Chapter 71

Lu Xiaoding looked at the person in front of her, equally surprised, and after a moment of shock, she said, "You also look very appetizing."

"That's great, you can talk. You really look so good to eat." The person excitedly added, as if being good to eat was a compliment.

The one blocking Lu Xiaoding was a woman who looked to be in her twenties, not very tall, and appeared petite and cute. She wore a skirt with a seven-colored hem, neat and beautiful without being overly complicated.

Two light red patches appeared on her pure cheeks, a sign of her excitement. She cupped her face and smiled happily, "It's great to meet you. I'm Zhiling. What's your name?"

Lu Xiaoding carefully examined her. A late-stage Lingqi-stage demon beast, but she couldn't tell what its true form was. However, she was quite bold, coming to talk to her directly. Wasn't she afraid of being eaten?

She swallowed and said with a smile, "I'm Lu Xiaoding. Can I eat you?"

"If you can help me with something, after the task is done, I'll give you the soul of one of my arms." Zhiling clasped her hands together and smiled, not at all bothered by the idea of being eaten. She was also suppressing her own appetite for the physical form of this spirit.

"You're stronger than me. Can't you do it yourself?" This was great. As long as she helped, she could eat an arm. But if she failed, would she have to give up one of her own arms?

Zhiling looked around and then lowered her voice, "There are too many people here. Let's find a place with fewer people to talk."

"Okay." Lu Xiaoding immediately agreed, happily carrying the tripod behind her and following Zhiling to find a less crowded place.

"You must be a tripod spirit. Carrying your body around must be very tiring, right?" Zhiling turned to look at her and smiled.

This was indeed true. Lu Xiaoding said helplessly, "Yes, you guys have it easy. You don't have to carry your bodies around; you just need to transform into human form. You can also absorb the essence of heaven and earth and cultivate on your own."

"So what? In the end, a single mistake and you'll be caught by humans, who will strip your flesh and bones and even extract your soul. Sometimes I wonder why we cultivate, only to end up benefiting human cultivators." Zhiling shrugged and said with a somewhat dejected smile. Everyone's life was tough.

Lu Xiaoding felt this topic was too dark. She was carrying quite a few pills made from demon beasts, and she felt a bit embarrassed.

Zhiling seemed to know what she was thinking and laughed heartily, "Although spirit souls need to be devoured for advancement, you don't need to worry. It's just the law of the jungle. We also kill many of our own kind during our advancement. Not to mention, we're not the same kind. We've devoured quite a few spirit souls ourselves."

"Your words make it hard for me to cooperate," Lu Xiaoding grumbled.

"What can't be cooperated on? As long as there's a benefit, it's fine. Otherwise, if we really wanted to eat each other, we'd have to fight fiercely. If you use your soul to cast spells, I'd have to use my full strength too. If we're unlucky and a cultivator sees us, we'd be in big trouble. Picking up a heavily injured spirit or a precious demon beast would make a cultivator's life much better." Zhiling touched her chin and thought, this was very likely. She knew quite a few idiots who got themselves severely injured and then were taken advantage of by cultivators.

Since she said that, Lu Xiaoding didn't feel so hesitant and happily followed her to a small mountain beside Phoenix Yi City. This mountain wasn't remote; instead, it had many standalone pavilions and courtyards, which were rented by wealthy cultivators.

Zhiling also rented a courtyard here. She didn't choose a place with dense spiritual energy but instead chose the highest courtyard. The biggest feature of this house was a seven-story viewing tower.

The location was already high, and with the tower, it felt even more isolated. It was suitable for cultivators who liked to act aloof, sitting on the tower top every day, looking like a high-minded person.

"Fortunately, I killed a few cultivators and抢了一些晶果, otherwise I couldn't afford this place. You don't know how much humans spend. I've been here for three months and I'm almost broke." Zhiling led Lu Xiaoding into the courtyard, complained a bit, and then pointed to the top of the tower, "Let's go up and talk." She then flew up to the top of the tower and waved at Lu Xiaoding from below.

Lu Xiaoding looked up at her. A large bright moon hung in the sky, and from her angle, it looked like Zhiling was standing in the moon. Seeing this, Lu Xiaoding couldn't help but praise, "What a great place. How much moonlight essence must be absorbed every night?"

At this moment, she was a bit relieved that she could use the things in her sleeve technique. Otherwise, carrying the tripod and climbing the stairs to the seventh floor, she would have been eaten by Zhiling before she got there. A spirit with only a Lingqi-stage soul and no spiritual techniques would be like an invitation to be eaten.

The things in the sleeve technique were not souls or spiritual energy but a mix of both. Since they could be used to cast spells, Lu Xiaoding called them soul energy. She didn't know what they were, so she just called them by her name.

