You XiaoMo exited the dimension and found that they were no longer at the bottom of the sea. Above them, the azure skies stretched on for miles and bright sunlight shone, almost blindingly so. The clear blue sea shimmered all the way to the skyline. It appeared that they had arrived at an uncharted area of the seas.
To the side, Ling Xiao was meditating, eyes closed. He seemed rather pale.
You XiaoMo leaned against the film separating them and watching the other with wide eyes. Though he didn’t know what happened just now, they were probably out of danger now. There was no sign of Black Spider or the people from the two tribes.
After who knows how long, Ling Xiao finally opened his eyes.
You XiaoMo was staring at him, and therefore noticed this immediately. He smacked the barrier with all his might, trying to get Ling Xiao’s attention. He wasn’t sure if Ling Xiao knew he was trapped in the palace or not.
What was disappointing was that Ling Xiao didn’t seem to notice, instead, the other scowled,
You XiaoMo was anxious; did Ling Xiao really not know he was in the palace?
Currently, his cultivation base had been sealed, and he couldn’t attack the palace. He had to find another way to let Ling Xiao know he was in here.
That was when an idea popped into You XiaoMo’s head. How could he have forgotten something as convenient as the transmission stone? If he recalled correctly, so long as he was close enough, the transmission stone would work.
However, when he tried to contact Ling Xiao, the transmission stone didn’t react at all. As expected, he couldn’t do anything apart from enter his dimension.
Just as he wilted in disappointment, the sky above turned dark.
You XiaoMo raised his head, and when his eyes got used to the lighting, he realized that it wasn’t that the sky had grown dark, but that there was blood, lots of blood above the palace, blocking the light until it was like nighttime.
This situation immediately had him panicking. This blood wasn’t Ling Xiao’s, was it? He coughed up so much, he hadn’t lost too much blood, had he?
As he thought of this, something happened.
The palace flashed with dazzling light, and though the humming sound it made wasn’t loud, it felt deafening to You XiaoMo. His head spun and when it cleared, his surroundings had changed. The breeze against his face felt startling real.
He got out?
You XiaoMo was stunned for a moment until there was a slight cough, and he remembered what had happened before he got out. He hurriedly rushed to Ling Xiao’s side and said nervously, “You coughed up so much blood just now; that scared me.”
Ling Xiao, “…”
“How do you feel right now?” You XiaoMo patted Ling Xiao down, thinking that Ling Xiao was injured. But he had felt Ling Xiao up all over and hadn’t found any injuries. Lifting his head, he was met with Ling Xiao darkened gaze, like a black hole sucking him in.
“…”
… What was this?
No matter how oblivious he was, You XiaoMo realized that there was something wrong and quickly retracted his hands, which had been unintentionally teasing Ling Xiao.
You XiaoMo carefully scrutinized Ling Xiao up and down, and noticed that apart from looking a little pale, Ling Xiao seemed completely fine. Did he hallucinate or something?
“Which eye of yours saw me coughing blood?” Ling Xiao stared at him for a moment, and finally spoke up when You XiaoMo had nearly lowered his head to the ground. Hearing this, You XiaoMo immediately lifted his head, only to look away awkwardly when their gazes met.
You XiaoMo twisted his fingers, stammering, “I… that… When I was in palace, I saw a lot of blood so I thought you had sustained injuries or something.”
“A lot of blood?” Ling Xiao’s voice seemed to hold a hint of amusement, “You mean this?”
You XiaoMo carefully raised his head and saw that Ling Xiao was holding something in his hand, it was cube-like and only a fourth of the size of his palm.
Right above the object, a drop of blood spread over it, slowly being absorbed. The milky white jade stone had turned blood red – it was the palace that he had been trapped in before.
“…”
。
There really had only been a drop of blood, but for someone trapped in the palace, it seemed like a lake of blood.
You XiaoMo, having realized that he had misunderstood, really wanted to dig a hole and bury himself in it. He had once again done something embarrassing, and this time he had embarrassed himself twice in succession.
“Idiot! I don’t think I could find someone as stupid as you anywhere else,” Ling Xiao said, smiling. He had originally wanted to punish the other for this, but with this tangent, he had lost interest.
You XiaoMo wilted.
Ling Xiao continued to mock him mercilessly, “If you didn’t have me, you’d probably get yourself killed by your own stupidity.”
“It was you who dripped blood over the palace,” You XiaoMo couldn’t help but grumble.
