Chapter 28 Beautiful and kind-hearted Shen Qingluo: The child is hungry, let's give him some food...
The wind whistled past my ears.
The lush, dense jungle rapidly expanded into his field of vision. Ji Mingran looked around, and the thick branches within his field of vision came into view.
Concentrate and close your eyes; a pale golden light appears.
Her feet landed precisely on the thick branches. Ji Mingran squatted on the branches, calculating the distance between the branches and the ground.
Find a good landing spot, activate the formation as quickly as possible, and then head to the next landing spot. Landing in stages will prevent you from crashing straight to the ground.
Having experienced two falls from great heights when she first entered the spiritual community, she is no longer flustered.
The light returned, and Ji Mingran landed steadily on the ground.
The grass on the ground was soft, the branches and leaves were towering overhead, and everywhere you looked there was a path.
Ji Mingran scratched the back of his head, pulled his cane out from behind his back, placed it vertically on the ground, and lightly tapped the tip of the cane with his finger.
Just go wherever you want.
Just as he was about to let go, a loud "boom" exploded, and the branches and leaves overhead rustled with the roar. Ji Mingran pressed his fingertips against the crumbling cane and turned around.
The loud noise came from deep within the dense forest.
Immediately afterwards, deafening roars of beasts came from that place again, the volume suddenly increasing and becoming even more deafening.
You can even hear the madness and anger contained within it.
Such a roar indicates that the beast was quite large.
Although she didn't know what kind of beast was making the roar, she wasn't unfamiliar with the kind of wild beast's screams that were so out of control, restless, and even angry.
In Fengqi Town, this is what happens when pigs are slaughtered in villagers' homes.
The roar rang out again.
The branches and leaves nearby shook violently, and the ground trembled even more intensely, making it difficult to stand.
We're closer now.
Ji Mingran frowned slightly, his eyes fixed on the front, the faint light of the Jin Clan appearing at his feet.
If something seems wrong, you should run away as soon as possible.
However, a gigantic black shadow appeared with lightning speed, accompanied by a roar, its coarse, thick black fur completely obscuring her vision.
At the same moment, a petite figure in red appeared instantly in front of her, declaring, "This is my prey!"
When Ji Mingran heard this, she was already a foot away from where she stood. Perhaps she was dizzy from hunger, and before she could even think about what the person meant, she instinctively cried out, "Fellow Daoist, please share some meat with the child!"
His stomach growled at just the right moment. Ji Mingran clutched his stomach and turned to look back at the giant beast.
The girl in red, who was fighting back and forth with the giant beast, was stunned when she heard this.
What kind of nonsense is this?
She peered out from the gap revealed by the giant beast's raised paw.
The two locked eyes.
"It's you?"
"It's you?"
The roar continued, and the girl immediately turned and flipped to the side to nimbly dodge the beast's attack. Her beautiful face was then obscured by the enormous beast's body.
Even in that brief moment, Ji Mingran recognized that stunningly beautiful face.
It was the girl who crossed over into the world with her in the small world!
"Hey! What a coincidence!" Ming Ran quickly used a teleportation array to move from the giant beast to a spot half a zhang behind the girl, and said excitedly, "It's so good that you're alright!"
The woman in the red dress had a menacing back view and did not respond. Mingran followed her gaze and looked ahead.
A giant black bear, five times the size of a normal person, roared ferociously, its sharp fangs snarling as it frantically pawed at the ground, trying to gather strength to charge forward.
The girl in red, who was confronting the sawtooth bear, raised her hand. A silver ring flashed on her finger, and a long knife appeared in her palm. She said coldly, "It's best to hide in the back."
Ji Mingran was stunned upon hearing this, staring blankly at the back of the girl in red.
"Gou?"
Ji Mingran's eyes gradually brightened.
I never even considered the idea of others charging ahead while I stayed behind and played it safe.
When someone is always at the forefront, she suffers less harm, and by all accounts, she is healthier and can live longer.
