Chapter 141: Brother Meng Sneezed!

Half a minute later—

Zhang Suannai hid her figure behind a large tree, looking at the person in front. She blinked her eyes, her expression blank.

Why is it him?

She saw a small clearing paved with gravel ahead, with a campfire burning in the center and three unconscious Sword pigs lying on the side. A person sat in the middle, turning a homemade grill in front of him; what he was roasting seemed to be a rabbit, and next to him sat a small Spirit Power rice cooker, emitting steam.

It is exactly Xiaoxiao's brother-in-law!

The boyfriend that Qingqing hasn't dated!

Zhang Suannai opened her eyes wide to look carefully.

She saw that this person had above-average looks and an above-average build, his hair was neither long nor short, and he was wearing long pants, a long-sleeved T-shirt, and a baseball cap.

In all fairness, he was a little handsome.

But that was all.

Yet when he turned the roasted rabbit, brushed oil on it, and applied seasoning, he was exceptionally focused.

Zhang Suannai sniffed.

It smelled damn good!

She could faintly hear the sizzling sound of grease dripping into the fire, then the flames would go "whoosh" and grow a bit larger, only to quickly return to normal. She felt as if she could imagine the rabbit being roasted until the outer layer was crispy and charred, oozing with glistening grease.

Zhang Suannai shook her head, forcing herself to cast aside distracting thoughts, holding her breath and focusing her mind.

This person didn't seem to be carrying any weapons or equipment; next to him were only two backpacks filled with things, and then some bottles and jars containing seasonings.

Two backpacks...

Zhang Suannai's gaze shifted—

There were traces of Sword pigs being dragged nearby, and following these traces, there was a string of deep footprints in the fallen leaves of the forest, leading down the mountain.

It seems there are at least two people.

Did the others take the Sword pigs down the mountain to sell them, while he stayed here to guard and prepare dinner?

Sure enough—

Footsteps gradually came from afar.

A boy with a round face and loose clothing walked back.

Zhang Suannai blinked again.

She had also seen this boy before.

He is the boyfriend of "Qingcai Keke".

Now it seems they should be roommates, though it is unknown if there is any other deeper relationship. Given the style of the Dayi Imperial Family, they probably wouldn't easily accept Meng Yi's descendants developing unique sexual orientations like those sissies of the previous dynasty.

Zhang Suannai heard their voices.

"Brother Jiang, so fast?"

"Yeah, the weather is good today, the road is dry... it would be troublesome if it rained, you'd sink into the ground."

"Hard work."

"Not at all, it's about the same as my Physical Fitness training."

"Did the sale go smoothly?"

"Pretty smooth, I guess? The scale should be fine, I stood on it to test it, and the price was the same as this morning's price... thanks to your Thunder Method, Brother Chen. I saw others selling nearby, but because there were too many wounds on the pigs, the boss deducted money for that."

"That's good, take a rest and have a meal."

"I'm not tired, I'll carry another load."

"The rice is cooked, eat before you carry more."

"Then... alright."

"This rabbit is almost ready too."

"Yeah... Brother Chen, I feel like something is weird."

Zhang Suannai saw the round-faced boy start turning his head left and right, so she quickly pulled her head back, hiding her whole body behind the tree, while simultaneously clearing her mind and imagining herself as a bright, beautiful little mushroom growing by the tree.

She only heard a voice faintly coming from that direction: "I just felt like someone was watching us, but now there's no one, could someone be hiding in the Dark Silence?"

"Let me check!"

Zhang Suannai immediately retracted all her Spirit Power, entered the Dark Silence state, and pondered to herself.

Currently, she still wasn't sure whether Qingcai Keke was that Imperial Family disciple or Xiaoxiao's brother-in-law. She had thought of many ways to prove it, but all were difficult to judge.

For example, Qingcai Keke's familiarity with Ling'an Academy.

If Qingcai Keke is Xiaoxiao's sister, as the boyfriend that Ning Qing hasn't dated, he must have come to Ling'an Academy to find Ning Qing. Perhaps in daily life, Ning Qing occasionally revealed a little bit about the school to him, well, occasionally. Or if he asked with a thick skin, Ning Qing might have told him. So it's not strange that he is relatively familiar with Ling'an Academy.

