The brushstrokes were heavy, reflecting the caligrapher’s exceptional penmanship. Lin Jin dabbled a little in the art of calligraphy too and he too, had pretty handwriting. To him, observing one’s handwriting was akin to observing the writer himself.
One look at the letter and Lin Jin was able to picture the old Taoist loftily writing the two lines with this brush he had prepared in advance.
He had an overbearing demeanor.
A proud man, he was.
Lin Jin could sense it in his words.
Lin Jin also knew that he was the old Taoist’s target.
Reaching out to pick up the white fur brush, Lin Jin immediately felt a wave of energy seeping out from the brush, just like a pebble being thrown into a calm lake.
He could feel the ripples.
It flowed out instantly, enveloping Qi Long Town in the process.
“Oh no!”
Lin Jin did not expect that the Taoist would booby trap the brush with some sort of mysterious spell.
The moment he picked up the brush, every pet beast in Qi Long Town, including the beasts of burden who were not bound by blood contracts, started growling as their eyes turned bloodshot.
The pet beasts who were bound by blood contracts were suddenly overwhelmed by a sense of ferocity and bloodlust, overriding their loyalty to their owners.
With their blood contracts disabled, and with their bloodlust triggered, the primitive instincts of these pet beasts kicked in immediately. In other words, a rampage would surely ensue from this.
On a nearby table, a pet beast instantly leaped up and attacked its owner. The same thing was occurring all over Qi Long Town.
One second was all it took for a river of blood to start flowing and for the casualties to pile up.
This was probably just one of the old man’s little tricks, intended to show off his might to Lin Jin.
Lin Jin could not allow this tragedy to continue, especially when it came to beast-manipulating spells. This was his forte and to allow someone else to one-up him was unacceptable.
“Bind!”
Regulating his own spirit energy, Lin Jin snapped his fingers.
The crisp sound rippled throughout Qi Long Town.
As if they were being clamped around the neck, the beasts that were seconds away from attacking innocent bystanders were immobilized. This was the only solution Lin Jin could think of to counter the Taoist’s spell.
‘Bind’ was a spell that indiscriminately bound all pet beasts in a certain area. As plain deterrence wouldn’t be effective on beasts who were under the influence of a Berserk spell, this was the only solution Lin Jin could employ.
Everything happened in only the blink of an eye, from the point when the pet beasts went berzerk to the point when they were paralyzed. Most of the people inside Qi Long Town failed to even register what happened, but a handful of stronger individuals noticed the sudden change. What they sensed was a momentary failure of their blood pacts.
Those who realized what was going on hopped away from all other beasts.
Most of the folks didn’t understand what was going on. Pet beasts were widely regarded as a man’s closest life companion, so it didn’t make sense for owners to be paranoid against their pet beasts.
It was only after using Bind could Lin Jin deploy ‘Spell Negation’. Borrowing Goldy’s loud crow, Lin Jin transmitted the spell via sound to nullify the Berserk spell that afflicted all pet beasts in Qi Long Town.
From the beginning until the end, this bloodless battle only lasted for a fraction of a second. Even so, there was so much on the line that if Lin Jin came even a single millisecond late, Qi Long Town would be showered in blood.
“Hey did you hear that? Sounds like a rooster!”
“I heard it too, but don’t roosters crow in the morning? Who’s silly chicken is this?”
“I just lost control over my pet beast just now, but everything went back to normal after the chicken crowed. How odd, how odd!”
The folks at Qi Long Town started talking about the incident. Meanwhile, Lin Jin was already heading out of the town. Of course, he had already destroyed the brush with Dragonfire just in case there was another spell cast on it.
The person who left that note for him addressed himself as ‘Taoist’.
To Lin Jin, this man must have been a top-class beast appraiser with a significant degree of cultivation for him to be able to lay such an elaborate trap for Lin Jin. Had he not been competent enough, Lin Jin would have lost the battle back at the tavern.
