The daylight gradually filled the gaps between the clouds, illuminating Sky Rift Valley. The range of the Divine Map, reflecting both heaven and earth, had unknowingly expanded to its fifty-mile limit, which greatly delighted Yu Ci. This proved that the previous shrinkage was not permanent but likely a random occurrence under the unique environment of Sky Rift Valley.
Having stayed awake all night and remaining in a state of high tension, Yu Ci's eyes were bloodshot, yet his spirit was exceptionally high. An hour ago, the night-roaming beasts fell silent. Now, it was his time to act.
Harvesting Shrimp Whisker Grass was a laborious task. Even with Yu Ci's advanced cultivation and the grass being readily available, it remained so. He had been working hard all morning until the summer heat penetrated the layers of clouds and affected the valley. Only then had Yu Ci managed to pick a few hundred stalks. The valley's birds and beasts had passed by three or four times, forcing him to hide each time, which added to his fatigue.
After another hour or so, Yu Ci's night-cultivated vigor was nearly depleted by this monotonous and tedious work. He began to understand why the cultivators of White Sun Mansion, despite their abilities, still hired ordinary people for such tasks...
Spending all day on such nonsense, how could one cultivate Dao or grow in life!
At this moment, a stench rolled over from the clouds. Sighing, he swiftly ducked and rushed to his prearranged hiding place.
Just as he concealed himself, flapping sounds echoed overhead. Yu Ci peeked out to see a Meat-Winged Flying Monkey landing on the slope. He had seen this creature yesterday. Despite its meaty wings, it could only glide for short distances and typically lived in the higher areas of the valley. Compared to those terrifying beasts that left a deep impression on him, this one was not too troublesome.
This flying monkey seemed injured, its grey-green fur stained with blood and its demeanor listless. However, it seemed to have a strong purpose for being here. Upon landing, it did not look around but immediately started digging at a spot on the ground with its forelimbs.
That spot happened to be an empty patch where no Shrimp Whisker Grass grew. Yu Ci was not worried about the beast damaging the herbs but was intensely curious. From his angle, he couldn't see what was under the monkey's claws. He decided to use the Divine Map and adjusted it to a perspective almost identical to that of the flying monkey to see what it was doing.
The monkey's claws were sharp, quickly digging several feet deep and revealing the pine roots beneath. It parted the roots with expertise and pulled out something resembling an earthworm. Without bothering about the dirt still clinging to it, it shoved it directly into its mouth, chewed a few times, and swallowed.
Perhaps this "earthworm" had medicinal properties because after swallowing it, the flying monkey's spirit seemed to lift. It let out a squawk, spread its meaty wings, and glided away on a strong gust of wind.
Yu Ci watched, stunned. He had used the Divine Map to observe the surrounding terrain in great detail previously and had of course seen this "earthworm". At that time, he hadn't paid it any attention. But seeing the "earthworm" in the monkey's claws, he realized that it was not an earthworm at all, nor was it a living creature. It was a medicinal herb that looked incredibly like a worm.
He had seen medicinal herbs like cordyceps before, but this was very different. The stem of this herb was too lifelike. Apart from not moving, it looked exactly like an earthworm or similar crawling insect. On its surface, there were even fine scales, giving off the delicate sheen unique to living creatures.
Magnifying it several times over, one might even believe this object to be a long snake or an eel, Yu Ci might have been convinced.
Wait, eel...fish?
He still remembered the words of the tipsy Herb Gatherers a few days ago: The White Sun Mansion could concoct a potion, immersing a large amount of Shrimp Whisker Grass within. The best and most perfectly preserved plant may possibly be revived. This revived Shrimp Whisker Grass would absorb the vitality of its kind, transforming into a new type of medicinal herb. This herb was called...
The Fish Dragon Grass!
Yu Ci leapt out from his hiding place and ran to the layer of soil dug up by the flying monkey. He inspected it carefully, but there was only that single plant in the vicinity, which the flying monkey had chewed down, leaving nothing behind.
