Recap
“What kind of personal grudge have you ever had?” Shen Chaomu’s eyes became colder.
It’s just a few mantises, it’s not difficult to beat them. As long as they dare to attack the young man, he doesn’t mind warming up in the snow.
“Ying.” Long Shiyu gripped Shen Chaomu’s clothes even harder.
He was nervous and guilty.
“It’s him.” The mantis was reminded of the memory, and its wings trembled angrily, “It was he who ate up the granary of our entire settlement one day, which caused us to keep going to the ground to prey for a while. He ate all the peppers and then breathed fire everywhere. As a top predator in the sky, this is a notorious scandal in our group, a great shameless %siidwk$skj#ppsj=&jkk”
The latter is completely incomprehensible.
But it is obvious that it is mantis swearing.
Shen Chaomu: “…”
Shen Chaomu: “…………”
He looked at the innocent silly dragon behind him, and remembered the poor griffin just now, always feeling that he had misunderstood something.
___
The mantises’ thin wings trembled, all expressing extreme anger, but they were also somewhat afraid of Long Shiyu.
After all, they had seen the out-of-control and mischievous behavior of this evil dragon.
They couldn’t stop him at all.
Feeling guilty, Long Shiyu worried that the kind princess might hate him if he found out about the past bullying incident. He explained to Shen Chaomu in a low voice, “It’s not called stealing for an evil dragon…”
Shen Chaomu didn’t know what to say for a while.
He eats too much, he really eats too much.
The mantises in front of him became more and more agitated, and Shen Chaomu said again, “Then, why did your settlement fall here? It can’t be because the granary is empty.”
But the mantis who could speak the language of the alliance did not answer, full of vigilance.
Shen Chaomu said, “I know I am a hunter, but I am hunting a strange beast suspected of being a siren. If it has caused you to fall, I can help you.”
The only known powerful individual in this area is the siren, and it is hard to imagine anything else that could affect the entire sky settlement.
The mantis continued to say in a strange tone, “Why do you want to help us?”
“There is no reason why. You should have been trapped here for a long time; everyone wants to go home, don’t you?” Shen Chaomu said, “You can treat it as a simple exchange of interests. I want to find more helpers to deal with that strange beast, and you want to go back to the cloud.”
When he said this, his tone was extremely calm, and there was a strange light in his eyes.
The light swept past extremely quickly, but Long Shiyu saw it—like something was burning.
The mantises whispered to each other again, surprised by the proposal.
In the end, the mantis said, “We cannot trust you.”
“Okay.” Shen Chaomu nodded and didn’t bother too much.
On the contrary, Long Shiyu suddenly said, “I know why you fell.” He pointed to the side of the leading mantis, where there was an unhealed wound, black, with flesh exposed and slightly rotten. It looked really bad. “I recognize this kind of wound.”
Shen Chaomu’s eyes also fell on it.
He could tell at a glance that it was caused by some kind of decaying spiritual ability.
…very similar to the wounds of the Blazing Dragon who died here.
But why does Long Shiyu know?
He lowered his eyes slightly, hiding his emotions.
The mantis relayed the words to his companions, and there was another chaotic hissing sound. Long Shiyu’s words caused quite a stir; this time their discussion lasted for a long time, and their emotions were very intense.
In the end, they seemed to have made up their minds, and said to Long Shiyu: “We will not tell you where the settlement is now. But if you can take us to find that person, we will agree to help you.”
“Oh, sure.” Long Shiyu said, “He will come, but you can’t beat him.”
The mantis vibrated its wings: “Dragon, you don’t have to worry about this kind of thing. Even if we can’t beat him ourselves, we will use blood to avenge our shame.”
After another whisper, the mantis said: “You want to find that strange beast, right? What do you call her?”
“Siren.”
“Then we will take you to find the siren, but dragon, you’d better keep your promise. Our anger towards you has not subsided. It’s just that that person is our most wanted prey.”
A group of black mantises vibrated their wings at the same time, and a cloud-like special spiritual ability appeared around them.
Long Shiyu and Shen Chaomu felt light all over.
This feeling of lightness was different from weightlessness.
If complete weightlessness brings fear and a sense of wandering with nowhere to rely on, then this feeling of lightness is controllable—there is a subtle sense of solidity, as if the ethereal clouds and mist have turned into solid land.
The mantises’ spiritual ability is so special.
The strongest ones, like Wilpan, completely transform the ethereal spiritual power into real objects, such as those weird tickets, circus animals and clowns, and directly tear the enemy apart when they are angry. But even ordinary mantises can float in the sky by stepping on the transformed clouds.
So the sky settlement always appears with huge clouds that look like cumulonimbus clouds.*
*(
menacing looking multi-level clouds, extending high into the sky in towers or plumes. More commonly known as thunderclouds, cumulonimbus is the only cloud type that can produce hail, thunder and lightning.)
