Chapter 38 (Part 1)

“!”

Every pore on Song Yuanxi’s body stood on end. His instinct was to reach back and grab, but in the end, he caught only a handful of air.

His heart grew even more uneasy. Nervous, he kept twisting his head back and forth. “What is it? Come out!”

“Heehee… heeheehee…”

The laughter seemed both there and not there, drifting away on the wind.

Song Yuanxi stood where he was, on guard in every direction. After a stalemate of almost fifteen minutes, he confirmed nothing was wrong before continuing his night watch.

But as soon as he sat down, those icy fingers climbed up again, silently twining around his neck. Sticky, wet, crawling slowly upward along his throat…

Song Yuanxi grabbed backward again, and once more caught nothing.

After this happened several times in a row, the terror in his heart shot straight up.

“Song Miao? Song Miao?” Song Yuanxi shouted loudly.

Yet the tent so close by was utterly silent. No one answered. Song Miao seemed to have fallen into a dead sleep.

Worried something had happened to him, Song Yuanxi strode over. But just as he drew near, the other person walked out safely from inside.

“What’s wrong?” Song Miao had gotten up in the night, and when he ran into the other party’s deathly pale face, he could not help asking with concern.

“You were inside the whole time just now?”

“Mm.”

“Asleep?”

“I dozed lightly for a while.”

Seeing how awful Song Yuanxi looked, Song Miao could not help becoming suspicious. “Did something happen to you?”

“I did run into something a little strange…”

Song Yuanxi described in detail what he had encountered earlier. After Song Miao finished listening, his first reaction was that the dragon mimics were playing tricks.

“Those little flying pigs?” Song Yuanxi did not quite believe it.

“Don’t be fooled by their appearance. You can’t imagine what makes dragon mimics terrifying.”

“What’s terrifying about them?”

When Song Yuanxi asked again, Song Miao could not answer. “I’m not sure, but the elders have always said dragon mimics are terrifying. Otherwise, they wouldn’t limit us to only one month.”

Neither of them felt at ease, so they simply sat back-to-back and kept watch together. Sure enough, those strange things never appeared again. In the days that followed, the two of them never kept night watch alone again.

Half a month passed in the blink of an eye. Song Yuanxi and Song Miao had captured a total of fifty dragon mimics.

By now, the spirit beast pouches had become extremely crowded. Song Miao suggested dividing and sealing them, with every ten dragon mimics sealed inside one spirit beast pouch.

Song Yuanxi happened to have twenty on his side, so he was responsible for sealing two spirit beast pouches himself. But just as he was preparing to close them, his sharp eyes noticed something unusual.

“What’s this?”

Song Yuanxi blinked uncertainly and peered into the spirit beast pouch again. That streak of golden flowing light flashed past once more.

Startled, he looked up at the person across from him. “Song Miao, do these dragon mimics glow?”

“No. Once they’re caught, the light all over their bodies immediately dims. After enough time passes, they turn gray.” As Song Miao spoke, he opened one corner of his spirit beast pouch and let the other person look at the dragon mimics he had caught.

Sure enough, Song Yuanxi saw clumps of gray, dusty-looking dragon mimics, like stones that had lost all vitality. But the dragon mimics inside his own spirit beast pouch were completely different!

It was not that they were all completely different. Among the twenty dragon mimics, nineteen had already turned gray. Only one was still tender white and lively. And that golden flowing light flashing by came from its wings.

“Song Miao, the ones here…” Song Yuanxi was just about to explain the situation when he looked up and saw that the other person had already walked away.

“There’s something off about this thing. Better not touch it much.”

Song Yuanxi still had lingering fear from that night half a month ago. He had absolutely no intention of taking it out barehanded to study it.

He pulled the cord and sealed the pouch. But in the instant before it fully closed, he heard a cry like that of an infant.

“Waa… waa waa waa…”

The sobbing was so wretched that anyone who heard it would have been moved to tears and pity.

Song Yuanxi, however, reacted as though facing a great enemy. He stared at the tumbling little flying pig inside the spirit beast pouch, his brows tightly furrowed. “You’re the one making that sound, aren’t you? You’re trying to confuse me with sound! Too bad for you, I know nothing about music. Your crying is useless against me!”

Sound attacks counted as a common offensive method in the cultivation world. Misty Pavilion, one of the four great forces, was especially skilled in sound-attack techniques.

But Song Yuanxi was the kind of person who was completely “impervious to persuasion.” His trash physique as a five-spirit-roots cultivator was not only reflected in how slowly he absorbed spiritual energy. When facing sound-based attacks from nature, he was also thousands of times duller than others at the same level.