Although Lin Jin wouldn’t get hurt physically, to see thousands of pet beasts go berserk in Qi Long Town would inevitably deal a huge blow to his mental health, something which was considered worse than physical injuries.
This was Lin Jin’s reason for arriving at the conclusion that this ‘Taoist’ was an expert.
‘Mount Gu Cong, huh? Alright, since you’ll be waiting for me with a warm cup o’ tea, I’ll be sure to meet you there,’ Lin Jin mused.
Finally, his eagle beast had caught up with him, and it was circling above Qi Long Town. Lin Jin placed Shang’er on his shoulder and he carried Goldy in his arms. After that, he climbed a flight of cloud stairs and hopped onto the eagle before they headed south for Mount Gu Cong.
On the eagle’s back, Lin Jin recalled that Wang Tuzi mentioned that he had bumped into the group Qi Long Town two days ago. In other words, right after setting this trap, they must have made haste to Mount Gu Cong immediately after. If Lin Jin’s deduction was correct, there might be a trap at Mount Gu Cong too. It was either that or the mountain was the base of operations for that Taoist.
He was clearly Lin Jin’s enemy at the moment, he had the upper hand. The situation was stacked against Lin Jin, who was unable to back away from this conflict.
If he didn’t go, God knows what they would do to White Ape. Even if it meant going through hell, Lin Jin would charge right in for the sake of rescuing White Ape.
Based on Lin Jin’s understanding, while the ‘Taoist’ was highly skilled, his lvel of cultivation must have been on par with the rector of Daluo Temple. However, in terms of beast appraising, the man was probably a Rank 3 beast appraiser, maybe a Rank 4 even.
Fortunately, Lin Jin had his own trump card.
For the past few days, as she recuperated, Lin Jin had kept the water reservoir scale close to Shang’er. The water spirit energy nourished her veins and healed the parts of her body which were damaged by divine lightning. Not only did she manage a full recovery, but her cultivation had improved. As she had evolved from Rank 4 to Rank 5, Shang’er’s actual strength had increased ten-fold compared to before.
In fact, nothing stopped her from taking on a human form, but for some reason, she deliberately refused to do so. Perhaps she just liked to be carried around by Lin Jin. As too much had happened to her lately, Lin Jin decided to let her be. Once White Ape was rescued, he would stop spoiling her.
And then there was Goldy.
Goldy had achieved Rank 4 without even cultivating Beast Energy Formation. His achievements relied solely on his Golden Crow bloodline. Despite being only Rank 4, if he was provoked, even a rector from Daluo Temple wouldn’t be able to hold him down.
With both of them and Xiao Huo, they should be fine.
Speaking of which, his own pet beast, Xiao Huo, was now lagging behind these two. He was only at Rank 4, and although he possessed a Dharma body, when it came to a head-on battle, he would never win against Goldy with his Golden Crow bloodline.
There was no helping it because Xiao Huo’s started out lower than the rest, and he was not a part of any unique bloodline. The only reason why he was able to make it this far was because of Lin Jin’s museum. After all, only a handful of fire wolves have ever achieved Rank 4 in this world and a Rank 5 fire wolf probably never existed at all.
With the eagle beast, they easily covered a distance of one thousand miles within two hours. Having traveled such a long distance, the eagle was unsurprisingly exhausted. And so, Lin Jin decided to feed it some pills and performed acupuncture on it, just to make sure it was able to cover the final stretch of their journey.
Lin Jin had never been to South Continent before. He could already feel the humid tropical air back in Qi Long Town, and now that they have arrived at the edge of Mount Gu Cong, Lin Jin got a taste of how humid the climate was over here. It was completely different from the cool and desolated Grassy Continent.
Below them were mountains covered in lush greenery. Here, there was no empty patch of land but trees and endless foliage, from which heat rose during the day and dew condensed at night. Mount Gu Cong, in particular, was packed with countless ancient trees that had stood for a thousand years. Even the locals didn’t dare to venture too deep into the jungle, as it was filled with poisonous bugs. One minor mistake, one tiny sting, and that would have been the end of one’s life.
