Chapter 49: A World Without People

No impurities, no sand, no water weeds.

Interestingly, he found he could breathe freely, as comfortable as a fish in water, without the slightest sense of suffocation.

Yet he was furious inside. He would never normally take on such a dangerous job as scouting for others, but he had been caught by the residual force of the Great Wind Army commander and knocked right into this place.

To put it bluntly, his cultivation was too low.

He hadn't felt it back when he was throwing his weight around in Black Water City, but later, after encountering Nian Songyu and State Preceptor Sun, and then exploring Panlongcheng, he saw the crises closing in step by step, and this bit of cultivation felt increasingly powerless.

If only he were a little stronger.

His body sank rapidly, and directly below him was pitch black, like a bottomless pit.

Just a breath before he sank into the boundless darkness, He Lingchuan seemed to catch a glimpse of a dark red figure.

That thing seemed huge, looming in and out of sight around him, and the part of the body exposed appeared to be cylindrical.

Hmm, shaped like a water bucket, but magnified countless times.

Most importantly, this thing could move!

Unfortunately, He Lingchuan didn't have time to look closely before everything went black before his eyes.

……

When he opened his eyes again, the scene had changed.

He was standing by a small stream. The water, barely covering his instep, was crystal clear, the sand and stones were clean, and a small river shrimp was launching an attack on his boot.

The water peanuts and wild radishes by the stream were a pleasing green, and in the distance, there were a few farmhouses with wisps of cooking smoke rising.

He Lingchuan felt his body and found his clothes were dry; they hadn't been soaked by the bloody water in the well at all. It seemed that was just a passageway.

He climbed from the valley up a low slope, and as soon as he looked up, he was stunned.

Before him lay a vibrant plain, with large patches of wheat turning green. The green trees by the fields were a bit sparse, but the tallest ones were three to five zhang high.

Small huts for guarding the fields were scattered about, and He Lingchuan even saw a water skin hanging from a tree branch nearby.

And in the distance, a great river flowed turbulently, dividing the two plains.

On the other side of the river, the terrain was much higher than here, looking from afar like a giant crocodile lying by the river.

Most importantly, the shape of the plain's edge was very unique and very familiar.

Could that be... the Chipa Plateau? He Lingchuan leaped down the slope and walked toward the direction of the Chipa Plateau.

The sky was very blue, the clouds were very white, and the air was filled with the damp scent of soil and grass. Walking through this pastoral scene, he felt completely refreshed.

Especially for someone who had just walked out of a desolate desert city.

However, the more serene it was, the more eerie it felt.

He Lingchuan walked straight for several hundred zhang, passing through a village on the way that had a hundred households, yet he didn't encounter a single person.

This village was truly not small in scale.

The fields, the farmhouses, everything was quiet. He specifically checked house by house; they were empty. But in one kitchen, the coarse flour buns were already steamed, steaming hot.

He didn't dare eat them, but he took one and squeezed it; it was soft and hot to the touch.

Where had the people gone? Passing another wheat field, a swallowtail butterfly happened to fly toward him.

He Lingchuan reached out and tapped, his fingertip passing right through the butterfly.

Nothing there.

Fake?

He found a green grasshopper in the wheat field and poked it with his finger; it was also just air.

These living things were all illusions.

But the touch of the wheat seedlings was very real. He pinched off a bit of the seedling core and chewed it in his mouth; it was a bit astringent and a bit bitter, exactly the taste grass sprouts should have.

Just then, there was a rustle in the wheat field, and a living creature darted out.

He Lingchuan was startled and had his blade half-drawn before he realized the newcomer was actually a sand bandit.

This man was the second cousin of Situ Han's brother-in-law, nicknamed Mao Tao, a nickname he got simply because he was thin, small, and had a face full of sideburns.

He was also stunned when he saw He Lingchuan, then overjoyed: "Young Master, you're alright!"

"Where are the others?" He Lingchuan looked left and right, finding that only this one teammate had come. "Also, why is one of the life-flames on your shoulder missing?"

"The State Preceptor took it and put it on a candle." Mao Tao's face turned bitter. "Then he pushed me down. Where is this? Panlong... Wasteland?"

Anyone with eyes could see the eeriness of this place. "This place is fake, right? An illusion?"

"Yes." He Lingchuan guessed State Preceptor Sun's purpose immediately. "They used you to scout the path, so they will be coming down soon too."

The two walked together, and He Lingchuan asked him: "When you passed through the scene... no, after you fell into the pool, did you see anything?"

"It was just light red bloody water, and it didn't choke me. Then, in the blink of an eye, I was here."

"Nothing else?"

Mao Tao thought carefully: "No. What did you see?"

He Lingchuan shook his head.

Was it his eyes playing tricks on him when he saw that huge unknown object in the light red pool? After walking for another an hour, the two finally approached the Chipa Plateau.

The river water before them was gentle, about three zhang wide, and the current was neither fast nor slow. He Lingchuan knew this should be the moat of Panlongcheng, but it was far from as deep or as wide as he had seen before.

Continuing west along the riverbank for another two quarters of an hour, Panlongcheng finally appeared in his field of vision.

"That, that!" Mao Tao exhaled. "Is that Panlongcheng?"

Panlongcheng was still in the exact same position, the lower pass of the Chipa Plateau. But it looked nowhere near as magnificent as it did in the desert.

The city walls were not that high or thick, and there weren't even crocodile-tooth spikes on the battlements.

When the two walked near the natural bridge, they found the bridge deck was paved with bluestone, much of which had already shattered, with moss and grime stuffed into the cracks.

After crossing the bridge, the city gate was still there, but the gate panels were not iron-fir, but ordinary thick wooden gates wrapped in iron.

The defensive hardness of this city pass is not much different from Heishuicheng.

However, two people were still standing under the city gate, waving at them.

Nian Songyu, Sun Fuping.

He Lingchuan frowned inwardly when he saw them, but walked up with a look of surprise: "Why are there only the two of you? Where are the others?"

"The Great Wind Army souls brought reinforcements, and Prefect He stayed behind with his men to hold the enemy outside the pool and well," Sun Fuping said. "This is the Great Wind Army's territory; we cannot fight them here."

Otherwise, it would be an even surer path to death.

It sounded very reasonable, but He Lingchuan's heart skipped a beat; he knew he had to be extra careful, yet he looked very dissatisfied on the surface: "Dad is really unkind, leaving me here all by myself."

He Chunhua and the main force hadn't come down, leaving him alone to face Sun and Nian. Wouldn't the other party be able to mold him however they pleased? The situation was stronger than the person; it was better for him to be sensible!

Sun Fuping couldn't even be bothered to respond, only asking: "By the way, how long have you been down here?"

"About... two hours?" He Lingchuan's attitude improved, and he turned to point behind him, "I landed in that village over there and crawled up from the river."

Sun Fuping's expression changed slightly, and Nian Songyu pointed at Mao Tao and said: "How can that be? I followed this fellow down closely. He was only a few dozen breaths later than you."

The State Preceptor pondered: "The four of us came down one after another, but the time we appeared here is different. That means it's a flow rate issue. This place really is more than just an illusion."

Yes, anyone who comes down here would first define this place as an illusion.

(End of chapter)