Chapter 20: A Night of Dreams

First off, proposing the duel. A person from an

extravagantly rich family would probably not care too much about getting 20%

off for a sword in exchange for winning a duel. A smart person would have

realized that they were probably being played by Guo Huo. However, Jia Yuan had

been immediately enticed by the discount. Furthermore, he didn’t appear to even

consider what level of Song Guo Huo cultivated in.

At the time, Guo Huo had decided that Jia Yuan was likely

from a moderately wealthy family, maybe the son of a successful merchant.

He went into the fight expecting to win, but was quickly

surprised by Jia Yuan’s speed, and even more so by the strength of Jia Yuan’s Song.

The most important part was that during the fight, when Jia Yuan had gone for

the overhead strike, Guo Huo had been able to get see his face.

He saw the unwashed face of a common looking boy. He saw the

wall of flame created in the wake of the sword’s path.

He felt the power of the strike, felt the raging inferno of

an aura that surrounded Jia Yuan.

In that moment, he made an assumption of Jia Yuan’s

background and paired it with the strength in front of him. At the same time,

he had released his cultivation and raised his axe to defend against Jia Yuan’s

blow.

The conclusion he had drawn from the duel with Jia Yuan was

that he was a kid who had grown up in a poor setting. He most likely found a

Song somewhere and began cultivating it. By the kids luck, it turned out to be

a very high quality Song. However, even though the kid has a solid cultivation

base, he’s not the brightest kid in the world.

Guo Huo quickly made up his mind and decided to try and rope

Jia Yuan further into the Black Wing Merchant Guild. After all, a Merchant Guild

needed strong warriors. They often had trade caravans travel through Kingdoms

and sometimes even cross borders. They needed to maintain their own private

army to keep these caravans and the Guild Halls themselves as safe and

reputable as possible.

Of course, it would be very expensive to maintain a small

army of highly talented and powerful individuals. As such, it was a common

practice for a Merchant Guild to try to befriend and rope in strong

cultivators.

However, Guo Huo had another motive. He was one of the

strongest cultivators in the Fire Kingdom, but over the last few years, he had

realized that even he could not withstand the passage of time. When he realized

this, he had begun looking for a disciple. This was why Guo Huo had given Jia

Yuan the gold Currency Card. Not only was it an attempt to further rope Jia

Yuan to the Black Wing Merchant Guild, but the golden Currency Card also had a

type of tracking magic engraved on it. This was a secret among the Black Wing

Merchant Guild. With the golden cards, they could track their most influential

customers, and if any of the cards were stolen, they could track down the

killer/thief by using said tracking magic.

Using it, Guo Huo could easily go and track down Jia Yuan at any time.

At this moment, Guo Huo had made up his mind. In the

morning, he would set out and observe the young Jia Yuan he had met earlier. If

he saw that the temperament and strength of this young man was adequate, he

would ask the young man to be his disciple.

So the night passed on, with a young man basking in the

warmth of his dreams, and an old man fretting over the legacy he would leave…