Chapter 38: Account

The bus stopped at the station, and Zheng Fa stepped out of the door, following the map on his phone as he walked toward the zoo.

He searched online and discovered that his prefecture-level city actually did have a zoo—although the reviews on the map app were not very high.

Tang Lingwu spoke without thinking, but he listened with intent.

Previously, Seventh Young Master had told him that if he wanted to master the Spirit Crane Body, the secret lay in the first volume.

But the two of them had flipped through the first volume inside out, studying it to the bottom of the barrel, yet found no hidden code.

Seventh Young Master thought that since this Spirit Crane Body was merely a copy, perhaps some key point had been missed in the copying.

But... what if the secret was in this autobiography?

Among the four volumes of the Spirit Crane Body, only the first one contained the most content; if one were to exclude the possibility that the author was an extremely narcissistic person... well, that was hard to exclude.

If this author, besides being narcissistic and wanting to brag, had some other intention.

Then the most likely one would be the author's own account of his experience crossing a thousand mountains and observing a thousand feathers during the process of creating the technique; this was the content most closely related to the Spirit Crane Body martial art.

In the Xuanwei Realm, Old Bai was actually quite right; this author was absolutely a person of great perseverance, or even someone with a major flaw.

The Xuanwei Realm was not like the modern world; mountains were often territories of various powerful demonic beasts, and the act of climbing mountains was often a matter of nine deaths and one life, so calling it an extreme sport was not an exaggeration.

As for observing a thousand feathers...

You want to see birds, but are the birds willing?

How do you know if it has cultivation? Even if it is a mortal bird, how do you know if its parents were not demonic beasts?

Furthermore, considering that the Spirit Crane Body talks about entering the Dao through martial arts, it is merely a mundane martial art; why would you say you are risking your life for it?

So, even if someone had the same idea as Zheng Fa, it was almost impossible to test it.

But the Xuanwei Realm wouldn't work; the modern world is too simple!

Zheng Fa walked to the entrance of the zoo; this place was called a zoo, but in reality, it was just a walled-off large park.

At the main gate stood a red lacquered table with peeling paint, behind which sat a woman in her forties wearing a red armband.

On the wall behind her was a piece of paper, on which was written: Ticket fifteen.

"Twenty."

Zheng Fa obediently took out the money.

He had come during the lunch break between classes; time was tight, otherwise he would have saved five yuan no matter what.

The appearance inside the zoo was just like that table at the entrance; both were quite old.

At noon, there were not many people in the park... and not many animals either.

Just as he walked in, he saw a sign the size of a person, on which was written "Treasure of the Hall," along with a bright arrow.

Zheng Fa couldn't help but feel curious and took two steps further inside.

Sure enough, outside a building, he saw a signpost on which was written: Panda.

There was even such a thing?

Zheng Fa excitedly craned his neck to look inside the building; sure enough, two black-and-white bundles were running and rolling happily on the ground... barking.

Turning his head back, he saw that on the signpost, next to the large characters "Panda," was a small character "Dog."

Zoo administrator, you are so dog-like; why don't you paint yourself black and white and squat inside?

Deeply hurt, Zheng Fa headed straight for the area in the park known as the Bird Paradise.

Although he had already lowered his expectations, looking at a flock of pigeons pecking at the ground and then at the large black net overhead.

He fell into a long silence.

The moment he walked out of the zoo, he took out his phone and wrote a scathing negative review for this zoo.

After returning to school, Zheng Fa lay on his desk, feeling a bit depressed.

The experience at the zoo was one thing; more importantly, that net made him realize a problem—birds can fly.

So whether it was a zoo or a flower and bird market, they all wished to raise flying birds like walking beasts.

Even in the most high-end zoos, the birds inside should have lost their natural instincts.

Trying to comprehend the Spirit Crane Body through these birds would probably not work.

Inside the desk, his phone vibrated twice.

Zheng Fa quietly took out his phone; a small cat avatar was jumping.

"Who is this?" A large face stretched out beside Zheng Fa's head; Wang Chen, curious and gossipy, leaned on Zheng Fa's shoulder, staring at the small cat avatar: "Looks like a girl!"

"Tang Lingwu."

Zheng Fa answered and clicked on the avatar.

Tang Lingwu had sent two messages.

The first was a link.

The second was a somewhat long message: "I saw you said you were going to the zoo? Are you going to see birds? The zoo in our city is no good; I found a few documentaries for you."

Clicking the link, it was a cloud storage folder containing several subfolders.

He clicked save before he felt something was wrong: Wang Chen beside him was staring straight at his face.

His eyes were full of confusion.

"What's wrong?"

"You have Tang Lingwu as a friend?"

"Is there a problem?"

"A huge problem; you've been scammed!" Wang Chen spoke with certainty: "She doesn't even have an account!"

Zheng Fa was stunned: "She added me in person."

Wang Chen couldn't hold back: "Didn't you check the class group chat?"

"I blocked it."

Their class had a group chat with no teacher, only students.

But a few people inside were extremely active, spamming the group every day. Zheng Fa found it too noisy and blocked it directly.

Wang Chen took out his phone, wishing he could press it right against Zheng Fa's face.

He opened the class group chat interface.

This group was actually, surprisingly, unusually quiet.

The last chat occurred two months ago.

"Tang Lingwu, I added you as a friend, why didn't you accept?"

The speaker was a boy in the class who was usually very active in the group.

"She doesn't have an account." Someone with the name Tang Lingwu replied.

"?"Who are you?"

"I am her mother."

Then everyone in the group was like they were dead; no one has spoken since.

"We already have a new group; I'll add you." Seeing Zheng Fa's expression, Wang Chen knew he had no idea about this, so he said quietly: "I don't know which idiot added Tang Lingwu's mother; this group is ruined!"

Zheng Fa finally understood why Wang Chen said Tang Lingwu didn't have an account. He scrolled back through his chat history with Tang Lingwu. They didn't have many messages; the very first one was sent to him by Tang Lingwu:

"Medium cup, five parts sugar, add pearls, no ice."

Below that was another line:

"Switch to a large cup!"

Then there was also a red packet.

"You two even drink milk tea together?" Wang Chen looked at the record, exclaiming in amazement. He hadn't seen the previous two messages and was still asking: "What did Tang Lingwu just want from you?"

"She gave me..."

"The teacher is here!" From the back of the classroom, a gentleman who wished to remain anonymous said in a low voice.

Old Chen appeared at the back door with a stern face. His eyes first swept across the classroom, then fixed firmly on Wang Chen.

"Wang Chen! What are you doing with that phone!"

Wang Chen stared blankly at the phone in his hand, then turned to look at Zheng Fa.

Zheng Fa held a textbook, his brows furrowed, immersed in the ocean of knowledge and unable to extricate himself.

"Look at Zheng Fa; he reads and studies even during breaks. Why don't you learn from him?"

Wang Chen: "..."

Zheng Fa: People who practice martial arts value seeing in six directions and hearing in eight, quick eyes and hands, and emergency evasion.

The videos Tang Lingwu found were very complete, even overly complete.

Domestic and foreign, Chinese and English.

More than a dozen documentaries about birds lay in the cloud drive, giving Zheng Fa a happiness of not knowing how to choose.

However...

"'The Vanished Sky Dominators—Pterosaurs,' does this thing count as a bird?"

Zheng Fa frowned, thinking Tang Lingwu had probably searched for the wrong thing.