Chapter 196 – Flower’s World
Zhao Hai and the others sat in the living room, but the atmosphere was quite odd. Green and Meg were smiling and Meg said, “Grandpa, grandma, you don’t know how anxious I was when we faced that Rank Nine expert. The Young Master, however, wasn’t nervous at all and spoke with confidence in front of it. It was really amazing.”
“Who said I wasn’t nervous,” said Zhao Hai, smiling. “That was a Rank Nine expert and I wasn’t strong at all against it. I found out, however, that Zhao Wen didn’t have any evil intentions toward us. Since we were out in the open, nervous, we naturally must speak in order to communicate with it.”
Green and the others smiled. Shown on the screen was Zhao Wen holding the Ghost Cane as she flew towards Flower City. Zhao Wen was quick, and she also knew where Flower City was. She naturally wouldn’t take the wrong route.
The good atmosphere in the room was naturally due to Zhao Wen. After Zhao Wen joined their clan, they felt more daring. Don’t even speak about the Markey Dell clan, even if it were the whole of the Aksu Empire, they wouldn’t be afraid[1].
On the continent, only those clans which had a Rank Nine expert in reserve could be called a genuine and respectable clan. If the Buda clan had a Rank Nine in the past, then they wouldn’t have fallen to their current status and situation.
And these weren’t the only advantages they had obtained here. One must know that a Rank Nine expert was a good deterrent force against the magic beast riots that rampaged throughout the Black Waste. The clan could ask Zhao Wen to act and frighten off the invaders. Even if they couldn’t deal with every magic beast and undead invader, they could at least protect the people, crops, and castle.
But Zhao Hai and the others also knew that Zhao Wen couldn’t move so casually. She was still a Rank Nine expert of Carrion Swamp. If the other Rank Nines knew of her actions, then it might spark greater trouble. After all, there was still the treaty between the Flower Protection Alliance and the other factions on the continent.
Anyway, since they now had a Rank Nine expert, their morale had been bolstered. They were confident enough to face the Markey Dell clan.
Before long, Zhao Wen reached the outskirts of Flower City. She hadn’t encountered any problems along the way. Although there were some magic beasts, when they saw Zhao Wen they immediately lay on the ground and didn’t dare to move. Wild animals and beasts had strong intuition. With regards to the existence of a Rank Nine magic beast expert, they were, without a doubt, revered as deities. No one dared to violate the prestige of a deity.
Zhao Hai soon found that he could communicate with Zhao Wen when she held the Ghost Cane. It was as if Zhao Wen was still with Zhao Hai. Seemingly, the Ghost Cane acted similarly to a long-distance remote control[2].
Zhao Wen suddenly stopped and told Zhao Hai, “Young Master, not far from here is Flower City. There shouldn’t be any magic beast that goes further than where I currently am. If a magic beast crosses this distance, the seven-colored flower might be alarmed and might call in other magic beasts.“
Zhao Hai knew she meant the other Rank Nine experts. He naturally didn’t hope to see them, so he nodded and said, “Alright, pass the Ghost Cane on to the eagle.” He released an eagle afterward and returned Zhao Wen to the Space.
After waiting for the eagle to go out, Zhao Hai found that the eagle seemed a little different. This made him magnify the screen so he could carefully observe the eagle.
Green and the others also looked carefully. This eagle was truly different than the original eagles. The original eagles had dark brown feathers, while this one had blood-red colored ones. Although they had similar beaks, this one had sharper talons. Moreover, Zhao Hai observed that the tip of these talons were hollow, like the proboscis of the Devouring Blood-Mosquitoes.
Zhao Hai hadn’t thought that the evolved eagle’s flying speed would have increased by so much. Having such thoughts, Zhao Hai moved himself to the ranch. Once there, he observed no noticeable changes. The blue-eyed rabbits stayed the same, as Zhao Hai had thought they may also have turned red, or at least larger.
Zhao Hai nodded, then returned to the living room and sat back down. Green was puzzled. He looked at Zhao Hai and asked, “Young Master, what did you do?”
Smiling, Zhao Hai said, “Nothing, I just went to the ranch. Anyway, Zhao Wen, what do you usually eat?”
Zhao Wen replied, “Nothing in particular. We eat some magic beasts, any kind of magic beast. With regards to our kind, what we eat isn’t very important.”
Zhao Hai nodded. “How much do you eat everyday?”
Zhao Wen shook her head and said, “This is something I cannot answer clearly. Sometimes, I eat a lot in a day, sometimes, I do not eat for many days. It depends on my mood. If I am in a good mood for eating, then I’ll eat. Otherwise, I won’t.”
Zhao Hai smiled. “You are too easy to feed. This is good. If you want to go out to find food later, just catch a few magic beasts and bring them back.” Zhao Wen complied, but was actually seriously looking at the screen. Zhao Hai couldn’t help but shake his head while smiling. Zhao Wen’s appearance was like that of a child focusing on watching television on Earth.
Zhao Wen’s strength was tyrannical, moreover, her intelligence wasn’t low. Now, however, due to the changes in her life and her new associations with humans, she began to study things. She must have felt curious about many things, and it gave off a child-like feeling.
The eagle had been flying towards Flower City all this time and Zhao Hai didn’t speak. They really wanted to know what would the results be when the eagle reached Flower City.
At present, Zhao Hai had more than a thousand Eagle Virtuous Phantasms. Even if a few were to be sacrificed, it wouldn’t be much, therefore, Zhao Hai wasn’t worried.
