Chapter 123: A Dragon, Not a Snake
There are many strange-looking people in the underground palace.
There are people with heads as big as winnowing baskets, people with hands like crabs, and people with no arms or ears.
Jiaoran only discovered it later.
Cha Che and Mu Jin discovered it earlier than she and Zhu Xing.
At the beginning, Zhuxing was walking through the corridor and bumped into a person without eyes. She was holding a lamp at that time, and the other person was also holding a lamp. When she raised the lamp, she saw that the person in front of her had a nose, a mouth, and even eyebrows on his face, but no eyes.
A person without eyes on his face is even more bizarre than a blind person having eyes but not being able to see.
Zhuxing screamed in fear, and Jiaoran hurried over, "Senior Sister!"
After taking two steps to their side, Jiaoran also discovered that this man had no eyes.
Compared to Zhuxing's fear, Jiaoran seemed to be more likely to accept people with strange appearances. Perhaps it was because she knew that there were places like the Wonderland of Fish and Dragons in the world, where there were dragons and immortals. So it was not surprising that there were some strange beings among mortals.
Ji Feng even revealed a dragon's tail with a human head on it in front of her. After seeing such an extraordinary scene, Jiao Ran became much calmer when she saw the eyeless mortal in front of her.
"Senior Sister, are you okay?"
Zhuxing was still in shock and couldn't utter a word.
It was the person on the other side who spoke first, "I'm sorry, did I scare you?"
Jiaoran said it was no problem, "We'll let you pass, please go ahead."
Zhuxing was a little confused. "If you can't see, why do you light the lamp?"
The aimless man said, "Walking in the dark is my normal state. However, although I can avoid other people in the dark, sometimes they walk too fast and can't see me. I hold the lantern so that the person on the other side can see me."
Jiao Ran nodded, "Are you a disciple of the Zongxun Sect?"
"The Tracking Sect? Never heard of it." He shook his head. "We've always lived here, me and my family."
"Do you have family living here?" Zhuxing looked at Jiaoran.
Jiaoran pointed at the man with his chin, indicating that he should say a few words before leaving.
"Yes, I was born blind and was a freak among the crowd. It was Ah Heng who brought us here and built our home, so that we could live well."
"Who is Ah Heng?" Zhuxing asked him.
Jiaoran seemed to understand a little bit. The Ah Heng he was talking about was most likely Kuang Heng.
"Ah Heng is Ah Heng. You are his guests and should have met him. Why are you asking me who he is?"
Zhuxing leaned close to Jiaoran's ear and asked, "Could the Ah Heng he mentioned be the Phoenix chick?"
Jiaoran didn't say anything.
The man continued, "It's almost lunchtime, I have to go home early."
Jiao Ran asked, "Is this your home?"
The man said, "Yes, didn't I just say that? My family and I live here."
Jiaoran said, "Then walk slowly. Some of the paths have forks, so be careful not to get lost."
The other party burst into laughter. After hearing this, he couldn't stop laughing. "Don't worry, I know this place better than you guests. Although I can't see, I know many of the roads here very well. Some roads are temporarily closed, so we won't go there. We can just take another one."
Zhuxing was overjoyed and was about to stop him to ask about the terrain below.
Jiao Ran said, "Let him go."
After a while, the two of them went back to the stone chamber to relieve themselves. Seeing Qi Qingyun still standing outside, Zhuxing said, "There's no one watching outside. We won't run away. You should go back and rest."
Qi Qingyun felt that Zhuxing was easier to talk to than Jiaoran, so her tone was much better. "Miss Zhuxing, the master sent me here to serve you. I don't need to rest."
Jiaoran walked straight in and heard someone say, "If you want to watch, then watch. It won't be tiring to stand anyway, and there are people who bring him food and drinks."
Zhuxing could only smile dryly and followed Jiaoran in.
"Why are you so rude to him? They were watching over me before and didn't hurt me. On the contrary, they were worried about the dampness in the dungeon and changed my quilt several times."
Jiaoran looked at his senior sister and sighed helplessly.
After the two of them talked with Chai Che and Mu Jin, they realized that they were not the only ones who noticed that something was wrong with those people.
"The first time I ran into a person without ears, I thought his ears were just a little small and grew backwards, but when I passed by him, I found that he was indeed a person without ears," said Chaiche.
Mu Jin has now removed his disguise, but when he was still wearing it, he had encountered it before. "Once I saw a girl whose hands were like crab claws. Apart from her palms, she was no different from an ordinary person."