She channeled soul energy to her feet, then pushed off with all her strength, and her body soared into the air, taking a few steps in the air and landing steadily on the top of the tower.

Zhiling smiled slightly and looked up at the moon, "I hate wherever humans are, but this tower is an exception. If I didn't rent this place, I wouldn't be able to endure for more than three months, and I would have already transformed and caused chaos here."

"Every time it's overcast and there's no moon, I feel uncomfortable all over and think the humans here are too noisy. I have to kill a couple of them to calm down. I go out and kill a few humans outside the city. No one has discovered me yet, and I've even stolen quite a few good things. Their sleeve techniques are no match for my strength."

"I don't have that feeling. Maybe it's because you hate them, so without the moon to soothe you, you want to kill. By the way, your true form is a bird, right?" Lu Xiaoding sat down on the top of the tower and looked down at Phoenix Yi City, which was brightly lit and bustling.

Zhiling turned and smiled, "How did you guess?"

"Because you live high up. If your true form was too cumbersome, you wouldn't love staying on the top of a tower. Even if you like looking at the sky and the distance, a cumbersome creature would choose a solid place, like the edge of a cliff, where the ground is firm and you can sleep soundly." Lu Xiaoding pointed to a cliff on the side, where there was a pavilion, half of which extended over the cliff, and from a high place, you could see a pool of water.

"Annoying, I suddenly like you a bit." Zhiling laughed so hard her shoulders shook. It was indeed hard to talk to humans, but she could still communicate with a spirit.

Lu Xiaoding touched her face awkwardly, "How embarrassing. What exactly do you want me to help you with? If I fail, will you ask for one of my arms?"

Zhiling calmed down and looked at the distance with a worried expression, where the mountains of the Tianling Sect were located, "I want you to help me steal an egg from the Tianling Sect. They have a very powerful protective spirit array. I tried once and almost broke through, but suddenly a cold and sinister energy appeared in the array. If I hadn't run fast enough, my soul would have been devoured. It's not an ordinary protective spirit array; it has some evil elements."

"Steal an egg, is it yours?" Lu Xiaoding asked curiously.

"It's a long story. I'll tell you slowly. I hope after you hear it, you'll help me. Otherwise, I'll be in a difficult situation." She smiled gently, but it made people feel a chill.

Lu Xiaoding also smiled. If she didn't help after hearing it, she would probably have to fight, and see who could devour whom.

"That egg is from my clan..." Zhiling also sat down and slowly began to tell her story.

She didn't say what kind of demon beast she was, only mentioning that she and her clan lived far from humans, using her Lingqi-stage cultivation to protect everyone. If it weren't for the egg being stolen by a cultivator, she would likely have been the next clan leader. But the loss of the egg led to her being punished by the clan leader, who accused her of not being diligent in her duties, resulting in the death of clan members and the loss of the egg.

If she couldn't retrieve the egg before it hatched, she would be expelled from the clan. As a social bird, the thought of being driven out and living alone made Zhiling feel scared.

She looked serious and a bit nervous, "Do you know? If our kind is expelled from the clan before the Lingqi stage, we will die from loneliness. No one has ever been expelled at the Lingqi stage. If I am really expelled, I don't know if I will die."

Zhiling held Lu Xiaoding's hand and looked at her earnestly, "Can you help me? The clan is my life. I can't bear to leave any of them. If I can't live with them, what's the point of living?"

"You're so attached to your home. But it's just one egg. Can't you take over and lay another one? Birds are numerous. If you shout in the mountains, the sky will be darkened by the birds that fly up." Lu Xiaoding didn't know how to comfort her and said it casually.

To her surprise, Zhiling hugged her head and said dejectedly, "Those birds should be roasted and eaten. There are too many of them. My clan now has only twelve members, including the lost egg. If I can't bring it back and I am expelled, there will be only ten left."

"You have so few offspring," Lu Xiaoding said speechlessly, knowing that the number was so small, even counting the egg, it was less than the number of people on Tian Dan Peak.

"We can't have more. We females are social, but the males are solitary. They wander around, and only those with good memory come back every few years. Most of them are gone. I went out to look for males ten years ago and searched for six years without finding one. I don't know where they have gone." Mentioning this, Zhiling became even more dejected. Without males, how could they reproduce?

Lu Xiaoding stared at her in surprise, not expecting this kind of bird to have such strange habits, and asked, "Why don't the male birds come back?"

Zhiling looked at her with a sad expression and said softly, "Because male birds are directionally challenged. Once they fly out, they can't find their way back. They also have a strong desire to go out. If we force them to stay in the clan, they will die of loneliness after they grow up."

"This isn't a solitary habit; it's just getting lost," Lu Xiaoding said, surprised that there were such stupid male birds in the world.