Chapter 7 The Poplar Forest Nearly Encounters Three Devious Encounters 3 Jiang Yu Only Realized After Speaking...

Jiang Yu realized that Liu Taohua was still there after she finished speaking, and that she seemed to have said something she shouldn't have said in front of others.

Jiang Yu turned to look at Liu Taohua, his previous nonchalant demeanor vanishing, replaced by a serious expression and a cautious scrutiny in his eyes. He asked, "Did you hear everything?"

Liu Taohua nodded noncommittally and said, "Yes, being this close, I'm sure my hearing is fine."

Jiang Yu said, "Aren't you curious about who we are?"

Liu Taohua didn't answer immediately. Instead, she walked up to the tuft of fur, gently stroked its head, and said, "Do you think this is important?"

The words were spoken while looking at a tuft of hair, but they were meant for the river fish to hear.

There is a rule in the Three Realms: whether one is a god or a ghost, one's identity should not be easily known to mortals, nor should one easily use one's magic in the human world.

Mortals worship gods above and ghosts below, each with their own affiliation. If any deity or ghost manifests, it's either in a dream or in an unknown place, which is acceptable to the public. Conversely, aside from the possibility of publicly revealing one's identity and being mistaken for someone else, causing madness and panic, what if someone with ulterior motives uses it to do something bad? Wouldn't that disrupt the order of the three realms?

Times have changed. The harmonious coexistence of humans, gods, and ghosts is a thing of the distant past, seven hundred years ago.

Liu Taohua didn't take it to heart, saying, "The most important thing in friendships is compatibility. Here, we won't discuss past events or consequences, only the present. Whether you are human, god, or ghost, we are friends, so we won't care about your so-called status. So, does it matter?"

Jiang Yu was taken aback, then reverted to his usual nonchalant demeanor, chuckling as he said, "It's not important, it's not important! I was just being shallow!" As he spoke, Jiang Yu put his arm around Liu Taohua's shoulder and added, "Taohua, you are truly one of the only two, no, only three women I admire."

Suddenly, Jiang Yu felt a cold, menacing gaze from behind. Her brow twitched, and she quickly let go of his hand, saying, "Sorry, I got a little carried away."

Liu Taohua smiled and shook her head. Then she saw Jiang Yu looking at the silent Lianxi with a faint smile on his lips, looking like he was in a good mood. She said, "Brother, you have such good taste!"

Lianxi casually fiddled with the hair ribbon wrapped around her fingers and said, "That's right, I've always had good taste."

Liu Taohua looked bewildered and said, "What are you talking about? I don't understand."

Lianxi replied, "It's not the right time yet. I'll tell you later."

Liu Taohua thought to herself, "In the future? Could it be that we'll never meet again after this trip? Then let's leave everything to fate."

Jiang Yu, leading the way with a tuft of hair, said, "I'll lead the way! Anyway, my magic is limited, so who's afraid of who?!"

Liu Taohua couldn't help but admire Jiang Yu's unique way of thinking. Others would be on guard and cautious in such a place where their ability to protect themselves is limited, but he didn't care at all and charged forward without hesitation. His courage was truly commendable!

Lianxi walked slowly alongside her and asked, "Are you scared?"

Liu Taohua looked forward and then back, and said, "Since we're already here, we should at least see the whole spectacle."

The two followed Jiang Yu deeper into the woods. After walking for about 15 minutes, Jiang Yu stopped, looked around, and said, "That's not right... It's right here."

Liu Taohua asked, "What's wrong?"

Jiang Yu said, "The place where we encountered that barrier should be right here, but it's gone now." As he spoke, Jiang Yu opened his palm, releasing a beam of white light, which vanished instantly. He exclaimed "Ah!" and then added, "No! My magic power hasn't recovered either!!!"

Lianxi surveyed her surroundings. Since entering this forest, apart from the "fire dragon" and the black-gold red-bellied king snake, all she had seen was this towering poplar forest that never saw the sun.

Since Jiang Yu said that the barrier had disappeared and his magic power had not been restored, there is only one possibility.

Lianxi said, "We are already inside the barrier."

Jiang Yu: "What?!?!?!"

Liu Taohua: "......"

Lianxi strolled around the trees, smiled slightly, and said, "Interesting."

Jiang Yu asked in confusion, "What do you mean?"

Lianxi said, "The barrier you just saw was just an illusion. It was a movable array eye to mislead those who saw it, making them think that opening this barrier would allow them to reach their desired destination. The trees here all look similar, but when someone triggers the array eye, although it may look the same, its position has actually changed several times over."

Liu Taohua said, "But why is it the key to the formation? Shouldn't it be the key to breaking a formation?"

Lianxi laughed and said, "That's precisely what makes this formation interesting. The key to the formation is neither a real eye nor a fake eye."

Jiang Yu frowned and said, "Why are you making me more and more confused?"

Lianxi said, "Actually, we have already stepped into the formation from the moment we entered this forest. The 'fire dragon' breathes fire but does not harm people, which is to warn those who are already afraid; the black snakes attack in groups and kill with every move, which is to punish those whose desires outweigh their fears."

"If the first two are successful, the array's core will materialize, attracting attention. The first person to see it will be affected by the array, their magical power limited, which will then affect others. Therefore..."

Lianxi looked at the river fish with a playful expression and said, "You're the first person to see it, you're lucky."

Jiang Yu: "......???......."

Lianxi's eyes lit up, and she said calmly, "The owner of a tavern said, 'Only true warriors can enter Yez.' And the sandstorm before entering the forest, Mu'er said, 'That's one of the trials on the way to Yez.'"

