Chapter 246: Tree Stump Yingdi — The Mischievous Little Spirit

Zhao Ji was just about to try jogging a few steps and then throwing the Silver Plate he was holding on his shoulder, but as soon as he ran two steps, the ground suddenly became slippery. The surface of the ground rocks, which had been rough and quite grippy, suddenly became smooth.

Zhao Ji's feet slipped, and he fell face-first onto the ground. The Silver Plate he had panicked and dropped while falling bounced twice on the ground, then spun along the smooth surface and tumbled down from the entrance of the ruins.

In the end, it only fell to the ground two meters away from the entrance.

Immediately after, Zhao Ji saw the ground, which was only a few dozen centimeters away from his eyes, suddenly change back from the smooth surface to the original rough rock surface.

"What's going on?" Zhao Ji tried to stand up and used his foot to rub the ground to feel it.

It felt like the usual ground he walked on. But if that was the case, what was it that made him slip just now?

Looking left and right, Zhao Ji suddenly saw a fleeting, earthy-yellow light on the ceiling of the passage behind him. But before Zhao Ji could run over to take a closer look, that earthy-yellow light on the ceiling quickly dissipated.

Zhao Ji stared at the spot where the anomaly had just appeared, wondering if the mysterious little thing he had rescued earlier was coming to harm him.

But wasn't that thing supposed to be extremely powerful? If it really wanted to harm him, couldn't it just attack him directly? Why go through the trouble of messing with him like this? Come to think of it, was that little thing just pranking him, laughing at his expense or something?

Perhaps it was a creature with a nasty personality.

This incident made Zhao Ji more vigilant, and he was much more careful in the time that followed.

After dark, until it was nearly late at night, Zhao Ji finally moved all the Silver Plates to the bottom of the tree stump. Next, he would have to work outside the passage. Since the weather was so cold now, Zhao Ji had to put on his wolf-fur Cloak and the thick Gloves on his armor when returning to the Yingdi, so that he wouldn't feel cold when working outdoors later.

While cooking by the campfire, Zhao Ji's arms were sore and aching, clearly the result of overusing them earlier. Because of the pain in his arms, he had to pause his training for tonight.

Fortunately, over the next two days, he mainly used the Crane to work, and his arms only had to do simple pulling of the Rope; other tasks like moving heavy objects would be much easier.

Just as Zhao Ji was drinking soup in small sips, his Wooden Bowl suddenly flew up, spinning uncontrollably.

A large amount of hot soup spilled from the air. Zhao Ji was quick-witted and pulled up the wolf-head hood of his Cloak, which avoided the result of having hot soup spilled on his head.

Angrily drawing the Long Sword at his waist, Zhao Ji looked around, and soon discovered an earthy-yellow glowing dot on a dirt slope not far behind him. Just as he was about to rush over to teach the other party a lesson.

That glowing spot zipped into the dirt with a *whoosh*, and by the time Zhao Ji rushed over, the last trace of light on the spot had vanished.

This made Zhao Ji so angry that he kept hacking at the ground with his sword, and the hard ground was hacked to pieces by him.

He could see it now; that little thing was definitely pranking him. It was doing things that weren't very harmful but were highly insulting.

The soup couldn't be drunk anymore. He had only boiled a little over one bowl of soup in total, and he had already eaten some earlier. With that full bowl spilled just now, he had no soup to drink tonight.

Afterward, Zhao Ji had to simply roast some frozen, cured meat jerky to fill his stomach. He also had to melt some ice from his Water bottle to drink some hot water to maintain his body temperature.

This time he was much more alert, turning his head to look around from time to time, though the little thing did not appear again that night.

The next day, when Zhao Ji got up, he discovered that something seemed to have been drawn on his face, and a new Charcoal Pencil was left by the side of his bedding.

"Forget it, at least I picked up a Charcoal Pencil that isn't cheap for free. It doesn't matter what's drawn on my face." Zhao Ji had to mock himself, putting the newly found Charcoal Pencil into a Wooden box inside his Backpack.

As for the drawing on his face, he couldn't see it himself anyway, and there wasn't a single person around, so he would just pretend this thing didn't exist. Anyway, after he started working later, the sweat on his head and face would soak and smudge all those drawings.

When that time came, he would just wipe his face, and wouldn't that be the end of it?

In a corner outside the Yingdi, seeing the Human come out to eat with a face covered in drawings made the little Spirit's old face smile extremely happily. However, it later discovered that the Human was truly shameless, eating with that painted face so calmly, then doing squat jumps to exercise, and then setting off to work.

