After hours of staring at the purple leaf resentfully, Little sparrow finally pecked at it.
It was bitter and left a foul stinging sensation in his mouth. It was even worse than the frozen grass he was forced to eat. But immediately, he felt a strong burst of energy from within. This leaf... it was filled with an absurd amount of qi!
He shut his eyes and finally sat still, condensing the qi into his tiny dantian.
As the last of the qi was absorbed, the bird stared at the leaf with a complicated look. What exactly were the humans after? He knew first hand how rare spirit plants of this strength were, from his parents' teachings.
...
Weeks passed, and Little sparrow grew accustomed to the humans, somewhat. Though when the small human tried to touch his head for some reason, he would peck back aggressively.
Recently, every morning, a third human, one with a long head mane would arrive, constantly rattling off gibberish, while showing him various foods. Little sparrow would simply play dead in annoyance, until eventually, something clicked.
That human... it was trying to teach him their language! That peanut it was holding was a "hua sheng"!
Little sparrow had no idea why the human would want him to know what they were talking about, but he had no interest. Out of annoyance, he tipped himself over and immediately played dead.
Exasperated, the human tossed him something.
A... a berry walnut?
Little sparrow got up and hurriedly scarfed it down.
...
And very soon, another year passed.
Little Sparrow shortly realised he would get walnuts in exchange for learning their language and begun to learn diligently. He also realised they had given him a name... Xiao Yun!
What type of stupid sounding name was that? Upon finding out, Little sparrow was enraged, flying around and smacking into the cage left and right like a bouncy ball. In his language, the superior sparrow language, his name meant Sky Conqueror! "Little Cloud" however, was so pathetic and lame!
...
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With the constant herbs he had been fed, Little sparrow had broken into Rain Shroud, the second realm of cultivation.
At that very moment, Little sparrow was perched on a nice branch the humans had gotten him, cultivating with what sparse qi there was. There really wasn't much else to do, stuck in here.
The door opened with a bang, as the small human ran in.
"Good morning, Xiao Yun!" she smiled.
"Chirp! Chirp chirp!" Sky Conqueror angrily protested.
"Hahaha! You really like that name, huh?"
Little sparrow slumped, defeated. He spent so much effort learning the human language, most definitely not just for walnuts, but in the end, he still couldn't even speak it. What even was the point?
At the same time, he finally figured out how to tell male and female humans apart. The ones with long head manes were the girls, and the ones with the short head manes were boys. It was very simple!
The human girl, Qing Han picked up his cage, running out of the room excitedly.
She crashed into another person, dropping the cage. Little sparrow hurriedly let out a cushion of wind, floating the cage in the air.
"I told you not to run around with the cage! What if you got injured?"
It was a man with a short head mane, but he couldn't help but think he looked familiar...
"Ze Lin! Sorry, heheh!" the girl stuck her tongue out.
Wait... that was Ze Lin, the human that tutored him in human language? But she had a long head mane! Little sparrow was very confused. Humans could turn from girls into boys? Or was his way of using head manes to tell wrong to begin with? Hmm. Come to think of it, Ze Lin seemed to lack the "chest lumps" long maned humans usually had. Could it be the chest lumps were the real way to tell humans apart?
Little sparrow didn't have much time to ponder as Qing Han ran out of the house, carrying his cage.
The humans seemed to think his understanding of Chinese was good enough, so they stopped tutoring him very recently. Instead, the little human would take his cage outside to play each morning, which he greatly appreciated. Being stuck in a room with nothing to do but cultivate always got a little stuffy.
"Wait!"
Qing Han stopped as Xuefang ran over.
"Just a moment..."
Little sparrow watched, puzzled as the tall man took the cage from his daughter, unlocking its door. As the man poked at his claws, he pecked at the finger defiantly before hopping on, Xuefang taking him out of the cage. Between the man's fingers was a small metal ring of sorts, embedded with a shinyred gem. As he pressed the gem, the ring split into two, before he clicked it shut over the bird's left claw.
"There! This helps us find you wherever you fly to." the man smiled. "Sorry, little one. It must have been stifling to be stuck in a cage for that long, huh? Now you can soar freely again!"
Hmm? Really?
Little sparrow looked at the new addition around his feet. It was a little uncomfortable, but it was actually quite pretty. He raised his claw, watching as the gem sparkled in the sunlight, and felt rather fashionable. For a moment, he felt as if he understood the fixations crows had.
"Chirp chirp, chirp chirp chirp!"
He hopped around happily and sung a happy birdsong, for the first time before the humans.
The two of them laughed and clapped.
"I didn't know you could sing so well!"
Little sparrow took off in a hurry.
It had been so long since he properly spread his wings... the embrace of wind was familiar and comforting. Behind him, he could hear the human girl complaining, saying she still wanted to play with him.
Hmph! As if he'd make time for those suckers if he wasn't forced to. Though, thinking back about the walnuts, he supposed he didn't actually dislike those humans that much.
Now at the Rain Shroud realm, the wind around him felt as if it were a part of him. With a flap, he channelled the winds, shooting through the air at speeds previously unreachable. He looked forward to testing his new prowess.