In other words, that pair of ears of his had absolutely no response to musical patterns. He was a proper tone-deaf person.

When the dragon mimic saw that its crying had no effect on this human, it was directly dumbfounded. How was that possible? How could a human resist it?

“Stunned, aren’t you? This lord feels nothing for you.”

Song Yuanxi looked at the plump little white pig in a daze, slapped it directly, then quickly tied it up with rope. After that, he followed Song Miao around, searching everywhere for other dragon mimics that might have transformed.

Night fell once more, and the two of them packed up their things to rest.

Song Miao sat on a stone block not far from Song Yuanxi. Aside from necessary exchanges of information, he spent the entire time meditating.

Song Yuanxi had originally wanted to ask about the dragon mimics, but seeing that the other person was in a half-cultivation state, he did not disturb him. He thought they could discuss it first thing tomorrow morning, and that would still be in time.

Little did he know that after one night passed, the evidence would be gone!

Song Miao received instructions from the team leader, Song Qian, to hand over fifty dragon mimics ahead of schedule. He had already taken out his own three spirit beast pouches and was about to go collect Song Yuanxi’s two when the other party could no longer produce them.

Song Yuanxi rummaged back and forth through his storage pouch. He pulled out and put away every spirit beast pouch he had, but he just could not find the two pouches sealed with dragon mimics.

“Where are my pouches? I clearly put them here. How did they all disappear?”

Song Yuanxi’s anxious expression did not seem fake. Song Miao could not help comforting him. “They should be inside your storage pouch. These things can’t eat or drink, so they can’t have gotten lost.”

Song Yuanxi’s rummaging motion instantly froze. He raised his head to look across at him, his expression bitter and miserable. “Song Miao, maybe they really did get eaten.”

“What?”

Song Miao looked puzzled, only to see the other person lift a fat, fluffy chick out of his storage pouch. The little yellow chicken had its wings of destiny restrained, and it kept chirping miserably in discomfort.

“Song Miao, those two pouches of dragon mimics were eaten by my contracted beast.”

Song Yuanxi held up the little yellow chicken, his feelings especially complicated. How familiar this scene was! Back in Wan’an City, that snake egg had been swallowed in one gulp by this chick in the exact same way.

Nine years had passed, and because Little Yellow had fallen into a deep sleep, he had actually let his guard down!

Song Yuanxi felt very apologetic, and also very embarrassed. “Song Miao, this is my fault. Can you give me some time to make up for it? I’ll go catch enough dragon mimics again right now. As for the team leader…”

“Wait!”

Song Miao was staring at the little yellow chicken in front of him, his expression extremely curious and puzzled. “This is your contracted beast? It ate those dragon mimics?”

After receiving Song Yuanxi’s confirmation, Song Miao was simply stunned. “This is too unbelievable. I’ve never seen a living creature capable of swallowing dragon mimics whole. Is this really a first-rank demonic beast, a yellow brocade chicken?”

Song Yuanxi could not explain Little Yellow’s origins, but he picked out the key point in the other person’s words. “No creature can eat dragon mimics? Then why do all of you work so hard to capture them?”

Song Miao shrugged, his face innocent. “Who knows? It’s a rule set down by Jin City’s ancestors. In any case, every ten years, people must enter the abyss to capture them once. All the dragon mimics caught by every family are thrown into the Heavenly Chasm. I’ve never been there, but everyone says monsters are being raised in Jin City’s Heavenly Chasm…”

In the past, Song Miao absolutely would not have said such a thing. But getting along with Song Yuanxi these days had been fairly pleasant, and his sense of belief that they were both Song family disciples had grown quite a bit, so he was no longer as resistant as before.

This was not the first time Song Yuanxi had heard the words “Heavenly Chasm.” On No-Return Mountain in their Xuantian Sect, there was also a Heavenly Chasm. It was said that layers upon layers of arrays had been set up there, and without the sect master’s secret order, miscellaneous people were absolutely not allowed to barge in.

“I didn’t expect Jin City to have a Heavenly Chasm too…”

Song Yuanxi was curious about this and wanted to ask more about the Heavenly Chasm, but Song Miao waved his hand. “If you truly want to know, you can apply to the family head to escort the dragon mimics there. But I advise you not to be too curious. There are many miasmas in the Heavenly Chasm. Without Foundation Establishment, no one dares step inside.”

The other party still wanted to ask more, but Song Miao directly cut him off. “I’ll take these thirty dragon mimics to the team leader first. There’s less than half a month left. Hurry up and think of a way to catch more dragon mimics.”

Song Miao headed toward the location Song Qian had designated. Before parting, they agreed to meet at the old place after nightfall. Song Yuanxi smiled and said goodbye, watching him leave. But when he turned around, he held Little Yellow and got a headache right there.