It seemed he didn't take the 'artwork' it drew last night to heart at all.

Could it be that he didn't notice?

Impossible, such a funny artwork, how could it not be noticed!

The little Spirit jumped up on its Snail Shell; it had to be noticed.

It piloted its Snail Shell, floating out from the corner where it was hiding, circled around, and flew in front of Jier.

Seeing that mysterious little thing appear in front of him so brazenly, Jier took a deep breath and decided not to act yet, to see what this mysterious little thing wanted to do.

If it wanted to fight, he would naturally oblige. It was just that his most powerful axe was still on top of the tree stump, and the Long Sword in his hand seemed to have some effect on these mysterious things, though it wasn't much.

Steadying his mind, Jier placed his hand on the hilt of his sword.

The little Spirit ignored the Human's guard and flew directly in front of Jier. It chirped and chattered with laughter, pointed its little finger at Jier's face, and even made a drawing motion.

Well, this little thing was even admitting it on its own initiative. Jier pulled a long face, watching to see what this little thing meant.

Seeing that the Human had no extra reaction, the little Spirit gestured again, but no matter how it tried to say how funny the drawing on the other party's face was, the other party just had a reaction of not understanding.

Slapping its forehead, it realized that the Human didn't understand the High Elven Language it spoke, and as such, it was even more impossible for the other party to understand Sprite Language.

The speechless little Spirit paced anxiously on its Snail Shell, and soon, it thought of a method.

It cast a spell with both hands, pointing from afar at the Silver Plates scattered beneath the entrance of the ruins, and used magic to control one Silver Plate to float out from the petrified tree stump.

Jier had originally drawn his Long Sword slightly when the other party was preparing to cast the spell, looking guarded, but seeing that the little thing wasn't trying to harm him with its magic, he held back and didn't move.

Then Jier saw a Silver Plate fly out from the tree stump, and it soon flew in front of them.

He felt a bit envious of such magical spells; he wondered what he could do to make this little thing do things for him, which would save him so much trouble.

The Silver Plate stood upright in front of Jier. The little Spirit waved its hands to cast a spell again, and the side of the Silver Plate facing Jier soon vibrated slightly, then suddenly became as clear as a mirror.

Jier raised an eyebrow. Sure enough, back in the ruins passage, it was this little thing that had done the bad deed, making him take a big fall.

But as the silver mirror surface gradually became clearer, Jier also saw what was drawn on his face.

On his forehead, there was a little person drawn, and the little person's head was full of coins. As for the brain, it had been eaten by a little pig next to the little person.

On both cheeks, there were drawings of many little animals lying on their backs with their feet in the air, laughing happily. Needless to say, those little animals were all laughing at him.

On his chin was a map. Jier looked closely and saw it was the map of the vicinity, and the location where he had hidden the silver he had moved out from just outside the ruins was also clearly displayed on it.

On his nose, there was a little person drawn just like the little thing in front of him, holding its belly and laughing.

After Jier saw clearly what was drawn on his face, he was so angry he could have exploded. The little thing opposite him saw Jier's current expression and finally rolled around on its Snail Shell happily.

Clang!

Jier drew his Long Sword and slashed at the little thing that was happily mocking him. This thing was mocking him for moving Silver Plates from the Elf Ruins; judging from the many times he had been messed with before, it was definitely this little thing using magic to mess with him where he couldn't see.

With one slash, the little thing didn't dodge Jier's sword because it was lying on its Snail Shell laughing, but the sharp blade of the sword just passed through the little thing, having no effect on it.

Jier only felt a slight resistance from the hilt, knowing that this Long Sword could only slightly deal with this mysterious little thing.

But he couldn't let it go, so he had to swing his sword repeatedly at the little thing, which had now reacted.

After being slashed several times, the little Spirit finally felt uncomfortable. It wrinkled its nose and brows, pushed its little hands forward, and pushed Jier back several meters.

Jier steadied his legs and center of gravity so he wouldn't be pushed over by the little thing's counterattack. Then, he rushed forward, anticipating the moment the little thing cast its spell, pushed off the ground with his feet, dodged the invisible force, and then stabbed the little thing's body with his sword.

But the opponent's body seemed merely illusory; the Long Sword struck it without any extra reaction, only the little thing itself seemed to be in discomfort, and with a *whoosh*, it burrowed back into its Snail Shell.

