Chapter 2431: Chi Shan Zei

Ling Jinbao hesitated.

After half a stick of incense's time, that thief gull suddenly flapped its wings and flew away.

Ling Jinbao did not breathe a sigh of relief, because he sensed the ground trembling faintly — a big fellow should be coming.

The thief gull just didn't want to be discovered slacking off by it, so it hurriedly slipped away.

This vibration was very strange, and also carried the sound of something sweeping across the ground. Ling Jinbao deduced it was that giant lizard; its tail was too long, so walking inevitably dragged on the ground.

"It's coming for you." That voice said, "It smelled the One-Eyed Giant's scent on you."

The cloth doll in Ling Jinbao's hand also swiftly pointed in two directions.

Danger, danger!

He was about to be surrounded.

"If you don't listen to me, you're dead." That voice said, "You have one last chance. Now shed your disguise, restrain your aura, and walk east."

Very well, Ling Jinbao could only comply.

Along the way he encountered Magic Eyes several times, but with that voice's timely prompts, plus the cloth doll in his own hand, he avoided them all with no real danger.

But he knew the giant lizard was still in hot pursuit behind him.

After slipping away like this for one li, that voice suddenly said: "See the mushroom umbrella beside you? Jump on it."

Ling Jinbao happened to be walking beside a mushroom-shaped building; hearing this he jumped onto the mushroom house, and saw a very deep depression on the roof. Cleverly, it was blocked by another building's eaves, invisible from the air unless standing at his angle.

"Crawl in, play dead."

Ling Jinbao jumped into this groove as told, not only not moving a muscle, but even stopping his heartbeat.

Two breaths later, the giant lizard arrived at this narrow light well, and looked around in all directions. The wolf pack behind it also sniffed everywhere.

But from their angle, they simply couldn't see the groove on the roof.

After a routine search of two rounds, finding nothing abnormal, the giant lizard led its underlings onward.

Not long after, two more Magic Eyes passed by, and also didn't discover Ling Jinbao's figure.

Finally, that voice said: "Safe for now, come down."

Ling Jinbao said in a low voice: "Who are you, where are you?"

"Want to see me?" This voice said, "Go left... go right..."

It guided Ling Jinbao to walk several more places, finally saying: "Go forward."

"Forward?" Ahead was a stone wall, its cracks full of green moss, colors mottled — one look showed great age. Ling Jinbao reached out and touched the stone wall, discovering it truly existed, and the feel was rough.

"See that piece of red sandstone on the wall? Press it twice, then come in."

Sure enough, in the upper left corner of the stone wall was a piece of red sandstone the size of a quail egg. Ling Jinbao pressed it lightly twice, then pushed against the stone wall —

The stone wall didn't move, but he entered.

Darkness before his eyes.

Then, Ling Jinbao discovered he was in a dark cave with no doors or windows. The only light came from a narrow horizontal crack ahead. The cave was crammed everywhere with bottles, jars, and all kinds of clutter, leaving almost no place to set foot.

"Where are you?"

"Here." A wisp of smoke emerged from a dark corner, floated onto a stone block, took human form, and then sat down.

He looked refined and fair, his figure slender, especially his arms slightly longer than an ordinary person's.

Ling Jinbao sized him up; this person's appearance revealed little information, he only knew this fellow most likely wasn't a living person.

"Who are you, sir? Why are you here?"

"My surname is Bao. Same target as you sneaking in, I've been trapped here since long ago." This man smiled, "Truly unexpected, even now there are still people delivering sheep into the tiger's mouth."

Bao? Ling Jinbao's heart stirred, and he blurted out: "Chi Shan Zei!"

From legends to the monster captives of Yujing City, all mentioned that long ago there was a Xian thief who got close to the White House but failed and was captured. The Earth Mother flew into a rage, specially extracted his soul, and imprisoned him in the city depths to torture.

And this unlucky fellow's nickname was "Chi Shan Zei".

This man tilted his head: "There are actually still people in the world who've heard of my name? It's been so long. Hm, five hundred years or a thousand?"

"Over two thousand years."

Chi Shan Zei's eyes went round: "What..."

"You being here, you avoided the world's Qi exhaustion and the fall of the immortals."

Chi Shan Zei murmured: "Two thousand years, actually two thousand years have passed! Alas, no sun or moon in the city. Where are you from, coming to deliver yourself to death?"

This man's words were unpleasant to hear, but Ling Jinbao didn't mind: "Over two thousand years, the word 'over' cannot be omitted. I come from Lingshan. Are you imprisoned here?"

"Count it as such."

Ling Jinbao kept looking around: "Is this a Secret Realm? I heard the Secret Realms in Yujing City are mostly controlled by the Earth Mother."

"If it were the Earth Mother's Secret Realm, the moment you entered, the Earth Mother would know." Chi Shan Zei pointed at the crack, "Go take a close look, and you'll understand."

Ling Jinbao carefully approached the crack and peered out, and as a result —

At the first glance, he came face to face with a giant yellow eyeball!

Even though Ling Jinbao considered himself bold as brass, at this moment he was scared so badly his heart nearly stopped.

What a huge eyeball, and a vertical pupil at that, just staring straight at him.

Ling Jinbao whooshed to the side.

Then, the owner of that giant eyeball outside the crack moved its heavy footsteps and continued forward, as if it hadn't seen him at all.

"Ah hahahaha!" Chi Shan Zei laughed until he bent backward and forward.

Ling Jinbao stood there with an awkward face: "It can't see me?"

He approached the crack again, and only then discovered that what had just passed was precisely that giant lizard, and behind it several more monsters walked by, but every single one couldn't see him.

Most importantly, these monsters' builds were all huge; just their heads were many times larger than the dark cave he was in.

Ling Jinbao scratched the back of his head. No, it wasn't that the monsters had grown larger — it was that he had shrunk!

What place is this?

The crack in the wall. The house you came in through… its crack in the wall.

That's why the monsters can't see Ling Jinbao. Who would stare intently into a wall crack for no reason?

"Sorry, I've been alone too long—it's rare to have guests." Chishan Ze straightened his back. "Let me reintroduce myself properly. My nickname really is 'Chishan Ze,' but I'm not Bao Chishan—I'm Bao Chihai."

"Huh?" Ling Jinbao looked completely bewildered.

Who's Bao Chihai? Bao Chishan's brother?

"I'm Bao Chishan's twin brother, but I died shortly after birth, so my parents refined me into a yin spirit. I grew up and cultivated alongside Bao Chishan. He's alive; I'm a yin cultivator."

Ling Jinbao suddenly understood: "You share one body?"

Yin spirits are colloquially called 'nurturing little ghosts' in folk tradition.

Some deviant cultivators harm others' children to death, then lure their souls to refine little ghosts; but the Bao family, like this, uses their own deceased infant souls to refine them—also a way to retain loved ones. And since these brothers have had psychic resonance since childhood, they fight even stronger together.

"Pretty much. Almost no outsiders know about this."

(End of chapter)