I use my future dreams to prove immortality.

Chapter 1 Changing Fate

Are you going to buy it or not?

The chicken vendor looked at the boy in hemp clothing carrying a salt shaker with obvious impatience.

This guy has been here for half an hour, just looking but not buying, which is quite annoying.

The boy was about fifteen or sixteen years old, with a straight nose. His eyes were fixed intently on the chicken coop, and suddenly they brightened.

"Your chicken is dead!"

The stall owner looked at the old hen lying on the ground in the chicken coop, his face as black as the bottom of a pot.

What a jinx!

"Your chickens probably have the plague!"

The stall owner glared at the boy and yelled, "Bullshit! Get lost if you're not buying!"

Zhou Qiuyuan wasn't annoyed. He grinned, revealing sixteen pearly white teeth. "How about I sell this diseased chicken to you for ten coins?"

Meat prices in Black Swamp City have remained high year-round; a laying hen costs eighty coins, while a dead hen is worth half the price.

Ten coins?

This cut was aimed at the ankle.

"A strange snake!"

Just then, a cry of surprise came from the west gate.

Five men dragged a black snake, about ten feet long and as thick as a thigh, through the street. What was astonishing was that the snake's back was covered with numerous pustules, and tiny, transparent white wings grew on top of the pustules.

Even though the black snake is dead, it still exudes a chilling aura that inspires fear in those who behold it.

Zhou Qiuyuan looked at the boy at the back of the group and greeted him, "Brother Chuan, you're really amazing. You killed a strange snake outside the city."

The boy was about the same age as Zhou Qiuyuan, and carried a crimson longsword on his back. When he heard Zhou Qiuyuan's words, a hint of pride unconsciously appeared on his face.

"My Crimson Sky Breathing Technique has achieved some success. I was just starting out, using the energy of heaven and earth to temper my body. I don't have this kind of ability yet. My master and senior brother killed this snake. I was just there to test my sword."

Qi Lingchuan walked to the stall, inadvertently revealing the crimson longsword on his back.

The sword was five feet long, its spine covered with intricate and mysterious patterns, making it quite impressive. As if showing off, he exhaled two visible streams of red air from his nostrils, and the red sword reacted, emitting a red glow.

"A spiritual tool?" Zhou Qiuyuan couldn't hide the envy on his face.

The two grew up together, but Qi Lingchuan's spiritual awakening propelled him to great heights, leading them down different paths in life.

The middle-aged man at the front of the group, seeing that his apprentice hadn't kept up, shouted, "Ling Chuan!"

Qi Lingchuan left in a hurry, his voice drifting back on the wind, "I should be able to get some exotic snake meat. I'll bring some for you to try tonight."

The chicken stall owner stared blankly at Zhou Qiuyuan, never expecting that the poor young man had such a close relationship with the body cultivator.

The customers of the chicken business are wealthy households and body cultivators. Once the rumor that I am selling diseased chickens spreads among them, it will be difficult to do business in the future.

We must not let small gains lead to big losses.

Thinking of this, the stall owner replied, "We'll go with your price!"

Zhou Qiuyuan unexpectedly took advantage of the body cultivator's influence and successfully profited from the situation.

Fearing the other party might change their mind, he quickly counted out the ten copper coins he had left over from buying salt from his pocket and sincerely wished, "May your business prosper."

With half a pot of salt in his left hand and an old hen in his right, Zhou Qiuyuan's steps became lighter.

We walked through narrow, cramped alleyways until we arrived at a secluded alley near the southwest corner of the city wall.

As the setting sun slanted westward, the three-zhang-high city wall cast a shadow, resembling a colossal, reclining figure, enveloping the large courtyard where more than a dozen people lived together.

Zhou Qiuyuan arrived at the westernmost part of the courtyard, near the city wall.

The old wooden door was half-open, and the voices of a man and a woman talking could be heard from inside.

"I'm a useless father. I've tried my best to give my son a chance to awaken his spirit, but I'm still short 13,800 coins. I can only ask you for help."

"He's getting more and more unreasonable. He insisted on causing trouble this morning, which prevented his father from going to the mine and caused the foreman to deduct three days' wages."

"Business at the grocery store is tough, I'll figure something out..."

Zhou Qiuyuan listened to his father and sister's voices, a smile playing on his lips, and pushed open the door to enter.

Zhou Chengwu, the father, immediately looked at the old hen his son was carrying and couldn't help but look surprised. "Where did this chicken come from?"

