Chapter 0209: Zhangsun Yan asking for help
His broken bones were transmitting intermittent bouts of stinging pain, and although this injury was not a severe wound to Ning Cheng, but the pain he was feeling was just too real.
But when Ning Cheng saw that those One Horned Mammoth Demons were not pursuing him, he immediately sat down in relief while simultaneously swallowing a healing pill. The place he had sat down was a Spiritual Qi deficient area, and generally such places did not have many powerful monstrous beasts living or even passing by through it. Since his injury was not a heavy one, as such after eating the healing pill, he sat there for a while as he recovered his mental and physical facilities.
Ning Cheng’s injury had not yet healed completely, when he once again grabbed the Profound Break Spear in his hand. He could see a shadow of a person running towards him from a distant place in a staggering and stumbling manner. But soon Ning Cheng recognized who that person was, and was immediately reassured as he put down his Profound Break Spear. Simultaneously taking out a jade box, he carefully arranged the six stubs of Silver Spiritual Blossoms inside it. These stubs of Silver Spiritual Blossoms were something that he had risked his poor life to obtain a few moments ago, as such he could not just casually leave it about.
“Aaaah, you are Senior Apprentice Brother Ning Cheng….” Just as this figure arrived at some distance in front of Ning Cheng, the first words spoken by that person had immediately shocked Ning Cheng.
It was only after a good long while that Ning Cheng finally recovered from his shock and managed to ask, “Zhangsun Yan, how did you know that I am Ning Cheng?”
“Senior Apprentice Brother Ning, how come you are injured, are you alright?” Zhangsun Yan saw that Ning Cheng’s back had a huge bloodstain, and immediately asked out anxiously. It seemed she was more anxious about his injuries than her own.
Ning Cheng was completely speechless for a while once again before he spoke up, “You’d better be worried about yourself, my injuries are nothing important.”
Zhangsun Yan’s clothes were in tatters, and her exposed abdomen looked like a large bloodstained mouth as the clothes covering her abdomen were completely ripped and torn apart. Moreover, going down just a little bit, one could even draw a clear line to her exposed navel. The exposed skin of her abdomen that was revealed was not at all white, but because of being exposed to the blood and dirt it had turned a reddish grey colour, if one did not carefully look, they would definitely think that it was Zhangsun Yan’s underwear.
Even her hair was in complete disorder. Fortunately, Ning Cheng had recognised that she was Zhangsun Yan. Otherwise…… Even so he really was not able to believe that this girl in front of him was indeed Zhangsun Yan. Initially when he had first seen Zhangsun Yan, her face still had some remnants of baby fat on her, and her hair was combed in a neat and beautiful fashion, even her voice was as soft as someone singing and as lively as birds chirping, so how could her appearance turn into someone scruffy and pathetic to look at?
“Oh, oh, this is really not good, Senior Apprentice Brother Ning, I beg you save Elder Sister Lingwei. Big Brother Ning, if you don’t save Elder Sister Lingwei, then she might end up dead……” At last Zhangsun Yan remembered why she had come over. The reason she was wandering around was to look for a person that could help her. She even changed how she addressed him midway to ‘Big Brother Ning’, it was obvious that Zhangsun Yan was in a hurry because of her worries.
Ning Cheng knew who this ‘Elder Sister Lingwei’ that Zhangsun Yan spoke of was, it should be that Jia Lingwei who Zhangsun Yan was together with before.
However, towards Zhangsun Yan’s begging for help, Ning Cheng was not that anxious and still continued to sit there as he recovered. He and Jia Lingwei were not even good friends with each other. Also, initially when those cultivators who were blocking the blue stone doors which was also the entrance to this Second Segment, he had actively made a move to help them. At that time, Jia Lingwei and Zhangsun Yan knew perfectly as to how much danger it would pose to him. Naturally even though he was able to overcome it, but even then didn’t they also not make a single move to extend a helping hand? Even if he did not ask the other people to help him, wasn’t there still Zhuang Xiangsha who had still come over.
“I am a Devil Cultivator, moreover a seriously injured Devil Cultivator to boot at this moment. Zhangsun Yan, for you to speak with me for such a long time, it seems to be somewhat inappropriate aah.” Ning Cheng spoke in a light voice.
Zhangsun Yan did not care about Ning Cheng’s sarcastic tone, and spoke with some more anxiousness, “Big Brother Ning, Senior Apprentice Sister Yan Ji is also there……”
“Did you say Yan Ji is also there? What did they go to do?” Just as Ning Cheng heard Yan Ji’s name, he immediately interrupted Zhangsun Yan, and asked a question. Yan Ji’s behaviour and manner was polite and nice, moreover Ning Cheng had got to know later that she really had a good sense. There was also the fact that Yan Ji had helped him out before, if something happened to Yan Ji, then once he met her later, then he would feel really bad for not helping her.
Zhangsun Yan hastily recounted all that happened from the point the three of them had rushed towards the Blood River Mountains as their goal, and spoke without hiding anything from Ning Cheng, while also speaking about how Jia Lingwei had recognised him to be Ning Cheng.
