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Chapter 2:That Type of Posture Truly Made People Feel Embarrassed
>>Part 1<<
After walking speedily past two streets, Chen Luonian suddenly stopped and turned around. What appeared in his sight was Huai Zhen, wearing a little western-styled dress that reached her knees as she peeked out from an alleyway to the side and smiled at him.
“Why did you run out here?” Chen Luonian approached and asked, “And why are you hiding here?”
“I’m hiding to avoid being hit on.” Huai Zhen bounced out of the alleyway and pulled Chen Luonian’s arm as she said, “I was worried about you ah. Did you encounter monsters?”
“En, I killed a couple small monsters.” Chen Luonian looked at the envious expressions on the faces of the people around them and lowered his voice. “This dagger is pretty good, it’s just too short. It can’t cut into monsters that are large.”
Huai Zhen’s eyes twirled and she giggled but didn’t speak.
“What?” Chen Luonian looked Huai Zhen up and down. “You’re hiding something from me again.”
“In any case, you’ll be able to tell if I lie, so it’s better just to not say it.” Huai Zhen smiled as she said, “If it’s too short, just chop your way through and cut it to pieces.”
“Easy for you to say. Right now these types of monsters are small with only weak monster qis and no intelligence, so it’s fine once you scatter their monster qi.” Chen Luonian muttered, “If it was a type whose entire body was filled with monster qi like that Chisel Tooth, how am I supposed to deal with it?”
“One way is to just swallow them into your stomach directly, then digest and refine them!” Huai Zhen said.
“I don’t have a throat as large as yours.” Chen Luonian said in ill humor.
“Otherwise, just attack and scatter them bit by bit.” Huai Zhen thought for a while, then continued, “Actually, each type of monster has a core area where they congregate their monster qi. Once you disperse that area, the other monster qis would also go out of control and disperse. It just depends on whether you know where its vital point is.”
“Oh?” Chen Luonian was a bit surprised and glanced at Huai Zhen.
“You’re not allowed to look.” Huai Zhen reached over to cover Chen Luonian’s eyes as she said, “If one day you see through me and find my vital point, you can’t say it out loud no matter what. You can’t even say it to me. The immortal world is filled with things with unnaturally good hearing. I’d be in big trouble if someone found out about it.”
“How am I anywhere close to being that amazing?” Chen Luonian found it funny and said so as he pulled away Huai Zhen’s hand.
“If there really exists someone that would be able to tell, that person would be you.” Huai Zhen said in a quiet voice, “After all, no one knows what the Phoenix Spirit can do.”
“Phoenix Spirit?” Chen Luonian heard a new term again and his brows furrowed.
“The spirit of the phoenix.” Huai Zhen said. “Didn’t I say that you exchanged spirits with the phoenix? The reason why you have a portion of the phoenix’s power is because you switched to this sort of spirit.”
Chen Luonian thought for a while and finally asked a question that had been lingering in his heart for a long time. “Do I still count as a human? Or am I a monster?”
Huai Zhen blinked her eyes and asked, “What’s the definition of human? How is it different from a monster?”
“Uh…” Chen Luonian was at a loss as to how he should respond for a while.
“Don’t think about these complicated things.” Huai Zhen smiled and said, “Those little monsters that had eaten their fill seem to have all went to hid in the mountain. Want to go watch the lively show?”
“How?” Chen Luonian asked, surprised.
“I’ll take you.” Huai Zhen seized Chen Luonian’s waist. Then, the two suddenly burst through the air and headed straight towards the clear sky.
“Hey!” Chen Luonian was extremely shocked and said, “Aren’t you worried people will see?” That’s strange. The people from earlier didn’t seem to have noticed?
“I’ve set an Eye-Diverting Array. People that haven’t reached a certain level in cultivation won’t be able to see.” Huai Zhen said proudly.
“Then what were you hiding for earlier? Wouldn’t it have been fine if you just used this trick?” Chen Luonian asked, puzzled.
“This is a way to influence the operation of the inner brain within a certain range using a combination of monster qi and dao techniques. It’s not like you’ve really disappeared.” Huai Zhen explained, “You can see the true reality through mirrors, water surfaces and some photographs, cameras, and things like that. That’s why it can’t be used for long periods in a single place, it’ll scare people.”
“That’s why it’s more suitable for moving moments?” Chen Luonian asked.
“That’s right ah.” Huai Zhen pointed downwards and said, “Wah, there’s so many metal plated cars.”
Chen Luonian looked down and couldn’t help but be amused as he said, “Those are tanks.”
Currently, all the roads below that led to the mountain were guarded by troops. Groups after groups of soldiers set up cheval de frise and carried loaded rifles as they guarded the roads. As for the forest, though it looked quiet, it was completely filled with monster qi. It was unknown how many monsters had hidden in there.
