Chapter 25 – Wealth Stirs the Heart

Chapter 25 – Wealth Stirs the Heart

After dragging the fat man’s corpse into the Taiyan Vessel and briefly cleaning the bloodstains from the ground, Li Fan returned to his room as if nothing had happened.

“What an utter fool,” Li Fan remarked.

The fat man clearly hadn’t grasped the situation. Relying on a bit of petty cleverness, he’d discovered that Li Fan might have snuck in under a false identity and couldn’t wait to come threaten him—probably hoping to extort some benefit out of it.

But had he even stopped to think? Sure, Li Fan had infiltrated Glazed Glass Island under false pretenses. But hadn’t their entire group of exiles similarly obtained their residency by posing as disaster refugees?

How was that fundamentally any different from what Li Fan had done?

The moment they got their Glazed Glass Island residency, they actually started thinking of themselves as natives.

Li Fan had seen it all very clearly. The immortal master who had come to receive them with face concealed, and Sun Zhang’s Heavenly Treasure House—they all conducted their affairs with extreme caution, terrified that others might find out.

Obviously, their identities as mortals from the Exile Realm were something that couldn’t see the light of day.

It was precisely for this reason that Li Fan had killed the fat man who’d come knocking with his death wish of a threat without a second thought.

He didn’t believe Heavenly Treasure House or the exile group would make a big fuss investigating the matter.

Furthermore, even if they traced the fat man’s disappearance back to Li Fan’s place, with no body to be found, as long as Li Fan insisted he’d never seen the man, there was nothing they could do to him.

After all, blowing things out of proportion would benefit neither side.

And if Li Fan had hesitated and held back, leaving the fat man alive, that would have been far more likely to invite all manner of trouble.

So Li Fan decisively chose to nip the potential threat in the bud.

……

Just as Li Fan had predicted, several days passed, and aside from Su Changyu coming by to ask a single question, the fat man’s mysterious disappearance attracted no attention whatsoever.

The incident was merely a minor episode in Li Fan’s island life, and he soon cast it from his mind.

Over the following days, Li Fan spent his time gathering information about various affairs on the island while scheming how to reasonably bring out the treasures stored within the Taiyan Vessel for use.

Gradually, Li Fan formed a general understanding of the Glazed Glass Island he now inhabited.

These waters were called the Layered Cloud Sea.

The Layered Cloud Sea was vast and boundless, dotted with tens of thousands of islands of varying sizes.

Glazed Glass Island was situated in the southern part of the central Layered Cloud Sea region, and was of moderate scale.

It earned its name because the surrounding waters were rich in a species of delicious fish known as glazed fish.

Glazed fish were not only popular among mortals on the surrounding islands—certain immortal masters even used the glazed pearls that occasionally formed inside glazed fish as ingredients for pill refinement.

For this reason, immortal masters presided over Glazed Glass Island, and a certain quantity of glazed pearls had to be collected and submitted each year.

The immortal masters generally did not concern themselves with worldly affairs and were rarely seen by ordinary people. The day-to-day governance of Glazed Glass Island was handled by the Glazed Glass Manor, established by the Island Lord of Glazed Glass.

Island residents could obtain a job assignment through the Glazed Glass Manor. The higher the danger level of the work, the higher the compensation.

Among all the positions, fishing for glazed fish out at sea was by far the most popular.

Not only were there no significant risks to speak of, but the pay was also quite generous.

More importantly, of the glazed fish caught, only seventy percent needed to be turned in—the remaining thirty percent could be kept and sold privately.

So this fishing job was truly a coveted position.

Unfortunately, going out to sea required large ships, and the glazed fish schools were unpredictable in their movements. Locating them required specially crafted spirit lures unique to the island.

The spirit lures were only distributed by the Glazed Glass Manor when a crew set out to sea, and were collected back upon return.

Private fishing was out of the question. Moreover, anyone caught doing so was executed on the spot.

