After reaching the shore, Jiang Lian collapsed onto his back, unable to cough up any water since he had already swallowed it all. Struggling to open his eyes, he noticed numerous people surrounding Meng Qianzi while no one paid attention to him.
He was used to this. Seeing Lu Sanming and Pixiu, along with other familiar faces, approach with looks of concern, Jiang Lian waved them away: “It’s fine, I’m not injured, don’t worry.”
He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths, hearing the commotion gradually fade away. Meng Qianzi was genuinely injured and needed prompt treatment.
When he opened his eyes again, the cave was much quieter. A large face appeared before him—Shen Gun looking down at him: “Little Lian Lian, did you crawl through a chicken coop or something?”
Jiang Lian rolled his eyes at him, fumbling to pluck a phoenix feather from his neck. The thing stuck tenaciously, as if glued on, pulling at his skin as he tried to remove it, making him wince in pain.
Jiang Lian held it up to show Shen Gun: “What kind of eyesight do you have? Have you ever seen chickens with such beautiful feathers?”
After speaking, he lay still again. The ordeal had left him completely exhausted—even getting up to walk seemed too troublesome. He wished he could sleep right there for twenty-four hours straight.
He mumbled, “Could you get me something to eat? Are you going to watch me starve to death?”
Shen Gun snapped out of his daze and hurried away. When he returned, he carried a Mountain Ghost basket, eagerly unscrewing the cap of a mineral water bottle and handing it over, then helping to tear open the wrapper of an energy bar. Jiang Lian propped himself up, accepting everything offered, taking a sip of water and a bite of food, thoroughly enjoying the care.
Shen Gun collected the phoenix feathers from his body one by one. Those stuck to his clothes came off easily, but those adhered to his skin caused “skin-pulling” with each removal, giving Jiang Lian the comical sensation that Shen Gun was plucking feathers from him like a chicken.
After collecting and counting them, there were more than twenty. Shen Gun suddenly remembered something: “Oh no, Miss Meng has them too!”
Jiang Lian replied irritably: “The mountain dwellers will collect them too. Anyone can see these are rare items—you think they’d throw them away as trash?”
He looked around: “That… fish-head guy, where is he?”
Shen Gun reminded him: “That’s a Water Ghost named Zong Hang. He appeared in the Water Ghost videos, don’t you remember? When the mountain dwellers carried Miss Meng away, he followed them.”
As he spoke, he examined a phoenix feather closely: “Miss Duan only took one feather, who would have thought there’d be so many hidden here? Adding those stuck to Miss Meng, there must be forty or fifty…”
He asked Jiang Lian: “Did you bring up all of them from below? None fell into the water?”
Given how tenaciously these things stuck to their bodies, the likelihood of any falling into the water was minimal. As for whether all those from the cave below were brought up, Jiang Lian couldn’t say for certain: “Most of them, I guess. Anyway, why worry about whether we got them all—you don’t even know how to use them.”
How could he not know? Shen Gun contradicted him: “The flame from burning a phoenix feather can ignite dragon bones.”
“And where are the dragon bones? Do you have any?”
Shen Gun was speechless. He wasn’t even as well-equipped as Yan Luo, who at least had fragments of dragon bone.
With food in his stomach and some strength restored, Jiang Lian finally stood up, partly supported by Shen Gun as they left the pit.
It hadn’t rained for the past two days, and several tents of various sizes had been erected beside the pit. Jiang Lian had no idea where Meng Qianzi had been taken, but fortunately, Lu Sanming approached, and Jiang Lian quickly grabbed him to inquire about Meng Qianzi’s condition.
Lu Sanming couldn’t explain clearly, but he employed his skills of observation: “I saw the doctor talking a lot with Sixth Sister and Seventh Sister. Sixth Sister didn’t cry, and Seventh Sister seemed very reassured—I guarantee she’s fine.”
That meant she was likely fine. Jiang Lian felt relieved, patted Lu Sanming’s shoulder, and looked around with no further concerns.
He staggered into the nearest large tent, which appeared to be for storing supplies—there were oil cans, ropes, and bowls. After looking around, he moved aside a pile of bowls, pulled over a bundle of rope to use as a pillow, and fell asleep as soon as he lay down.
He woke once midway, feeling as if he was being carried, his body constantly swaying. In his hazy consciousness, he noticed his pillow felt soft, as did the bed.
Opening his eyes, he was surprised to see Xian Qionghua standing before him. He tried to sit up, but Xian Qionghua gestured to stop him, saying: “Sleep first.”
So Jiang Lian slept again. As he closed his eyes, he felt slightly mortified, remembering how he’d last met Fifth Aunt Qiu Biying in an equally disheveled state—why did he always let Meng Qianzi’s mothers see him at his worst?