"If someone is lucky enough to pass the first two tests, they will come here. This place has changed positions multiple times when the array core was triggered, forming a maze. Each of these things seems to be a test, but in reality, they are designed to prevent anyone who wants to enter Yez from ever getting out, and ultimately trap them here to die."

Jiang Yu clenched his fists, took a deep breath, and suppressed the urge to shout. After a silent roar in his heart, he said, "I just don't understand, what is there in Yezi? How could someone use such a vicious method to prevent people from entering Yezi?"

Liu Taohua pondered for a moment and said, "In other words, once you enter this forest, there's no way out. If someone is frightened by the 'fire dragon' and turns back, it's ostensibly a chance to change their mind, but in reality, it was all predetermined. Once you make a choice, there's no turning back."

Lianxi said, "Taohua is right."

Liu Taohua felt something was missing and asked, "But is it over yet?"

As if on cue, the ground beneath my feet suddenly went soft, and the yellow sand began to shift, accompanied by a violent tremor. The surrounding trees remained motionless, but their leaves flickered with an eerie red light.

A soft hum reached my ears, so faint it seemed to drift on the wind from afar, or perhaps it came from underground.

Soon, the low humming sound grew louder and clearer. At first, the sound was hoarse and low, but it gradually turned into wailing and roaring, and even sorrow.

That wasn't one person's voice.

A deafening roar erupted from the ground, and one after another, monsters, each three zhang tall, with slender bodies, ferocious faces, and humanoid sand bodies, emerged from the ground.

Liu Taohua was startled and exclaimed, "What is that thing?!"

Lianxi grabbed Liu Taohua's arm, jumped onto a branch, and traversed the forest over the monster, explaining, "That's a Qiaonu, a ghost whose soul turned into a vengeful spirit after death."

Legend has it that stilt slaves are formed when their flesh, bones, and blood are completely consumed during their lifetime, and their souls become vengeful ghosts after death. When they are reborn, their physical bodies are too damaged to support them in human form, so they take on a human form based on the environment they were in at the time of death. Stilt slaves are tall and slender, and they are named "stilt slaves" because their walking posture is very similar to that of a person walking on stilts.

Jiang Yu, still clutching a tuft of fur, quickly examined the area and said, "There are about a hundred of these 'Qiao Nu' (a type of slave), maybe more! Could they all be...?"

These stilt slaves were the people who, over the past century, had tried to reach Yez but ultimately died in this forest.

Their bodies were either devoured by the Black Gold Red-bellied King Serpent or trapped here to their deaths, their flesh becoming nourishment for the trees in this forest. With so many of these slaves before us, how many have died in the last hundred years?

Thinking of this, Jiang Yu felt a chill in his heart, slipped, and almost fell.

The swirling slaves surged in from all directions, and the three of them moved through them. The sand on the ground continued to shift, forming whirlpools of varying sizes. Gusts of cold wind emanated from the whirlpools, like bottomless maws, threatening to devour everything in their path.

The stilts moved across the shifting sand as if on flat ground. Their features were indistinct, but their expressions varied, and their limbs could be twisted at will, their postures bizarre. Their dark sand mouths opened as if drooling, spewing out pools of sand. The sand that landed on the ground instantly turned into highly sticky mounds of earth, and when it fell into the vortex, it would merge into one, expanding the vortex.

Every now and then they would utter a mumbled word that sounded like they were saying "Stay".

Although Jiang Yu's magic power was limited at the moment, he was too busy holding a tuft of hair to deal with the group of slaves and could only keep dodging. After a few rounds, he also looked a little tired.

Jiang Yu asked, "Brother! What do we do?"

Lianxi, with Liu Taohua in her arms, dodged away as if searching for something. When she saw an open space, she said, "Found it."

Before Liu Taohua could react, Lianxi pulled out a folding fan from somewhere, waved her long arm, creating a gust of wind that led all the stilted slaves to the open space. When the fan opened, a white light flashed out.

He said, "Kill them."

As soon as these two words were uttered, the leaves on the trees around the open space were all swept up, turning into a blood-red vortex that shot straight into the sky.

The leaves transformed into sharp blades, and with a series of continuous "hissing" and "crackling" sounds, countless stilt slaves were instantly torn to pieces, turning into a pile of loose sand.

Liu Taohua stared at everything in disbelief and asked, "Your magic power isn't limited?"

Lianxi simply said, "I'm very capable."

It wasn't like showing off, but rather like trying to reassure her.

The problem of the stags has been solved, the ground has stopped flowing, and the whirlpools have all disappeared.

Everything returned to calm.

The red leaves that had just slain the Qiao slaves no longer emitted an eerie light, appearing normal. They covered the scattered sand bodies of the Qiao slaves, as if they were draped in a fiery red robe, except that the red no longer devoured them, but instead gave them new flesh and blood, allowing them to settle down and return to their roots.

A faint light appeared not far away. Lianxi said, "The formation is broken."

It turns out that this formation is not unbreakable, but rather it is designed to counteract the opponent's own weaknesses. Relying on external forces will only hasten the death of those who come, while utilizing what is already present in the formation is the only way to safely resolve the situation.

Even a small leaf can be used to make a vessel.

Before leaving, Jiang Yu took one last look at the red leaves buried in the sand, feeling inexplicably sad. He silently bowed and then left with a tuft of hair.

The three walked to the light, which was indeed the exit. At that moment, an old man in black robes and a mask stood not far away, as if he had been waiting for a long time.

As the three men emerged, the old man slowly stepped forward, placing one hand on his chest and the other on his forehead. His voice, aged and deep, said, "Welcome to Yezi, distinguished guests."

A note from the author:

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