But if Qingcai Keke is a descendant of the Imperial Family, as someone who grew up in Yujing, he must have played at Yujing Academy and Ling'an Academy, so it's not strange that he has a certain familiarity with these two academies, which were converted from royal gardens.

Although Qingcai Keke said in the group that he wouldn't come to participate in the Hunting Festival.

Yet Zhang Suannai still didn't believe it!

About a minute passed.

Only then did Xiaoxiao's brother-in-law's voice come from behind the tree: "Didn't find anything, maybe someone passed by just now and felt we were eating too well, or saw us burning a fire in the forest and wanted to report us."

"Possible."

"Forget it, come eat, come eat, the rabbit is ready."

"Okay!"

"Let me tell you, this five-spice hand-shredded roasted rabbit I made is truly a masterpiece; the crust is crispy and charred, the marinade is extremely flavorful, everyone who has eaten it says it's good!"

"What's in the pot?"

"Soy sauce mixed rice, ever had it?"

"Never had it..."

"Then you are really missing out."

"……"

Zhang Suannai did not lower her guard; she maintained her Dark Silence state, pondered for a moment what "ultimate flavor" meant, and then quietly left the area. Her feet stepped over the dry, fallen leaves, yet she made no sound.

The scent of roasted rabbit and rice drifted on the wind, making her swallow involuntarily.

……

A gulp.

Chen Shu took down the roasted rabbit and began to swallow as well.

But while taking the rabbit, he activated his Spirit Eye and glanced all around. Finding no abnormal accumulation of Spirit Power, he then continued with his task.

"Brother Chen."

Jiang Lai handed him a bowl of rice.

Chen Shu reached out and took it.

Coming to this deep mountain forest, whether for the Hunting Festival or the Full Moon See, both were secondary.

The main point was to have fun.

Of course, one had to eat well.

Most of what Chen Shu carried in his hiking backpack was food, or things related to food. Besides that, he only carried one change of clothes and a sleeping bag; the tent and other items were carried by Jiang Lai. Jiang Lai's pack was larger and had many items strapped to the outside.

The sun set.

The sky gradually darkened.

The campfire was still burning, the firelight flickering, casting shadows throughout the forest.

Although this world had Cultivators, they were still quite vigilant about forest fires, though not as strictly regulated as in his past life. Furthermore, during the Hunting Festival, it was permitted to light campfires on Qingshan Ridge; if a fire were to break out, it would generally be extinguished by the Cultivators within Qingshan Ridge before any specialized personnel needed to arrive.

That was why Chen Shu dared to light a mountain fire so brazenly.

Beside him, a Sword pig grunted twice, appearing to be on the verge of waking up.

Chen Shu temporarily set down his bowl and chopsticks, went over, and gave each pig another gentle-version Thunder Method to ensure they slept soundly.

It wasn't that he was afraid of killing them; Sword pigs had thick skin and tough flesh, and their vitality was extremely tenacious, making them not easily killed. He was mainly worried that leaving too many obvious electric shock marks on their bodies would affect the selling price.

Today's harvest was quite good.

While on the outskirts of Qingshan Ridge, Chen Shu and Jiang Lai had caught one Sword pig and sold it on the spot, and later they caught four more.

This was all thanks to Chen Shu's "Heavenly Eye Technique."

This was a traditional Spirit Sect Spell, one of the many spells Teacher Shi Qian had given him. In ancient times, it was never to be passed on to outsiders and was known only to Spirit Sect disciples.

The name of this spell sounded intimidating, but it wasn't actually a "heavenly eye"; it was just that a Spirit Cultivator could use this spell to temporarily borrow an animal's vision. Usually, the caster would imprint the spell onto a bird, and then the bird would fly into the sky, allowing the caster to gain a view from above, hence the name.

This spell was very complex, and Chen Shu had studied it for quite a while.

When he first used this spell, he was very unaccustomed to it because what a bird saw was vastly different from what a human saw, and using a human's visual thinking mode to operate a bird's eyes was very uncoordinated, like a driver incompatibility. However, after spending some time adapting to it, its utility became immense.