When he awoke again, he found himself lying comfortably in a small tent.
Outside, voices clamored. Jiang Lian got on his knees and unzipped the tent, immediately blinded by the light. After his eyes adjusted, he was surprised to see someone walking past carrying a video camera.
What the hell was going on?
Jiang Lian froze in confusion, but soon spotted a familiar face—Shen Gun was walking towards him with a boxed meal. Upon seeing him, Shen Gun’s face lit up with delight: “Little Lian Lian, you’re awake! You’ve been sleeping for an entire day. Want this meal? It has chicken legs.”
Jiang Lian confusedly accepted the box, then pointed at the retreating figure: “What’s… going on? Are the Mountain Ghosts filming a documentary?”
Shen Gun replied enthusiastically: “They’re filming a movie! I just did a cameo and got this boxed meal.”
Seeing Jiang Lian still confused, Shen Gun explained: “Are you dense? With so many people bringing this much equipment into the mountains, such a big operation needs a legitimate cover story. Lu Lu Tong said that since they’d already invested in film, they brought a crew to shoot a few days of scenes. They properly registered with the relevant authorities and even recruited villagers as extras. The response was extremely enthusiastic.”
Jiang Lian looked around and realized they were no longer near the pit. Shen Gun, guessing his thoughts, explained: “We moved out first. Half the people stayed behind to bury the coffins and refill the site—they need to restore it to its original state.”
Now he understood. Jiang Lian opened the meal box and broke apart the disposable chopsticks when suddenly something occurred to him: “What about Qianzi…?”
“She’s here too,” Shen Gun nodded toward a large tent in the distance. “Like you, she slept for a long time and just woke up. Little Hang Hang went in to talk with her.”
Jiang Lian frowned at him: “So now it’s ‘Little Hang Hang’? Do you have something against Qianzi? We’ve known each other for so long, but I’ve never heard you call her ‘Little Qian Qian’ or ‘Little Zi Zi’.”
Shen Gun defended himself righteously: “Aren’t I one of her Three Lotus Petals? She’s my leader—you can’t use such casual names with leaders.”
Who would have thought Shen Gun had such awareness of respecting superiors? Jiang Lian picked up his chopsticks: “Did Xian Qionghua come to see me?”
He needed to confirm whether it had been a dream.
Shen Gun nodded: “Yes, after settling Miss Meng, she said she wanted to find you. But she found you sleeping with a bowl in your arms, so the Xian family girl had someone move your bedding.”
Jiang Lian silently ate his rice. Originally, he had hoped it was just a dream. If not a dream, he’d hoped his sleeping posture had been somewhat presentable. But now… sleeping while hugging a bowl—there was no hope left.
He changed the subject: “These past two days, you’ve had quite a bit of exchange with the Water Ghost, right?”
Of course, he had. Shen Gun spoke mysteriously: “Little Lian Lian, do you know the correct method to break through that yuan tuan?”
Jiang Lian put down his chopsticks. He had been wondering why this rescue was so complicated, requiring two giant crocodiles.
Shen Gun began by explaining “yuan,” describing how miraculous the fixed-water yuan was, how Little Hang Hang couldn’t break through it, and how, at the critical moment, he had the sudden inspiration to use the two giant crocodiles. Here, he expressed some remorse: “We didn’t want to kill them, but there was no alternative. In the future, I’ll burn more incense for the small crocodile. Growing that big wasn’t easy for it.”
Jiang Lian consoled him: “Think of it this way—it was the fixed-water yuan that killed the small crocodile. Zong Hang merely sent it down as the vanguard… So, what’s the correct method to break through it?”
“Herding the yuan. Little Hang Hang showed me the records in the book. It said Water Ghosts ‘grasp soil in hand, scatter it like a whip,’ which can drive the yuan tuan to move through water.”
Grasp soil?
Jiang Lian was puzzled: “Wouldn’t soil held in the hand quickly dissolve when thrown into water? How could it form a ‘whip’?”
Shen Gun said, “At first, I thought it was just soil too, but then I figured it out. Little Lian Lian, think about it—what did Water Ghosts once possess?”
Jiang Lian had a sudden realization and blurted out: “Xirong?”
Shen Gun slowly nodded.
Xirong was something that grew when exposed to water. Imagine a Water Ghost grasping just a tiny bit in their palm, which extends into a long whip when scattered, moving the yuan tuan—incredible yet magnificent.
Jiang Lian fell silent: it was very likely that Water Ghosts had also been involved in setting up the Phoenix Eye.
That puzzle that had long occupied his mind returned: what exactly were these people trying to do?
He placed half his hope on Shen Gun: “After seeing and handling the phoenix feathers, have you had any more dreams?”