Thus, glazed fish harvesting could only be conducted with the Glazed Glass Manor’s authorization.

And those who were able to go out fishing were the envy of every resident on the island.

A fleet that had gone out just days ago not only returned with a bountiful catch of glazed fish but had also stumbled upon a sunken ship.

The ship was said to have belonged to a family fleeing a storm disaster, and so it carried over a dozen chests of gold, silver, and jewels!

Now all of it had fallen into the fleet’s hands.

Regarding items salvaged from shipwrecks, the island’s rules were the same as for glazed fish—thirty percent could be kept for oneself!

So when the fleet returned to port, half the island was buzzing with excitement.

Even the island’s chief financial officer, Steward Qian, came personally to inspect the haul.

Watching the fleet members grinning so wide their faces nearly split, quite a few islanders turned green with envy.

One after another, people began pulling strings behind the scenes, hoping to secure a spot on the next voyage.

……

As Li Fan saw it, he could use the very same method to gradually launder the countless treasures aboard the Taiyan Vessel, with relatively little risk.

The only difficulty was how to obtain the right to go out to sea alone.

The existence of the Taiyan Vessel absolutely could not be exposed.

There were far too many people on the island vying to join a fleet. After a bit of casual inquiry, Li Fan quickly learned the key details.

The Island Lord of Glazed Glass had three trusted aides: Steward Zhao handled personnel, Steward Qian handled finances, and Steward Zhou handled security.

The vast majority of fleet positions were controlled by Steward Qian. Steward Zhao and Steward Zhou had long tried to get their hands in, but Steward Qian maintained an iron grip, yielding only one or two fleets to them.

Where there are people, there is struggle.

Li Fan recalled the reaction Steward Zhao had upon seeing him on registration day, and thought that perhaps it would be worth arranging a meeting with this Steward Zhao.

But Steward Zhao was not someone the current Li Fan could simply demand an audience with.

Li Fan decided to go through Heavenly Treasure House and Sun Zhang instead.

Having found out the location, Li Fan made his way to Heavenly Treasure House’s front door, hoping to see Sun Zhang.

But he was met with a cold rejection.

“Shoo, shoo, shoo! Our Elder Sun is a man of great standing—you think you can just waltz in and see him? Get lost!” Several black-clad brutes at the entrance eyed Li Fan with hostile intent, looking as if they’d resort to violence at the slightest provocation.

Seeing this, Li Fan had no choice but to leave for the time being.

He found it rather strange. Heavenly Treasure House was a business establishment, after all—what kind of business turns people away without even seeing them?

Moreover, these black-clad brutes hadn’t bothered to consult anyone before making the decision on their own, as though they already knew exactly who Li Fan was…

“They must have been given orders to deliberately refuse me.” Having reached this conclusion, Li Fan guessed that something must have changed on the exiles’ side, causing Sun Zhang to turn his back on them entirely.

After making some inquiries, Li Fan finally learned what had happened.

It turned out that Su Changyu, in order to rid himself of the miasma in his body as quickly as possible, had resolutely chosen to become a test subject for the immortal masters.

Before leaving, Su Changyu had signed his name on the remnant of the contract.

With that, all three signatures were complete, and the contract dissipated entirely.

From that point on, the exiles and Heavenly Treasure House had no further ties to one another.

“No wonder they suddenly turned on us and are deliberately avoiding us. I just didn’t expect Su Changyu to be so decisive,” Li Fan sighed.

“Ah, we all tried to talk him out of it, told him not to rush. But would he listen?” The speaker was someone Li Fan recognized—it was Xiao Heng, the one who had claimed to be the son of the Prince of Zhennan back in the Heavenly Treasure House cavern.

Xiao Heng seemed to be extremely close to Su Changyu, and at that moment appeared utterly dejected. “If it weren’t to save his younger sister who suffers from a terminal illness, Brother Su would never have pushed himself so hard.”

Hearing these words, Li Fan fell into deep thought.