Chapter 747: A Large Horse
Together with the Duck Emperor, Xiao Luo traveled through many colorful walls of light and he quickly realized he was traveling through s.p.a.ce. Xiao Luo felt tension during the teleportation, and his ears were ringing as if he was in a train traveling through a tunnel.
After several dozen seconds, the feeling of traveling through s.p.a.ce eased off, then stopped, and they appeared to have arrived. The colorful lights around them disappeared, and they saw a ma.s.sive circular platform with a high wall around it. He was standing right on it.
While he was there, more and more travelers arrived on the round platform, out of nowhere. That platform was the receiving terminal for all the travelers teleported from different locations.
“This is the Stan City. Please do not remain on the receiving platform after your arrival. The exit is that way. This is to avoid hindering arrivals from other locations.” An impersonal voice made that announcement.
Xiao Luo looked in the direction where the voice came from. It was a soldier in armor, and there were more soldiers like him teeming around. They appeared to be guards for the receiving terminal, responsible for supervision g that place. The soldier pointed at a gate as he spoke, telling those who had arrived on that platform to leave through that gate.
Xiao Luo said nothing and just left with the others.
After walking out of the gate, he found Stan City to be a bustling place.
The streets were full of pedestrians, either standing in front of some stall or chitchatting along the street side. Their clothes were modest. Most of them were wearing short s.h.i.+rts with narrow sleeves and flat shoes. There were men wearing clothes with loose sleeves, too. But their sleeves were short, which exposed their arms. It was a design that enabled the person to unsheathe the swords they were carrying at his waist.
Some white-clothed men were walking around carrying their swords. With their long beards blowing in the wind, they looked like haughty, extraordinary swordsmen. But when they saw variety shows performed on the street, they would stop to join the girls who were watching. They would cheer and clap their hands until their palms turned red. However, when the performers came around to collect money after their performances, the haughty look of these swordsmen immediately returned. They looked as if to say, “Charging for a variety show? Why don’t you rob us? We absolutely will not pay for that performance!”
At a distance away, there was a brothel. A prost.i.tute was behaving coquettishly on the terrace, trying to entice customers from the pedestrians pa.s.sing by.
“Mother ducker, this seems like a scene from the costume dramas of the Original World,” commented Duck Emperor as he popped his head out of Xiao Luo’s pocket. The duck found it incredible because the world they found themselves in looked like an ancient society of the Original World.
Xiao Luo did not respond. Instead, he kept walking along the street. He stopped to speak to an old stallholder and asked, “Mister, do you know the way to the Danhui Sect?”
According to the map that Zuo Xiangming had given him, the next teleportation portal was at the Danhui Sect. That formation would take him five hundred thousand kilometers away. However, the Danhui Sect was not in the Stan City, so he needed to locate it.
The stallholder selling figurines made of candy paper looked very kind. However, when he found out that Xiao Luo was only asking for directions, the look on his face changed. The smile that he greeted customers with immediately faded. He had an unfriendly look afterward and answered impatiently, “I don’t know. I don’t know. Ask others. Don’t disturb me. I’m doing business. Go away!”
Frowning, Xiao Luo turned around to leave. He did not expect the stallholder to be so rude.
He continued to ask several people the same question. All of them gave him the same answer. They did not know where the place was. They also told him to go away and to stop disturbing them. As for the pedestrians, they would not even stop to answer him.
“G.o.dd.a.m.n jerk! You do not know the ways of the world. Give them some money if you want to ask for directions. I promise they will answer you warmheartedly,” said the Duck Emperor, feeling sorry for Xiao Luo.
Xiao Luo had forgotten about that. The Ziyue Cave Heaven sect gave him abundant sacred currencies, the currency used in the Arcana Land. He took two bills out of the bunch and ordered a portion of dumplings at a stall. Then he casually asked the stallholder the location of the Danhui Sect, and he instantly got the information he wanted.
“See? What did I say? Just give them some money. Money talks!”
The Duck Emperor jumped out of Xiao Luo’s pocket, then stood in front of the bowl and hungrily gobbled up the dumplings. The soup was all over its mouth.
“Yes, you are so clever!” Xiao Luo said sarcastically, and he rolled his eyes.
“It is true I have been in the Dimension of Chaos for a long time. But I still know the ways of the world better than you. You cannot deny it. Well, there is a lot you can learn from me,” preached the Duck Emperor while eating the dumplings.
When Xiao Luo saw how much Duck King was enjoying the food, he also felt hungry. So, he ordered another portion of dumplings.
“Gee, is this your pet beast?” asked the stallholder. He was curious when he saw the mini-sized Duck Emperor.
Xiao Luo nodded and said, “Yes.”
“A duck?” The stallholder was astonished. He thought it strange to have a duck as a pet beast.
Xiao Luo did not answer him and instead, he said, “Your dumplings are delicious.”
“Thank you. Enjoy your food.” The stallholder walked away smiling.
The Duck Emperor was already on the verge of flipping out. However, Xiao Luo had forbidden him to speak in front of strangers. That was why he had been holding his tongue. Otherwise, he would have jumped up to peck the stallholder when he had called him a pet beast.
When they finished the dumplings, Xiao Luo set out to the Danhui Sect. It was on the west of Stan City and was about four to five hundred kilometers away.
Suddenly, a large black horse was galloping down the street. It was an azure-clothed youngster, about twenty years old, riding on horseback. He was riding fast, paying no attention to the safety of the pedestrians on the street. Stalls collapsed one after another when the horse galloped past. The pedestrians who could not get out of its path in time went flying, spitting out blood as they fell. Some people had their legs broken when the horse stepped on them. Many fell to the ground while they tried to avoid the horse.
In an instant, the galloping black horse caused mayhem along the entire street.
“Mom, Mom…”
A panic-stricken little girl holding a stick of sugar-coated haws stood crying in the middle of the street. She got separated from her mother in the chaos and was looking around for her.
“Giddy up!”
Even when he saw the little girl in his path, the young man on the horseback did not pull back the reins to stop the horse. Instead, he dug his heels into the horse’s flanks to quicken its pace.
The little girl felt a chill wind blowing at her. She turned around and her pupils dilated. She was so scared that she lost grip of the sugar-coated haws. To the child, the horse looked like a giant mountain. As the enormous animal charged toward her, its speed created a fierce wind, and her bangs flew around her forehead.
“Shoot, that little girl is going to get killed!” the Duck Emperor shouted in a panic.
Xiao Luo sped over as quickly as a flash of lightning to stand in front of the little girl to protect her.
The large black horse collided with him. It went flying from the True Inner Force that Xiao Luo had given off before the horse could reach him. The man and the horse smashed into Xiao Luo’s protective field, and the black horse fell to the ground, neighing tragically. Like a kite on a broken string, the young man was thrown sailing in the air from the impact.
The young man’s skills were good. He found his balance in the air and landed on his feet instead of falling hard on the ground. However, the impact was so strong that he had to take ten-odd steps back to steady himself.