Living in Black Swamp City was difficult. The whole family had to tighten their belts and eat only coarse food to have a tiny foothold in the outer city. They had no spare money to give their children pocket money.

The origin of this chicken is self-evident.

Zhou Chengwu's face darkened: "Could it be a stolen chicken?!"

"Of course, we bought the chicken!"

"Where did you get the money? How dare you steal money from the house!"

A single old hen could be exchanged for more than twenty kilograms of stale grain with chaff. Thinking of this, Zhou Chengwu couldn't help but feel a pang of heartache and grabbed the door bolt.

Whether it's stealing money or stealing chickens, they're bound to get a beating.

"The money for half a pot of salt."

"You think you can buy a hen for ten coins?"

"If you don't believe me, go ask Hu Laosan from Ximen."

Seeing that his son showed no fear, Zhou Chengwu believed him to some extent.

Ten coins for a chicken is not expensive; it's a real bargain, a rare opportunity.

After all, the last time our family ate meat was during the Lunar New Year...

"Sis, why don't you stay for dinner?"

"No, I have to go back and cook for your brother-in-law." Zhou Hui declined his offer to stay and quickly left.

Zhou Qiuyuan took out a kitchen knife and a pottery jar, went to the front of the house, cut open the chicken's belly with the knife, and reached inside to grope around.

Before long, six shriveled pearls appeared in the pottery jar, along with a large chicken egg that was comparable to a goose egg.

The hen did not suffer from fowl plague. The mutated egg had been stealing nutrients from other eggs while it was inside the hen's abdomen. Because it was too big, it got stuck in the abdominal cavity, causing the intestines to become blocked and ruptured.

Following the original trajectory, Liu Laowu, a local thug in the courtyard, bought a dead hen from a chicken stall and discovered mutated eggs.

Zhou Qiuyuan, with his supernatural abilities, foresaw this event and staked out the chicken stall in advance, successfully seizing this opportunity.

"What a huge egg!" Zhou Chengwu was about to step forward to help when he looked at the large egg in the earthenware jar with astonishment and blurted out, "This is a mutated creature!"

"After the great disaster, more and more things underwent abnormal changes."

"Most mutated items have a nourishing effect on body cultivators. The mutated egg weighs about half a pound and can probably be sold for a hundred coins."

One hundred coins were equivalent to his wages for four days at the mine outside the city.

Seeing that no one was around, Zhou Qiuyuan put away the mutated egg and went into the inner room, solemnly saying, "Father, I have something important to tell you."

Zhou Chengwu realized something, quickly followed, and closed the door tightly.

"Chickens are poultry, and the history of raising chickens is extremely long. It is possible that mutant chickens could also be raised. Mutant eggs hatch into mutant chickens, and mutant chickens lay mutant eggs continuously, generation after generation, endlessly."

This is the ideal state we envisioned.

The mutant chicken originated from a regular chicken, but it is unclear whether it has reproductive isolation from the regular chicken.

Therefore, it is crucial whether the mutated egg hatches into a rooster or a hen.

The mutant rooster can only be raised to be eaten, while the mutant hen, even if it cannot reproduce, can still produce mutant eggs in a continuous stream, bringing considerable value.

"I've never seen anyone in the city selling mutant chickens or mutant eggs." Zhou Chengwu reached out and grabbed a mutant egg, his eyes filled with anticipation for the future.

Chickens lay eggs, eggs hatch into chickens; if the business of raising mutant chickens succeeds, it will be a gold mine that generates a fortune.

With money to awaken his spiritual power, his son could one day purchase a spiritual root in the inner city, and becoming a celestial master wouldn't be out of reach...

The excitement on Zhou Chengwu's face came quickly and disappeared even faster, and he couldn't help but let out a long sigh.

"With so many people and eyes in the courtyard, it's impossible to hide anything from the neighbors."

"It's too dangerous outside the city! Apart from immortal masters, no one dares to spend the night outside the city."

After the world underwent a strange change, terrifying beings appeared in the night, silently taking lives.

If the family hadn't been close to the former Black Swamp City, Black Swamp Market, and received protection from the Immortal Master's array, they would have died mysteriously long ago.

Moreover, without sufficient strength to back it up, selling mutated chickens and eggs is tantamount to a child carrying gold in the market, which will only bring about his death.

They finally found a chance to make money, but their hopes were extinguished so quickly.

Zhou Qiuyuan had anticipated this and replied, "Since we cannot profit in the long term, we can only realize our gains in the short term."