This person is a good person.
Ji Mingran asked again, "Are you sure you don't need my help?"
The girl tilted her head slightly, the long sword in her hand flashing with a sharp, cold light. "I've already said, this is my prey."
"Whoa~" Ji Mingran realized what was happening and happily started picking two large leaves from the bushes next to him, holding them up to block his view. "No problem."
Hearing the cheers behind her, the girl felt a sudden sense of unease. She turned around and, sure enough, saw the person who was burying his head in the sand. He asked with a strange expression, "What are you doing?"
Before Ji Mingran could respond, a flash of silver light appeared, and with a whoosh, the girl turned around, drew her sword, and charged straight at the giant bear with even greater speed and ferocity.
Several lightning-fast, silvery blades flashed past like ghosts, colliding with the giant bear's massive body and producing a resounding clang.
The giant bear roared in pain and raised its paw to strike the girl. The girl spun to the side to dodge, but the giant bear's gaping maw snapped fiercely in the direction she was dodging. She gripped her knife downwards, kicked the saw-toothed bear back with her left leg, and spun sideways to avoid the bear's attack.
The girl then flashed back to Ji Mingran's side: "I need to deal with it for a while, you'd better go somewhere far away."
Ji Mingran swallowed hard and shook his head, saying, "I'm too hungry to walk."
The girl frowned slightly: "If you're hungry, you can go to the Linfeng canteen. Most new disciples do that."
Does it cost money?
"nature."
"Then I'll wait."
"..." The girl replied, "Whatever you wish." With a flash of her sword, she confronted the charging bear head-on.
Seeing the girl's agile and powerful figure, Ji Mingran felt even more hungry and weak all over. So he simply changed to a more effortless position, comfortably lying on his side to watch the girl fight the giant bear.
The giant bear roared angrily at the girl before it, its blood-red maw wide open, its terrifying fangs seemingly capable of biting off her head in one gulp. But the girl raised her sword with both hands, blocking the fangs and claws that were inches away, while her gaze turned to Ji Mingran, asking, "Aren't you being a little too leisurely?"
Ji Mingran scratched the back of his head and laughed, "No problem, no problem. By the way, I didn't have time to ask you last time what your name is. My name is Ji Mingran."
Realizing its enemy was ignoring it, the giant bear roared and swung its other claw at the girl. The girl deftly sheathed her sword, flipped over to dodge the attack, her fiery red dress billowing and gathering with her movements, her jet-black hair flowing in the wind, her beauty breathtaking. She stopped and turned back: "My name is Shen Qingluo."
In the next instant, a flash of silver light appeared, and Shen Qingluo's longsword slashed horizontally towards the giant bear.
After several meetings, Ji Mingran realized that Shen Qingluo was purely honing her swordsmanship and hadn't used any spiritual power at all.
Seeing the girl wielding her long sword with such flair, Ji Mingran couldn't help but ask, "You've switched to using a sword?" The scene of her whipping the horse last time was still vivid in his mind.
The girl knelt on one knee, using her sword to block the giant bear's oncoming palm strike. She was pushed back half a foot by the immense force and said, "I am a weapon cultivator, and I must learn different weapons." With that, she raised her sword and charged forward to slash.
They are not simply sword or saber cultivators, but weapon cultivators.
Ji Mingran: "I see."
I'm so hungry.
Completely exhausted, Ji Mingran simply lay down on the ground, staring blankly at the sky.
Shen Qingluo, who was fighting the giant bear, also heard the sound. She glanced at the person lying on the ground, then looked back at the giant bear that had gone into a frenzy. Her brows furrowed with impatience. She clicked her tongue, suddenly stopped, and jumped up to create distance between herself and the giant bear.
She stood still with her hands at her sides, and the aura emanating from her body suddenly changed. The blade in her hand turned completely red, surrounded by rising heat.