Shen Gun shook his head.
However, Jiang Lian’s question reminded him: “But before that, when trapped in the cave, I did have a dream.”
He recounted his dream to Jiang Lian: how lively the scene was when they were counting the boxes, how strange and varied the items placed in the boxes were; how two people whispered in a cave at night, mentioning phoenix feathers, dragon bone ash, and the craftsmen who made the boxes; how inexplicably he had his chest cut open, suffering the cruel torture of having his heart dug out and intestines pulled…
Jiang Lian finally realized there had been an information imbalance between them for quite some time. After careful consideration, he shared his theory about the “Divine Race” and “Human Race” with Shen Gun.
Shen Gun listened with widened eyes, and after a long while, slapped his thigh: “That’s what I thought! Yan Luo, that guy wouldn’t look like a prince even wearing dragon robes—how could he ‘become a god’? Miss Duan also asked ‘What defines godhood.’ She must have felt something didn’t add up.”
Jiang Lian nodded: “I’ve always felt that the ‘Divine Race’s understanding of this world had reached a considerable level. Our current technology probably hasn’t caught up yet. Do you think… that Nüwa clay figurine might have been their ‘robot’?”
Shen Gun couldn’t digest this information: “Wasn’t that a doll made of clay? The legend of Nüwa molding humans from clay?”
Jiang Lian smiled: “Humans today can already create robots, though our capabilities are still limited. But in a few decades, or maybe just a few years, we might achieve perfect imitations—why couldn’t they? Perhaps Nüwa creating humans meant creating what they understood as ‘robots.’ True, we use metal, but the material doesn’t matter. Maybe they used clay? Taking the clay figurines away in boxes, they probably didn’t want to pass this technology to us, leaving no trace behind.”
Shen Gun initially found it absurd, but upon reflection, couldn’t refute it. Thinking further, he became engrossed, murmuring: “They mentioned ‘original texts: one volume of Mountain Classic, one volume of Sea Classic, one volume of Great Wilderness Classic.’ The maps in the ‘Classic of Mountains and Seas’ actually bear considerable resemblance to today’s actual maps, which is why many scholars suspect it’s not fiction but an ancient historical, cultural, and geographical book recording the real conditions of that time.”
Jiang Lian was curious: “We have the ‘Classic of Mountains and Seas’ too—you can easily buy it. Why did they emphasize it was the ‘original text’? Is what we have now a copy?”
Shen Gun nodded vigorously: “Exactly! The biggest difference must be in the ‘Great Wilderness Classic.’ In our current ‘Classic of Mountains and Seas,’ the records about the great wilderness are strange—they still describe mountains and seas. I’ve always suspected the true ‘Great Wilderness Classic’ was long ago tampered with.”
Jiang Lian asked: “Then what exactly does ‘great wilderness’ refer to?”
Modern people might call remote, desolate places “great wilderness.” In the 1950s and 60s, there was even a slogan in China about reclaiming the “Northern Great Wilderness.” But in ancient times, people’s understanding of “great wilderness” must have been different.
Shen Gun swallowed: “For this, you need to understand ancient people’s perception of the world. They believed there were mountains on the continents, which were surrounded by seas, and the great wilderness was something beyond both mountains and seas.”
Jiang Lian smiled: “That perception isn’t wrong. Today’s world is also one sea with seven continents scattered within it, meaning the sea surrounds the land. The vast world is nothing but mountains and seas. What could be beyond mountains and seas… surely not outer space?”
At these words, he felt a jolt in his heart. Shen Gun’s mouth gaped, unable to speak for a long while.
Jiang Lian felt that his casual comment might have hit the mark.
Humans were already exploring the mysteries of the universe. If the “Divine Race” of that time had knowledge surpassing modern humans in all fields, how could they not have researched what lay beyond this world while studying medicine, dimensions, and the afterlife?
After a moment of silence, Shen Gun suddenly said: “Do you know something? The seven ominous slips—ancient people understood them as celestial forces, believing this terrible power came from the Big Dipper. They once called the ominous slips ‘star slips’ or ‘star lords.'”
Jiang Lian remained silent.
The source of the seven ominous slips was seven beast bones, which also appeared in that counting scene, placed in that box.
If the supposition was correct, the era of the “Divine Race” truly deserved words like magnificent: their exploration of mountains, waters, humans, and even what lay beyond the world had reached a remarkable level, truly admirable…
As he was pondering this, from the corner of his eye, he suddenly glimpsed Zong Hang emerging from the large tent.
Instantly, Jiang Lian’s thoughts returned from the vast cosmos to mundane matters: Zong Hang had left, which meant Qianzi should be free now. He could go see her.