Zhuxing didn't understand, "Why did Phoenix Chick put so many strange-looking people here?"
Mu Jin speculated, "Could it be that he has some kind of magic that requires the help of these strange people?"
As he said this, he glanced at Jiaoran.
Jiao Ran said, "I'm not sure either. I don't think I've heard Fenghuang Chu mention it. How about you? Have you heard Zhou Zhi mention it?"
Mu Jin also said no, "She never mentioned it to me."
At this moment, a golden light flashed on Jiaoran's wrist, and in the blink of an eye, Jifeng appeared in front of them.
They had never seen Ji Feng, not even Mu Jin had seen it with his own eyes, but he had heard Jiao Ran talking to someone. Although he could not hear the other person's voice, he knew that Jiao Ran must be talking to someone else without telling him.
Jiao Ran was also stunned, "Why did you come out?"
Chaiche saw that the woman looked unfamiliar and asked, "Who are you?"
Only Zhuxing suddenly realized, "It's you. The golden bracelet wrapped around Jiaoran's wrist is you, right?"
Hayate nodded.
Mu Jin looked at Jiaoran with some blame. She always hid a lot of things from him. If she hadn't shown up herself, Jiaoran would probably never talk to him about it.
Jiaoran felt a slight chill on his scalp. Mu Jin didn't explode in anger all at once. His anger always accumulated slowly like water. When it reached a certain point, it would all burst out and could not be stopped at all.
Ji Feng said, "This palace is only this small. Even if I don't come out now, they will see me one day. It's better to come out early."
Mu Jin asked, "Do you know what those unusual people are like?"
Chache also had a guess, "Did the Phoenix Chicks deprive them of their ability to be normal people and turn them into this?"
Ji Feng didn't answer any of them. He turned to Jiao Ran and said, "Listen carefully. You can't see him again, and you can't enter the Water Realm. He can't help you in any way. As long as you remain in the Underground Palace, the barrier here will be closed. If you force your way in to see him, he will follow your dreams to find them, and it will bring disaster."
Jiaoran certainly knew who this "he" was.
Thinking back to the hands that had followed her the last time, and the circle Zhu Su had set in the forest, she knew she couldn't go there again. Every time, it felt like someone was following her. If Zhu Su hadn't been so defensive, Phoenix Chick would have taken advantage of her. Ji Feng's risky reminder meant that Zhu Su could no longer guide her actions through her dreams.
Jiao Ran said he knew, "This is the territory of the Phoenix Chick. We are like being inside his body. His lair certainly doesn't allow outsiders to enter. If he wants to trap us here, we can't get out."
Ji Feng wanted to say that it was only you that he trapped, but he didn't say it out loud.
This was all she wanted to say, and she was about to transform it into a divine weapon and attach itself to her wrist, but she didn't expect Chai Che to stop her with his sword.
Jiao Ran's eyes widened. "What are you doing?"
Chache said, "She must know something."
Mu Jin didn't say it, but he thought so in his heart. These powers beyond mortals should all come from one place, and also from the man who hurt him in his dream last time.
He firmly believed that Jiaoran had some unspeakable connection with them, but Jiaoran could not tell him the truth about their situation.
Since she can't say it, let this woman who is not an ordinary person say it.
Mu Jin tugged at Jiaoran's wrist and pulled her to her side, "Don't speak for now."
Zhuxing tutted his words, asked Chai Che to put away his sword, pressed Ji Feng's shoulders, comforted her to sit down, and poured her another cup of tea. "Are you thirsty?"
Ji Feng said, "Not thirsty."
Jiaoran understood Jifeng and knew that she would not say anything nonsense. She would say what she could say, and she knew better than her what she could not say, so she sat down opposite her with confidence.
Pick up a piece of date paste cake from the plate on the table and eat it.
As soon as she took a bite, the aroma of dates filled her nose. She couldn't help but finish it in a few bites, and then picked up another piece and put it in her mouth.
Hayate said, "If you want to ask me anything, do it as soon as possible."
Cha Che said coldly, "There are four of us. Do you think four of us can pry open your mouth and ask you to tell the truth?"
Jiaoran thought to herself, that’s not necessarily true. If she turns into a giant python, she won’t be this tall, thin, cold beauty anymore.
After eating a piece, he handed it to Mu Jin and said, "Try it, this is really delicious."
The food sent from the underground palace was not noticed earlier, but it was actually quite delicious, and many of the foods were very much to her taste.