With the help of this spell, Chen Shu found quite a few Sword pigs, though he didn't catch most of them.

The Sword pigs were too alert.

This mountain forest was their home turf.

The two of them finished their meal quickly.

Chen Shu took the bowl and chopsticks to a nearby pool to wash them, then began setting up the tent, while Jiang Lai continued to carry the Sword pigs down the mountain to sell them.

The division of labor was clear.

Chen Shu felt a bit bad; Jiang Lai did all the dirty and hard work, while he did all the easy tasks.

But there was no other way.

Someone had to stay here.

Chen Shu did indeed have a Crystal that could be used as a Space Artifact, but the working principle of the Crystal was completely different from the Space Artifacts of this world, and he didn't have a sufficiently large Space Artifact to use as a cover, so he couldn't use it lightly.

The Space Artifacts of this world were all based on the use of Space Stone; inside was just a fragment of space, nothing special—

There was neither time stasis nor any kind of taboos.

Theoretically, every Space Artifact could store living things; the difference was that some spaces had temperatures that were too high or too low, some had no oxygen, some were even filled with other gases, some had no Spirit Power, and so on and so forth; the environments varied. You could put living things inside, but there was no guarantee they would survive.

Note: It is "putting" them in.

Not "collecting" them in.

When using a Space Artifact in this world, one needed to use a Formation to open an entrance, and then you had to manually put the items inside; when taking them out, you also had to open this entrance to retrieve the items, rather than just using a thought to collect or retrieve things. At the same time, the power to open or close this entrance depended on the design of the Formation and the output of Spirit Power, and it was relatively fragile; it was not like a space rift that was infinitely powerful and indestructible, so you could not use the opening or closing of a Storage Space entrance to sever something.

The Crystal was different.

The entrance opened by the Crystal was invisible; it looked as if there were no entrance at all, and only Chen Shu could touch it. Chen Shu could use his mind to retrieve items stored in the Crystal, but when putting them in, he needed to use a control spell like the Capture Technique to throw them inside.

Jiang Lai ran three trips, each trip taking an hour round-trip, and did it all by running, as if tireless.

By the time the moving was finished, it was already late at night.

Chen Shu had already set up the tent.

Jiang Lai wiped the sweat from his face, took out his Mobile Phone, and asked, "Brother Chen, is there a signal here?"

"Very poor, why?"

"I'm transferring the money from the sales to you."

"What's the rush? Let's split it when we get back."

"I'm not taking a share!"

"You have to take a share." Chen Shu's tone was firm. "Half each."

"Then I still wouldn't be getting half." Jiang Lai frowned. "The Sword pigs were all found by you, and caught by you; I only provided the manual labor. If I were to take half the money for that, I would feel very bad."

"Huh?"

Chen Shu twitched the corner of his mouth.

Unexpectedly, this person felt bad about it instead.

He then revealed a smile, waved his hand, and said, "Go wash up and sleep; we'll talk after we head back."

"Mm."

Jiang Lai took his toiletries and went to the nearby water pool.

Chen Shu unfolded his sleeping bag and looked up at the sky.

Today is the thirteenth.

The moon is already very bright.

Although Full Moon See is called Full Moon See, its actual blooming time is around the thirteenth to the seventeenth of every month, or rather, those few days when the moonlight is bright.

However, this is not deep enough yet.

Tomorrow, I must continue walking inward.

The further in I go, the further away from the foot of the mountain it gets; I will have to trouble Brother Jiang.

Chen Shu enjoyed the moon for a while, took the opportunity to set up a comprehensive Warning Array, kept the "Absolute Spiritual Perception" from the Thousand Machine Art running, and then returned to the tent to sleep side-by-side with Brother Jiang tonight.

I'm even a little bit expectant.

Daily Cultivation.

Go to the edge of the Forbidden Land to enjoy the moon.

Return to sleep.

All night long, crows cawed and wolves howled.

