Chapter 125

  Echoes (I)

  The forest is rather beautiful, I must say.

  But also rather daunting.

  Without Wan Lan to guide us, I was beyond certain I'd have gotten us lost. Whenever she pointed out a 'landmark', it'd just make me go '...huh? Really?' because, to me, it just looked like another damn tree--as thousands upon thousands of them.

  The white-brownish bark and the long, thin branches webbing out rather violently into a thick and tall canopy, with an occasional round and red fruit that I wouldn't bite into even if I was starving. There was no variety--even the flowers, at some point, just started looking completely the same to me.

  And yet, she navigated the entire place kind of like a pro.

  "Madame taught me," she explained as we settled camp for the night. "She used to come here often, searching for special flowers or herbs to sell in one of her shops or to use in one of her concoctions. And she started bringing me with her as far back as when I was six. Taught me everything. For instance, see this patch of flowers?" she pointed at the rather round bundle of rose-like red flowers with long, thorned stems.

  "Hm." we all nodded.

  "They're called bloodied petunias," she said. "And they grow all over the forest. Quality of soil or access to sunlight doesn't matter much, but night temperatures do. That's why they are in a bundle here--temperatures drop, so they grow in a patch, but down south, where the nights are warmer, they grow apart from each other. The warmer the nights, the further apart they grow as to have as much soil to themselves as possible."

  "Wow!" Dai Xiu exclaimed. "It's amazing that you know that!"

  "Ha ha, it's not that amazing," she chuckled. "Madame always used to say it's just common knowledge, but I think she was just trying to make me not have a big head."

  "What about the trees?" Dai Xiu asked. "How can you see a difference in them?"

  "Moisture in the bark," she said. "Causes its shade to change slightly. There are about a hundred or so extremely old trees here; Dawnoaks, we call them. They're each at least a thousand years old, which means they've retained more moisture than the younger ones, which makes for the darkest shade of any tree. Madame made me memorize their locations when I was eight. To test me, she dropped us off at a random one and then had me find a way home orienting by them."

  "Sounds like she taught you a lot of things," I commented.

  "Hm," she nodded, dropping her head slightly. "Not a lot... everything I know. She taught me everything."

  Silence fell as we started gnawing at some dried meat and herbs in silence. They were... well, they were dry and pretty much tasteless, but it's protein and calories.

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  At least, that's what I've been telling myself.

  Otherwise, our journey has been rather... uneventful. It's been three days since we ran from town, and we have managed to not run into anyone--beast or bandit--so far. An occasional critter that one of the kids would hunt down so we could roast it for dinner, yes, but nothing more than that.

  It also provided me a lot of time to moan to the system--despite the fact that I killed a dozen people, a number of whom were stronger than me, the system gave me... nothing.

  Big zilch.

  Nada.

  Not even a 'Good Job', let alone a freakin' reward.

  Luckily, Dai Xiu was relatively close to breaking through into the Foundation Establishment--she was already at the 11th stage, while Xi Zhao was at the 10th.

  Long Tao?

  Yeah.

  He was at the peak of Foundation Establishment.

  Peak.

  ... a freakin' peak.

  It's hard for me to compute that guy, to be honest. I mean, it makes sense; rather, if he had infinite resources at his disposal, I imagine he'd be about a hundred times faster, but still, to see someone so outrageously beyond this realm is both depressing and amazing... and I somehow just happened upon him the literal moment I woke up in this world?

  Fishy, system. Fishy, fishy, fishy.

  Anyway, Wan Lan and Light were yet to cultivate together, but namely because the former was focused on learning the face-shifting art that I gave her. She'll join our ranks as a newly born soon enough, and there won't be any risk of somebody recognizing her.

  Something finally happened on the fifth day--we found a body.

  At some point, it was probably buried in a shallow grave, but the animals must have dug it up, as there it was, rotting and decaying.

  Suffice to say, a couple of us did spill our guts, but as to not embarrass 'them', I won't say who.

  I've seen dead bodies before, sure, but this wasn't so much a dead body as it was a corpse--it was clear whoever it was had been dead for a while, and the stench... oh my God, the stench, it was like someone made an omelet of rotten eggs and sprinkled some rotten fish on top of it.

  "I recognize that insignia," Wan Lan suddenly said, pinching her nose. We all were, really, besides Long Tao. "I've seen it once in a book Madame showed me of the most powerful sects on the continent. Heavenly Star Sect, I think."

  The sigil was indeed of a star bursting into a quasar--or, perhaps that's just how I saw it. It was likely that the intended meaning was different since they weren't likely to know what quasars even are.

  "He was killed," Long Tao said, using a thin strand of Qi to move the robe that had practically melded into the decaying flesh. "Right here, somebody stabbed him. It went straight through his heart. It's strange, though."

  "What is?"

  "That's the only wound," he said, glancing up at me.

  "... meaning he wasn't fighting someone?"

  "Yes. Either he was ambushed or..."

  "Somebody stabbed him in the back. Figuratively and literally." Hey, look at the two of us. In another lifetime, we'd be playing the roles of cop buddies in some over-the-top Hollywood thriller about an alcoholic and a rookie pairing up for a job that will threaten the entire world.

  ... yeah.

  My brain is sometimes rather weird, it seems.

  "It isn't entirely impossible that there's infighting," Long Tao pointed out with a shrug. "Any time a treasure is up for grabs, brotherhoods and sisterhoods tend to... loosen their bonds."

  "Has nothing to do with us," I said. "Let's dig out a deeper hole and bury the body properly."

  "There isn't time," Long Tao said.

  Ah man, come on! I just said that the days were uneventful, not that I wanted them to be exciting!

  "Stop right there, murderers!" It seemed like they crawled out from nowhere, all eight of them. "How dare you kill a disciple of the Heavenly Star Sect?!"

  "Hey, are you blind?!" I didn't even care who it was; I was just annoyed. "You think he died just now? At least look at the damn body once before you start spewing garbage from your shithole, goddammit."

  ... oops.

  I think loosening my tongue at that old guy may have done something to me that can't be undone...