novelraw 187. Departure from Zhongzhou
187. Departure from Zhongzhou
Xiao Yan carried Zi Yan through the sky, his keen soul power allowing him to sense Yan Di's location in advance.
Before Xiao Yan and Zi Yan even got close, they saw the enormous creature flying in mid-air—a powerful seventh-tier magical beast, a mount comparable to a Dou Zong expert—the Azure Feather Three-Tailed Sparrow.
Xiao Yan and Zi Yan flew onto the back of the Azure Feather Three-Tailed Sparrow, where Yan Di and Huo Zhi were already waiting.
Upon seeing Huo Zhi for the first time, Xiao Yan felt the strange sensation return to his body. Now, Xiao Yan understood that it was the sensation emanating from his own primordial flame.
Xiao Yan respectfully cupped his hands to Yan Di and said, "Thank you for your kindness, Senior!"
Yan Di gave him seven days. During those seven days, Xiao Yan still accomplished quite a lot. Moreover, without Huo Zhi's help when the Five Kingdoms Alliance came on strong, Xiao Yan dared not say that he could have safely resolved the huge trouble from last time.
Yan Di waved his hand dismissively and said, "Just obediently follow me to the Yan Clan."
With that, he stepped on the back of the Azure Feather Three-Tailed Sparrow, and the sparrow spread its wings, its wings carrying wind-attribute battle aura, and charged straight into the distance.
The Azure Feather Three-Tailed Sparrow's speed far exceeded that of flight aided by Dou Qi; the wind-attribute Dou Qi allowed this already agile magical beast to reach even greater speeds. Xiao Yan could only sense the surrounding scenery constantly blurring into afterimages as it rushed backward.
Yan Di stood atop the body of the Azure Feather Three-Tailed Sparrow, the howling wind unable to even stir the hem of his clothes.
"You can go and rest for a bit. This journey will take about seven days," Yan Di said to Xiao Yan and Zi Yan.
Hearing this, Xiao Yan was already a little confused. After all, it took him two or three months to fly from Tianlan City to the Jia Ma Empire. Although the speed of the Jiaojia Vulture was not as fast as that of the Qingyu Three-Tailed Sparrow, it was not much slower. Logically speaking, as the true core of the entire continent, Zhongzhou should not be able to be reached in just seven days.
However, Xiao Yan did not forget the identity he was pretending to have with Yan Di, and he refrained from asking the question. After all, there were some questions that he might not know due to geographical limitations, but the people of the ancient clans would know.
So he led Zi Yan toward the pavilion carried by the Azure Feather Three-Tailed Sparrow. With Yan Di, a Dou Zun, in front of him, no matter what tricks he played, he had no way to escape. It was better to go to the Yan Clan and see what the situation was like there.
Zi Yan had obtained many good things from Queen Medusa, and now that the opportunity was rare, she followed Xiao Yan around, urging him to refine pills for her.
Xiao Yan and his companion entered the pavilion and found the conditions to be quite good. Xiao Yan couldn't help but sigh that people from wealthy families knew how to enjoy life, even their magical beast mounts had such nice facilities.
Xiao Yan walked into the room and looked at Zi Yan, who was staring at him expectantly. He thought about it and realized that he didn't have anything particularly urgent at the moment. Although he was close to breaking through the bottleneck of the eight-star Dou Huang, there were still about half a month left. Xiao Yan always preferred to accumulate strength and then unleash it, and he would never break through immediately until everything was ready.
"Alright, I'll let you refine 30% of the medicinal herbs into pills, and I'll take the remaining 70%, okay?" Xiao Yan looked at Zi Yan with a smile. Medusa still had many rare and precious treasures in her possession, and Xiao Yan naturally wouldn't refuse such good things.
The ring that Yao Lao gave him contained a variety of medicinal formulas, and Yang Yue also gave Xiao Yan many pill formulas, so the scarce resource of pill formulas was not a problem for Xiao Yan at the moment.
However, many of the medicinal materials required for these pills are rather obscure, and even Xiao Yan's reserves do not contain them all.
Upon hearing this suggestion, Zi Yan's face was filled with disdain for Xiao Yan: "You brat, are you bullying me?"
After saying that, she clenched her little fist and waved it in front of Xiao Yan, threateningly saying, "I'm a Dou Zong expert, do you want to get beaten up?"
Xiao Yan shrugged and said nonchalantly, "Since you're unwilling, then let's find someone else to refine the medicine for you."
There are only four people here now. Neither Huo Zhi nor Yan Di mentioned that they don't know how to make medicine. Even if they did, they wouldn't make medicine for Zi Yan.
Although Zi Yan was itching to see Xiao Yan, she was already used to the special pills he made for her using his special methods, so she naturally wouldn't want to swallow the medicinal herbs raw again.
Zi Yan held up four fingers in front of Xiao Yan and said, "Forty percent, or I'll fight you to the death!"
Xiao Yan gave Zi Yan a high five and said, "Deal!"
Zi Yan tossed the storage ring to Xiao Yan, who was in a great mood as he looked at the abundant medicinal herbs inside. After all, some of the things in the storage ring were really hard to find.
Xiao Yan took out the medicinal herbs one by one and arranged them neatly according to their categories, focusing on classifying them according to their medicinal properties.
Although Zi Yan has a huge appetite and can swallow all kinds of herbs and pills, after Xiao Yan's many attempts, he found that the pills made by fusing and refining various herbs with similar medicinal properties were the ones that satisfied Zi Yan the most.
Forcibly fusing multiple medicinal herbs without a prescription requires Xiao Yan to be extremely familiar with their properties and to have his soul power highly concentrated; otherwise, he could easily turn all the herbs into a pile of useless residue.
This was also a form of rigorous training for Xiao Yan, which, although very difficult, was beneficial to his path as an alchemist.
Of course, Zi Yan had absolutely no interest in watching Xiao Yan pick and choose and then refine pills, so after throwing the storage ring to Xiao Yan, she went to sleep in the next room.
Xiao Yan couldn't say for sure about Zi Yan's current condition. She could suddenly transform into an adult when needed, but most of the time she was still in the form of a little girl and needed to consume a lot of energy-containing herbs.
Xiao Yan had heard the name Taixu Ancient Dragon from different people many times, but he had no way of judging Zi Yan's current situation, so he could only take it one step at a time.
After sorting the herbs, Xiao Yan put them into the pills he was making for Zi Yan. He was completely focused during the process and did not slack off at all.
However, just as Xiao Yan was about to finish refining the first batch, a voice broke the state he was maintaining. In a moment of carelessness, the entire batch of good stuff turned to ashes.
"Xiao Yan, can I ask you for a favor?" Huo Zhi's slightly cold voice came from outside the door.