Chen Shu woke up early in the morning, checked the Warning Array, and seeing that the Spirit Power was basically exhausted, he ignored it, cooked breakfast for himself, and after eating, packed up his personal items and trash, then continued with Jiang Lai deeper into Qingshan Ridge.

The Hunting Festival lasts for seven days in total.

However, the strength of human Cultivators is truly too great; generally, by the end of the first day, most of the Sword pigs on the outskirts are cleared out, and by the later days, if one wants to hunt more Sword pigs, one must walk deeper into Qingshan Ridge or hunt at night—Sword pigs appear more frequently at night, but it cannot be called nocturnal; their rest and foraging times are fragmented and overlapping, so one can only say they are more inclined toward the night.

Chen Shu does not want to stay up late for now.

"Pfft..."

A few birds flew over his head.

Chen Shu didn't even need to go looking; he used the Summoning Technique to catch one, channeled a Spell, planted a Heavenly Eye Technique imprint, and let it fly off.

He then closed his eyes.

After a brief darkness, his field of vision suddenly became extremely wide, even able to see clearly above his head and behind him, with mountains and forests rolling in succession. At the same time, the images transmitted back contained many "colors" Chen Shu had never seen before; they were hard to describe, colors invisible to the human eye, and there was no definition for them, no vocabulary to describe these colors, and when he first saw these colors, Chen Shu even found it hard to use the word "color" to describe them; it was more like a feeling of first contact, and for a moment, his brain didn't know how to process it.

With the help of the Heavenly Eye Technique, he could slightly influence the bird's movements and focus, but he could not interfere crudely, otherwise, the bird would be injured.

So he controlled the bird to circle and fly with himself as the center, looking down to watch for movement in the forest.

This bird is very good at distinguishing the color difference between a certain object and the soil, but its eyes are good at catching small items and it does not easily notice large ones.

A moment later—

Chen Shu opened his eyes and quietly walked to the left.

A distance of about three hundred meters.

A foolish-looking Sword pig stood in the grass staring at him, likely because its location was too remote and it hadn't heard the news that humans had invaded, and it even wanted to drive this person in front of it out of its territory.

Chen Shu quietly channeled his Spirit Power, activated the further improved Thunder Method, and shot a mass of invisible Spirit Power toward the Sword pig.

The Sword pig was very alert; it had already sensed the Spirit Power before it even reached it, and without hesitation, it turned its head to run, but discovered another person behind it, so it had to change direction and run the other way; it was because of this moment of hesitation that the suddenly exploding purple-red thunder still affected it.

"Sizzle!"

The Sword pig let out a miserable shriek and its feet slipped again.

Before it could recover and pick up speed, two more bolts of the Thunder Method were fired, directly making it unable to stand up ever again.

"Brother Jiang."

Chen Shu pushed aside the grass and walked out, saying to Jiang Lai, "You carry it out first; you don't need to follow me. Just come back and find me with the satellite positioning. I'm quite familiar with the combined use of the Heavenly Eye Technique and other Spells now; most likely, by the time you return, I'll have caught another one. You just focus on the transport."

"Alright, then Brother Chen, you take care of your safety alone."

"Rest assured, in this forest, besides humans, the strongest combatants are the Sword pigs." Chen Shu paused, "By the way, how far is it from here to the nearest road?"

"It's ten kilometers, I suppose; it takes me two hours to go back and forth."

"Awesome."

"I have great stamina..."

"And you're tough to beat."

"Uh..."

"Then it's still over ten kilometers to the edge of the Forbidden Land, right?"

"Just about..."

"Then let's walk another ten kilometers inside, and then we'll stop; otherwise, it's dangerous to accidentally enter the Forbidden Land, and it's too hard for you to carry them out if it's too far; it would take most of the day just to go back and forth."

"Okay!"

Jiang Lai nodded honestly, but suddenly he remembered something, so he asked, "By the way, Brother Chen, where did you go last night? It took you several hours to come back."

"Enjoying the moon."

"For that long?"

"I wanted to write a poem, but I couldn't."

"Emmm..."

Jiang Lai didn't know what to say for a moment; thinking about it roughly, he actually felt it was quite reasonable.

After all, he often saw this kind of person.