The huge clouds cast a thick shadow on the ground at noon, and wherever they pass, the sky leaves behind pieces of cumulus clouds—those scale-like clouds, soft and ethereal.
In this way, they flew up in the vast snow-capped mountains, and the frost and cold wind could not penetrate the clouds.
Shen Chaomu remained vigilant, always attentive to the mantises’ actions—as they were to his.
Long Shiyu, still fearing Shen Chaomu’s anger, quietly hooked his tail around Shen Chaomu’s wrist. “Ying.”
But Shen Chaomu said, “The first time I saw the sky settlement was before I became a hunter. A group of promising juniors from the Shen family were training together in wilderness survival and hunting. We went to the planet Dorn.”
“Oh, I’ve been there,” Long Shiyu said. “There are many herdsmen and herds there.”
Shen Chaomu immediately became alert. “You didn’t do anything there, did you?”
Long Shiyu looked sincere. “Absolutely not… don’t shake me, don’t shake me.”
Shen Chaomu shook the dragon’s horn for a while before letting go and continued, “… Anyway, we had just returned from the wilderness and arrived in the area where the herdsmen gathered. When we went back, we saw a large number of cattle and sheep. We hadn’t seen so many living creatures for many days, and everyone was very happy. But when we looked up, we saw a large cumulus cloud. The sky settlement had just passed. If you looked toward the distant mountains, you could still see their huge cumulonimbus clouds.”
“Ah, what happened to you then?” Long Shiyu eagerly asked about the princess, fearing he might have been bullied by the mantises.
As if recalling something, Shen Chaomu was momentarily stunned.
At that time, large golden grasses were swaying in the pasture, and cattle and sheep were walking in groups.
The afternoon sun was golden but not dazzling, and a group of teenagers who had just returned noticed scale-like clouds imprinted in the sky, and sunlight poured down from between them. Looking further into the distance, they can even see the cumulonimbus clouds as high as mountains behind the blue mountains.
Powerful and mysterious monsters live on top.
The faces of the companions were a mixture of hostility and desire to conquer, with excitement, and one of them said passionately: “One day, I will pull the sky settlement down from the clouds. Isn’t it just mantises? It’s not that scary, even the Dragon Clan is now subdued at our feet.”
“That’s right.” Another person answered, “Whoever can make them fall first will definitely be famous in history. Hey, Shen Chaomu, why do you keep staring at the clouds?”
The partner said with a smile: “The great genius must be ready to show his power.”
“Yes, there is nothing we can do if Shen Tiancai* makes a move.”
*(Genius)
A group of people began to laugh and make noise, the desire to hunt in their bones was burning, and the sky would also become their battlefield. However, the Dragon Clan disappeared so completely later that they went their separate ways. Some continued to hunt, some became mercenaries, some became scholars, and some started to do business. They were all extremely talented people who thrived in various industries. No one mentioned this topic again.
The young Shen Chaomu still looked at the cumulonimbus cloud.
It is much larger than ordinary cumulonimbus clouds. The golden sunlight outlines the cascading edges, like mountains but more like castles.
The sky is boundless.
There was a shallow bloodstain on his face, which hadn’t congealed yet, and his clothes were stained with blood and dust that couldn’t be washed off for several days. The battle in the wilderness was arduous, and the battle with the night ghosts and carrion-eating griffins was extremely thrilling. The battle between monsters and humans never stopped.
The wind came, puffed up his clothes, and he said—
“It’s so beautiful.” Shen Chaomu said, “At that time, I thought that the clouds here were so beautiful.”
Not only this cumulonimbus cloud, he has seen many amazing things, such as the singing of the group of owls, the tears of the merman, and the shining scales of the dragon.
Long Shiyu was stunned for a moment, then said with a smile: “You are a very strange person.” His tail began to rub Shen Chaomu’s wrist frantically to show his favor, “But I like you like this very much.”
Shen Chaomu rubbed his head.
The mantises’ clouds and mist quickly drifted past the towering mountaintops, through the unmelted ice and snow that no one had visited for many years. A frozen castle appeared before them.
The castle was magnificent, half of its body deeply embedded in the glacier. Around it, five or six gray watchtowers had collapsed by half. Sharp icicles hung from the edges of the broken walls, and they were also firmly covered by frost.
Long Shiyu asked, “Where is this?”
“It’s another castle of the Bei En Dynasty. In the past, their royal family, possessing extremely powerful spiritual power, was born in the ocean. Every full moon, the stars surged, and they also had the ability to go upstream,” Shen Chaomu replied. “The Land of Eternal Night was their exclusive territory.”
The mantises landed on the south side of the castle.
The thick ice layer there was relatively small, and a tunnel had been split open by sharp sickles, leading directly to the depths of the castle.