“Seems like you wish to stay in there some more. You want me to grant that wish?” Ling Xiao heard his grumbling, but wasn’t bothered by it. He raised the shrunken palace to You XiaoMo. “I’ll personally send you back.”
You XiaoMo grabbed Ling Xiao’s arm tightly, changing the topic not very successfully, “Unlocking the palace required blood?”
“What do you think?” Ling Xiao retorted, raising an eyebrow.
You XiaoMo nodded seriously, “I think you’re the most heroic, most amazing person ever.”
Ling Xiao burst into chuckles, clearly not taking his flattery.
Afterwards, Ling Xiao had You XiaoMo help him to rest. His injuries hadn’t healed when he fought at the bottom of the ocean. Though he had injured the cloaked person, he had also worsened his internal injuries. He was very lucky to have been able to escape from Xia Yin and MoQi XiYuan’s hands.
If Xia Yin and MoQi XiYuan knew that he was actually gravely injured, the two definitely wouldn’t hesitate to gang up on him. It was lucky that they didn’t believe the cloaked person’s words. However, his escape was thanks to Fu ZiLin. If it wasn’t for their arrival drawing most people’s attention, then things wouldn’t have gone as smoothly.
“Where are we now?” You XiaoMo helped Ling Xiao to the base of a coconut tree. They were currently on an uncharted island, facing the boundless blue sea.
“DaTong Ocean,” Ling Xiao replied simply.
You XiaoMo was stunned for a moment. He had heard of DaTong Ocean before. It was the ocean that was connected to Dong Yu’s border. It was at the edge of the TongTian Continent, stretching out boundlessly. It was immensely vast, and if people didn’t have someone familiar with the area to lead them, first timers would usually get lost in the DaTong Ocean. The more unlucky ones might never get out.
He didn’t know that Ling Xiao had crushed the transportation talisman, so not even Ling Xiao knew what corner of the DaTong Ocean they had been transported to.
However, You XiaoMo didn’t ponder for long. They weren’t in desperate need of finding a way out of the DaTong Ocean. What they needed to do now was get stronger and rest up.
The unnamed island was a primitive island, filled with dense forestry. Each tree was at least four, five hundred years old, some looked malnourished, but in reality they were over a thousand years old and abundant with nutrients. The spiritual energy here was more dense than in Dong Zhou, too.
You XiaoMo, thinking that they probably would be staying for a while, chopped down a few older trees and built a simple hut near the sea. He managed it within the hour.
Inside the hut, there was a wooden bed; he had specifically gone for the kind of wood that was rather soft and held a light fragrance. Some trees that he couldn’t recognize, thousands of years old, weren’t like normal trees that were easy to cut.
You XiaoMo had hacked at it, rotating upwards of 90 degrees, yet it still didn’t break. The tenacity was something he had never seen before. He had even gone and replanted a few in his dimension.
All this time, You XiaoMo had felt that his dimension was rather monotonous, and the addition of a few trees might make it more pleasing.
Afterwards, he had chosen a few other kinds of trees, some black, some red, some brown, and so on. Planted in rows, they made a colorful and satisfying sight.
After the hut was built, You XiaoMo adorned the inside.
He had finished this small, cozy home in two hours. Apart from building the supports for the hut, the other areas used the high tenacity wood. That way, they wouldn’t have to fear splinters and the like.
You XiaoMo looked at his hut with a sense of accomplishment, thinking to himself deeply, he really was a great wife.
“In the future, even if you decide to not be a mage anymore, you’d probably do alright as an architect.” Ling Xiao had personally witnessed the hut come to shape bit by bit. Though he knew before that You XiaoMo knew how to build houses, he didn’t think the other was so familiar with the activity.
You XiaoMo grinned in delight. “In the past, my dream was to become an architect. These simple huts are nothing. In the future, when you come to Earth, where I’m from, you’ll find that their buildings are completely different. They’re far more complicated than this.”
“Watch your ego.” Ling Xiao said.
A good environment was helpful to one’s physical and emotional health!
You XiaoMo truly believed that and, to make sure that Ling Xiao could focus on resting up, he ran back into the primitive forest and hunted a few low level demon beasts. He was lucky enough to find two low level demon beasts not too different from turkeys.
He decided to make one into beggar’s chicken, so that Ling Xiao could have a taste of how amazing beggar’s chicken was. The other, he made into chicken soup to help with Ling Xiao’s condition.
