Chapter 858 The Seven Fairies in the Immortal Peach Garden
Tens of thousands of pract.i.tioners rus.h.i.+ng forward like crazy at the same time was a spectacular scene.
However, compared to the vast expanse of the immortal palace, the tens of thousands of pract.i.tioners were nothing more than a handful of sand that disappeared into a vast ocean in the blink of an eye.
Li Mu and his companions lost their way as soon as they rushed through the Southern Sky Gate into the white clouds. They wandered through the white clouds for some time, not knowing how far they had traveled. Finally, they landed somewhere with a pavilion covering an area of about ten acres.
The only thing that they could see was a sea of clouds.
The tens of thousands of pract.i.tioners who had rushed into the immortal palace were nowhere to be seen.
Obviously, they were scattered in other areas of the immortal palace like dandelion seeds.
“This is very strange.
“I seem to have suddenly lost my sense of direction after entering this immortal palace.
“The air here is filled with a faint, strange scent that makes people feel refreshed and relaxed. It is different from ordinary Spiritual Qi. Could it be the legendary Immortal Qi?”
Li Mu took a deep breath and began to survey the surroundings.
The air was filled with white mist and clouds, and the visibility was only several hundred meters. Even though Li Mu used the Gazing Skill, he still couldn’t see through the mist and clouds. He tried to look into the distance with his Third Eye, but he could only see things within the range of about one kilometer.
There was a white immortal pavilion right in front of him.
Its carved railings and the paintings on its walls were exquisite.
In the center of the pavilion, there was a round stone table surrounded by four stone chairs. On the table, there was a white porcelain plate with four jade wine gla.s.ses on it. A double-nozzle wine pot with dragon patterns was placed next to the porcelain plate. The wine pot was about 20 centimeters high, and wisps of wine aroma came out of its nozzles.
“It smells so good.” The Husky leaned forward, sniffed the wine pot and said, “It’s more intoxicating than the wine brewed by the monks in Jintai Temple. Could it be that the wine in this pot is immortal wine?”
The stupid dog couldn’t wait any longer. He picked up the wine pot and began to drink from its nozzles.
“Don’t mess around...” Li Mu hurriedly s.n.a.t.c.hed the wine pot from the dog and said, “Aren’t you afraid that the wine is poisoned? It’s already tens of thousands of years old. How dare you drink it without checking it first?”
He lifted the lid of the wine pot and looked inside, but he found that there was no wine in it at all. There was only a layer of hardened gel-like brown amber with a thickness of about two centimeters at the bottom of the pot. The wine aroma came from that layer of brown amber. After the lid was removed, the wine aroma became even stronger.
Li Mu suddenly felt dizzy.
“d.a.m.n it. I feel like I’m drunk.”
He quickly covered the wine pot with the lid.
“The layer of brown amber at the bottom of the pot is obviously the highly concentrated and solidified gel of wine. Perhaps it’s more accurate to call it wine sludge. That means the wine pot had been placed here for a very long time. The wine that used to be in it must have been brewed by immortals, and it could make immortals drunk. I was almost drunk after taking just a few sniffs, which means...”
Li Mu suddenly thought of something. He turned his head to look.
He found that the stupid Husky had already pa.s.sed out, lying on the ground, nose and mouth twisted.
“f.u.c.k! What a stupid dog!
“He’s really pa.s.sed out.”
Li Mu was speechless.
“I’ve brought the dog here to look for top-grade magic fruits relying on his keen sense of smell, but how long has it been since I came in here? This stupid dog got himself drunk in less than ten minutes and suddenly became a burden.”
“The wine is terrifyingly powerful. Even masters in the Deity Realm would get drunk and pa.s.s out if they inhaled too much aroma of the wine,” said the Cloud Light Saintess.
Li Mu thought for a minute and then put away the wine pot and wine gla.s.ses.
“Carry this dog for me,” he said.
“What?” The Cloud Light Saintess asked, wondering if she’d misheard him.
Li Mu said, “Why not? I’m his master. Do you expect me to carry him?”
