Lin Mu took two steps back and felt that jumping off a building wouldn"t work.
Yan Xuanjing looked at him and looked down at the ground and suddenly realised, “not high enough.”
Lin Mu jolted, and ducked to another side before Yan Xuanjing flew upwards with him, “I"m not jumping!”
The fox spirit watched how nervous Lin Mu was, thought for a bit, and didn"t really mind. He placed down his hand that had just been reaching out and said, “then we"ll not learn flying first?”
Lin Mu felt that compared with breaking his neck, being beaten was quite a good choice.
He nodded, and was grabbed and carried down by Yan Xuanjing.
Because of Yan Xuanjing"s appearance, the four small monsters hidden the corner crowded together. In this dark night, the lights of the yard weren"t on, but these four little non-humans didn"t need lights, and could see everything that was happening in the yard under the moonlight.
Except for Lin Mu, this half-monster.
The moonlight was broken up into pieces by the house and branches, and it was very dark in the yard. The dark colour that Yan Xuanjing wore caused him to be almost blended into the night, and with his fast actions, Lin Mu could only tell which direction the attacks were coming from through fuzzy shadows and subtle winds.
And then, unsurprisingly, he was beaten again.
The four little monsters were shivering in the corner.
Lin Mu laid on the floor and turned over, looked up at the starry dots in the night sky above, and grimaced in pain.
“You"ve improved.” Yan Xuanjing said.
Lin Mu already knew how to use his energy to block attacks — although Yan Xuanjing wasn"t surprised by this. This type of energy that monsters had couldn"t be given any concrete description, only that it was like a ‘energy" that every monster instinctively used.
Scientifically speaking, it was similar to when humans got attacked, they would instinctively tighten the muscles of the attacked area, an instinctive defense mechanism.
After one had been beaten a lot, and found out that their body alone couldn"t resist, naturally, they would use this monstrous energy when they faced danger.
Yan Xuanjing felt that his teaching method was really rigorous and scientific.
It was a perfect reproduction of the vast majority of monster"s childhood.
That was how everybody had lived, and all grew up safe and sound.
After all, those that weren"t safe were all dead.
Lin Mu looked at the wounds on his body, and didn"t feel as if he had made any progress.
He pouted, “wasn"t it because you went easy on me?”
“The last time, I also went easy on you,” Yan Xuanjing said.
Lin Mu laid on the ground like a starfish and stared blankly at the starry sky.
“Not bad, you still can stay conscious and talk to me.” Yan Xuanjing said, realistically. “The last time, you fainted.”
If it wasn"t for the moon essence, Lin Mu would have probably pa.s.sed out until the next morning.
Lin Mu thought back, and it really was the case.
Not only did he faint, he even felt that he was on the road to the netherworld.
“If you say it like that, it seems so.”
Lin Mu was a little happy. He looked at the soft silvery moonlight that shone out cl.u.s.ters and cl.u.s.ters of soft white light one after another, and watched how it floated with the night wind straight to him.
Yan Xuanjing looked at Lin Mu, who soon got wrapped up in moon essence, then raised his head to look up at the sky.
Today, the Milky Way was beautiful, very suitable for stargazing and divination.
Wu Gui"s side might have been able to get some clues.
Yan Xuanjing looked up for a while, and realised that Lin Mu had got up from the ground, shook his hands and said energetically, “again!”
The four little monsters in the corner huddled together. They couldn"t bear Lin Mu, who was always getting beaten.
The Ginseng Baby looked at the falling moon essence through his fingers, used his elbows to poke his friends, and quietly said, “this is a good thing. All of you take one each, just one is and not more, or you"ll won"t be able to take it and die.”
The other three little monsters nodded and carefully reached their hands out to take a ball of light.
Yan Xuanjing noticed their movements and paused, turning to glance at them. The little monsters shivered, took the moon essence and retracted their hands, not daring to look up at him as they shrank from his gaze.
Seeing that they were very restrained and only collected one ball of light, Yan Xuanjing retracted his line of sight, and raised his hand lightly to block Lin Mu"s knee.
This Relaxed Emperor still lacked some means of attack.
Yan Xuanjing held Lin Mu"s wrist, took him by the shoulder, twisted his hand back, and directly flipped Lin Mu to the ground. He expressionlessly aimed at Lin Mu"s soft abdomen, and watched as Lin Mu rolled and didn"t chase after him, simply continuing to ponder by himself about what means of attack a Relaxed Emperor could have.
After thinking about it, he found out that a Relaxed Emperor was really a rare type of pure support monster.