“dragon mimics are things that appear and disappear without a trace. Catching twenty already exhausted me, and now it’s all gone overnight. What am I supposed to do?”

“Chirp chirp…”

“Smack—”

Song Yuanxi slapped it, grabbed its chicken wing, and scolded, “You could have eaten anything, but you just had to eat those things. Haven’t I told you that eating everything will only get you killed? What if those dragon mimics were poisonous?”

“And! This was my mission. I had to hand them in. Who allowed you to secretly eat them all?”

“You rebellious son! Hurry up and spit them all back out. I don’t believe you’ve already digested all of them…”

Song Yuanxi refused to give up and still wanted to struggle a little. He grabbed Little Yellow and tried to dig those dragon mimics out of its mouth.

Little Yellow had not seen its host for nine years. It had originally wanted to cling to its dear “Daddy” and act spoiled for a while, but it never expected the other party to desperately try to pry open its beak. Although its mouth could open three hundred and sixty degrees and prying it open was nothing much, the little chick felt terribly wronged.

“Butt… eating butt…”

“Oh, listen to you! You chick, instead of learning properly, you not only do bad things, you’ve learned to curse people?”

“Butt… it’s just butt!” Little Yellow cried with its neck stiff, pecking Song Yuanxi’s fingers again and again with its pointed beak.

Song Yuanxi immediately felt pain and itch at the same time. He slapped Little Yellow’s rear. “I think you’re just asking to be taught a lesson!”

“Chirp chirp… waa…”

“Eating butt. Little Yellow ate butt. Only ate butt-butt.”

Song Yuanxi could not help scolding, “Those are dragon mimics. What butt or not butt?”

“Butt! It’s butt! All butt!”

Song Yuanxi could not understand, but the little chick struggled fiercely, which was a little beyond his expectations.

“Daddy’s good big son, explain slowly. What do you mean? How are dragon mimics butt?”

Little Yellow tilted its head. Its little black sesame-seed eyes spun and spun, and the tuft of yellow fluff on top of its head drifted back and forth in the wind. After a long while, it finally understood how to express itself.

It chirped and ran hard in one direction. Song Yuanxi followed closely behind it, not interfering with Little Yellow’s running route.

“I’d like to see what this little brat is trying to do.”

Half an hour later, Song Yuanxi silently crouched in a cluster of flowers, watching Little Yellow lying on top of a puddle of soft, squishy matter. It pecked hard at the puddle with its beak. There was no disgusting scene like he had imagined. Instead, that puddle of stuff suddenly seemed to come alive, performing all kinds of juggling transformations in front of him.

He watched with his own eyes as an object similar to a lump of poop turned, in the blink of an eye, into a little flying pig. The pig was not very big and still looked like a piglet.

But compared with Little Yellow, it was much bigger. However!

Little Yellow chirped once, opened its beak a hundred and eighty degrees, and swallowed it in one bite.

He could even hear the little flying pig inside Little Yellow’s mouth letting out fierce, miserable pig squeals.

Song Yuanxi: “…”

For one instant, his feelings were extremely complicated.

“Chirp chirp… eating butt…”

Little Yellow performed swallowing one pig in one bite, its little eyes very smug. It believed it had already explained clearly.

In a subtle mood, Song Yuanxi was silently healed by it. He even thought happily: since Little Yellow was so good at finding dragon mimics, then the numbers would definitely be no problem.

Let it eat as much as it wanted! They had activated a cheat!

“Little Yellow, is it very easy for you to find dragon mimics? This is very easy for you, isn’t it?” Song Yuanxi smiled kindly, cupping the fluffy thing and stroking it gently.

Little Yellow was petted along the feathers until it felt comfortable. Its little head bobbed again and again, but its voice kept chattering. “Butt-butt! Not dragon!”

“That’s called a dragon mimic,” Song Yuanxi corrected. “Although I also think calling them dragon mimics is very strange, and that little flying white pig would be more fitting, the people of Jin City really do call this thing a dragon mimic.”

“Not dragon! It’s butt! It’s butt!”

Little Yellow cared about this point in particular. After catching another dragon mimic, this time it was in no hurry to swallow it in one bite. It bit the dragon mimic’s wing and used its newly grown teeth to tear it back and forth. Amid miserable pig squeals, those white, plump little flying pigs gradually turned into a mass of air.

Little Yellow’s eyes instantly lit up. It inhaled that mass of air and then swallowed it, its expression satisfied.

“Daddy, butt. It turned into butt!” Little Yellow was very pleased with its own performance.