Though he knew it wouldn’t help with Ling Xiao’s internal injuries any, but it would let You XiaoMo spoil Ling Xiao a little. He was determined to be the good wife and mother to the end.
Though You XiaoMo had made beggar’s chicken before at home, he hadn’t done it by burying the chicken in the ground. In the twenty-first century with all that technology, who’d bury the chicken in the ground anymore?
You XiaoMo hadn’t done it back then, but he dared to bet that if he had, he’d be looked upon with disdain by his family, especially his mother who was a real aristocratic lady. She was very picky about the food that came on the table, as well as their table manners, and she had a husband that spoiled her to no end, too.
You XiaoMo first killed the turkey, and then removed its internal organs. After that, he cleaned it and rubbed on the season he had bought before. However, because he hadn’t made ample preparations, so he had to simplify things slightly. Luckily, he did have most of the necessary spices, so the flavor wouldn’t be too affected.
Afterwards, You XiaoMo used some leaves from the forest to wrap the chicken up. These leaves were even larger than lotus leaves, and one leaf was enough to wrap up the entire turkey. Then, he lumped mud on it, a layer around 1.5 cm thick, and after that, he placed it into a hole in the ground.
You XiaoMo had wanted to get Ling Xiao to light a fire for him, but after considering it, he decided against it.
After finishing the beggar’s chicken, he began working on the second dish. The fragrance of cooked meat wafted through the air. It was all meat dishes. He had wanted to make a few vegetarian ones, but he didn’t have enough ingredients. He only found twenty wild mushrooms. Alone, the flavor would be monotonous. It was better to cook it with something else.
Two hours later, he had made a table of meat dishes.
With the aroma of meat in the air, You XiaoMo didn’t have to go and call for Ling Xiao. The other had come out already.
You XiaoMo excitedly dragged Ling Xiao over and had him sit at the table. He had made the table and chairs himself. The table was wider than normal tables. “Look, I made all this for you.”
Ling Xiao really liked the barbequed meat You XiaoMo cooked. Though they had ate it in the cave for several months, he had never gotten tired of it, and different demon beasts would have different tastes, so compared to You XiaoMo, who had gotten sick of barbeque, he was still very interested in it.
Plus, demon beasts all enjoyed meat. Meat was much more tempting to them than to humans.
“What’s this?” Ling Xiao’s gaze fell onto the beggar’s chicken, which was covered in a layer of mud, and he frowned.
You XiaoMo knew that the other had misunderstood, but he didn’t tell him any specifics, just grinning and saying, “This, we’ll save for last. Then you’ll see how amazing it is.”
Ling Xiao raised an eyebrow at him.
The two began to sweep through the dishes on the table. You XiaoMo had made plenty of each dish, seven different flavors for seven different meat dishes. Ling Xiao hadn’t even finished them when his gaze once again fell onto the beggar’s chicken.
You XiaoMo was so stuffed that he had a little food baby. He quietly activated his inner energy, digesting half of it before he started to peel open the beggar’s chicken. The mud had prevented the beggar’s chicken from leaking warmth, so even after half an hour, it’s flavor, color and scent hadn’t changed at all, still piping hot and delicious.
The aroma wafted towards the sea, and a gust of wind blew it right back onto the island.
From that day on, Ling Xiao became obsessed with beggar’s chicken.
Each day, after he finished meditating, he would sit at the table, waiting for beggar’s chicken, not missing a single meal. You XiaoMo had no choice but to go and catch turkeys in the forest every day, in the end, not only did the number of turkeys fall, but for a while, he could barely find any. Even though they might not be sentient yet, low level demon beasts could sense danger and avoid it instinctively.
In the end, You XiaoMo had to change tactics. He no longer hunted the turkeys at a specific time each day, and instead caught more in one go. In order to make sure that Ling Xiao could have beggar’s chicken in the future, he caught a few male and female turkeys and put them in his dimension. Afraid that they would trample over his magic herbs, he had to get more wood to build a tall fence.
However, it wasn’t as if the hens could immediately lay eggs. It wasn’t until You XiaoMo had hunted all the nearby turkeys that he realized this wasn’t good.
One day, he entered the forest to catch turkeys again, yet didn’t find a single one, and this continued for several days. As he thought, they were going to break the food chain here, weren’t they?
Though Ling Xiao didn’t say anything, he hadn’t eaten beggar’s chicken for four, five days, and each day he would silently come out and then silently return to the room. This, somehow, had You XiaoMo developing a sense of guilt that he really shouldn’t have.