As Ning Cheng heard the reason how Zhangsun Yan recognised him, he realized that it was all because of Jia Lingwei’s keen intuition and making a connection with his name, and immediately felt somewhat helpless.
The reason why he gave his name out as ‘Cheng Xiaoning’ at that time, was because he did not really plan to conceal his own origins. After all, even if he was recognized, as long as he entered the Law’s Way, he did not care about anything else. Because when he would come out from this place, he could still easily restore his identity without any hassle.
But what he had not taken into account was that because of him using the True Cosmic Devil Axe, he would end up being misunderstood as a Devil Cultivator and the situation would turn out to be so serious. He, after all, was a person who came from Earth, as such he was not aware of the disgust and hate towards the Devil Cultivators in the Yi Xing Mainland. Moreover, even Elder Sister Shu seemed to not care much about this matter, and had just helped in changing his appearance once.
If he knew earlier on that such kind of matter would occur, then at that time when he had given out his name, he would have definitely chosen a name that had nothing to do with him at all, and would not have thoughtlessly stated out his name in reverse.
But even so, Ning Cheng was a very open person, since there were already a few people who recognised him as Ning Cheng, so now he basically did not have anything to be afraid of. Moreover, in addition to Ji Luofei, he did not have any family members or relatives here. The Yi Xing Mainland was so big, as long as he was able to find Luofei, he could then look for a place to practice cultivation in seclusion, at that time who could find him? Waiting for his cultivation to reach the peak in the future, who would then dare to talk to him about being a Devil Cultivator?
In this place that was the Yi Xing Mainland, Ning Cheng had already completely understood what kind of place was this. In this place only true strength was something that was revered. When one’s strength was better than the others, then even if they were carrying the brand of Devil Cultivator and even swaggering it all around, not a single person would then come find trouble with them.
“All right, you change your clothes first, then we will go the Blood River Mountains.” Ning Cheng finally stood up, he planned to rescue Yan Ji while at the same time, also wanted to obtain a Blood River Red Lotus for himself.
The Blood River Red Lotus was an extremely scarce and rare Rank 6 Spiritual Grass, and was extremely difficult to both plant and grow, moreover this spiritual grass can be refined into the Clean Lotus Pill. The Clean Lotus Pill was a Level 6 Profound Pill, not only can it help in removing the various impurities from within the body of a cultivator, it can even break down several fierce and malicious poisons. In addition to that, the Clean Lotus Pill was one of the most suitable pill for a Profound Core Cultivator to break through a bottleneck.
Ning Cheng had the Silver Spiritual Blossoms, as such he would sooner or later advance to the Profound Core Realm, it was just a matter of time. As such the Blood River Red Lotus was something very important for him.
“I do not need to change clothes, we have to hurry, I am afraid that by the time we arrive Senior Apprentice Sister Ji and Elder Sister Lingwei would not be able to support themselves.” Zhangsun Yan was very smart, she immediately realized that Ning Cheng had attached a greater importance to Yan Ji when compared to Jia Lingwei, because of which she had simply placed the words ‘Senior Apprentice Sister Ji’ in the front.
After saying that, Zhangsun Yan still felt that Ning Cheng’s mind would still have a few suspicions, so she once again took the initiative to explain, “Big Brother Ning, it was Elder Sister Lingwei who had led me away, I don’t fear death and am definitely not ungrateful like that Nalan Ruxue. Moreover, it was because Elder Sister Lingwei realized that even if we remained behind, we would not be able to help you with anything, as such the only best course of action was to walk away from there. Elder Sister Lingwei spoke that if she had the ability to help you out, then she would have definitely not walked away from that place. She said that even if you were a Devil Cultivator, her Dragon and Phoenix Academy had also been surviving for thousands of years, as such it has its own ways to naturally live out without any troubles, and it is absolutely unlikely that just because she assisted a single Devil Cultivator, the others would right away exterminate the entire Academy just because of her actions alone.”
Ning Cheng had definitely said the words ‘ungrateful’ to Nalan Ruxue in front of everyone, as such he was not surprised for Zhangsun Yan to know about it, but how come Zhangsun Yan and Jia Lingwei seem to know about the details and intricacies behind this matter?
“How do you know the reason behind Nalan Ruxue’s ungratefulness?” Ning Cheng had some doubts and asked a question, he was aware that Jia Lingwei and Nalan Ruxue had a bit of good relation between them, as such she would definitely not speak out about Nalan Ruxue being ungrateful.
Zhangsun Yan spoke up with heavy disdain in her voice, “You had braved death to rescue that Nalan Ruxue from the hands of two Profound Congealing Cultivators, yet she still suspected that you took advantage of her. Senior Apprentice Sister Ji said that they are just two lumps of meat and fat for people to see, if it was me I would not have minded it if you had even groped both of them. I have no interest in such things. Big Brother Ning with your skill so high, certainly you would also not be interested in such things. That Nalan Ruxue is definitely ungrateful, and… and both me and Elder Sister Ji spoke out for it, but even though Elder Sister Lingwei did not speak out much in this matter, she did help in explaining this to us with a few words.”