Yan Xuanjing looked at Lin Mu who got up and rushed at him, and gave up on the idea of figuring out what means of attack a Relaxed Emperor could have.
This problem wasn"t big.
Since by their nature, they didn"t have any claws or fangs, and didn"t have hallucinogens or poisons like other plants, then Lin Mu should get hit a little more first, to get his skin thicker, and to train his speed. In any case, it wouldn"t be wrong.
If one couldn"t win, just bear with it. If one couldn"t bear it, then run.
No matter what, he couldn"t simply taken away by other monsters without fighting back at all.
Yan Xuanjing thought about this, and suddenly started to hit harder.
Lin Mu was beaten from the night to the next morning.
The fox spirit was inhuman, and watched as the moon essence heal Lin Mu"s injuries, then continued to give him a vicious beating.
Lin Mu was also stubborn. It wasn"t a problem for him not to sleep for a day or two, and since Yan Xuanjing was free to come and didn"t call it off, he also didn"t want to call it off — especially when he saw that he was gradually able to hold on, instead of having no ability to resist at all. With such obvious progress, Lin Mu would be stupid to take the initiative to stop.
Yan Xuanjing was the one who stopped first.
The lights that fell in the yard changed from moon essences to pale golden sun essences.
A place where a Relaxed Emperor stayed was really rather luxurious.
The fox spirit took at look at the young seedling on top of Lin Mu"s head that had perked up and looked exceptionally spirited, then glanced at Lin Mu who was full of energy, had a healthy glow, and even a smile on his face.
The little Relaxed Emperor had been washed by moon essence for one whole night. His whole person was in a good state of mind, and his body was better compared to last night, by several times.
Yan Xuanjing slightly clicked his tongue and thought about his own experience, and felt that there was really no need to compare between monsters.
“It"s until here for now.” The fox spirit said.
Lin Mu"s eyes were bright. He looked down at his hands and clenched his fist, “okay! Do you want to have a meal before you leave?”
Yan Xuanjing shook his head, found a little gauze bag, and shoved a lot of sun essence into it. He sealed it well and gave Lin Mu, then said, “bring this along when you go to work.”
Lin Mu put away the bag and nodded. He watched as Yan Xuanjing went away, moved his body around, and turned to see the little monsters that were in the corner of the yard sleeping together, heads nodding, and suddenly remembered that he still had a dog.
Lin Mu turned and headed into the house, and after looking around, he didn"t see Milky. He pushed open the window of the room and shouted for the little Ginseng, and asked, “have you seen Milky?”
The little Ginseng rubbed his bleary eyes and said softly, “Milky ran away before that great monster came!”
“Ay?” Lin Mu was a little dumbfounded, then he thought about what Da Hei had said about how ordinary animals and some weak little monsters couldn"t even resist a single gaze of a great monster.
Milky probably realised that there was a great monster nearby, so he went out to take refuge.
Lin Mu sighed, went to take a shower, and made some soup and rice.
He warmed up a bowl of bone broth rice for Milky, and casually stir fried some meat for a meal. He took the big watermelon he bought yesterday afternoon, opened it, and extracted the juice.
Lin Mu carried four gla.s.ses of watermelon juice out, looked at the timid little monsters and didn"t go near. He called the little Ginseng from afar and gave him the tray, “for you guys.”
“Okay! Thank you Lin Mu!” The little Ginseng stood on his toes and pulled Lin Mu"s clothes, giving him a little peck on the cheek as he leaned down, then took the tray and ran with his little short legs to his friends and gave out the juice.
Three small children and one teenager sat in a row, holding a cup under the sun, and slowly drank the fruit juice sip by sip. They watched as Lin Mu took advantage of the weekend to pack and clean stuff up, hesitated for a while, gathered together and murmured for a long time, then stood up one after another.
The little Ginseng half ran and half dragged his little friends in front of Lin Mu, “we"ll help too!”
Lin Mu was a little startled, then smiled and said, okay.”
Hesimply handed over several rooms on the second floor for those little monsters to clean, and he cleaned the bedroom, study, and his mother"s studio.
Lin Mu took down the curtains, and the sun came in without anything to block it. It shone on the photographs on the bookcase, and the sunlight fell onto the wooden box containing the fruits of the Relaxed Emperor.
There were several cl.u.s.ters of sun essences sitting quietly on the box.
Lin Mu placed down the curtains he was holding, raised his arm and flexed it towards his mother"s photo and the fruit, patting his slightly bulging biceps as he said, “I"m working hard to get strong, wait for a while more.”
Neither the photo or the fruit moved.
