, half the market knew someone with a spiritual compass had arrived.

That somehow became proof that an ancient formation existed beneath Red Cliff.

Wu Jian gave up correcting everyone individually.

Instead, he added another line to the board.

AN ASSOCIATION SURVEY TEAM WILL INSPECT THE DAMAGED ROAD.

THIS DOES NOT CONFIRM THE PRESENCE OF A RUIN OR TREASURE.

Lin Yuan stood beside him while he attached the notice.

"Think it’ll work?"

"No."

"At least you’re learning."

Wu Jian gave him a tired look.

The survey group ate at Wandering Cloud Tavern that evening.

So did several of the cultivators who had arrived hoping to investigate Red Cliff themselves.

The difference between the two groups was obvious.

The treasure seekers spent most of dinner guessing what might be underground.

The surveyors discussed rope, road width, unstable slopes, and where previous travelers had felt tremors.

Lin Yuan preferred the second conversation.

It sounded less likely to get someone killed.

Jiang Heng ate alone near the wall.

When Lin Yuan brought him tea, he nodded toward Surveyor He’s table.

"They might learn something."

"About the stone?"

"About the ground."

Lin Yuan sat across from him for a moment.

"You’re going with them?"

Jiang Heng shook his head.

"I’ve already looked."

"Lost interest?"

"I learned enough to know I don’t want to stand beside a collapsing fissure while someone pokes it with an iron rod."

Lin Yuan looked toward the surveyors.

One of them was currently checking the tip of an iron probe.

"Reasonable."

Jiang Heng lifted his cup.

"I thought you’d agree."

After closing, Lin Yuan stepped outside.

The market was quieter than during the day, but rows of parked wagons remained beneath the lantern light.

Some would turn east tomorrow.

Some would stay.

Others would unload valuable cargo and try crossing west on foot.

Beyond them stood the watch platform.

Farther still, the western road disappeared into darkness.

For days, Blackstone had depended on travelers bringing back pieces of the same mystery—strange tracks, tremors, abandoned beast territory, cracked ground, and now worked stone buried beneath it.

Tomorrow, someone was finally going west for the specific purpose of finding out what was happening to the road.

Lin Yuan had no intention of following them.

For once, he was perfectly happy to wait for the answer to come back to him.