Chapter 171
Chapter 171: Little White Tiger’s Call
Yan Yan tried to sit up, but as soon as he lifted his torso he realized he was completely bare with nothing on.
Rong Shu hurriedly reached out and covered him, blanket and all: “You are not Little Hamster right now.”
Only then did Yan Yan react, because after turning human he needed to wear clothes.
He answered in a low mood: “Mm.”
[Now that I’m this big, Shu Shu can’t cradle me in her palm anymore. That makes me a little unhappy.]
Yan Yan quietly tried to change back into his Little Hamster form, but to his disappointment he could not.
He tried several times, and for now he suddenly could not change back, only able to remain as he was.
Growing anxious, Yan Yan tugged on her sleeve: “I… I can’t turn back.”
Rong Shu blinked in surprise and asked: “Ah? You can’t turn back?”
Yan Yan pouted and stammered: “Sometimes it happens like this, but it doesn’t last very long.”
The last sentence sounded as if he were consoling himself.
Rong Shu reached out and rubbed his head as she said: “I see.”
[If Yan Yan can’t turn back into Little Hamster, it will be troublesome if we need to teleport to escape.]
She soothed him: “It is fine. We will leave after you recover. We are not in a rush.”
He answered: “Okay.”
She added: “You do not know when you will be able to change back, so put on some clothes first so you do not catch a chill.”
He said: “Mm.”
Rong Shu stood up on her own and left the study to give him space to dress.
A moment later, she heard shuffling footsteps outside the door. When she turned around, she saw Yan Yan coming toward her step by careful step, wearing a loose robe that hung off him.
The pair of shoes on his feet also seemed a size too big. They fit poorly, as if he might trip at any moment.
“Shu Shu…” Yan Yan walked over and, out of habit, held out his arms, wanting Rong Shu to carry him.
Seeing this, Rong Shu stepped up to support him and, while she was at it, straightened the robe he had not put on properly.
She glanced at his feet and said: “The shoes are a bit big. Do we have a smaller pair?”
Yan Yan shook his head and muttered with awkward dignity: “No, this small one tried a smaller pair and they hurt.”
Rong Shu nodded: “All right.”
She did not say more, only making a note in her heart to buy Yan Yan a proper pair of boots once they left the secret realm.
Originally, she had planned for them to go out tomorrow, but since Yan Yan could not become Little Hamster, she decided they would stay a few more days.
After walking with him for a while, the ill-fitting shoes no longer affected his steps much.
When the scheduled cultivation time arrived, Rong Shu sent Yan Yan to play with the Wind Spirit and the Fire Spirit, while she went to the alchemy room.
Just as she sat down on the meditation mat, a voice seemed to sound from deep within her heart.
“Partner.”
Rong Shu started, then realized it came from within the Han Chuan Cosmos Pearl. It sounded like Little White Tiger… had gained consciousness.
She called softly: “Little White Tiger?”
At once her mind sank into the Han Chuan Cosmos Pearl.
The Divine Beast egg still rested quietly in Immortal Jade Nectar.
Nearly two years had passed. In those two years the Divine Beast egg had shown not the slightest reaction, so Rong Shu had gradually paid it less attention.
Now, the egg actually responded.
Delighted, Rong Shu asked: “Little White Tiger, are you about to hatch?”
A second later, Little White Tiger’s voice came again: “…I feel like I’m just a little short, but soon! Soon I’ll come out and grow strong with Partner!”
Hearing that, Rong Shu smiled: “Good, I will wait for you.”
The Divine Beast egg was finally about to hatch.
Thinking of the Little White Tiger she had once seen in her soul-space, Rong Shu grew even more expectant.
Night fell.
As usual, Rong Shu was meditating, but she suddenly stopped. She snapped her eyes open, and the aura rolling off her body surged and dipped. At times it reached that of mid-stage Foundation Establishment, only to fall off again.
She murmured in surprise: “Am I about to break through to mid-stage Foundation Establishment?”
Over the past year she had cultivated steadily without aiming to reach mid-stage Foundation Establishment within a single year, letting everything proceed naturally.
Now, feeling the boiling surge within, she thought it over and still chose to suppress it.
[To reach mid-stage Foundation Establishment in just one year… better wait a bit longer and consolidate more.]