Soon, a city wall appeared in the screen. The city walls were really large, around 67 meters[3] high. The top of the walls were covered with a layer of green vines. Only these large vines can be seen along the profile of the city walls.
These vines bloomed with numerous seven-colored flowers. Furthermore, these flowers were immensely large, none smaller than a meter in diameter and some reaching as big as two to three meters. Zhao Hai had never seen such large flowers.
What surprised Zhao Hai the most was that each flower had seven petals, each uniquely colored. These seven petals had the same colors as a rainbow and were both beautiful and alluring.
Green also watched the scenes on the screen blankly. What they saw was too beautiful, a beauty that made people forget to even breathe. Zhao Hai now understood. Previously, Buffy had described it to them, but now that they saw it, it really was too beautiful, too intolerably and extremely beautiful[4].
After some time, Meg whispered, “It’s beautiful, too beautiful here. If one day Fort Iron Mountain would be like this too, then that will be amazing. Master, will we be able to cut a flower branch off and bring it back to grow?”
Zhao Hai couldn’t help but smile as he looked at Meg. “You are quite daring to think of cutting off a branch of flowers. Aren’t you afraid that the flowers might eat you? Have you forgotten that Buffy ran away from this flower, and even Little Wen here says those flowers are powerful.”
Zhao Wen was, after all, a magic beast. She didn’t know if a flower was beautiful, only that it was strong. After hearing what Zhao Hai said, Zhao Wen couldn’t help but fly over and nod. She looked at Meg and said, “Yes, that flower is very fierce. Don’t even talk about if we can beat it; all of the Rank Nines in the Carrion Swamp combined wouldn’t necessarily be able to beat it.”
Zhao Hai hadn’t expected such an analysis of the seven-colored flower’s strength to come out of Zhao Wen. Zhao Hao then observed that there were no animals within Flower City.
Here in the Carrion Swamp, there were numerous magic beasts. Zhao Hai had met a lot of them along the way. Generally, however, there weren’t a lot of flying magic beasts that would participate in large scale fighting, even against their prey. If these magic beasts wished to deal with the eagles, it wouldn’t be a good idea due to the eagle’s comparative combat prowess of a Rank Six.
And how big was Flower City? This was a city that could accommodate 500,000 people. A city without any large buildings that could house 500,000 people wouldn’t be small, right? Although the screen couldn’t display much, they still hadn’t seen any flying magic beasts after a while. This matter was somewhat strange.
Zhao Hai just recalled what he had seen on the screen and he couldn’t help but be frightened. This was due to the fact that after the eagle entered Flower City, the green dots that represented magic beasts all disappeared. In other words, there wasn’t any magic beasts within Flower City.
Since they were entranced by the beautiful shades and colors of Flower City, they hadn’t noticed this point before. Now that Zhao Hai thought about it, he couldn’t help but pay attention to Flower City.
Just like Buffy had said, vines covered the whole of Flower City. On the vines were blossoming flowers. Optimistically, the city would be covered by these seven-colored flowers. His description of Flower City wasn’t an exaggeration.
Zhao Hai carefully observed these flowers. Again, as Buffy had said, there were small fibrous roots on the vine. These small fibrous roots were dug into the stone walls of the city, causing fright to anyone who looked at it.
The eagle circled around Flower City as Zhao Hai and the others carefully observed the flowers inside the city. This was just as how Buffy described it. The city wasn’t just full of vines. Within the city there was a very long and thick vine. Moreover, it stood erect like a tree. There were a lot of branches on top of it along with a lot of blossoming flowers. It was as if this were a flower’s world.
Zhao Hai slowly noted that this flower’s vine was more concentrated in the center, and were sturdier too. If you looked closely, you would find that these plants didn’t have a main root, but only had small fibrous roots. Smaller flower vines branched out from the sturdy vine, and those thicker flowers branched out from the thicker branches of the vine. Finally, they converged into a section of a 10 meter thick immense vine which extended from the middle of the city[5].
Green examined the situation, and even Zhao Wen observed earnestly as she hadn’t been able to come this close to observe those seven-colored flowers.
Zhao Hai ordered the eagle to fly into the center of the city while his eyes chased along the vine. He wanted to take a look as to what this seven-colored flower’s trunk was, and if there was anything good at the end.
Notes:
-This chapter was MTL’ed. Please leave a comment for constructive criticisms and advice. Thanks.
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-Please check out the Editor’s footnotes, thanks.
Footnotes:
[1] Remember that while the Markey Dell clan has business throughout half the continent, they are still just a business clan. In terms of Rank Nines, Quinn John had said they at least have two, which seems on par with a single strong clan. The Aksu Empire as a whole would have several such clans, not counting the power of the royal family. ↩
[2] This should have been a thing before, when Green went to meet the Purcell clan. It’s a repetition of the knowledge of being able to communicate through the Ghost Cane… ↩
[3] This is written as 20 丈 (zhang). A Zhang is about 3.33 meters, so it’s around 66.666 meters or 218.72 feet. ↩
[4] Did you guys get it? It’s really beautiful. ↩
[5] Forgive me for this really confusing description. Basically, there is a large vine trunk with numerous smaller vines branching from it. Some of the thicker vines have large flowers, the smaller ones have smaller flowers. Everything is eventually connected to the trunk-like vine. I think. It’s a really confusing paragraph.