Outside Yao Mountain City, beside a rapidly flowing river…
Man Man was wearing dragon leather soft armor with elbow sleeves, holding a dimly sparkling trident. She was standing on a rock by the river, with a faint fiery light s.h.i.+ning in her eyes. Those eyes of hers were fixed on a group of ‘white belly black back iron scale silver carp’, through the flowing river water.
This group of fish had dug a nine-meters deep dent in the sand area by the river, as their nest. The nest was surrounded by rocks, and the water inside the dent had been flowing gently, as it was filled with thriving aquatic plants. Indeed, this dent could serve perfectly as a nest for fishes.
Man Man boosted up her strength, abruptly gave a shout while swiftly lunging the fork held in her hand. The head of the fork swished out and penetrated into the head of a six feet long fish through the tens of meters deep river water, as fast as a bolt of lightning. Three lethal spell symbols on the fork-head released a fierce power vibration, following which, the body of the large fish trembled and stopped moving after it died.
Man Man shouted out happily. A thin black chain around the fork-head tightened up, and then abruptly pulled backward. Being pulled by the chain, the fork-head, which was covered in thorns, dragged the large fish out of the water surface. Man Man stuck her fingers into the gills of the fish, then held it in her arms while laughing.
"Large fish, large fish, a delicious iron scale silver carp."
Laughing happily, Man Man rushed backward with the fish, which was almost the same size as herself, held in her arms. At a distance from the river was a burning bonfire with an iron pot floating upon it. Yu Mu had been carefully throwing some weirdly shaped herbs into the pot.
The water in the pot had boiled already, yet not even a single drop of oil could be found in it. However, because of those strange spices Yu Mu threw in, an exotic aroma had already spread out in the air. This aroma was hard to describe, but it could indeed make everyone drool.
Shaosi took over the large fish from Man Man’s hands and put it on a clean large plantain leaf. Then, she laughed to Yemo Shanye, who squatted aside, and said, "Come over here. You saw how I did this a couple of days ago. Do you want to give a try by yourself this time?"
Yemo Shanye blushed because of the excitement. She hurriedly nodded, carefully touched the cold and hard scales of the fish, then took over the red bronze dagger decorated with gold on the hilt.
The one foot and two inches long bronze dagger had tens of sharpening and hardening spell symbols on it, and consequently was impressively sharp. She sc.r.a.pped the scales off the fish not so expertly, then pressed her fingers on the dagger, slowly and smoothly cutting off a snow-white slice of fish.
"Not bad," Sitting by the bonfire, Yu Mu praised, "Sister Yemo, you have to be careful when you slice it. You should go along the lines left on the fish skin when you slice it, so that you won’t break the structure of the fish muscles, and it will taste better and softer in that way."
Giving some advice to Yemo Shanye, Yu Mu continued seriously, "Eh, I don’t know much about your Yu Clan people, but for our human beings, if a girl doesn’t even know how to cook, no one would want to marry her for sure!"
"Eh?"
Yemo Shanye was shocked. No one would want to marry a girl who didn’t know how to cook? Was that true? This was largely different from the tradition of Yu Clan. For Yu Clan n.o.bles, if any girl would go make the food or boil the tea by herself, that would be quite disgraceful, and literally, no Yu Clan man would ever want to marry a girl like this,
If her sister, Yemo Luoye, could see what she was doing at the moment, Yemo Luoye might faint, and even vomit some blood.
However, the lives of human beings seemed to be a lot more interesting than those of Yu Clan people. Human beings didn’t need to wear all those luxurious clothes and try their best to act elegantly. They could run, they could touch the trees and flowers, they could play with those adorable animals, as much as they wanted. Human beings could do whatever they liked! Even slicing a fish was much more interesting than doing those so-called ‘elite art’ in the Dark Sun Castle.
White and soft fish slices fell into the soup pot one after another, as Yemo Shanye’s moves got quicker and quicker, smoother and smoother.
A long distance away, Feng Xing sat on a branch of a large tree, looking at Yemo Shanye, who was laughing happily with Shaosi and Man Man. A non-humankind girl, but not irritating at all, how special was that!
More than not irritating, she could even make the others like her, and want to protect her!
Among those evil, blood-thirsty and hypocritical Yu Clan people, a girl like Yemo Shanye was just like the only bright pearl s.h.i.+ning in the boundless darkness.
"Ah…" Feng Qing sighed slowly. The ancient styled longbow of his was put horizontally on his lap. Gently flicking the bowstring with his fingers, countless familiar faces flashed across Feng Xing’s mind, old ones, young ones, men, and women.
The dense scent of blood reached the sky, while a black smoke suffused the air. Within the smoke and blood, countless faces, which belonged to the dead ones, were smiling at him. Those smiles made his heart ache, and even froze his soul.
Among all those faces, a tender and innocent one looked seventy to eighty percent similar to Yemo Shanye’s face. They both were so kind and naive, pure and flawless; their pure vibe could immerse one, could break one’s heart.
"Yi Shen! Hmm…I will go back." murmured Feng Xing, "I will go back. The bloodline of Yi, the ancient divine G.o.d, you humiliated this bloodline. You don’t deserve this bloodline…You!"
Feng Xing stroked the longbow gently with his fingers, while his tone turned softer and warmer. The longbow buzzed deeply while releasing streams of divine light, slowly merging with Feng Xing’s body. The power vibration released from Feng Xing was changing slowly, turning sharper and sharper, fainter and fainter.
In the woods far away, Gong Gong Wuyou stood under a tree, with a thin stream of watery mist hovering around him. Blandly, he looked at Man Man, Shaosi, and the others, who had been enjoying the picnic time by the river, and said with a low voice, "We’re friends indeed, but I will not join the mission of yours this time. By bringing you here, I’ve done enough as a friend."
Slightly waving his hand and rolling a black jade flute in-between his fingers for a few times, Gong Gong Wuyou then continued, still in that bland tone, "As for the next, you’re on your own. You’ve already set up a teleporting magic formation anyway, so you will be able to retreat safely as long as you can catch her. I’m leaving now, do whatever you want!"
Gong Gong Wuyou flashed across the air after laughing and jumped into the river flowing through the woods with tens of his warriors, disappearing within the blink of an eye.
Inside the woods, nearly a thousand heavily armored Yu Clan n.o.bles and Jia Clan warriors had gathered up with serious looks. They began checking their own equipment, putting the defensive and attacking jade talismans and the other one-time usage tools, in the most convenient places.
"We have the time span of ten breaths!" said a Yu Clan elderly man coldly, "We only have ten breaths. If we miss the target, we retreat through the teleporting magic formation immediately. Otherwise, we will all die here."
"Go, now!" growled the Yu Clan elderly man with a deep voice, "Mission, take Miss Yemo Shanye back and kill everyone around her!"
Flicking his fingers, a purely black divine tower roared up from underground and expanded to three-hundred meters in a moment. Then, it released a thick layer of dark light screen that covered up the whole area with a radius of a hundred miles.
Over a thousand Yu Clan and Jia Clan warriors dashed out of the woods, as fast as a gust of wind, leaving shreds of afterimages in the air.