With that thought, Rong Shu ceased meditating.
With a whoosh, at a mere turn of intent, flames blossomed out of thin air around her and wrapped her whole body.
This was the Blazing Body art.
After taking the Fire Spirit Tribulation Fruit and gaining an Exotic Flame, her command of fire had become extraordinary.
What had once been difficult to cultivate in Blazing Body could now be cast in an instant.
Rong Shu flicked her hand, and a portion of the flame sloughed off her body and gathered into a Fire Puppet under her control.
One Fire Puppet split into two, two into four, four into eight…
Eight Fire Puppets stood imposingly before her, the flames on their bodies flickering.
Rong Shu could control these Fire Puppets. At present she could split off eight in total, but could only control four at the same time.
Each Fire Puppet’s strength was tied to the intensity of its flame.
The ones she had condensed now peaked at the early stage of Foundation Establishment.
When the flames went out, the Fire Puppets would vanish.
She had discovered these Fire Puppets by accident while training Blazing Body. Pinching a handful of flame into a human shape like kneading dough, a puppet had taken form.
Unlike the Fire Spirit, these Fire Puppets had no independent will. They were merely a puppet troop.
If they were not fighting, they could exist for the time it takes to drink a cup of tea.
If they were in battle, their duration depended on consumption.
Rong Shu released several more Fire Puppets in succession, then left them standing as she timed how long it would take for them to disappear.
She took out a formation manual and read beside them, occasionally glancing up at the puppets.
After sitting for several hours, she closed the manual and stood. She glanced at an hourglass on the bookshelf.
Only a few grains of sand remained at the top.
She walked over and flipped the hourglass so the lower half became the upper, and the sand rushed down with a hiss.
“It is dawn,” she said to herself with a faint grin, “time to practice the blade.”
Rong Shu left the alchemy room and went to the training hall.
Soon, the room filled with the whooshing of her blade cutting through air.
Three days later, Yan Yan was finally able to change back into Little Hamster.
Rong Shu packed her things and then cleaned the cave-dwelling.
When everything was ready, she cradled Little Hamster in both hands and called gently: “Yan Yan.”
Little Hamster answered with a soft chirp: “Gu~”
He lifted a paw and scratched open a Spatial Rift.
Rong Shu stepped in with Little Hamster in her arms.
A full year had gone by, and she did not know whether the cultivators hunting her outside had given up.
She came out prepared, a saber in her right hand, ready to meet a sudden ambush at any moment.
This time, luck was with her. They teleported to a place with no one nearby.
Rong Shu put away her saber and first oriented herself.
This was south of the cliff cave-dwelling. She needed to head northeast to reach the Scripture Tower.
Before that, Rong Shu also needed to replenish her stock of spiritual herbs.
The medicine garden was out of the question. Who knew whether that young man had given up.
The lure of the Fire Spirit Tribulation Fruit was too great, and he had not looked broad-minded. He might still be holding a grudge.
So Rong Shu decided to look for herbs only in the deep forest.
It would be slower to pick them that way, but safer than going to the medicine garden.
She muttered to herself as she set out: “Let me think… Where do the herbs for refining the Fourth Grade Fire Refining Pill grow… somewhere near Mount Rongli…”
Measuring the distance from here to Mount Rongli in her mind, she frowned. One was to the west and one to the east. The distance was really far.
“Forget it. I can make another trip to Mount Rongli anyway, and see if I can find some Exotic Flames for Little Blue Flame to devour.”
The simplest and most direct way for an Exotic Flame to grow stronger was to devour other Exotic Flames, raising its quality and abilities. If luck was good, it might even gain the abilities of the other flames.
“Gu~”
Seeing that Rong Shu was about to leave, Little Hamster preemptively scratched open a Spatial Rift.
Rong Shu smiled and stroked his head: “Isn’t your ability unstable? If you send us back to the cave again, would that not waste our effort?”
Little Hamster shook his head, put both tiny hands on his hips, and chirped a string of proud gu-gu-gu.
Rong Shu tapped his forehead with a fingertip: “Speak human.”
Had he really taken himself for a real hamster?
Even if you brought over an actual hamster, it would not understand this made-up hamster language.
Little Hamster cupped the spot she had tapped and, looking a bit aggrieved yet bright-eyed for praise, declared: “I… I think I can control the direction now.”