Yu Ci obviously couldn't dissect the grass stem from the belly of the distant flying monkey, but he had a Divine Map. Amidst the green light waves, the terrain around the slope was presented to him in the most comprehensive and complete manner.
With intentional searching, he quickly reaped results. There was none left on the slope, but under the surrounding Cliff wall, there were indeed about seven or eight plants. Furthermore, at about the same depth level and approximately four miles apart, he discovered another growth area of Shrimp Whisker Grass. There, similar herbs were found in three to five plants.
However, these herbs were all growing in deeper crevices, with some even locked directly deep within layers of rock several feet thick. This was normal; if this grass possessed excellent medicinal properties, those growing in plain sight would have been dug clean by the valley creatures long ago. Those that could survive were naturally these plants hidden deeper.
Yu Ci sighed deeply. He had to thank the Divine Bronze Mirror and the Divine Map. Otherwise, even if these plants were right under his feet, he wouldn't have been able to discover them, let alone confirm their exact locations. But to dig them out would undoubtedly require a great deal of effort.
He chuckled lightly and drew out his Nine Yang Talisman Sword directly. If it really was Fish Dragon Grass, what would a little bit of exertion matter?
Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.
Sunset and moonrise, sunrise and moonset, nearly twenty hours passed in a blink of an eye. During this time, Yu Ci exhausted all his tricks, chiseling one deep pit after another on the iron-hard Cliff wall, extracting the herbs growing within.
This was not an easy task. The surrounding Cliff wall was as hard as iron and difficult to handle. The roots inside were tangled and complex; any slight carelessness would lead to damage. In a day and a half, Yu Ci completely gave up on Shrimp Whisker Grass. Despite his full effort, he only managed to extract eight herbs near the slope. As for the newly discovered location four miles away, he hadn't had time to start.
However, during the excavation process, he discovered a characteristic of the herb: Within approximately half an acre around where this grass grew, there was certainly no presence of any Shrimp Whisker Grass, while other plants could grow freely. Connecting this with the information he had heard earlier, it might be because this grass consumed the vitality of other Shrimp Whisker Grass to nourish itself, resulting in this phenomenon.
With this in mind, the likelihood of this herb being the Fish Dragon Grass has increased by thirty percent.
Yu Ci did not mix the herb with Shrimp Whisker Grass, but instead, he cleared out the Stone Box that belonged to Yan Daoist and carefully placed the eight herbs inside.
By the time he finished these tasks, the slope nearby was a complete mess. The noise he had made while chiseling the stone wall was quite loud and had attracted the attention of numerous fierce beasts. After some thought, he decided to abandon the remaining thousand or so Shrimp Whisker Grass and temporarily move to a new herb gathering spot four miles away to avoid any potential trouble.
The new gathering spot was much more difficult than the slope. There was no stable point to leverage. However, Yu Ci had gained some insights from his days of chiseling the cliff wall. By utilizing a large crack on the cliff wall, he carved out a barely sufficient recess, providing him with a foothold.
That being said, this place was indeed more concealed than the slope.
The quality of the Shrimp Whisker Grass here wasn't great, but what Yu Ci was more interested in was the herb that resembled Fish Dragon Grass. He patiently used the Divine Map to check again, confirming each location. Just as he was about to start work, he suddenly noticed that in one corner of the Divine Map, the light and shadow were changing in an unusual manner.
Focusing his gaze, he recognized a familiar face.
When that person's face clearly appeared in the Divine Map, Yu Ci spat out a word: Thief Monk!
In the Divine Map, it was indeed the monk who had tried to ambush him two days ago but had been counter-attacked by him. Even now, Yu Ci didn't know his name and simply referred to him as "Viper Monk".
The monk was oblivious to the fact that deep in Sky Rift Valley, someone was brazenly observing him and cursing him. Now, he was harming others again, but this time he seemed to have the upper hand.
His opponent was a young man in a white robe who appeared clumsy and unable to fight back. However, whenever he was in danger, a golden light would circle around him. Viper Monk seemed quite wary of this light and would slow his attacks, allowing the young man to escape.