Song Yuanxi had already frozen in place, his mouth unconsciously opening into an O shape. Anyone who saw a tender white little flying pig suddenly turn into a mass of air right before their eyes would be shaken three times over.

What did I just see?

Could this world get any more fantastical?

“So dragon mimics aren’t dragons, and they aren’t pigs either. They’re a mass of air?”

Little Yellow was immediately unhappy. It angrily shouted with a combined “chirp chirp” and “woof woof,” “Not air! Butt! It’s butt!!!”

“Kid, butt is air. It’s the same. Both are products of nature.” Song Yuanxi’s worldview reassembled itself, and he felt his heart was truly strong. In such a short while, he had actually completely accepted it.

Who would have thought that in the next second, Little Yellow would directly reveal another heaven-shaking piece of information?

“It’s butt. Dragon butt!”

“What?”

“Little Yellow hates dragon butt. Eat it, eat it all!”

“Hey, wait! Kid, explain slowly. How did dragons get involved again…”

After one human and one chicken communicated back and forth for three hundred rounds, Song Yuanxi finally figured out what Little Yellow was trying to express. dragon mimics were not true dragons, but a mass of dragon breath. And this so-called dragon breath was called dragon butt by Little Yellow.

According to legend, dragons were divine beasts, and dragon breath contained divine charm that did not decay for ten thousand years. Under uniquely favorable conditions, dragon breath could take form and become a demon.

When Song Yuanxi had flipped through Miscellaneous Notes on Canglan back then, he had seen records of this kind, but he had always treated them like ancient Strange Tales stories and enjoyed them as fiction. He had never expected that in his lifetime, he would run into dragon breath capable of taking form.

This was way too dramatic!

“It’s butt, dragon butt!” Little Yellow continued chirping noisily, completely refusing to acknowledge the words dragon breath.

Song Yuanxi looked at the little chick’s two black sesame eyes, which were almost turning cross-eyed, and immediately laughed until he nearly split apart. “Little Yellow, why are you so stubborn? Dragon breath comes from the upper mouth. At most, it’s a bit of bad breath or something. Dragon butt comes from the lower mouth. Even if it’s from a divine beast dragon, that thing is disgusting. Are you really that willing to eat someone else’s lower-mouth air?”

Little Yellow was muddled and did not understand what upper mouth and lower mouth meant, but it keenly sensed that Daddy might be laughing at it.

It immediately felt wronged. Creatures like dragons were natural enemies of its kind, weren’t they? Eating dragon butt was perfectly justified. Why was it being laughed at?

The more it thought about it, the more it felt it was not wrong. Little Yellow looked at Daddy, who could not stop laughing, flew up, and pecked him. Then it angrily hid inside the spirit beast pouch.

After that, no matter how Song Yuanxi called and coaxed it with every nice thing he could say, Little Yellow refused to come out again.

Song Yuanxi had originally pinned his hopes on Little Yellow displaying divine might. In the end, he had angered the little brat, leaving only himself to fight alone.

Song Miao offered to help, but Song Yuanxi tactfully refused out of shame. “I made this mistake myself. I’ll bear it myself.”

After that, he carried new spirit beast pouches and embarked on the path of searching for dragon mimics. For several days in a row, the results were not very good. Song Yuanxi only caught five.

Seeing how quickly time was passing, he grew anxious. Instead of continuing to capture them in a frantic rush, he sat down where he was and began studying how he should act in order to capture dragon mimics both quickly and well.

“dragon mimics are dragon breath. This was probably identified through Little Yellow’s unique inherited memories as a Dafeng, so it can’t be fake. Those dragon mimics can already take form, which means the dragon breath has existed for a very long time. These dragon mimics should be the breath left behind by some dragon ten thousand years ago…”

“This abyss is in a place derived from the Ten Thousand Beasts Domain, and there is dragon breath here. Could the Ten Thousand Beasts Domain from ten thousand years ago have been the land of the dragon race?”

“I heard Daoist Master Yunhua say that phoenixes have already disappeared for ten thousand years, and so have phoenix chicks. There are no related records in the history books of the Canglan Realm either. Did a great war happen ten thousand years ago, causing the transmission of the Dao to be cut off…”

Song Yuanxi had originally been thinking about how to catch dragon mimics, but his thoughts scattered too far, and the things he pondered grew more and more boundless. By the time he came back to himself, he was startled to realize the sky had already gone dark.

He shot to his feet, wanting to return the way he had come and meet up with Song Miao.

However, the path that had originally existed behind him had somehow twisted in the darkness without his noticing. What appeared before his eyes was a stretch of water like a vast river of stars.

“What is this place?” Song Yuanxi instantly went on guard.

“Heehee… heeheehee… Come play…”

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