The mantis said, “She has been here before, and we don’t know where she has gone now. We will not put the settlement in danger; you must go in by yourself.” He vibrated his wings and looked at Long Shiyu. The decaying wound on his body was still ferocious. “Dragon, remember to bring ‘that man.’ We will meet again soon.”
The clouds and mist rose again, and the mantises left.
Long Shiyu walked into the tunnel, Shen Chaomu by his side. Shen Chaomu suddenly asked, “Who is the person you’re talking about?”
“I don’t know.” Long Shiyu said, “I just made it up. I didn’t expect them to actually believe it.”
“…I only know one person who has the decaying spiritual ability. So this is a very rare type. If there were one among the legal residents of the alliance, it would definitely be recorded.”
“Ah, I really don’t know.”
“Then have you heard of Shen Di? He is the only known person with this spiritual power.”
Long Shiyu looked sincere: “I don’t know, I haven’t heard of it, never.”
Shen Chaomu: “…”
Long Shiyu was not good at lying; the tip of his silver tail curled up because he was slightly guilty.
Shen Chaomu asked again: “Can’t the sky settlement do anything to you?”
No matter how suddenly Long Shiyu appeared, even if a large number of mantises were hunting on the surface, the sky settlement still had the most basic combat power; otherwise, it would not be enough to scare many monsters in the air.
Long Shiyu said while walking: “Because I eat very fast.”
Shen Chaomu: “…”
This must be true; he didn’t have any doubts about it.
But this is at least the strength of the third generation of dragons.
No way to explain it.
Really can’t explain it.
It was pitch black in the tunnel, and Shen Chaomu began to shake Long Shiyu’s dragon horns: “Why don’t you have spiritual power? Why not?”
“Ahhh, don’t shake me, how do I know?”
Shen Chaomu looked at him carefully: “Everyone has spiritual ability. Long Shiyu, tell me, how did you grow up like this?”
This is a very simple and harmless question for him.
Long Shiyu got angry: “You still want to scold me!” He shook his head violently, not letting Shen Chaomu touch his beautiful dragon horns.
Shen Chaomu: “…”
So the situation became that Long Shiyu walked in front with his head buried, and Shen Chaomu followed half a step behind.
The temperature here was very low, and it was only brightened by the light of the oil lamp hanging in the air.
They walked for an unknown amount of time until a thick ice wall appeared in front of them. The golden catkins turned into sharp blades and forcefully pierced it.
Ice chips splashed everywhere. When they stepped through the door again, the scene in front of them was completely different.
There were still layers of ice, but this time it covered the magnificent corridor.
Red velvet carpet, shell lamps, curtains with fine carvings, huge floor-to-ceiling windows… Everything was in the elegant style of a dynasty.
In the old days, when the castle was submerged in the sea, the royal family swam through the corridor. The curtains were like soft silk entwined around them, the shell lamps along the way had a strange and bright brilliance, and outside the floor-to-ceiling windows were huge whales swimming by.
A dreamlike and magnificent underwater dynasty existed under the stars with a silent giant bridge.
But after the sea level dropped, the place was completely sealed by frost.
The castle is extremely remote, and mercenaries do not have aircraft and will not risk their lives to climb snow-capped mountains with griffins. But for these mantises walking in the sky, it was easy.
Walking slowly over, the whole castle was like a silent tomb. Speaking loudly would disturb the dead souls of the past.
All the doors were covered with thick ice. They searched up the stairs layer by layer; at least this half of the castle looked very normal, as it had been abandoned for a long time.
Except for the thick door on the third floor.
There were exquisite reliefs on the gate, depicting rolling waves and fish, swaying seaweed and shells, and groups of mermaids, all blowing horns.
There was only a thin layer of frost on this door, and looking at the scratches on the ground, it looked like it was often opened and closed.
But who would walk into this frozen tomb?
Shen Chaomu pushed open the door, and a chill hit his face. What appeared in front of him were several long tables, frozen candlesticks, a map of the galaxy nailed to the wall, and layers of bookshelves that could not be seen at a glance.
The library of the Bei En Dynasty.
There was a cup of tea on the long table, which had been frozen, but the pattern on the cup was very cute, with a furry brown bear painted on it, which should belong to a woman. There was only a layer of frost on the books here, which could be wiped off with a light touch. The special material made them undamaged even if they were soaked in water, so many years of freezing had not damaged them too much, and the words were still recognizable.
The only thing that was clean was a ladder in the corner that had been used not long ago.
The ladder was placed on the leftmost bookshelf in the third row, where a book was pulled out, leaving an empty space.
To be fair, the position of the book was not very high, and most men could reach it with a slight stretch.
With the little bear teacup, it looked like a petite girl tried hard to stand on tiptoe here, but in the end she angrily brought a long ladder.
Shen Chaomu walked over and looked at the other books next to the vacancy.
“It’s all poetry books here,” he said.
___
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