Chapter 52

Helping Lord Xingde escape produced a feeling of joy. This feeling made Liu Xiaolou feel very comfortable. It was a pleasure that reached his body's meridians from his mind and dominated the smooth operation of true essence in his meridians. He urgently wanted to return to the mountain and start practicing immediately.

He quickened his pace and rushed back to the outskirts of the Taoyuan mountains, found the spirit stones, array plate, token, array book, silver, and other things he had hidden, and immediately set off on the return journey. Compared to when he came, he had more wealth on him, so he didn't dare to cross Mount Wuling again. There were too many bandits and spirit beasts inside, and there was no need to take risks. So he detoured more than a hundred miles to the south, went upstream along the Wuchao River bank, and finally returned to Mount Wulong, which he had been away from for more than three months.

He lingered under Ganzhu Ridge for half a day, had a meal of brown rice at Uncle Tian's house, scattered a few taels of broken silver at several familiar villagers' homes, and then steadily went up the mountain.

Uncle Tian said that Ah Zhen came back once in the first lunar month this year and intended to go up the mountain to visit Liu Xiaolou, but unfortunately, Liu Xiaolou was not there. Ah Zhen had been practicing under Master Jingzhen of Mount Xiushan for a year and had already entered the first level of Qi Refinement. This progress was quite fast. He himself went up the mountain at the age of eight and didn't enter the first level of Qi Refinement until he was ten, so he couldn't help but feel a bit inferior.

If he was surpassed by that little girl, he would lose face!

Thinking of this, Liu Xiaolou didn't care about the weeds growing in the courtyard, didn't care about the spider webs tangled between the beams, and started practicing directly.

The three major acupoints of the Hand Jueyin Meridian—Tianchi, Tianquan, and Quze—had all been opened. Naturally, the next one was the Ximen acupoint.

The Xi Sect acupoint is located on the palm side of the forearm. Once this acupoint is opened, symptoms such as palpitations and chest pain are less likely to occur. It lies not only in opening the acupoint barrier but also in the accumulation of true essence in the acupoint pool after opening. True essence is the transformation of spiritual power after adapting to the human body. After having true essence accumulated, one can warm and nourish essential acupoints. This is the biggest reason why cultivation can prolong life.

The spiritual power in the spirit stone in his palm was absorbed bit by bit. With continuous breathing, it was transformed into true essence in his body, rushing toward the Xi Sect acupoint barrier bit by bit. Liu Xiaolou had been repeating this process since he was eight years old, so cultivation was boring; but the comfort and pleasure after each successful breakthrough were indescribable, so cultivation was also extremely fun.

Days passed like this. One day, the big white goose suddenly returned, carefully clearing weeds and spider webs like a child who had made a mistake. When Liu Xiaolou opened his eyes, the courtyard had regained its vitality.

Fourteen days later, a spirit stone was exhausted by Liu Xiaolou, so he changed to another spirit stone and continued to practice.

When the first spring rain of this year on Mount Wulong fell silkily, the Xi Sect acupoint was broken by Liu Xiaolou, and true essence happily surged into the acupoint pool, stirring up waves.

He originally wanted to make persistent efforts to continue to impact the fifth acupoint, but was awakened by an increasingly unbearable stench, so he had to temporarily stop his practice, looked at the pile of fat fish, wild rabbits, and pheasants piled up by the stove, and couldn't help but smile bitterly.

This beast was becoming more and more greedy for cooked food. It didn't matter if Liu Xiaolou wasn't on the mountain, but whenever he was, the big white goose would desperately bring back game, waiting eagerly for him to light a fire and cook.

Forget it, let's cook a meal. He had also been eating dry food for a month, so it was time to improve his life. It's just that many of these wild things had already rotted, especially those fish, the smell was really unbearable.

Before he got up, the big white goose flapped its wings and rushed back from outside, holding two fresh fat fish in its mouth. It didn't notice that Liu Xiaolou had finished his practice. After throwing the fish down, it circled around the stove twice, suddenly stretched its mouth to pick out a piece of wood from under the stove, stared at the wood for a moment, and its long beak started pecking at the wood.