Then, one day, he came back empty-handed and didn’t plan to touch the turkeys in his dimension, so You XiaoMo decided to enter the deeper area of the forest to find some. Since the turkeys were low level demon beasts, he had stayed at the edges of the forest to catch them and very rarely went deeper.
The following morning, You XiaoMo left after bidding Ling Xiao goodbye.
Though the unnamed island didn’t seem to have any signs of other people, there was a primitive forest, so there must be demon beasts there, so even if there were no turkeys, he could get other fowl. So long as it was some sort of fowl, it could be made into beggar’s chicken!
Barely a minute after he had left, a black eagle on a nearby true suddenly flew into the air and deeper into the forest with a long cry. It’s speed was shocking.
You XiaoMo raised his head as the black eagle just so happened to fly overhead. He only saw a flash of its tail and couldn’t help but gasp at the speed, the last vestiges of doubt leaving his heart.
The small island wasn’t small at all, but massive.
You XiaoMo darted through the forest, so fast that he left afterimages behind. Occasionally, he saw a few low or middle level demon beasts, but he hadn’t seen any fowl yet, which was puzzling. Fowl demon beasts weren’t rare. They were just as common as the chickens that normal people kept. Plus, he only caught turkeys, so how come he hadn’t seen any?
You XiaoMo landed on a branch of a large tree, looking around. There were quite a few middle level demon beasts nearby, but not a single fowl. Could it be that this kind of demon beast was particularly rare on this island?
Not long later, You XiaoMo’s befuddlement was finally solved.
Just as he prepared to leave and continue further into the forest, a Red-Crowned Turkey with with a crown of fiery red and feathers like the blazing clouds of the sunset. Red-Crowned Turkeys were a middle level demon beast, a mutation of turkeys, able to breathe fire and three times as fast.
You XiaoMo was delighted. After searching for four hours, he had finally found a Red-Crowned Turkey. As the turkey’s mutated form, and a middle level demon beast, it’s meat would be even better than turkey meat. He immediately chased after it.
Then, something strange happened.
He could see the Red-Crowned Turkey open up its wings, running in his direction with interest, but then a demon beast jumped out in the middle and said something to the Red-Crowned Turkey. The Red-Crowned Turkey seemed shocked, and quickly ran in the other direction.
You XiaoMo was stunned. What on earth was this?
After he snapped out of it, he immediately gave chase, not caring about anything else. No matter how fast it was, it wouldn’t be able to outrun him. Once he caught up, it immediately started attacking furiously, not giving him a chase to act first. Fireball after fireball flew at him.
You XiaoMo casually dodged the fireballs and, not five minutes later, had the Red-Crowned Turkey under foot. It was too bad that this guy couldn’t assume a human form, then he’d be able to find out what that other demon beast had said.
Soon enough, You XiaoMo knocked the Red-Crowned Turkey unconscious and was about to shoulder it and leave. The Red-Crowned turkey was thrice as large as the normal turkeys and required even larger leaves to wrap it. Later on, he could pick up some leaves on the way back.
Just as You XiaoMo turned, the rustling of leaves suddenly sounded beside him. He turned his head towards the direction the noise had come from and saw that it was a middle level demon beast that looked exactly the same as the demon beast that had talked to the Red-Crowned Turkey. However, he knew it was a different one, because there was no way they’d be faster than him.
These were a demon beast known as Demon Rats, they were nocturnal creatures. Demon Rats were very agile and sensitive to sounds. They could tunnel into the ground silently and were very good for spying. Seeing that he wasn’t moving, the Demon Rats quietly returned underground, crouching there without a single movement.
You XiaoMo, amused, sent out his soul power around him and soon discovered that there were around ten Demon Rats hidden around here. Over seventy percent of them were facing him.
Seeing this, if he still didn’t realize that someone was controlling these Demon Rats, then he would’ve lived for nothing for twenty years.
He had always thought that this was a island that hadn’t been taken over by demon beasts, but now it appeared that this island may have been claimed by a powerful demon beast. The reason why he had never noticed until now was probably because they were on opposite sides of the island.
You XiaoMo didn’t bother confirming this and headed back with his Red-Crowned Turkey.
He wasn’t here to fight over land with demon beasts. After Ling Xiao recovered some, or after he broke through to grade four, they would leave. Thus, there was no need to fight over this island where no one lived and nothing happened.
Not long after he left, so did all the Demon Rats.
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