How could it be ambergris?
To everyone's surprise, Guan Nan ignored her warning, snorted coldly, turned around and went back to the main hall, slamming the door shut and not coming out again.
"you……"
Mengli felt like she had punched a cotton ball, and she had nowhere to vent her anger.
Seeing that the herbs drying in the yard were almost gone, I decided to carry a bamboo basket and go to the barren mountain to collect more herbs.
Before leaving, I placed two large fruits from the basket on the small table in the yard. The fruits were bright red and looked sweet and refreshing. They were from a thousand-year-old immortal tree on the cliff and would not rot even after a year or two.
Although that guy was annoying, he hadn't eaten anything else since he arrived, except for eating her treasured souvenirs.
That person is, after all, a prince of the Heavenly Realm. I can't let him starve to death in his own palace. I'll give him fruit to eat, and when I return from gathering herbs, I'll send him away.
No sooner had Mengli left the Xuan Palace than the door of the main hall creaked open. Guan Nan walked out slowly, picked up a fruit, and sniffed it: "How could it be a dragon's saliva fruit?"
The ambergris fruit is the fruit of the ancient ambergris tree from the era of the gods. After the great war between gods and demons, the gods perished, and the ancient divine realm was left only as ruins after the war.
Once upon a time, there grew a dragon's saliva tree in these ruins. Legend has it that it was irrigated by the spiritual blood dripping from the fallen god. It only bore one fruit every thousand years. Any immortal who ate this one fruit could not only improve their cultivation by a thousand years, but also instantly cure any old ailments they might have.
Guan Nan was the Crown Prince of Heaven, and he was favored by the Heavenly Emperor since childhood. Naturally, he was entitled to this fruit, so he was very familiar with its aroma.
But where did these two fruits come from? Ordinary divine water cannot nourish the dragon's saliva tree, and over time it gradually withered away, leaving only a withered tree standing in the same place.
Could it be that there is a hidden ancient dragon saliva tree in this desolate mountain?
Guan Nan found it increasingly strange. The woman living in the Xuan Palace ate Soul-Severing Grass as food and somehow obtained the Dragon Saliva Fruit. So he picked up the fruit and took a bite: "Hmm, not bad, the real deal."
"Can't we share when we meet? Are you going to eat alone?"
Ksitigarbha had revealed his true form at some point, and to the other party's astonishment, he ate the other fruit. The surroundings were quiet, with only the crisp sound of chewing echoing in the courtyard.
"Do you...do you know what that is?"
"It doesn't matter what it is, I've already eaten it."
Ksitigarbha chuckled and sat down by the small pond, casually tossing the fruit pit into it.
Actually, he himself was also a little surprised. For some reason, he, who was usually serious and taciturn, suddenly seemed to be possessed by some kind of demon recently. His words and actions were very strange, and he was completely like an unruly hooligan.
Suddenly, Dizang clutched his chest, feeling a surge of power coursing through his body. This power, shimmering with golden light, traveled along every meridian and finally converged in his dantian.
"This feeling..."
Scorching hot, burning.
Ksitigarbha's cultivation was still shallow, and his spiritual consciousness seemed unable to withstand this power. A layer of sweat seeped from his forehead, his facial features were contorted and almost deformed, and his lower abdomen gradually bulged out, as if it was about to explode.
"I'll let you eat it. This fruit is stronger than your cultivation level. You'll explode and die."
Guan Nan glared at the other party, then quickly made a hand seal to summon the "Binding Spirit Spell". The golden runes on the Binding Spirit Spell appeared and tightly wrapped around the other party until the spell faded and disappeared. Only then did Dizang calm down and fall to the ground with a thud.
After a long while, Ksitigarbha finally woke up: "What happened to me?"
"The fruit you ate contained a thousand years of spiritual power. But your cultivation is still too shallow to withstand it. I just cast a spell to help you absorb it."
"Huh? A thousand years of spiritual power? That fruit doesn't look special at all. I thought it was just an ordinary wild fruit that girl picked."
"Hmm, I'm also very curious. Where did she get them? Even if the dragon's saliva tree still exists, it can only produce one fruit in a thousand years, and one fruit can only be preserved for a month at most. How could she make two fruits exist at the same time?"
Guan Nan was lost in thought when he suddenly remembered something and turned to Dizang, instructing him, "Don't tell Wuliang Mountain about this fruit yet."
“That won’t do. Master said that any suspicious matter must be reported to him.” Ksitigarbha shook his head. This matter was too strange and Master had to know about it.
Guan Nan's face darkened: "You mean I should have let you explode and die just now?" Seeing that the other party was still hesitating, he continued: "Or are you going to tell your fellow disciples that you gained a thousand years of cultivation for nothing?"
The first sentence didn't cause much of a stir with Ksitigarbha. Although disciples of Wuliang Mountain should know how to repay kindness, concealing something from their master is a great disrespect. There are other ways to repay kindness. But the second sentence really startled him.
The fellow practitioners of Wuliang Mountain cultivate diligently every day, but at most they only have eight hundred years of cultivation. If they knew that he had gained a thousand years of cultivation by eating a single fruit, they would probably gang up on him, skin him, and boil him into soup.
"When Wuliang Mountain asks about the origin of the fruit, just say you snatched it from the Crown Prince of Heaven. That will save them the trouble of coming to me for testimony," Guan Nan added with a cold laugh.
This fruit was indeed snatched from Guan Nan's hands. If word gets out of Wuliang Mountain, his fellow disciples won't even need to skin him alive. Daring to steal from the Crown Prince of Heaven, the Heavenly Emperor and the celestial officials will surely hunt him down to the ends of the earth.