“How amusing. They’re assigning everyone to the roads. Could it be that they think the monsters only travel across big streets?” Huai Zhen laughed.
“They’re probably guarding it just to give the public a sense of security.” Chen Luonian said, “Even if they really surrounded the entire mountain, won’t types like you still be able to fly out?”
“These small monsters don’t know how to fly.” Huai Zhen smiled as she said, “Unless they’re bird types and use their wings to fly.”
“There’s quite a lot of people killing monsters.” Chen Luonian sensed the monster qi and qi xi inside the forest as he said, “They’ll probably be able to get quite a lot of monster essence today.”
“Your friends are over there.” Huai Zhen suddenly pointed over and floated with Chen Luonian towards the west side of the mountain.
As expected, it was Lai Yixin and the rest. Chen Luonian watched from far away as the five of them speedily subjugated the monsters and placed the defeated monsters into their backpacks. He couldn’t help but find it laughable that he had forgotten he could pick up the monsters he killed earlier to present them as gifts.
The two followed them for a while. Seeing that there didn’t seem to be much of anything interesting, they were just about to head home when they suddenly saw about four black-robed men appear and block the path of Ye Weishan’s group.
“What’s going on?” Chen Luonian was a bit surprised.
Huai Zhen’s hearing was keener than Chen Luonian’s. She listened for a while, then said, “Sounds like they’re fighting over the monster carcasses.”
“Can we get a little closer?” Chen Luonian asked.
“If we get too close, the Eye-Diverting Array may lose its effect.” Huai Zhen said, “They all have qi xi, especially that Weishan meimei. She’s specialized in cultivating outer qi so her sensitivity towards external spell techniques is especially high.”
“Oh, then let’s just listen and see what they’re talking about.” Chen Luonian said.
Huai Zhen listened for a while before turning back to say, “It seems like those people want them to hand the carcasses over. They say that they were going to gather all of them and divide them or something.”
Chen Luonian slightly knitted his brows as he said, “Could it be that the Li Sect is trying to bully others again?”
“That black-faced Liang something started arguing with them.” Huai Zhen said, “Zhiwen is joining in on the fun, Yixin is mediating, Weishan’s not speaking… hey, another one came.”
Chen Luonian looked over and was slightly startled. The person that had newly arrived was rather familiar. So it turned out that it was that black-robed youth that was killing monsters with him earlier. The guy only said a few words to both sides before those four black-clothed men retreated, seeming a bit embarrassed. Then, all that was left was him and Weishan’s group.
“Oh, he told those people to leave.” Huai Zhen said, “He seems to be a good person, and his status also seems higher.”
Chen Luonian felt happy for Ye Weishan and the others. He nodded and said, “So it turns out that there are also good people in the Li Sect.”
“Hm?” Huai Zhen listened for a bit, then suddenly looked at Chen Luonian as she said, “Hey, they’ve brought you up.”
“Huh?” Chen Luonian was stunned for a moment before he asked, “What does that mean?”
Huai Zhen smiled as she said, “He asked why the Bai Sect was missing a person. Weishan and the others didn’t get what he meant so he started describing your appearance. So it turns out that your features are fair and clean with a scholar-like weak physique, you tend to fight like your life depends on it and have a cold indifferent expression?”
“It’s probably not talking about me?” Chen Luonian knitted his brows.
“And you’re still saying it’s not? The moment that person said that, all five said it was you ah.” Huai Zhen started giggling.
“Tsk!” Chen Luonian had nothing he could say. Only a while later did he manage to grumble, “At what point did I seem like I was fighting like my life depended on it earlier?”
Huai Zhen listened for a while more before asking, “You fought together with that guy? He said you killed like a dozen monsters and is telling the Bai Sect to go get the monster essence.”
“It was nothing close to that much though?” Chen Luonian furrowed his brows. Seeing that the person below had already parted ways with Ye Weishan’s group, he immediately shook his head and said, “Let’s head back. I have to think about how I should go about explaining it.”
“Strongly denying it would work. You can just say that you’re really good at fighting. In any case, these are just small monsters. Even ordinary people that are familiar with martial arts should be able to defeat them.” Huai Zhen said with a smile, “After all, the Original Chaos Breath isn’t like monster qi or qi xi. Humans and monsters of ordinary cultivation levels are incapable of sensing it.”
“Oh?” Chen Luonian said, “If you didn’t bring it up, I wouldn’t have remembered. How come they didn’t feel your monster qi?”
