Chapter 29 Anger
“A horse doesn’t know how long its face is, and a bull doesn’t know how to bend its horn. I’ve never seen a person with such thick skin as you.” Pang Bo pushed aside his hand and gave him a slanting glare, taking away the three fragrant fruits.
“How can you say something like that?” Li Changqing couldn’t hold back, and not caring about his face at all, he said, “We’re all classmates who’ve come to a new strange world, we should all be helping each other out. Right now we’re all hungry; now that you’ve found food you should take it out to split with everyone. Or do you plan on eating it all yourself?”
“Wow, do you not feel embarrassed saying such a thing?” Pang Bo sneered, saying, “Who was it that secretly ate chocolate in the bronze coffin? Why didn’t you think of helping everyone then? And now you’re putting on such a righteous manner, don’t make me laugh. When I look at you I feel even more disgusted than when I saw those divine alligators. Go stupidly stand over there, I don’t feel like bothering with you!”
Li Changqing’s face immediately paled and he choked. He was simply powerless to refute this.
Although Pang Bo spoke very brashly, it didn’t mean he wasn’t a careful person. He naturally knew Li Changqing’s intent. If he split them, then Li Changqing would get a portion, and if he didn’t split it with the many people here, then their hearts would naturally have a bad opinion of Pang Bo and Ye Fan.
“I’m sorry everyone, but there isn’t enough. We only have five fruits, so it’s simply not enough to split. Yiyi’s body is very frail, so no one will any objections to giving her two, right?” Pang Bo was not looking at anyone, and instead split up the fruits on his own. “Zhang Ziling, here you go.” Throwing him a fruit, he then continued, “These five fruits were found by Ye Fan and myself, so naturally there must be a reward for us, right?”
Pang Bo directly stuffed the fourth fruit into Ye Fan’s mouth, and as for the fifth one, he himself took a giant bite, eating half of it in one gulp.
The five fruits were split just like that. Liu Yiyi uneasily said, “I…I can just eat half, we should still split it with everyone.”
She wanted to hand the bright red fruit back, but Ye Fan pushed it back, saying, “Don’t worry, we can definitely find more wild fruits in this lush vegetation.”
Pang Bo also scowled back, urging her to eat. He knew that these fruits were definitely not ordinary. After eating it, he was filled with energy and all his exhaustion was swept away. There probably were additional benefits that had yet to appear.
“But...” Liu Yiyi still felt a bit awkward, and she looked over at everyone.
“Yiyi, you’re too kind. It’s not good.” Pang Bo whispered, “Many of them are secretly carrying chocolate, but you don’t see anyone taking it out to share with everyone.”
Only when she saw Ye Fan nod towards her did Liu Yiyi finally stop pushing it away.
“Everyone, I still have some chocolate. Everyone can split it up and share.” At this moment, Liu Yunzhi suddenly walked up and distributed a couple packages of chocolate to everyone.
“I don’t want any!” Pang Bo immediately became furious. This was an undisguised slap to his face. He was angered to the point that his teeth hurt from clenching, but all he could do was endure this formless slap in the face. Even if he were to jump up, he still didn’t have anything to say.
“Look like it’s Yunzhi who is really loyal!” Li Changqing opened up a chocolate package and stuffed it into his mouth. He didn’t forget to praise him or to cast a sideways glance at Pang Bo and Ye Fan.
“Only when people suffer together can we see their true hearts...” The woman who always followed beside Liu Yunzhi also spoke in such a manner.
This caused Pang Bo’s expression to become even more unsightly, and he quietly cursed, “If he had them, then why didn’t he take them out sooner? Now that we’re on a mountain filled with lush greenery, it’s extremely likely we’ll find wild fruits. The chocolate is already useless now, so he’s just taking it out now to show off his attitude. Like hell I’m going to praise him like he’s some Daoist saint.”
“When the path is long we have to trust horses; when the days are long we have to trust people’s hearts. In the future, as we move forward in this new world, I will definitely stick next to you, Yunzhi.” Li Changqing purposefully spoke such words with an appropriate expression before sighing, not forgetting to sweep a glance towards Ye Fan and Pang Bo again.
Having been easily slapped in the face by Liu Yunzhi, and then also satirized by another man and woman, Pang Bo had been angered to the point that he wanted to explode, but with everyone’s eyes watching him, he could only endure.