Jier slashed his sword at the Snail Shell, not expecting that this thing was the same as the little thing; the Long Sword could only produce a very weak effect, but compared to attacking the little thing, attacking the Snail Shell seemed to bring more harm to the opponent.

From inside the Snail Shell came a burst of quite loud, exasperated complaining; the little sprite saw in its mount-cum-house Snail Shell that many of its collections were in a total mess, and although the Human outside hadn't been able to cause any damage, the things inside the Snail Shell had already been stirred up everywhere.

Its favorite ant pet had escaped from the transparent box it was kept in, and after crawling out, it was tearing at some colorful moth wings it had collected.

A fresh fallen leaf it liked—it used this thing as a carpet—was now crumpled into a ball, mixed together with a glob of Honey.

Other things of its, like clothing, were all scattered and piled up inside the Snail Shell.

Just as it was shouting and complaining in confusion because of these messy things, the Human's sword slashed down again, and inside the house, it became even messier.

The little sprite hurriedly controlled the Snail Shell to burrow into the ground to avoid the Human outside who had been angered by it.

However, although its home was a mess, it was still having a great time because that Human had been angered by it.

Jier only had time to slash two blows at the Snail Shell before it went *pop*, and just like diving into water, it burrowed into the ground beneath his feet.

Knowing that the little thing had escaped once again, Zhao Ji had no choice but to put away his Long Sword and kick the Silver Plate still hanging in mid-air in a fit of anger.

The Silver Plate flew away, and he himself hopped on one foot, clutching his foot and shouting in pain.

Zhao Ji later retrieved that Silver Plate, because he discovered that after the little thing had processed it with magic, the side that was like a mirror surface still remained.

Zhao Ji carried it back into the cavern and placed it at the entrance of the cavern where it could be reached by light. In this way, firstly, it could be used as a mirror in daily life, and secondly, it could refract a portion of the light into the cavern, making the place where he slept brighter.

He began to work again; although the little thing's mockery made Zhao Ji feel embarrassed, facing so much silver, he still could not pretend not to see it or know about it.

In any case, those Elves had already abandoned and evacuated this place a very, very long time ago, so long ago that the once-hundred-meter-tall trees had collapsed and turned to ash, and the bases of the trees had mutated and turned into Petrified Tree Stumps.

In his dream, Zhao Ji saw that there were actually other Elves outside the ruins, but those Elves had also long since evacuated and left. Therefore, this little thing had absolutely no need to make things difficult for him because he was taking things from the ruins.

If you want it yourself, you can completely take it away yourself.

Zhao Ji thought to himself while putting a Silver Plate into a wooden bucket.

He mocked himself, suddenly feeling that he was truly hypocritical, thinking of these things to excuse himself.

Laughing, Zhao Ji pulled the Rope to let the wooden bucket rise up until it reached the front of the Crane, then he fixed the Rope and pulled another rope that controlled the Crane to make the Crane turn its head.

As the wooden bucket hanging in the air turned, it was eventually blocked by a horizontal wooden stick, and the Silver Plate in the wooden bucket fell from the air, landing on the open ground outside the Petrified Tree Stump.

It made a dull *thud* sound.

Zhao Ji could also hear it clearly from underneath inside the stump.

Like this, he kept busy until dark.

Unlike in the ruins' passageways, operating the Crane required sufficient light to support him, and Zhao Ji didn't have electric lights or anything, so with insufficient lighting, he couldn't work outside at night.

To do more, he would have to wait until tomorrow morning.

However, Zhao Ji didn't want to rest now; his body was in great shape, he was full of energy, and just operating the Crane and pulling some ropes was really not tiring compared to carrying heavy Silver Plates.

Since he couldn't sleep anyway and didn't need to rest, Zhao Ji decided to take this opportunity to go into the ruins' passageways and find a way to get out those metal racks in the room where the Elves had stored things.

Lighting a Torch, Zhao Ji stepped forward and entered the passageway again; he didn't need to light the lamp holders placed along the walls of the passageway and went straight to the room behind the stone door in the middle of the passageway.

To maintain sufficient lighting, Zhao Ji held a Torch in one hand and carried a homemade Oil Lamp in the other.

Inside the storage room used by the Elves to keep sundries, the ceiling was already covered with many bats that were resting; Zhao Ji didn't want to disturb them, so he entered on tiptoe.

First, he lit the Oil Lamp in an open area for illumination, then Zhao Ji placed the Torch at the doorway to wedge it.

Only then did he carefully examine the metal racks where the items had originally been placed.