At the Valley of Death…
The existence of spiritual herbs within the valley made the spiritual energy there denser than in anywhere else in the Three Realms.
Such a wondrous place was named the Valley of Death, causing the people of the Immortal Region to avoid it at all cost. Ye Zichen couldn’t help but retort about the place’s name in his mind once more.
Lorie was sitting on a rock and gripping the corner of her clothes with her hands. She looked at Ye Zichen pitifully while the latter poured vials and vials of her favorite “candy” down around the ley line.
The “candies” seemed to dissolve, then get absorbed by the ley line.
Lorie’s rough estimate told her that Ye Zichen poured more candy on the ground in the past hour than all the candy she ate ever since she met him.
“Wow, you’re being so wasteful!” Lorie jumped up with a sob, then grabbed Ye Zichen’s arm.
“Don’t feed it anymore, feed me!”
“Lorie, be a good girl. This is serious right now.”
The withering of the ley line was clearly due to its rampage, which unbalanced its absorption and release of spiritual energy. Since the valley was filled with spiritual energy, that made it the perfect recovery spot for the ley line.
With the aid of the spiritual herbs, Ye Zichen was sure that it was only a matter of time before the ley line recovers. The only question was when.
“You just want to help it replenish its spiritual energy, I’ll do it for you. Can you stop feeding it candy?”
Lorie felt truly pained. The candy Ye Zichen fed the ley line would last her ages!
“You can?” Ye Zichen was stunned.
“Just feeding it like you’re doing wouldn’t help much at all. How about this, give me all the candy and I promise you that it’ll be perfectly healthy in three days.”
“You sure?”
“Of course, but only if you give me tons of delicious candy,” Lorie’s gaze shifted towards the clay vial in Ye Zichen’s hands.
Lorie might love to eat, but she was not someone to make baseless statements. Ye Zichen was certain that she had her ways back up her claim.
Thus, he piled the rest of the pills in front of Lorie.
Her eyes lit up at the sight of the small hill of pills.
“Are these all mine?”
“If you can help the ley line recover, then these will just be the down payment. I’ll definitely give you more candy afterwards.”
“Yes, yes, yes! It’s a promise!” Lorie reached her pinky over.
Ye Zichen was momentarily confused before he did the same.
“It’s a deal.”
“Yay, these candies are all mine!” Lorie ran over to the pile of pills with a giggle and waved her hands. “Leave this to me. You can go and do whatever else you need to do.”
…
Is she shooing me away?
Ye Zichen had planned to watch over Lorie. The potential of Lorie only wanting to eat the pills flashed across his mind when he saw her skip over to the pills are started to feast.
“Should I leave?” Ye Zichen asked.
“Yeah, if you don’t, then you’ll end up absorbing its spiritual energy,” Lorie continued to munch down on pills. “Do you know why it wasn’t recovering even though you fed it so much candy? It’s because it passed all the spiritual energy it absorbed to you.”
A light bulb lit up in Ye Zichen’s mind.
No wonder the ley line wasn’t getting better. So that was the problem!
The ley line was a core spiritual item of the Three Realms. It would absorb spiritual energy from the surroundings, purify it, then scatter the purified spiritual energy.
It meant that the ley line did absorb spiritual energy from all the pills Ye Zichen fed it, but it only ended up transferring all the spiritual energy back to it.
Although it was extremely weak, it still needed to fulfill its duty.
“Then is it fine for you to stay here?” Ye Zichen raised his eyebrows.
“Hey, I’m a spiritual herb,” Lorie retorted.
…
Night had fallen, and candlelight shone through the windows of one of the rooms in the manor.
Ye Zichen pushed open the door and saw Xiao Yumei sitting on the side of the bed as she watched Tiantian with a smile.
“You haven’t rested yet?” Ye Zichen smiled, alerting her of his presence.
“I don’t feel like sleeping right now.”
“Tiantian must be happy to see you.”
“Mhmm. She really grew up a lot, she’s a lot more obedient now.,” Xiao Yumei caressed Tiantian’s cheeks.
At that moment, Tiantian rolled around in her sleep and muttered, “Mommy, I don’t want to eat carrots.”
The two people at the bedside chuckled.
Ye Zichen caressed Tiantian’s cheek, then glanced at Xiao Yumei, “You should get some rest.”
“Oh yeah, I need to tell you something. You were busy before, so I didn’t have a time to say it before.”
“Oh? I wanted to ask you something as well. How did you get away from the demons? Did Liu Qing save you?”
“I was going to talk to you about that,” Xiao Yumei pursed her lips. “The Demon Realm seems to have shifted hands.”
“What?”
“I’m not too sure about the different factions here, but all of the demons retreated. Someone called Gu Li is in charge of where I was staying at now.”
“Gu Li?” Ye Zichen frowned. He’s still alive… But why is he in charge? He has no backing though… Did he just take over the place like a cuckoo takes over a swallow’s nest?
“Su Yiyun led me away, then left me by the side of a cliff. He told me that someone would bring me back to you a while later, and soon after, Liu Qing appeared. That’s why returned with her.”
Confusion swelled up in Ye Zichen’s mind.
How did he know about where and when Liu Qing would appear? What’s more, he…
“What did he say to you?”
“Be patient,” Xiao Yumei thought about it for a moment. “He said that Gu Li will be trouble in the future and that his faction was no weaker than any other’s. He said that Gu Li will need to be taken care of as soon as possible. I feel like he wanted to tell you all this through me.”
“Anything else?”
“Anything else?” Xiao Yumei bit her lips and pondered. After a while, a weird expression surfaced on her face. “Uhm, you were good friends before, right?”
“Why do you ask?”
“He took good care of me when I was in the Demon Realm. Once, he was drinking outside where I stayed, and he told me that he never would regret having a brother like you and that everything he has done was worth it, but…”
“But what?”
“He told me before he left that you will be not friends but foes the next time you meet!”