"The future of breeding mutant chickens is promising. As long as suitable buyers are found, the bright prospects of mutant eggs can be exchanged for enough wealth to improve one's life."

"There are many wealthy households in the outer city, but you can't judge a book by its cover, so you must be extremely careful when looking for a buyer."

Zhou Qiuyuan didn't want to bring disaster upon himself by raising mutated chickens. He believed that using the first pot of gold he earned from them to start his path as a body cultivator was the right way to go.

"Sigh! That's all we can do."

Zhou Chengwu naturally understood the principle of being full at one meal and being full at every meal, but unfortunately, forcibly keeping the mutated eggs was more of a curse than a blessing.

"We were originally a branch of the Zhou family, a prominent clan in the city. Our patriarch was from a collateral branch and was never valued by the family, so he set up his own household outside..."

"The Zhou family shares the same bloodline as us, making them far more reliable than outsiders. Once the Zhou family makes a fortune raising mutant chickens, they will also take care of us..."

"We share the same bloodline as the Zhou family; this is an opportunity to get close to them."

"There's no time to lose, lest things get complicated." Fearing that the news might leak out, Zhou Chengwu carefully tucked the mutated egg into his robes and headed towards the East City.

"This matter cannot be rushed!" Zhou Qiuyuan called out to his father, saying, "First, we need to find out the market price of the mutated meat. Once we have a price expectation, we can find a kind-hearted uncle or elder from the Zhou family tomorrow."

The Zhou family's attitude is still unknown, and it's hard to guarantee they won't deliberately lower the price.

If we go again tomorrow, we can use the cheat code to gather information and prevent problems before they arise.

Zhou Chengwu looked at his son, who was thoughtful and steady in his actions, with a strange expression.

Why is my child different?

It feels like she's a completely different person.

Could it be that he caught a cold a few days ago and the fever damaged his brain?

No, wait, my son has finally figured it out!

Zhou Chengwu carefully hid the mutated eggs and hurried to the East Market to check the market price of mutated meat.

Zhou Qiuyuan plucked the feathers from the old hen, cleaned it, cut it into pieces, and put it in a pot with chopped yam. The aroma of the meat wafting from the gaps in the pot lid grew increasingly rich, making one's mouth water.

As dusk fell, people who had been busy all day gradually went home.

Zhou's mother, Shen Wan, who had been working at the pulp mill all day, stared at the stewed chicken in the pot with a strange expression.

After understanding the whole story, she glared at her son and said, "You only think about ordering your sister around. You finally get a bite of meat, but you don't even think about sending it to your brother-in-law's family."

"I'll go!"

Shen Wan put a large bowl of chicken into a food box and headed straight for her in-laws' grocery store.

Half an hour later, she returned, her expression slightly unnatural.

Let's eat!

The yellowish-black cornbread mixed with rice bran was dry and hard, and it hurt my throat when I swallowed it. But after being soaked in chicken soup, it became soft and chewy and was no longer difficult to swallow.

Zhou Qiuyuan had a great appetite and ate a lot.

The leftover chicken bones were not wasted; they were all put into a clay pot and saved to make chicken bone soup the next day.

"Chengwu, are you home?"

A weathered middle-aged man and a well-to-do man dressed in silk stood outside the door.

Zhou Chengwu looked at the man in silk with surprise, then put on a fawning smile: "Manager Li, what brings you here? Please come in quickly."

Manager Li stood still and said in a calm voice, "Starting tomorrow, you don't need to go to work at the mine."

Just because it's a day off, you want to fire me?

That's way too domineering!

People have to bow their heads under the roof.

Zhou Chengwu hesitated for a moment, then took out more than a hundred copper coins from his pocket and handed them over, saying ingratiatingly, "Sir, my whole family depends on the income from the mine to fill their stomachs. Please have mercy on us."

Manager Li's thin lips curled up as he casually pocketed the copper coin.

"You are extremely lucky."

"The mine was attacked by an unknown monster, and all the guardian immortals and miners perished. The mine has been closed and will be announced later upon reopening."

This news came like a bolt from the blue, leaving Zhou Chengwu stunned and pale-faced.

By the time he came to his senses, Steward Li had already vanished without a trace.

Zhou Chengwu was extremely grateful that his son insisted on having his spirit awakened; if he had gone to work at the mine today, he would have surely died in a daze.

Looking at his distraught father and his mother, who looked terrified, Zhou Qiuyuan's memory flashed back to the scene when his mother fainted on the spot upon hearing the bad news.

Because of his intervention, his father was able to rewrite his destiny.