After sending Zhao Rong and the other two out of Zhongnan Kingdom, the Yulin Guards of the Lanxi Lin family said goodbye and returned.

But before they left, they left a box behind, saying that it was ordered by the master and asked the young master to accept it.

After that, without waiting for Zhao Rong's reaction, he rode away.

Zhao Rong opened it reluctantly and found that it was indeed the farewell gift that Lin Wenruo had prepared for him that morning when she mistakenly thought he was leaving.

The only thing missing was an ancient guqin named "Ming Yu".

Maybe they thought he was inconvenient to carry around, or maybe they had completely given up hope on his piano talent?

Zhao Rong thought happily.

After that, the three of them embarked on their journey again, their destination being the large canyon that ran through the north and south of Wangquezhou. According to the map of mountains and rivers of Wangquezhou, the name of the canyon was Li.

Now, Zhao Rong and others are not far from Li Du, which is only a few countries away. When the time comes, they can take a boat in Li Du, go by water, go downstream, and reach Duyou City directly at a great speed in a day.

The three of them headed north.

There were occasionally some unexpected accidents along the way, but we overcame them and kept going.

One day, I passed by a village. The sun was setting and the scenery was pastoral.

One day I encountered a heavy rain on the road, with fresh rain in the empty mountains, bright moon and fresh breeze.

Another day, they passed through the heartland of a great dynasty. The customs changed every ten miles, and the dialect changed every hundred miles. It was very easy for outsiders to get lost here, but in the end the three of them still managed to get through smoothly.

It was evening of that day.

Zhao Rong and his two companions rested in a deep forest and made a fire.

After dinner, Zhao Rong completed his daily exercises breathlessly.

During these days, he still hasn't found the innate vital energy in his body, although he had already learned from Gui that if he proceeded step by step, it would take him about a year to reach the Qingxu period of the Ascension Realm.

However, after such hard and persistent training day and night, he still made little progress, which still made him feel frustrated.

He vaguely felt the gap called "talent", but at this time, he was only standing at the "foot of the mountain" and could not see much of the scenery. He didn't know how many desperate things he would encounter on the future climbing journey.

Suddenly, he thought of his good friend Lin Wenruo, who was already a Confucian monk in the Tianzhi realm and was not yet thirty years old.

Zhao Rong once asked him how long it would take to produce a golden elixir. Zhao Rong remembered that he shook his head, smiled bitterly, and said that if there were no accidents, it would take no less than half a century.

As far as Zhao Rong knew, this good friend was the most talented cultivator among the Lanxi Lin family in the past hundred years, and was a famous Taoist beauty in Zhongnan Country.

Therefore, his bitter smile at that time must have been because he was thinking of those more evil geniuses he had seen.

For example, those students in the four prefectures of Taiqing who have formed golden elixir before the age of 28.

Zhao Rong had a lot of thoughts in his mind, and for some reason, he thought of her and Qian'er again.

There were two of them, one was sixteen-year-old Haoran, the other was seventeen-year-old Haoran, and both were potential sword immortals in Gui's eyes.

Zhao Rong sighed. The three of them grew up together and were all from the Zhao family, a family renowned for producing many swordsmen. Why was he the only one who was useless?

When we were little, we agreed to have fun together and be lazy, but in the end, I was the only one who was really lazy.

Zhao Rong shook his head, went to the river, washed his face, and returned to the fire.

Liu Sanbian and Su Xiaoxiao are both here.

The former was staring at Juhuo in a daze again.

The latter, on the other hand, was leaning close to the fire, holding a needle and thread in her hand, squinting her narrow fox eyes, and concentrating on embroidering and threading the needle.

But when Zhao Rong approached, Su Xiaoxiao suddenly turned around without saying a word and turned her back to Zhao Rong.

Zhao Rong touched his nose and knew that the little girl was angry again.

Today they passed by an immortal market. To be on the safe side, Zhao Rong wanted her to stay at the foot of the mountain while he and Brother Sanbian went up the mountain to replenish some necessities.