The Cloud Light Saintess gnashed her teeth in frustration, but there was nothing she could do about it. In the end, she took out something.
It was an open-backed bronze chariot drawn by two horses surrounded by runes, and it had an ancient style like that of war chariots used in the ancient Hero Country. The stupid Husky was jammed into the cab, snoring while drooling.
Li Mu’s eyes lit up.
He jumped into the cab.
With a gloomy look on her face, the Cloud Light Saintess began to drive the chariot towards the depths of the immortal palace.
There was a lane paved with white jade outside the immortal pavilion. No one knew where the lane was leading, but it was the only way there. The Cloud Light Saintess had no choice but to drive the chariot straight down the lane.
For Li Mu, the first objective was to find top-grade magic fruits in the immortal palace.
Such fruits mostly grew in herb gardens and orchards. By recalling what was drawn on the ancient map that the chief of the Yellow Dragon Tribe gave him, Li Mu tried to identify the surrounding buildings and find the correct and safe way.
At the end of the white-jade lane, there were the ruins of a palace that had collapsed.
The walls and white jade pillars were fallen, and the windows, door frames, sculptures, and statues were broken... Obviously, a battle took place here a long time ago. The giant stone blocks and broken walls bore countless marks and holes left behind by broadsword and sword strikes, and there were broken weapons, rusted suits of armor, and broken white bones in the ruins...
Everything showed that a terrifying battle took place here.
On the red wall over one hundred meters high, there was a huge golden skeleton impaled on a broken sword that pierced through the spine. What made Li Mu’s heart palpitate was that he didn’t know what kind of creature the golden skeleton belonged to, and there were light golden flames flickering in the eye sockets of the skull, as if the skeleton were still alive.
“Let’s go around it.”
Li Mu made a suggestion.
Naturally, the Cloud Light Saintess didn’t want to take chances either. The golden skeleton gave off a terrifying aura, so she didn’t dare to get close to it.
After pa.s.sing through the ruins of the palace and moving on for another two hours, they arrived at an area with a cl.u.s.ter of bejeweled jade buildings and wide roads leading to all directions.
However, most of these buildings had collapsed, and there were signs of war everywhere. A towering shrine that was several hundred meters high had been split in half. Giant statues had penetrating holes in them, there were human-shaped indentations in the walls, and the corpses of strange beasts were scattered over the place...
This battlefield, which was thousands upon thousands of years old, was still full of tragic scenes now.
Moreover, it was just located at the periphery of the immortal palace.
The immortal palace was unimaginably huge.
The bronze war chariot stopped at a broken intersection.
Li Mu looked at a dark red statue that was about one meter high in the center of the crossroad. He finally matched it with a mark on the map that the chief of the Yellow Dragon Tribe gave him.
With the reference, Li Mu finally figured out where the route led.
“Turn left,” he said.
The Cloud Light Saintess glanced at him in a strange way without asking anything. She drove the bronze chariot toward a road on the left side of the intersection.
The sound of galloping hooves was especially loud and ear-piercing on an empty road in the immortal palace.
As legend had it, this immortal palace was built by the immortals of the Immortal Dynasty preceding the current Celestial Court and used as the imperial palace of the ancient Celestial Court, but later, the ancient Celestial Court was overthrown by the current one. The battle between them must have been earth-shattering, so it was understandable that this place was full of remnants and signs of a fierce battle.
In many areas, one could feel the strong killing intent in the air from the distance. Even the Immortal Qi and laws in these areas were distorted. Even the “old monsters” in the Deity Realm might not be able to withstand the terrifying aura, and they would surely be killed and reduced to powder once they were engulfed by it.
Many dangerous places were marked out on the map. Well aware of those places, Li Mu told the Cloud Light Saintess to take a detour whenever they arrived at such a place, so they didn’t encounter any danger along the way.
“Do you know the way?”
The Cloud Light Saintess couldn’t help asking.
Li Mu smiled. “The immortal palace is my house.”
The Cloud Light Saintess didn’t know what to say.