The two went from chasing each other on the cliff top to fighting on the sheer cliff of Sky Rift Valley. At this moment, they were suspended in mid-air with a drop of tens of thousands of feet below. A single misstep would lead to certain death. This not only tested their cultivation but also their courage. The young man could not withstand Viper Monk's cunning and became frightened. Unexpectedly, the monk suddenly swung his sleeve and shot out several points of ghastly green starlight.
The young man was clearly taken aback and instinctively recoiled, forgetting that he was already on a sheer cliff. His foot slipped into empty air and he screamed as he fell rapidly downwards, leaving the ghastly green starlight shooting into nothingness.
All of this was within Viper Monk's control. The monk let out a hissing laugh, swung his sleeve again, and sucked the ghastly green starlight back into his sleeve like a whale sucking in water. His body slid down the sheer cliff, reaching out to grab the young man's chest, seemingly intending to capture him alive.
Just at this moment, the young man, seemingly drawing strength from an unknown source, let out a loud cry. The golden light that had previously wrapped around his body appeared once more, transforming into a long rainbow that descended upon them with a vengeance. The Monk was taken aback, switching from defense to offense, his palm force striking the young man's chest. Using the momentum, he sidestepped, allowing the golden light to impale itself into the cliff wall with a resounding clang. Revealing its true form, it was a golden knife, over two feet long.
Although the Monk managed to evade in time, his face was grazed by the knife's aura, leaving a bloody gash that was rather unsettling to look at. However, the Monk was overjoyed. Ignoring the young man, he rushed forward to pull out the golden knife. Holding it in his hands and examining it for a while, he suddenly burst into laughter. Although no sound could be heard from the divine map, his ecstatic expression was sufficient proof that the golden knife was an extraordinary treasure.
Yu Ci spat in disdain at Viper Monk's behavior, feeling sympathy for the young man who had fallen into the cloud-covered abyss. The young man's cultivation wasn't much inferior to the Monk's. His failure was due to fear, which caused him to only use a third of his full power and overly rely on the golden knife – leading to his downfall... Huh?
The divine map revealed that after the young man fell, he went through a period of rapid descent. However, after falling over a hundred feet, his speed suddenly slowed as if he were a weightless leaf fluttering down.
At first, Yu Ci thought the young man was pretending to be weak, but he soon realized that he had truly fainted. The reason for this phenomenon seemed to be his robe, which was also an extraordinary treasure that instinctively protected its master. However, even if he survived the fall in this dangerous Sky Rift Valley, he would sooner or later be devoured by ferocious beasts and birds.
Observing this situation, Yu Ci pondered for a moment before suddenly standing up and rushing out of his hiding spot.
"Forget it, consider this your good fortune, kid!"
Yu Ci wasn't a reckless do-gooder. If the young man hadn't been protected by his magical robe and had fallen from such a great height, even an immortal would have been crushed by the impact. In that case, even if the young man had fallen right above him, he wouldn't have lifted a finger. But now things were different. He had the divine map and could easily cover ten miles within the Sky Rift Valley with just a bit of sweat – why not save a life?
Half an hour later, Yu Ci returned to the slope where he had been earlier with the still unconscious young man. This was the only decent place to rest nearby.
He unceremoniously dumped the young man on the ground. Even unconscious, the young man let out a low groan from the impact. From Yu Ci's perspective, this young man seemed too youthful. His face was filled with terror from his brush with death, but it was still apparent that he was in his early adolescence, no more than fifteen or sixteen years old. At this age, he could only be considered a boy.
Ignoring his pitiful combat abilities and judging solely by his cultivation level, his age was enough to make Yu Ci want to bang his head against the wall. However, what truly irritated Yu Ci was:
"This kid... fainted purely out of fright!"
**************
Please stun me with your clicks, bookmarks, and votes!
I have also posted the following more chapters [All free] on: https://www.readgates.com/article/74a39e