Ning Cheng blushed a bit with shame, this Zhangsun Yan’s no-holds-barred speech absolutely did not even have a shred of the initial cute, smart-alecky yet gentle appearance from before aah. Properly speaking, since she was following behind Jia Lingwei, then she definitely should have been influenced by her, at least a bit. Not interested in such kinds of things, what relation did it have with how high one’s cultivation was?
Zhangsun Yan herself did not seem to understand what she was speaking, but after she spoke those words, she immediately realized that her ‘complete’ reason simply did not make any sense, simply put even she found it to be nonsense. Because she had come under the influence of Yan Ji’s words, who herself was unhappy with Nalan Ruxue, so she just blathered on in annoyance. Ning Cheng not being interested in the lumps of meat and fat in front of Nalan Ruxue, that definitely did not have any relation to his skill being high.
Ning Cheng lightly waved his hand and spoke, “This matter is something of the past, I and she do not have any connection with each other before, even after that we do not have any relation. But for what reason did you speak a while ago that if Senior Apprentice Sister Lingwei would have assisted me, then the Dragon and Phoenix Academy might have a slight probability of being completely exterminated?”
“I heard that several hundred years ago, the Le Continent’s largest and the most powerful Academy, the Kun Yun Academy’s genius disciple Jing Hao, in order to save a female Devil Cultivator, had killed several disciples of several Academies. It resulted in giving birth to a pretext to besiege the Kun Yun Academy. Dozens of Academies surrounded the Kun Yun Academy, and the same Kun Yun Academy was completely exterminated overnight.” Zhangsun Yan herself was not clear about this, and the only reason she could speak about such things from the past was because it was Jia Lingwei who had told her these things.
“So originally it was because of this.” Ning Cheng muttered to himself, and did not question her again.
In the few thousands of years of Chinese culture and history back on Earth, Ning Cheng had read too many things that were similar to this kind of affair. The Kun Yun Academy was completely exterminated; it was absolutely not because of the issue of a mere disciple that had helped a Devil Cultivator. This was only an excuse, a trigger, he did not believe that just because of such a trivial matter, several Academies would gang up and completely destroy the Kun Yun Academy that was said to be the biggest and most powerful Academy at that time.
This scene was quite similar to the Marco Polo Bridge Incident of 7th July, 1937 in general, even if one did not take the Marco Polo Bridge Incident of 7th July 1937 into account, there were still 7-8 more such incidents, if not 7-9 such incidents. To use this excuse as a pretext for doing such a thing, it can always be possible to find out.
On the contrary, he was just a single person, even if he was labelled as a Devil Cultivator, it was simply impossible to make dozens of Academies to pursue and kill him. As to the so called famous and big family clans and large Academies, Ning Cheng did not have any behind him.
Contrariwise, those other people had an Academy’s roof over their head ever since they were a kid, in case they happened to possibly make friends with him, there was definitely a possibility that their enemies would use it as an excuse for something sinister.
“You lead the way.” Ning Cheng saw that Zhangsun Yan was not the same as that coy Nalan Ruxue, as such he had a bit of good will towards her.
“En.” Zhangsun Yan gave a cry, and increased her pace as she went forward as they passed through a few hundreds of Spiritual Qi deficient areas. Their speed also was quite fast.
Ning Cheng also nodded to himself, the disciples from the big Academies that came out to train themselves really were different from the place that he came from. If he did not have the Mysterious Yellow Bead, then once he arrived at the Yi Xing Mainland, then he would have definitely been the trash among the trash.
“Why is Senior Apprentice Sister Ji and Senior Apprentice Sister Lingwei both together in such a situation, while you are instead relatively alright?” Ning Cheng followed behind Zhangsun Yan and was walking with quick steps while he simultaneously asked her.
Zhangsun Yan spoke with lingering fear in her voice, “The Blood River Mountains are very frightening, it is actually a range of mountain peaks that are entirely comprised of blood red coloured rivers. When we were approaching the Blood River Red Lotus on one of the peaks of the Blood River Mountains, we met a pack of Blood River Otters. Because the path that leads to the Blood River Peak is very narrow, Senior Apprentice Sister Lingwei made me stay at the base to provide assistance. But as they got higher and higher, the number of Blood River Otters were increasing more and more, until they were finally surrounded. If by the time of the high tide of the Blood River, they still aren’t able to reach the peak, then once they are caught in the waters of the Blood River, they will not be able to make it out of it with their physical strength.”
Ning Cheng frowned, “How is this a Blood River, and yet there are also mountain peaks, from what I heard about it from you, it is already making me confused.”
“Big Brother Ning, you will know once you arrive, at this time there is only very little time before the high tide of the Blood River rises, as such we need to move at a faster pace.” Zhangsun Yan knew that she was not able to explain it properly, as she began to run faster and faster.