Everyone surveyed the mountain and land. They finally decided on a direction that they thought would lead them off the mountain and closer to other humans in the shortest time.
Without delaying too much, everyone began walking down the mountain and entered into a mountain forest. Carefully walking forward, each person carried a wooden stick in order to defend against wild animals. After all, the divine relics were practically completely broken.
But even after walking over half a day, not even a small mountain mouse could be seen, let alone a large beast or flying birds.
“It really is a Forbidden Land. Even birds aren’t crapping here,” observed Li Changqing.
Pang Bo ridiculed him, “You should rejoice. If we do find a wild beast, you can just hide your ass here.”
The mountain was filled with dense vegetation, and everyone managed to find many wild fruits which temporarily relieved their food problems. But even once the sky was beginning to darken, they still had yet to exit the forest. The vast mountain seemed to be without end, with one hill appearing after another.
“Do you think we took a wrong turn and are now entering into the depths of the forest?” Some people were wondering if they were on the right path, but in the end, they still decided to continue forward.
Once the sky became completely dark, everyone had no choice but to stop within the mountains. They decided to continue the next day.
This was a night that caused people to have difficulty staying calm. Around midnight, everyone heard a sudden hair-raising howl that pierced through the air loudly and shrilly. It was followed by the clanking of iron chains being dragged, causing people to feel cold all over.
In this deep and gloomy mountain forest, those sounds seemed to be like ghosts struggling against their chains, making everyone’s heart beat faster.
“It sounds like…it’s coming from the abyss of the Ancient Desolation Forbidden Land.” Many people were trembling with fear as they looked towards the distant nine mountains that surrounded the immense abyss.
Late at night, the trees’ shadows danced in the breeze, appearing like ghosts coming and going.
The howl became even louder, shaking the entire mountain. The forest shook, and leaves tumbled down from the trees.
A gloomy and chilly air spread from the Ancient Desolation Forbidden Land’s abyss, shocking everyone. They were already separated by an extremely long distance from the abyss, but the frightening thing was they could still feel this dreadful air.
Clang, clang…
Intense tremors exploded out in the night, as if some colossal monster was striking metal, causing the entire mountain to shake.
Everyone’s expression simultaneously changed, involuntarily recalling a certain thing.
“The nine titanic dragon corpses and the ancient bronze coffin fell down into the abyss…”
“Don’t tell me that…”
This kind of oppressive and powerful clanging sounded like someone was explosively banging against the bronze coffin, causing people to feel like a gloomy chill in the air and making their hairs to stand on end.
“What…is that?!”
Many people were extremely shocked, and at the same time, they were very frightened. The huge bronze coffin was a complete mystery, and even at this moment, no one understood what it was. Just what kind of thing would be striking it in such a manner? After all, the ancient coffin had easily sucked up all the divine energy from their Buddhist items.
“Ancient Desolation Forbidden Land…is its meaning that this place has been a Forbidden Land since the Ancient Desolation?”
“No one has dared step foot here since the Ancient Desolation…”
Clang, clang...
The deafening sound of the bronze coffin being violently smashed once more sounded through the world, causing the earth to shake. The forest’s trees were constantly trembling, their leaves sporadically fluttering about.
A howl ripped through the air, sounding even more angry and loud than before. It was hard to imagine just what kind of thing was down in the abyss.
“We should be celebrating. If the nine dragon corpses and the huge bronze coffin had not fallen into the abyss and attracted that thing’s interest, it might have come attacked us in the night. If that did happen, we probably wouldn’t have survived…”
It was definitely a possibility. This place was called the Ancient Desolation Forbidden Land; even birds and beasts didn’t dare to step foot here, so they could imagine just how dreadful this place was. Who knew what kind of terrifying existences lived here.
“Existences from the time of the Ancient Desolation…it really is hard to imagine!”
“Looks like he won’t be able to do anything to that mysterious bronze coffin for a while, so we can be considered a bit lucky.”
The night became restless, as many people couldn’t fall back asleep after this.
BOOM!
Suddenly, a violent explosive sound came from the distant mountains. A violent earthquake shook the abyss and endless amounts of black fog surged out of it. The fog completely covered the sky, blocking out all the stars and the moon, making it appear particularly oppressing.
Rumble!
Suddenly, all the black fog was sucked back into the abyss in an instant. The stars in the sky once more began to shine, but the scene they just saw was still very shocking.