In the next instant, the crimson figure struck out swiftly like an arrow released from a bow, while raging flames simultaneously surged from the hilt of the sword along the blade to the tip.
With a whooshing sound, the blade, carrying a massive wave of fire, swept across the giant bear, its powerful and ferocious attack slashing deep into its bones, splattering blood and sparks everywhere.
Flames raged all around, and the giant bear howled in despair.
With lightning speed, Ji Mingran activated the Vajra Formation, drawing a small circle around himself to avoid the falling sparks from all directions.
As soon as the formation was activated, a huge fireball slammed into the Vajra Formation and bounced back to the ground.
Ji Mingran turned his head and looked closely. What was engulfed by the red flames was the giant bear's arm.
"Keep an eye on the heat." Shen Qingluo's voice came from the other end.
For her to eat?
"Don't burn it, don't burn it..." Ji Mingran hurriedly sat up, quickly dug at the ground, used soil to put out the fire, and then found some branches and leaves to make a small fire, and put the bear arm back up to warm it.
By the time Ji Mingran finished his work and the aroma of bear meat filled the air, the battle on Shen Qingluo's side had also ended. Sheathing her longsword and storing it in her storage ring, Shen Qingluo looked in the direction of the fragrance.
The embers of fire had not yet dissipated, leaving the area charred and desolate, with waves of heat emanating from it. Birds and beasts had long since fled for their lives. Only a small patch of land remained untouched by the sparks, with grass and shrubs still growing. A man squatted there, poking at the pile of firewood in front of him and turning over pieces of meat wrapped in green leaves on a wooden frame, so engrossed that he didn't even notice the beads of sweat dripping from his brow.
"Why don't you just take the meat elsewhere to grill? Don't you find it too hot?"
Suddenly, a white handkerchief appeared in her line of sight. Ji Mingran looked up and realized that Shen Qingluo had walked up to her without her noticing. She looked around and saw that the giant bear was lying motionless in the distance.
“The location is perfect, the timing is perfect.” Ji Mingran took the handkerchief, rolled it up and wrapped it around his forehead. Then he picked up a twig, removed the bear meat wrapped in green leaves, and turned it over to reveal tender chunks of meat oozing golden fat. “We can eat now.”
"You eat." Shen Qingluo made a hand seal to extinguish the remaining fire around her, and then cast a purification spell, making the air feel fresh again. Only then did she sit down slowly and calmly to the side.
Ji Mingran didn't stand on ceremony and started devouring the food.
Shen Qinglu raised an eyebrow at the person beside her who was wolfing down their food, then took out a gourd from her storage ring and handed it over: "Are you that hungry?"
Ji Mingran almost choked from eating so fast, so she quickly drank several mouthfuls of water and felt instantly revived: "Thank you, Luanfeng has nothing, not even a blade of grass." She wiped the gourd's mouth and handed it back to Shen Qingluo: "Here's your gourd back."
"Here you go." Shen Qinglu pushed the gourd back with her index finger: "Anyway, they're all distributed by Lin Feng, so it's free."
"Distributed uniformly?" Ji Mingran lifted the gourd and examined it closely. Sure enough, she found a five-star, two-river, cloud pattern on the bottom of the gourd. She exclaimed, "Lin Feng distributes this too?"
Shen Qingluo rested her chin on her wrist, her beautiful eyes fixed on Ji Mingran: "Linfeng Fengshu Hall is in charge of sect missions, reward distribution, and disciples' daily affairs. Sect disciples can use spirit stones and merit points to exchange for weapons, pills, and other items at Fengshu Hall. New disciples can receive daily clothing and supplies at Fengshu Hall. Didn't Venerable Hongyan tell you this?"
Ji Mingran shook his head in a daze. He had only told her to jump off the cliff.
Shen Qinglu smiled gently: "When I saw you here, I thought the rumors were wrong. It seems that the rumors that Grandmaster Luanfeng went into seclusion to cultivate as soon as he arrived were not unfounded."