Rong Shu asked in pleasant surprise: “Really?”
Little Hamster nodded.
She beamed and said: “Wow, Yan Yan is amazing.”
Little Hamster tilted his head, body twisting bashfully.
She added with playful solemnity: “Yan Yan is super invincible, able to go up to the heavens and down into the earth, capable of anything.”
He murmured, flustered: “N-not really.”
Blushing from the compliments, Little Hamster curled himself into a ball.
Rong Shu gave him a few indulgent strokes, then stepped into the Spatial Rift.
The next second, she emerged in another location.
She checked her bearings. They had indeed instant-moved toward Mount Rongli’s direction.
That would save a lot of time.
“Yan Yan, teleport,” she said.
“Gu!” came the spirited reply.
“Teleport.”
“Gu~”
They repeated this over and over. After a dozen or so instant moves, Rong Shu passed through the labyrinth in the middle and arrived in the eastern zone of the secret realm.
Although Little Hamster said using his power cost him nothing, Rong Shu erred on the side of caution and had him rest.
She would handle the rest of the road herself.
She was drawing closer and closer to Mount Rongli when, halfway there, a scream pierced the woods.
Rong Shu preferred not to meddle, but then she heard a voice shout: “Han Cheng Yun, I never thought you were a petty man.”
Han Cheng Yun?
Rong Shu paused.
Was that the Han Cheng Yun she knew?
She thought for a moment, then slipped toward the source of the voice.
Yun Gao Fei slumped, battered, against a tree, bleeding from several wounds. He stared furiously at the three standing before him: Han Cheng Yun, Su Hua, and Su Meng.
He rasped: “You… you have gone too far.”
“We came in together, and we agreed to support and help each other, did we not?”
Su Hua was the first to sneer: “Naive, truly naive. Only a fool like you would believe in mutual support and help. In the face of profit, friendship is worth nothing.”
Han Cheng Yun cut him off with a cold order: “Enough talk. Finish him.”
With a desperate shout, Yun Gao Fei lunged: “Then I will fight you!”
But a ninth-layer Qi Refining cultivator could not hope to defeat three at the Foundation Establishment Stage. In the end, he died with resentment in his eyes.
Hidden in the dark, Rong Shu watched the scene, surprised by the cultivation of the two Su brothers, who were at early-stage Foundation Establishment.
Had they been concealing their cultivation all along, or had they just broken through?
After they finished off Yun Gao Fei, the three began stripping his body of valuables, rifling through his storage pouch.
Su Hua curled his lip: “This idiot only had things worth money from the Scripture Tower, like manuals and pill recipes, plus some herbs. A pauper.”
Su Meng took a broader view and consoled him: “We already made a profit by taking back that old man Zhu Chun’s Exotic Flame.”
Su Hua sighed: “A pity we do not know where Song Xuan ran off to. His Exotic Flame seemed to be higher quality than that old man’s.”
From their exchange, Rong Shu pieced the situation together.
Judging from how practiced they were, this was no spur-of-the-moment decision.
Most likely, from the very beginning, when they cozyed up to Yun Gao Fei and the others, they had already planned the next step: murder for profit.
Rong Shu could not help a faint sigh in her heart: [Truly, these days, even making a friend can cost you your life.]
But this was not her affair.
Just then Su Hua grumbled again, jealousy and disdain thick in his tone: “Where did that Lin Bu Fan run off to?”
Hearing them mention her alias, Rong Shu paused mid-turn.
Han Cheng Yun analyzed coolly: “Do you remember those pills he took before he walked forward? There must be something strange about them.”
Greed lit Su Hua’s eyes as he said: “If we could get those pills, then Exotic Flames would be ours for the taking.”
Listening to their confident guesswork, Rong Shu blinked in puzzlement.
What pills?
…Oh. She remembered.
Back then, the pill she had swallowed had been nothing more than an ordinary Spirit Gathering Pill.
It was mainly for show. Otherwise, a tiny cultivator at the third layer of Qi Refining approaching and fusing with an Exotic Flame unscathed would look very suspicious.
So she had deliberately taken the pill in front of everyone, shifting Han Cheng Yun and the others’ attention onto the medicine.
That way they would overlook the Little Hamster in her hand.