Li Mu said, “I’m sure you want to find something in the immortal palace, right? The Cloud Clan must have arranged everything for you. Why don’t you stop here and go find your own opportunity?”
He wanted to send the Cloud Light Saintess away.
Although she was his maidservant and appeared very obedient, she was like a timer bomb that might explode at any time.
Li Mu didn’t believe that she would stay loyal to him. After all, they were once sworn enemies that hated each other so much and couldn’t wait to kill each other.
The Cloud Light Saintess stayed silent for a while and then said, “I don’t have any goal here. My master has instructed me to be a good maidservant and stay by your side to protect you.”
Upon hearing that, Li Mu sneered coldly. “Don’t do that. I’m not stupid. I would be grateful enough if you wouldn’t stab me in the back at the critical moment. How dare I expect you to protect me? Please be a little more professional when you tell lies.”
With that, he grabbed the stupid dog by the neck and jumped off the bronze chariot, saying, “That’s it. Let’s go our separate ways. Don’t follow me. Otherwise, don’t blame me for being rude.”
Without waiting for the Cloud Light Saintess to reply, he rode on his broadsword and flew fast toward the predetermined destination like a beam of light.
The Cloud Light Saintess stood there in a daze for a while. In the end, she drove the bronze chariot to chase him.
The size of the immortal palace was beyond imagination.
Li Mu felt like a small tadpole that accidentally swam into a vast sea.
Two days pa.s.sed in the blink of an eye.
Equipped with a map, Li Mu wandered around the periphery of the immortal palace. If it weren’t for the fact that he had avoided several hundred dangerous places relying on the map along the way, he would really suspect that the chief of the Yellow Dragon Tribe had fooled him with a fake map.
Another three days pa.s.sed.
Li Mu finally came to the legendary Immortal Peach Garden according to the marks on the map.
He found the place so smoothly that he couldn’t believe it.
The Immortal Peach Garden was located at the periphery of the immortal palace, so it wasn’t that difficult to find. It was a green peach orchard hidden among the ruins, but it was full of vitality. The surrounding ruins were dyed dreamy green by its green glimmer.
Li Mu walked slowly toward the peach orchard.
“There is no restrictive spell or tactical deployment in this peach orchard. Even its fence has collapsed...”
He easily entered the peach orchard.
The legendary immortal peach trees looked no different from the ordinary peach trees on Earth. Affected by the battle that took place many years ago, some of them had wilted as their roots perished, their leaves withered and yellow, without any vitality. Others were still thriving with lush green leaves growing on branches, but they hadn’t bloomed or borne fruit yet.
“Obviously, this peach orchard was destroyed during the battle back then. However, the immortality peach trees indeed have very strong vitality. The roots of some trees did not perish completely. So many years have pa.s.sed, and they have grown into a new peach orchard.”
Li Mu came to a conclusion after careful observation.
Should this peach orchard remain the same, it would mean trouble for him.
The peach orchard was right here, but none of the peach trees had borne fruit. This was the worst news.
Fortunately, the peach orchard was quite big. Li Mu walked farther into the orchard, hoping to find peaches in some tree. Even if he could find only one peach to cure the Taoist injury in his spine, it would be fine.
He suddenly stopped after walking about one kilometer.
A look of shock and vigilance appeared on his face.
Several figures were standing under a huge peach tree in the distance.
Seven.
Seven figures.
To be precise, there were seven fairies.
They were wearing beautiful fairy clothes of seven different colors, including red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, and purple. With beams of immortal light swirling around them, they were standing motionless under the huge peach tree, each carrying a wicker basket made of willow rods on her arm. They were in different postures. Some were smiling and running their fingers through their hair, some were walking, while others were talking to their sisters...
However, everything was still.
The seven beautiful fairies seemed to be frozen at a certain point in time. They were in different postures and perfectly quiet, as if they were sculptures. At the same time, they looked so alive, as if they might walk over from under the tree laughing and talking merrily in the next moment...
“Could they be... the legendary Seven Fairies?”
Li Mu wiped the sweat off his forehead.
“Are they real?”