Liu Xiaolou didn't know what it wanted to do, so he watched patiently.

He saw the big white goose pecking at the wood faster and faster, wood chips splashing everywhere, and a round hole formed on the wood visible to the naked eye.

Liu Xiaolou laughed dumbly, why did this guy learn to be a woodpecker?

When he looked further, his smile gradually became dull. Blue smoke began to rise from the round hole...

Seeing the blue smoke, the big white goose picked up a few withered leaves from the side and covered the blue smoke. The leaves soon caught fire, leaving Liu Xiaolou dumbfounded.

Unfortunately, the spring rain suddenly became heavier, and the raindrops were several times denser than before, soon extinguishing the rising flames.

The big white goose stamped its feet on the spot and "quacked" at the sky twice, seemingly venting its dissatisfaction.

Liu Xiaolou only then came back to his senses and called out: "Big White!"

The big white goose flapped its wings and rushed to Liu Xiaolou, one wing drooping, pointing obliquely at the wood extinguished by the fire, "quacking" non-stop.

Liu Xiaolou pondered for a long time and finally took out a spirit stone, held it in his palm, and sent it to its mouth. Compared to last year, this guy seemed to have grown a bit more spiritual. Could it be that it really had a future for domestication? Now it was not a difficult time like last year, and he had quite a few spirit stones in his hand, so he could waste one.

The big white goose was stunned at first, then looked at Liu Xiaolou, then at the spirit stone lying in Liu Xiaolou's palm, watching back and forth, moving over step by step carefully, suddenly stretched its mouth, snatched the spirit stone from Liu Xiaolou's palm, turned around and ran, rushed out of the courtyard, and rushed into the bamboo forest.

Liu Xiaolou smiled, got up and came to the place where it collected things, pulled away a clump of dry grass, and found a gold ingot and a gold hairpin underneath. The gold was about half a tael, not heavy, but very exquisite. The gold hairpin was also carved with hollow butterfly patterns, and it looked very good.

Which wealthy family suffered again?

Just as he was pondering, a village child ran up from the mountain, climbed the fence and shouted: "Little Immortal Master, go and hide quickly, a major sect is coming to suppress Mount Wulong."

Liu Xiaolou asked: "Niu Ya, who told you to come?"

The child said: "It's Uncle Tian, saying that someone has already been inquiring at the foot of the mountain. By the way, it's people from Dongting Lake, some Green Jade Sect. Little Immortal Master, I won't say more, I still have to go to Qizhang Ridge!"

Liu Xiaolou frowned and thought, why did the Qingyu Sect suddenly come to Mount Wulong to suppress bandits? Could it be aimed at me? Do they know that I saved Lord Xingde and Zhou Qiniang?

Impossible!

Then it must be the incident at the end of last year when the Zhou family manor was broken by the crowd gathered by Wang Laoda. Could it be that many fellow Daoists from Mount Wulong who accepted the Hero Order at that time were investigated?

The Qingyu Sect's large-scale suppression of Mount Wulong, does it mean that they have given up the blockade of Taoyuan? Of course, it's also possible that they have the ability to open two battlefields at the same time?

Anyway, running is definitely necessary. Since he went up the mountain, he didn't know how many times he had run. There was always one time every year or two, which was not surprising at all.

He hurriedly packed a bundle, packed everything he wanted to take, including the shiny gold, silver, and jewelry picked up by the big white goose, and shouted at the bamboo forest: "Big White—"

The beast rushed out flapping its wings. The spirit stone was probably already swallowed into its stomach.

Liu Xiaolou shouldered the bundle, put on his bamboo hat, put on his straw raincoat, and went down the mountain in the drizzling spring rain.

This time he didn't dare to hide in his secret hiding place, but prepared to leave Mount Wulong. He had seen the ability of the Qingyu Sect. It was the Form-Capturing Technique, the Spirit-Ghost Technique, and the manifestation of the mountain god. Hiding in Mount Wulong might not be safe, so it was better to leave.