Chapter 127: Waiting for the Rabbit by the Tree

The Xumi Monastery was shrouded in uncanny strangeness. With Zhou Qing’s current level of cultivation, any attempt at vengeance would only mean casting away his own life in vain.

Yet the golden figure that had dragged Lin Yunxi into these waters seemed solely intent on fleeing. In Zhou Qing’s eyes, if it truly possessed great powers, it would not be so desperate to escape. Thus, he reasoned, the creature had no remarkable abilities—at most, it was a newly awakened spirit of the river, still unseasoned.

This aquatic spirit, born and raised in the water, had attained some measure of cultivation. Even though it carried a passenger, its speed still outstripped Zhou Qing’s.

Though left behind and unable to keep up, Zhou Qing did not give up the pursuit.

At first, as he chased, anxiety gnawed at him; he feared for Lin Yunxi’s safety. But as time passed and she remained lost beneath the waters, he could only assume she had perished.

His anxiety faded, replaced by a deep grief and a burning hatred. Driven by this hatred, he raced along the river as swiftly as he could.

In these remote mountain forests, untroubled by human hunters, the river creatures had little fear of disturbances. Thus, as Zhou Qing pressed onward, schools of fish would merely shift to avoid him, scattering only slightly before regrouping.

Though the fish did not disperse far, their sudden, minor deviations left discernible trails. So, while Zhou Qing could not match the golden figure’s speed, the scattered schools offered him clues to follow.

After floating along the broad river for a while, Zhou Qing spotted a smaller tributary, some thirty to forty feet wide, joining from the banks.

Ahead, in the main river, the fish had gathered undisturbed, their formation unbroken, suggesting no one had passed through. Zhou Qing halted at the tributary’s mouth.

Given the golden figure’s speed, it must have left Zhou Qing far behind. The fish, having since regrouped, only confirmed this. Yet Zhou Qing felt a strange certainty: the figure had entered this tributary.

Believing Lin Yunxi lost, Zhou Qing’s haste lessened; although determined to find the golden figure, he was in no rush. After a brief pause beneath the river’s surface, he slipped into the smaller stream.

The current was swift. He drifted along for nearly a mile, eventually arriving beneath a small lake.

Circling the lakebed, he found no other outlets, but at the lake’s center, he saw a bottomless pit from which a powerful jet of water surged upward.

He circled the jet, then merged into it, letting his will guide him as he plunged into the depths below.

But the force of the upwelling water was immense, and Zhou Qing’s command of the element was weak. He managed only about sixty feet downward before he could go no farther.

Hampered further by the use of only his right arm, deeper descent was impossible. He hovered twenty fathoms below the surface, relaxed his focus, and with a great rush, the current propelled him back up, launching him from the water like an arrow loosed from a bow.

He soared several yards above the lake before twisting in midair and landing steadily upon the surface.

Surveying the lake’s perimeter, he saw nothing unusual besides the bottomless pit. He dove again, retracing his path along the tributary he had entered.

Returning to the main river, he floated downstream once more.

He traveled some thirty miles further before stopping. Since the aquatic spirit had appeared in the waters he had previously traversed, its lair could not be far from that stretch.

Continuing downstream would only take him farther from his quarry.

He halted in the broad river, then turned back.

On his way, he recalled four tributaries joining the main river. One was where Lin Yunxi had been taken, another led to the lake, and the other two he had merely passed by.

He chose to investigate the two unexplored branches.

Soon he reached the mouth of a tributary five or six yards wide. He followed it for some seven miles before emerging at the mouth of another tributary—both connected back to the main river.

Thus, these seven miles formed a semicircular loop, and nothing along the way appeared out of the ordinary.

Returning to the main channel, Zhou Qing reached a conclusion.

The spirit was most likely hiding beneath the bottomless pit in the lake, though there remained a slim chance it had fled fifty miles further downstream.

After pondering in silence, Zhou Qing chose to float a hundred miles downriver. If he found no trace, he would return to the lake and watch the pit, waiting for the spirit to emerge.

A hundred miles was half a day’s march on land, but in the water, Zhou Qing’s speed was much slower. After several round trips, he found nothing and returned to the area where Lin Yunxi had been seized. Unknowingly, two days and a night had passed.

Having surpassed the fasting stage and reached the refined essence realm, Zhou Qing felt no fatigue. He searched tirelessly, his red figure moving like a phantom, eventually returning to the lake.

The lake was small, its edges thick with underwater weeds. Slipping into the dense vegetation, he concealed himself, watching the water jet at the center for any sign of movement.

Time flowed quietly. Bored beneath the surface, Zhou Qing tried to sit cross-legged and meditate, curious whether he could absorb spiritual energy from within the water as on land.

With each breath, invisible currents of spiritual energy, like fish, entered his body through the water—no different than on land.

This realization surprised him.

Sitting quietly amid the weeds, he split his focus between cultivation and watching the bottomless pit at the lake’s heart, awaiting any sign from the spirit below.