Mu Jin took it and took a bite. He found the taste very strange, as if it had the smell of ginger. Who would add ginger to the date paste cake? He ate half of it and endured the strange taste to finish the remaining half.
Ji Feng said, "I will tell you the truth, but I may not be able to answer all your questions. How about this? Each of you ask me one question. Since you are all Jiao Ran's friends, I will allow you to ask me a question. If I can answer it, I will tell you."
Zhuxing said quickly, "Isn't one too few? Fairy, why don't you give us a few more chances so that we can find out everything at once?"
Mu Jin took a sip of tea to dilute the strange pastry, swallowed the tea and said, "What are the questions you can't answer?"
It was a good question in case she didn't answer any for a while.
"Is this your question?" Ji Feng asked, "You've thought it through. Is this the only question you're asking?"
"right."
Ji Feng said, "You are not allowed to ask about my origins and destinations, the origins and destinations of the Phoenix Chick, where Jiao Ran went after he disappeared, and what is his relationship with us. The secrets of that land are not for mortals to know."
Chai Che, Mu Jin and Zhu Xing looked at each other, wanting to discuss what to ask.
But Ji Feng said, "Each of you asks one person, you can't communicate with each other."
Several people were helpless, seeing her being so unkind.
"Ask quickly, I'm tired and need to sleep."
Zhuxing was afraid that she would disappear immediately, "Let me ask first, I'll go first."
"Okay, ask."
Zhuxing asked, "What's going on with those strange people in the underground palace?"
Chai Che felt that she was not asking the right question. She should have asked the real reason why Fenghuangchu trapped them here. Was it really to resurrect that woman?
Jiaoran was also curious about this matter.
Ji Feng said, "Didn't that person tell you? He said this is their home, just like Huiying Inn is your home and the Governor's Mansion is Chai Er's home."
Zhuxing said, "I already know this is their home. Besides this, why did the Phoenix Chick trap them here as well?"
"He didn't trap them. Those people must have volunteered."
Chai Che asked, "Is it because these people can't live outside, so they hide here and live in misery?"
Ji Feng said, "People in this world are short-sighted. They judge beauty and ugliness based on appearance and bones. Those who are slightly different from them will be excluded, distanced from, and punished. Isn't this a common tactic used by mortals?"
"So Phoenix Chick is helping them, allowing them to live like normal people here." Zhuxing understood what she meant. "Although he can be cruel and ruthless at times, he's also doing good things."
Ji Feng sneered, "He killed so many innocent people. He is countless times more vicious than other mortals who simply excluded these disabled mortals."
Zhuxing immediately said, "Everyone has many sides. Maybe he has a good side too."
Ji Feng was very angry and slammed the table and said, "No, no, no, he is a bad guy, an absolute bad guy. Whether it is in the past, present, or even the future, he will always be an out-and-out bad guy."
"How can you be so sure?" Zhuxing asked.
Chai Che saw that she was using a small, easy-to-answer question to trick the woman into talking. She was indeed his wife, very smart.
"He was willing to help them, simply because he felt that those mortals who looked like humans and monsters shared the same suffering as him. He only had pity on himself, so he helped them."
Zhuxing said, "But Phoenix Young is a perfectly healthy person. You can see that he has all his limbs intact, and there's nothing strange about him. Even though his power leaked out before, and he suddenly looked as old as a ghost, he's fine now."
Jiaoran finished the cakes on the table in a short while, but still felt unsatisfied.
"Yes, could it be that he also had a physical disability like them in the past?"
Ji Feng was silent for a moment, as if he agreed.
"Well... he can't be considered disabled. He's just a little different from ordinary people."
Jiao Ran asked, "How is it different?"
Mu Jin listened quietly, and then followed up on this by asking, "Actually, Phoenix Chick is not a mortal. He has his own original body just like you, right?"
Ji Feng didn't expect that Mu Jin could see that her human body was just an illusion and that she still had her original body.
"You are a snake," Mu Jin tested.
He observed the bracelet on Jiaoran's wrist, which seemed to be a snake coiled around it.
As expected, the wind was blowing fiercely, and Jiaoran covered his ears out of habit.
As expected, Jifeng screamed, "No, I'm not a snake."
"Then what are you?" asked Chache.
"Dragon." Ji Feng said proudly.
Jiaoran felt that people should tell the truth. "It is a Jiaolong, but it hasn't turned into a dragon yet."
Ji Feng raised a hand and corrected him, "No, very soon. I will become a dragon very soon."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