The sun essence that stopped on top of the box fell, swayed and nudged Lin Mu"s face before nestling into his shoulders.
Lin Mu curled up his lips and smiled, picked up the curtains again and walked out.
Yan Xuanjing had told him to bring the small bag containing sun essence to work, so Lin Mu went to work on Monday with the bag and a hat.
It was rare that Wu Gui and Da Hei were both in the office, but just when Lin Mu had entered, he was told that they were going to leave for some time, and during this time, Lin Mu would be responsible for the paperwork in the office.
Lin Mu paused, “where are you guys going?”
“To track down Di Wu, the stars have been very clear these two nights, and it wasn"t easy to divine his position.”
Da Hei replied, and looked at Wu Gui who was frowning as he indecisively chose the spiritual medication, gave a heavy sigh and whispered, “and we don"t know if we can come back.”
Lin Mu"s heart tightened, “……what do you mean?”
“This kind of thing is very dangerous.” Da Hei licked his lips, as he was also nervous, “every single time we go to trace these sort of things, the mortality rate would be quite high. Otherwise, how could the Old Turtle bear to use the spiritual medication he prepared for his son?”
Lin Mu opened his mouth, and felt a little helpless.
“But it"s not necessarily the case. Look at this Old Turtle that lived for almost 3000 years, he"s seen these sort of things for tens of times at minimum, and he"s still alive.”
Although, every time he went, he was ready to die.
Da Hei thought of this and sighed again, “the Old Turtle really doesn"t have it easy. After all, all his relatives were in this line, and now, he only has one son whose fate is unclear. Now, he has to go and take the risk again, and if his luck isn"t good, his son would soon be able to reunite with him down there.”
“…… Can"t you not go?” Lin Mu said, softly, “even if we don"t bother with Di Wu, it wouldn"t affect us.”
Da Hei shook his head, “how could we not go? We don"t know anything about Di Wu"s situation. What if he really went insane and decided to kill everybody who had gotten stained with the negative karma? It would be super chaotic then.”
Lin Mu looked at Wu Gui and asked, “can"t I go?”
“You"re still young.” Wu Gui didn"t even raise his head, and spoke slowly. “Leave the dangerous things to to adults, you just need to stay here safely.”
Lin Mu pursed his lips, but didn"t say anything.
“By the way, this.” Wu Gui took out several books from a drawer and threw them at Lin Mu.
Lin Mu jolted, then quickly reached out to catch the books.
Wu Gui lowered his eyes and continued to pick the spiritual medication, then said, “I heard from Da Hei that you don"t know how to cultivate, and we don"t record human methods of cultivating in the reference room, but here"s some autobiography from some great plant related monsters I found, and inside, they disclosed some information about the cultivation methods of tree-based monsters. You can look through it when you have the time.”
Lin Mu looked down at the book in his hand and stayed in a daze for a long while. He caught a glimpse of the little gauze bag he was carrying, hesitated for some time, then took it out to give to Wu Gui.
Wu Gui raised his eyebrows, “what?”
Lin Mu thought for a moment, and said in a vague manner, “Yan Xuanjing asked me to bring it.”
Wu Gui heard it, opened the bag and glanced inside, then immediately tied it shut.
He previously saw how Yan Xuanjing took out a pile of sun essence to help Lin Mu settle his nerves in an extremely extravagant manner, but this kind of thing was too precious, and even though he was indeed quite envious, he didn"t open his mouth to ask Yan Xuanjing if he could give him some.
But now, Yan Xuanjing gave him a bag — this was enough to restore some of his son"s foundation, afterwards, spiritual medication would be used to support him, and although his son would still be a little weak, but at least his life would be safe.
Wu Gui took in a deep breath, “thank him for me.”
“En!” Lin Mu nodded, revealing two small dimples.
Wu Gui and Da Hei were in a rush, so after they packed their stuff, they hurried out of the door.
Lin Mu watched them walk far away, sent a message to Di Wu, and this time, bluntly explained the situation to him.
It took a long time for Di Wu to reply.
Lin Mu took out his phone to look.
It was only a period.
So Lin Mu sent a question mark over.
Di Wu had his hand supporting his face, and looked at the jade that had managed to personally nudge out a reply to his son"s message with great difficulty, and in the face of Lin Mu"s question mark fell into a high-quality silence, and couldn"t help but laugh.
The author has this to say:
Milky: I am very firm, the problem wasn"t big. Dignified.jpg
Di Xiu: ?.jpg
The translator has this to add:
No non-disclosure doesn"t mean permission to disclose, Lin Mu.
A sleepy, sleepy couch potato that adores BL. Only second to sleeping.