“It’s not like I’m some small monster!” Huai Zhen used her finger to jab Chen Luonian’s cheek. “As long as I have inner control and restrain my qi, even you, with your Phoenix Spirit body, can only discover me once you come into a range of within twenty steps. As for these people, even if they cultivate one hundred years more, they still wouldn’t be able to sense me.”
So it was like that. Chen Luonian calmed down. When the time comes, he’ll just persist in saying that he had practice martial arts before in order to tide this over.
◇◇◇◇
When they returned home, Chen Luonian and Huai Zhen squeezed into the sofa and watched the news on TV for two hours straight. As expected, similar phenomenons had occurred throughout the entirety of Taiwan. And it wasn’t just Taiwan either. To the north all the way to Russia, the south all the way to Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, and large parts of China had all been affected. Even though it was only small monsters that appeared, most people were helpless against them. Even with the army and martial dao school members immediately responding, the casualties were still devastating. Just in the land of Taiwan, several hundreds had died. It could be inferred how large of an effect this incident would cause.
Before today, the questions of monster appearances was just one of the topics during leisure time. Even though there would occasionally be a person or two sacrificing their lives, the number was really low. It hadn’t even been as high as the people that went missing or committed suicide everyday. However, after today’s incident, everyone started to face this question. How exactly were they supposed to deal with monsters that normal people had no way of contending against?
Some broadcasting stations found some monster specialists that didn’t really know what they were talking about to explain how to escape upon encountering a monster. Some broadcasting stations severely criticized the government for not preparing enough beforehand and for being so inefficient after the event. Of course, inevitably, there were also people that jumped out and said that the president should resign due to the incident of monsters killing people.
Most of the monsters that had appeared in dense, populated places were killed by human troops and martial dao school members after they had fed on humans. However, there were much more monsters that appeared in the sea or in desolate areas. They were now roaming all over the world. At the same time as the news was being broadcast, the death toll was still unceasingly increasing.
After the event, the members of martial dao schools in the West gathered one after another in East Asia. People had also figured out that as long as they had enough firepower, they would be able to kill monsters even if they didn’t know the qi techniques of martial dao schools. Due to this, the confidence of all the nations’ armies increased and they all entered the highest combat ready state. In each country, the military drove troops out in trucks and established battle operation bases in various areas in preparation for any turbulent situation that might arise. All the nations of the West were also consulting with the East Asian governments to prepare to assist in combat. There was no need to consider the difference in their political positions now since the monsters were humankind’s common enemy.
In short, though the events this evening didn’t seem very severe at first glance, it had already mobilized the entire world.
Even though Chen Luonian was part of it today, as he watched the news, he felt an intense surreal sensation as if everything the TV was showing was false. Were the events today really that severe?
“Look.” Huai Zhen blurted out as the TV started showing the regions where the monsters appeared on a map. “The central area is right near the north sea. It was definitely caused by those people…”
From the looks of the position, the north sea Huai Zhen was talking about was probably in the Yellow Sea and Bohai Sea area. Chen Luonian asked, astonished, “Didn’t they know that their actions would cause so many deaths? And didn’t you originally say that a really strong monster would appear?”
“This was probably just a test and not the official one yet.” Huai Zhen twisted her body and sat onto Chen Luonian’s thigh sideways. “And there’s so many humans, what does it matter if a few die? See, now with so many little monsters, they’re easy to kill and large amounts of monster essence could be collected. It’d allow for more humans to go through Bian Ti… Hey, it itches, scratch that part for me.” Once she finished speaking, she turned around and grabbed Chen Luonian’s neck.
What Huai Zhen said made sense. It wasn’t strange at all for someone to do this. It was probably just a little too ruthless… Chen Luonian thought as he hugged Huai Zhen and scratched her back. Chen Luonian knew that she liked it when he did this, but it always had to be a scratching motion that went from top to bottom. It couldn’t be the other way around, otherwise Huai Zhen would get angry. If she got super angry, she would even bite him.
As expected, after scratching a little, Huai Zhen stretched out on top of Chen Luonian and started humming ‘mmmnnn’. Right at this moment, the door suddenly opened and Chen Luonian’s uncle Chen Shangshan appeared in the doorway with a vexed expression.
__________
Credits: Translated by Chiyomira, Edited by Sigil
[Chiyomira’s Corner]
炁 (qi) is defined in Chinese wiki as the most fundamental energy that supports human life and function. I didn’t realize that these past chapters had been talking about monster qi and monster essence, which were two different terms. Monster qi is the monster’s general life energy and monster essence I guess is the concentrated form when they die?
In any case, I’ll fix past chapters later. To bring up another matter, how would you guys feel if I replaced ‘qi’ with the term chakra? Chakra = each of the centers of spiritual power in the human body, usually considered to be seven in number. Replace or keep as ‘qi’?
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