There had been an indistinct shadow within the fog whose shape could not be identified as either man or beast. Thick iron chains that were hundreds of meters long swung throughout the air, chains that could restrain the whole world! Considering how far they were, it was possible to imagine just how thick these iron chains were since they were still visible. The ear-splitting howl almost shocked people into unconsciousness; the roiling sound wave painfully pierced people’s ears.
That thing was bound by the huge iron chains, but it still managed to madly swing throughout the sky! Its fierce might was unrivaled, and as if it were amassing energy, it once more let out a ferocious roar before diving back into the abyss.
Clang, clang…
The sound of the huge bronze coffin being smashed once more began to ring out.
“Do you think it’s trying to open the inner coffin?”
“Probably. After all, the huge outer coffin has already opened, so there’s no point for it to be smashing it.”
Everyone’s hearts were filled with fear and alarm. Only after half the night passed did the abyss calm down. No more sounds came out, and everyone uneasily fell asleep.
The second day, the sun had already risen high into the air before everyone once more awoke. After drinking some water from a stream and eating some wild fruits, they once more pressed on.
They walked more than two or three hours without a rest. Everyone wanted to leave this place as soon as possible. The Ancient Desolation Forbidden Land caused too much anxiety, and they definitely wanted to leave this region before nightfall.
By noon, the scorching sun was hanging in the sky. They were actually quite fortunate to have the forest cover as shade. While they were climbing up a tall hill, everyone heard a distant beast roar.
“We should be able to walk out of this forbidden land soon.”
“Huh, there are cranes flying there. Then this might be an immortal land, maybe with immortal people…[i]” Some people’s thoughts were wandering quite a bit, and they quickly associated what they saw with the immortal people of legends.
Everyone’s footsteps quickened with this thought. People split up into three groups and two pairs as they quietly discussed separating into different paths after they found signs of human habitation in order to start new lives.
At this moment, Ye Fan noticed that Liu Yiyi appeared somewhat aggrieved and unhappy, so he asked, “What’s wrong, Liu Yiyi?”
“Wang Ba took my prayer beads and won’t give them back…” Liu Yiyi felt a bit wronged, and she was even a bit angry.
“Her? It’s definitely Liu Yunzhi’s prompting again!” Pang Bo was already angry, and this, in particular, was the female classmate who was always standing by Liu Yunzhi and contending against Ye Fan and Pang Bo.
Ye Fan didn’t say anything extra when he heard. Quickly striding towards Liu Yunzhi as well as Wang Bo and Li Changqing, he extended his arm and demanded, “Hand it over!”
“What are you saying?” asked Li Changqing, without the slightest sign of backing down.
“Stop with your crap, hand over the prayer beads!” Ye Fan wasn’t someone who didn’t have a temper, it was simply that he had restrained himself this whole time. But once he did become infuriated, it was an extremely frightful thing.
“Oh, you’re talking about that. I was just playing around with them for a bit, but then I felt that I actually liked them, so I exchanged them with Liu Yiyi for my bronze bell,” explained Wang Bo.
Ye Fan turned to look at Liu Yiyi. The others also stopped and turned to look back.
“I… I didn’t exchange with her, she took the prayer beads from me. She forced the bronze bell into my hand.” Liu Yiyi felt quite wronged. Under everyone’s gaze, she appeared quite nervous, making her appear quite pitiful and lovely.
“Yiyi, don’t make stuff up. You obviously wanted to exchange,” said Wang Bo.
“Hand it over! I don’t want this nonsense to continue.” At this moment, Ye Fan swept his gaze over Liu Yunzhi, Wang Bo, and Li Changqing. “I don’t have any more patience. Now that we’re about to leave this danger, don’t do anything that will hurt you!”
__________________________
[i] The term for the crane used here is 仙鹤, 仙 meaning immortal, as in immortal land and immortal people. 鹤 on its own does mean crane, but together, 仙鹤is a common term for a certain kind of crane, the red-crowned crane, also known as the Japanese crane.
Translator notes:
My assumption is that people saw the red-crowned crane, and linked its individual word meaning to associate it with immortal land and immortal people, not that they are seeing immortal cranes. I’m not going to call them Japanese cranes or red-crowned cranes in the story, because unlike in Chinese where it links up to immortality, Japanese and red-crowned do not bring forth an association to immortals. I also can’t exactly call them immortal cranes.