Let Shen Gun ponder these profound topics.
He put down his meal box and said to Shen Gun: “I’m off.”
Still far from the large tent, Jiang Lian’s heart was already racing: since emerging from the water, he hadn’t seen Meng Qianzi again. Underwater had been a desperate situation with life hanging in the balance, where people become uninhibited. Now that they were safe, would their next meeting be awkward? Uncomfortable?
While his mind was unsettled, he suddenly saw Xian Qionghua and Qu Qiao approaching from the side, also heading toward the large tent.
If it were just Qu Qiao, Jiang Lian wouldn’t be afraid, but Xian Qionghua…
He knew this Seventh Aunt had a poor impression of him, and the meeting would certainly be awkward. Better to avoid it if possible.
But turning away abruptly would be too obvious. He pretended to suddenly remember something, patting his pockets as if searching, then bent down to look carefully on the ground, turning back to continue his search, gradually moving further away.
Xian Qionghua had spotted him long ago. Seeing his act, she couldn’t help but stop, frowning as she watched for a moment before saying to Qu Qiao: “Look at him pretending.”
Qu Qiao smiled: “He probably thinks he’s convincing and that we can’t tell.”
Xian Qionghua scoffed: “We’ve all been young once—these are old tricks to us. Who wouldn’t see through them?”
Estimating he’d gone far enough, Jiang Lian looked back to see Xian Qionghua and Qu Qiao entering the large tent.
That was close. He silently praised his alertness.
Just as he was about to return to his tent, he noticed Zong Hang sitting in a nearby grove, head lowered, holding a twig, poking at something on the ground.
After being rescued, he hadn’t had a chance to thank him yet. Jiang Lian felt he should go say hello.
As he approached, his footsteps weren’t deliberately quiet, but Zong Hang was lost in thought and didn’t notice until Jiang Lian patted his shoulder, startling him as he turned around.
Jiang Lian saw that Zong Hang’s eyes were red-rimmed.
He was momentarily stunned, but before he could speak, Zong Hang quickly lowered his head, blinking hard several times, then looked up with a smile, saying: “Oh, it’s you.”
Jiang Lian grunted in acknowledgment, pretending not to notice anything, sitting down casually across from him: “I just saw you visiting Miss Meng. What did you talk about?”
Zong Hang said, “Nothing much, I just asked Miss Meng if there had been any progress.”
With just this sentence, Jiang Lian understood everything.
To be fair, over these past couple of months, he felt the progress had been substantial, but this progress meant nothing to the Water Ghosts, to Zong Hang, or rather to Zong Hang’s sick girlfriend, Yi Sa.
Jiang Lian carefully asked: “Is Yi Sa quite seriously ill?”
Zong Hang’s body trembled, his head dropping even lower.
After a while, he said softly, “Actually, I don’t want to stay at home just waiting. In situations like this, you should rely on yourself, not expect others to help. But Sa Sa’s health is poor, I need to care for her, and if I’m away too much, my parents worry terribly…”
He fell silent for a moment before continuing: “I could only help in this small way, and you’ve all faced so much danger because of it. I’m sorry.”
Jiang Lian quickly corrected him: “No, no, no, this isn’t a small help—it’s a great help. I came specifically to thank you. And don’t think of us as so noble. Whether it’s me, Miss Meng, or Shen Gun, we’re all just handling our affairs, investigating your situation along the way.”
Zong Hang said, “No matter what, and no matter the outcome, thank you all. And if there’s anything I can help with, please tell me… I have to go now. I’ve already said goodbye to Miss Meng and need to hurry back.”
He stood up, smiled at Jiang Lian, and turned to leave.
Watching his retreating figure, Jiang Lian felt a heaviness in his heart and felt compelled to say something. He couldn’t help calling after him: “Zong Hang?”
Zong Hang turned back.
Jiang Lian said, “Don’t worry, things will get better.”
“In Five Hundred Alley Village, we met someone called Yan Luo who might be in a similar situation to you—also resurrected. He was revived in the early 1990s, almost thirty years ago now, but when we saw him, he was perfectly fine with no signs of illness…”
Zong Hang’s eyes brightened.
“I remember when he first appeared, he was soaking in a pond. He scared our mule worker. Even though he lived far from the pond, he kept soaking in it, perhaps trying to draw something from the water. If Yi Sa isn’t doing well, you could try letting her soak in water every day. It might… it might help somewhat.”
By the end, Jiang Lian felt a bit insecure, thinking he was spouting useless advice like telling someone with an illness to “drink more hot water.”
But Zong Hang smiled, his eyes curving just as they had underwater when he removed his fish-head hood, as if he’d received some magical elixir. He nodded vigorously and said, “Thank you.”