Chapter 3928: Cloth As Payment

Seeing that they were stuck in their demands, Lin Mu gave another small nod. "Very well. What about food?"

The prisoners blinked.

"I have preserved food, meat, rice, grains and even vegetables. I can trade those."

Several hunters suddenly burst into laughter and one younger man slapped his own knee.

"Food?" He grinned broadly. "And where exactly are you carrying all this food?"

Another prisoner looked Lin Mu up and down. "You don’t even have a backpack."

A woman folded her arms. "Maybe he hid a banquet inside his sleeves."

The settlement erupted into quiet chuckles and even the broad shouldered hunter allowed himself a faint smile.

Lin Mu remained completely calm. "What about cloth?"

He asked. "I have fabric."

This time the laughter grew louder.

One elderly prisoner shook his head. "Young man. We’ve all lived here long enough. Nobody carries that much. You’ve got nothing except the clothes you’re wearing."

Lin Mu simply looked at them for a moment.

Then without saying another word, his right hand reached toward empty air as a faint spatial ripple appeared. And in the next instant a tightly rolled bolt of fine fabric rested within his grasp.

The laughter vanished immediately as every prisoner’s eyes slowly widened. The woman holding the Diza Herb nearly dropped it while one hunter rubbed his eyes and another instinctively stepped backward.

The broad shouldered hunter stared at the cloth before shifting his gaze toward Lin Mu’s empty hand, then toward the shackles and then back toward the cloth again. His lips slowly parted.

"A..." He struggled to speak. "...Spatial Storage Treasure?"

The words escaped almost involuntarily.

Another hunter looked completely stunned.

"That’s impossible."

"Our shackles seal cultivation."

"You shouldn’t be able to open one."

A third prisoner slowly whispered, "And yet... he just did."

The entire settlement stood frozen.

For countless years, one truth had governed every prisoner’s understanding of the Mad Demon Depths. Once the shackles locked into place, every spatial treasure became useless, every storage ring turned into ordinary jewelry and every storage pouch lost its purpose.

That certainty had existed for generations.

But now the stranger before them had casually reached into empty space and produced a pristine bolt of cloth. And one by one every prisoner’s understanding of the world quietly began to crack.

Silence continued hanging over the settlement and every person remained staring at the pristine bolt of white fabric resting within Lin Mu’s hands. The hunters had completely forgotten about the earlier tension.

Even their weapons slowly lowered and their attention rested solely upon the cloth.

Lin Mu quietly observed their reactions as there had been a reason he chose fabric. Ever since entering the settlement, he had subconsciously examined everything around him. The huts, tools, weapons and of course the clothing.

That final detail had quickly caught his attention.

Almost everyone wore beast hides. Some garments had clearly been fashioned from thick leathery skin belonging to large reptiles while others used coarse fur stitched together with crude sinew.

Several hunters had layered multiple hides across their shoulders to create thicker protection against claws and bites.

It was practical clothing that was heavy and durable. It kept them warm but also handled the mild humidity of the forest well too. Yet there had been very little cloth anywhere. The few scraps he noticed looked ancient.

They had probably been the original garments the prisoners wore when they first entered the Mad Demon Depths. Over generations, those pieces had been repaired countless times until they barely resembled their original form.

Some had patches sewn over patches while others consisted almost entirely of mismatched strips stitched together. A few children wore garments woven from peeled bark fibers. And calling it cloth felt rather generous.

The rough material scratched against their skin and possessed almost no flexibility.

It served its purpose but it did little more than that. Compared to that, the bolt resting within Lin Mu’s hands belonged to an entirely different world. It was proper Immortal Grade Long Staple Cotton.

It represented one of the most common fabrics found throughout the Immortal Realm.

Virtually every marketplace sold it and countless ordinary robes were woven from it. For perhaps ten or twenty Low Grade Immortal Stones, one could purchase enough cloth to make several complete outfits.

Most immortals rarely paid attention to it as on its own it lacked flashy defensive formations and it carried no unique elemental affinity. Nobody considered it a luxury as it simply existed everywhere.

But because of that people often forgot how remarkable it actually was.

The cotton had been cultivated within regions rich in Immortal Qi and its fibers naturally absorbed traces of that energy during growth. Once woven into fabric, it became surprisingly resilient.

Ordinary mortal weapons struggled to cut through it and even many Spirit Grade blades required repeated strikes before managing to tear it apart. Even common flames barely scorched its surface.

After all, it had originally been designed for immortals, people who regularly fought powerful beasts and traveled through dangerous environments. For them durability had always mattered.

Compared to ordinary mortal fabrics, the difference resembled comparing paper to forged steel. Lin Mu had initially viewed the cloth as a modest trade item. But judging from the expressions surrounding him he had severely underestimated its value.

The prisoners gradually gathered closer.

Nobody reached toward the fabric as they simply looked. Several older prisoners stared so intensely that their eyes gradually became moist.

One elderly hunter quietly whispered, "I remember..." His voice sounded distant. "My master once bought a robe made from this."

Another nodded slowly.

"My wife used to complain that Immortal Cotton stained too easily." He suddenly laughed bitterly. "Imagine complaining about that now."

Several others quietly smiled as long buried memories resurfaced one after another. Marketplace streets, tailor shops, sect uniforms and merchant caravans, things they had long forgotten suddenly returned with astonishing clarity.

For those born inside the Mad Demon Depths, the reaction proved entirely different. Children stared with wide eyes as several cautiously circled around Lin Mu. One young girl slowly reached toward her mother’s sleeve.

"Mother..." She whispered. "Why is it so white?"