No, it's better to keep this a secret for now than to reveal it. With that thought, Ksitigarbha steeled himself and said respectfully, "Your Highness, since you've spoken, I will certainly keep this a secret."
"Then how could you bear to deceive your master?"
Ksitigarbha's gaze shifted, and the corner of his mouth twitched visibly: "This... if this celestial fruit treasure gets out and is targeted by someone with ulterior motives, it might cause chaos in the Three Realms. It would be safer to keep the secret within our little courtyard."
"Hmm." Guan Nan got the answer he wanted, so he didn't say anything more to the other party and turned to leave the Xuan Palace.
In the desolate forest outside the palace, Mengli had already gathered a basket of immortal herbs, specifically the "Soul-Severing Herb" that she loved to eat. Her route when leaving the palace was always very predictable; she would basically come to a fixed location to gather immortal herbs, and then pick a few fresh fruits from the cliff edge.
The fruit tree was robust, perhaps nourished by the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. Every time Mengli picked a fruit, fresh and ripe fruit would soon grow back in the spot where Mengli had picked it.
Some of the fruit trees grow very tall, requiring frequent climbing to pick them. The bark often has thorns that frequently prick Mengli's hands, leaving small bloody holes. However, Mengli doesn't mind, because after each fruit, the wounds on her hands heal. She doesn't know how this happens, but she assumes that the fruit, nourished by heaven and earth, has a miraculous healing effect.
"Why is the fruit tree growing higher and higher?" she muttered, but still climbed up the fruit tree.
Mengli stood at the base of the tree branch she had climbed, tiptoed and stretched out her arms to search among the layers of leaves of the ancient tree. When she touched a round fruit, she plucked it off with a little force and put it into her bag.
When she reached out again, only her fingertips could touch the fruit. She shuffled forward until her toes were completely blocked, then stretched her arm forward again. Her four fingers could reach the fruit, but her thumb could not reach it.
Just as she tried to stretch forward again, she slipped and fell.
Below is the Heavenly Pool. The Heavenly Pool itself is not scary, but it gathers the water of the celestial realm and rushes down to the mortal realm. Passing through the Gate of Purification, anything from the celestial realm will be pulverized there, leaving only ordinary fresh water flowing into the rivers of the mortal realm.
Just as Mengli was about to fall into the Heavenly Pool, a figure flew up and caught her in a pair of large hands, gently landing her on the edge of the cliff.
"Guan... Guan Nan!" Meng Li's pupils shrank suddenly. She never expected that someone would appear to save her life. And this person was none other than Guan Nan, the Heavenly Prince whom she was about to drive away.
"This is that...fruit tree. The fruit you left behind was picked from here?" Guan Nan hurriedly put the person down and stepped aside.
“Yes, I often come here to pick fruit, but the fruit is growing taller and taller, and now it’s almost impossible to reach it.” Mengli said, lowering her arm, revealing two bloodstains on her pale pink sleeve.
"You're injured?" Guan Nan frowned slightly, staring blankly at the two bloody marks. "Come here, let me take a look."
Mengli was startled, and her legs moved towards the person as if they were not under her control.
Guan Nan used his magic to instantly tie two clean strips of cloth around Meng Li's thin, pale arms: "The wound is a bit deep. You don't have spiritual power, so it can't heal instantly. I'll use my magic to bandage it for you first, and it will heal faster."
After the bandage was finished, Mengli reached out to grab the basket on the ground, but the other person picked it up first, hung it on his own shoulder, and then walked towards the Xuan Palace without looking back.
Mengli's cheeks flushed, and she smiled slightly as she followed closely behind.
Upon entering the Xuan Palace, Mengli rushed to the small pond to visit the chubby carp: "Chubby carp, your wound has healed! It seems the immortal herbs I gathered were very useful."
Guan Nan rolled her eyes at Meng Li, thinking to herself, "If you hadn't fed her poison, she would have recovered long ago."
The fat carp looked exceptionally robust today. Not only did it swim with great strength, but the scales that were missing before had also grown back. It looked no different from the celestial carp in the pond on the day of the Heavenly Emperor's birthday banquet.
You should know that the celestial carp in the Heavenly Palace are cared for by fairies in shifts every day. They eat and drink the finest food and drink. Occasionally, a carp that looks particularly pleasing will be chosen on the Heavenly Emperor's birthday and fed a celestial pill to transform into a human form, living a carefree and happy life as a minor celestial being.
Mengli slowly sat down by the pond and sighed softly, "Alas, when will my fat carp be able to transform into human form like the celestial carp in the Heavenly Palace? But I have no elixirs or medicines here, not even food. Otherwise, I would have to crush the immortal herbs and feed them to him."
"Big brother, big brother, please save me! Seriously, that thing she put on my skin is already killing me with pain, and now she's going to force-feed me! Am I going to die?"
A male voice came through Guan Nan's spiritual consciousness; it was Ksitigarbha sending him a telepathic plea for help.
He couldn't help but chuckle, causing Mengli to turn around and look at him: "What's wrong?"
Guan Nan's smile vanished, and he said seriously, "This ordinary carp can't withstand your immortal herbs. If you continue to give it immortal herbs, it might explode and die." Seeing the other's disappointed expression, Guan Nan added, "I'll bring him a few immortal pills when I return to the Heavenly Palace in a few days."
Mengli nodded in satisfaction, picked up the fairy herbs from her basket, and started drying them in the yard.
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