"How did you know I had entered Luanfeng?" Ji Mingran asked.
Even though everyone knew that a new disciple had arrived at Luanfeng, how could Shen Qingluo know it was her?
“After passing the sect entrance competition, I saw your projection stone in the sect realm,” Shen Qingluo said. “I was waiting for you in the sect realm, but that night my master called me back. When I returned to the sect realm, you had already arrived. After that, news spread that the last place in the sect entrance competition had become the closed-door disciple recognized by Ancestor Luanfeng.”
Ji Mingran asked in surprise, "You've been waiting for me in the sect's territory? What were you waiting for me for?"
It took her a full month to climb up.
Shen Qingluo's smile froze, and his expression became unnatural: "I... I'm just killing time anyway."
In the Dingsheng Sect, there were not many disciples from small worlds to begin with. Among the new disciples this year, there was someone who had transcended the world at the same time as her. Shen Qingluo was surprised. Since they were destined to meet, she decided to wait and say hello.
Anyway, since this person can use a teleportation array, he'll probably only be here for a day or two.
Three days later, she was still on her way.
Shen Qingluo pondered to herself, since she had already waited three days, what harm was there in waiting another three days?
However, three days passed, and the man was still walking on the road.
Shen Qingluo originally wanted to leave, but then she thought that once this person used the teleportation array, it wouldn't take long for him to come up. Since she had already waited for six days, she might as well wait a little longer, otherwise she would have wasted the first six days.
So Shen Qingluo waited and waited, for a whole month, but she still didn't see anyone.
A whole month wasted.
Shen Qinglu was filled with self-doubt in the bleak night wind.
Why wait? And why wait so long?
Do I have nothing to do?
Filled with grief and indignation, she turned and plunged into the Linfeng battle, which continues to this day.
Just then, the person she had been waiting for for over a month said with a sincere expression, "You seem to have a lot of free time."
Shen Qinglu stared at Ji Mingran expressionlessly, wanting to grab the cane behind her back and hit her with it: "How could you say you'd eat my flesh?"
This person looks thin and innocent, but in reality, he is heartless.
Ji Mingran looked completely bewildered, but gripped the meat tightly in his hand: "Didn't you say it yourself? Why did you suddenly bring up meat?"
Her eyes were wide open, and the dark circles under her eyes looked particularly large against her pale skin, making her look both weak and pitiful.
Shen Qingluo closed her eyes. Forget it, in this half-dead state, even if I hit her with a stick, I'd still have to carry her to the hospital for treatment.
Unaware that he had escaped a beating, Ji Mingran enthusiastically said, "That's true, you'll be hungry after a fight, so eat up. Oh, I forgot to ask, after you reached the sect realm and passed the competition, which peak did you choose?"
Seeing Ji Mingran eating with great relish, Shen Qingluo, though not hungry, felt a surge of appetite and took a bite of the meat.
"It tastes awful!" Shen Qingluo's beautiful face scrunched up, and she instinctively opened her mouth to spit out the piece of meat, but when she looked up, she saw a pair of eyes with dark circles under them looking at her expectantly.
"Cough cough cough..." The piece of meat in his mouth was swallowed whole without him even realizing it.
My mouth was still filled with a fishy smell.
She returned the remaining meat to Ji Mingran: "I'm not hungry, you eat it."
"Okay." Ji Mingran happily accepted it and continued to eat with relish.
Shen Qingluo secretly used a cleansing spell on herself, and after the muttony smell in her mouth disappeared, she continued, "I did well in the sect entrance competition, and Elder Zhu Huo of Yaofeng made an exception and accepted me as his disciple."
Zhu Huo? That name sounds familiar. Ji Mingran racked his brains for a while before finally remembering: "You've become the Peak Master's personal disciple? Oh my, oh my, that's incredible!"
Seeing Ji Mingran's bright eyes and smiling face, Shen Qingluo knew that he was sincerely congratulating her. She smiled slightly and said in a gentle tone, "There are not many disciples from small worlds in Dingsheng Sect. This year, there are only the two of us who are new disciples. Now we are both personal disciples. It is fate that we are here."