But the little girl was probably too depressed to hold it in any longer and insisted on going up with them, so all the tricks I used to coax her were no longer effective.

Of course, she was not allowed to go, and she has been sulking ever since.

Zhao Rong sat down by the fire, glanced at the thin shoulders of the little fox demon, thought about it and decided to coax this good friend who was nearly two hundred years older than him.

"Su Xiaoxiao, look, there is a firefly on your ponytail. It dares to challenge your dignity as the controller of fireflies. Catch it quickly and let it experience the feeling of trembling in fear in your palm!"

The little fox demon didn't move.

"Su Xiaoxiao, I was just observing the celestial phenomena at night and suddenly got inspired. I remembered the story of a fox fairy and a scholar. Wow, this story is not simple. It is a story of love and hate, a heart-wrenching, and a magnificent and beautiful love. Get ready for your tears. I'm going to start. By the way, turn around and listen closer."

The little fox demon moved forward, further away from Zhao Rong.

Zhao Rong: “…”

The young scholar took a deep breath and used his trump card.

He was surprised and said, "Look, Su Fox Fairy, there is a handsome, elegant, tall and mighty scholar behind you! Is he the ideal husband you are looking for?"

As soon as she finished speaking, Su Xiaoxiao suddenly turned around and looked back.

Alas, it seems that I still have to rely on my peerless looks.

Zhao Rong was delighted, thinking that his words had worked.

He then said with regret: "Alas, what a pity, this outstanding scholar is your best friend... me! It's okay, I will find you another one later..."

Su Xiaoxiao interrupted with a blank expression: "Zhao Rong, don't try to control me!"

Zhao Rong was stunned. What does this have to do with anything?

Su Xiaoxiao stared at Zhao Rong and said seriously, "Grandma said that the men who restrict you from doing things, try to control you, and make you unable to do this or that but only listen to him, saying that they are doing it for your own good, are the most hateful."

The little girl said something like she was reciting a textbook, and she also said something that Zhao Rong had never heard of before, which was a "quotation from her great-grandmother" that she regarded as a golden rule.

Zhao Rong was stunned for a moment, then suddenly became angry. He said unhappily, "Oh, so your great-grandmother also taught you to use yourself as a stake and be someone else's furnace?"

The more Zhao Rong thought about it, the angrier he became.

The little fox demon looked at Zhao Rong's bright eyes, then suddenly looked away, feeling a little guilty, and argued in a low voice: "No, no, my grandmother asked me to find someone else to make the furnace..."

"Um?"

Zhao Rong straightened up and exclaimed in surprise.

Liu Sanbian, who was in a daze aside, couldn't help but look over, his eyes circling back and forth between the pair of "good friends of the opposite sex" who were traveling with him.

Zhao Rong narrowed his eyes.

Little girl, that’s not what you told me at that time. Didn’t you say you didn’t know what a furnace was?

You know, you still...

Su Xiaoxiao quickly lowered her head, buried her little head in her knees, and huddled her petite body together, as if this could distance herself from the outside world.

“Crackle—”

There was silence around the fire for a moment, with only the sound of burning branches.

At this moment, feeling two gazes that she felt were very oppressive, Su Xiaoxiao wished she could dig a hole in the ground and crawl into it, never to come out again.

She did know what a cauldron was, or rather, as long as one was a fox, they would know it.

She was married to the big monster by the Su clan, which was equivalent to making a cauldron, so she fled down the mountain as soon as possible.

However, on the day of the Confucianism-Taoism debate, she watched Zhao Rong waving goodbye and left, and for some reason, she suddenly had a brainwave and went to gamble.

When she thought about it later, she thought she did it only for her good friend, and she even praised herself for her loyalty in her heart.

However, now under the gaze of the two people in front of her, she recalled this matter again, and suddenly, she felt a little flustered.

I don’t know how much time passed.

At a certain moment, the little fox demon from Qiantang Mountain suddenly raised his head, puffed up his little face, widened his eyes, stared at the young scholar and said:

"Zhao Rong, you can be my furnace."