Ji Mingran nodded: "Indeed, although you waited for me for a whole month for nothing, we still managed to run into each other in the woods after all."
Why bring up something you shouldn't talk about? Shen Qingluo's smile froze again.
The person in front of him asked again, "Are you cultivating here?"
Shen Qingluo felt a pang in her heart again. She pursed her lips and replied, "Yes, and while you're at it, look for Yingxue. It's gone."
Yingxue. Ji Mingran recalled the horse he rode when he was away from the world; it was indeed pure white.
Ji Mingran analyzed carefully: "It's so white, it's easy to spot. There are such giant beasts in the forest, it's very likely to be eaten."
Why bring up something you shouldn't talk about? Shen Qingluo took a deep breath and looked at her expressionlessly: "You can leave now."
Ji Mingran asked in surprise, "I haven't finished eating yet." Why is he kicking her out?
Shen Qingluo stood up and pointed to her left: "Go about ten zhang up this way, and you'll find a teleportation array that leads to Linfeng Fengshu Hall." She took out a long sword from her storage ring and released it, the sword falling slightly to the ground.
"Eat slowly." Shen Qingluo stepped onto her long sword. "I'm leaving!"
Having said that, he flew away on his sword.
Ji Mingran held the chunks of meat in both hands, looked up at Shen Qingluo who had become a mere dot, and murmured, "With a knife this useful, why bother looking for a horse?"
But the person who should have responded to her had already left, and Ji Mingran continued to slowly gnaw on the piece of meat in the same spot.
Hunger was replaced by a feeling of fullness, and I finally regained my strength.
Looking around, the giant bear's corpse was nowhere to be seen, most likely taken away by Shen Qingluo.
The bear arm left for her was larger than half her body by its paw alone. Ji Mingran only roasted part of it, and wrapped the rest in leaves, carried it on her back, and left.
The remaining meat is enough to last a month. The smoked meat can probably last longer, but it might spoil at any time.
We have to go to Fengshutang first; we can't leave something for free untouched.
After collecting your things, go back and tidy up your room, then you can sit at the table and do your memorization.
It's a pity I can't refine and store spiritual energy yet, otherwise I would learn purification techniques and be able to clean the room much faster.
As Ji Mingran pondered, she walked in the direction Shen Qingluo had pointed out to her.
Ahead lay a dense forest, with lush green bushes and shrubs that could easily dazzle the eye.
The bear's arm on her back was extremely heavy, causing Ji Mingran to hunch over and stumble forward. Her mind was scattered and she didn't notice the slight deviation in direction under her feet.
As Ji Mingran walked forward, he sensed a change in spiritual energy.
Faint, but familiar—it's definitely a teleportation array.
Ji Mingran's gaze fell upon the trunk of the giant tree, which was entwined with vines.
Sunlight filters through the gaps in the branches and leaves, scattering dappled spots of light. The ancient tree stands quietly, as if no one has set foot here for a long time.
Ji Mingran reached out and parted the vines a little, and sure enough, he saw the teleportation array patterns that had been hidden.
She placed her hand on the vine, closed her eyes, and guided the spiritual energy of heaven and earth into the array, drawing the array patterns with the spiritual energy.
Golden light seeped out from between the vines, and gradually, a huge and complete pattern emerged from the ancient tree trunk, layer by layer, and appeared on the vines.
A brilliant golden light shone forth, and the array activated gusts of air, causing a low, rustling wind to sweep across the branches and leaves.
The gust of wind had already passed by the time the fallen leaves touched the ground.
The girl who was standing here carrying a large bundle has disappeared.
The ancient tree still stands quietly in its place, with only fallen leaves indicating that people have been there.
Author's Note: Currently working hard to accumulate chapters for the Lunar New Year holiday, updating every other day for now.
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