Chapter 9

When the sunlight once again illuminated the stone monkey's eyes, his parched tongue touched something small and hard.

"Sand?" He struggled to lift his head.

This was a beach, with the sea rhythmically lapping against the rocks on the shore, and a vast expanse of coniferous forest at the edge.

"We... we're saved!" He suddenly opened his eyes wide, and hope returned to him!

Struggling to stand up, he discovered the canary beside him, who had fallen into a deep coma.

Gently cradling her in his hands, the stone monkey walked toward the coniferous forest.

The environment makes one grow, and the stone monkey was no longer the same as when he first arrived in this world. He possessed all the survival skills of a monkey.

This was not Huaguo Mountain; the climate and species made that clear.

There were no abundant fruits here, but even so, he could find some pine nuts and walnuts to stave off hunger.

This was no challenge for the stone monkey, but the most pressing issue he faced was not hunger, but thirst.

"Hold on, you must hold on, just a little longer. I'll find water soon. Don't die, there will be water soon."

The gradually weakening breath of the canary alarmed the stone monkey. Already somewhat dazed, he forced himself to repeat those words over and over as he stumbled through the forest.

He plucked leaves at random, not caring if they were poisonous, and chewed them to extract a bit of juice to maintain his strength.

After struggling through the coniferous forest for the entire morning, he finally found a water source—a thin stream trickling down from the mountain.

Though it was small, it was enough for the monkey and the bird.

Since the canary was in a complete coma, the stone monkey had to feed her mouth-to-mouth.

"You must live," he said.

After a long time, the canary's eyes flickered, and she swallowed the water.

He found some walnuts and pine nuts, crushed them, and mixed them with water, feeding her bit by bit.

Finally, the canary's condition seemed to stabilize. She opened her eyes and asked, "How did we get saved?"

"I don't know. I saw a golden carp. It must have been a deity or a demon," the stone monkey said, smashing a walnut with a stone and feeding it to the canary, while he himself enjoyed it as well.

"How do you know it was a deity or a demon?"

"Are there carp in the sea? I don't think so, especially golden ones. But I know dragons like to transform into carp."

"You know so much... like a human, not a monkey," the canary said enviously, her eyes filled with worry.

After speaking, the canary fell into a deep sleep.

That night, they spent it in the unfamiliar forest, with the monkey squatting on an old tree, guarding the canary.

It was a moonless night, pitch black, with the occasional howl of a wild beast in the darkness. Something seemed to be struggling in the grass below, and the air was filled with the smell of blood.

The monkey held his breath, completely unaware of the dangerous animals in the dark forest, fearing that a single breath might bring death.

He was half asleep and half awake all night.

When the sun rose, the monkey finally breathed a sigh of relief, but soon he discovered a half-bloody deer skeleton at the base of the tree...

"What do we do now?" the canary asked softly, her head lowered.

The stone monkey, holding a cracked walnut, squatted on a rock, picking out the kernels from the broken shells and putting them in his mouth. His mouth moved quickly, but he did not answer.

He was trying to avoid recalling the fear of the previous night, but the more he tried, the more he could not shake it off.

Here, there was no troop of monkeys; he was alone, or rather, a lone monkey.

After a long while, the canary's head drooped even lower, but she did not ask again.

When the stone monkey finished the walnuts in his hand, he blinked and looked at the mountain behind him: "I will continue west. If you don't want to, go back to Huaguo Mountain and wait for me."

"Monkey, is cultivation really that important? More important than life?"

The monkey did not answer.

The canary said no more.

The stone monkey, who had just recovered from his fear, did not rest much before he began to climb the mountain to the west with the still weak canary.

Although the mountain was not particularly high, it was still a struggle for the monkey, who had not fully recovered.

It was only when the stone monkey reached the top of the mountain that he finally understood why the canary had asked that question—going down was no easier than staying here.

In many ways, the stone monkey knew far more than the canary, but in some aspects, the canary was superior to the monkey—especially in geography.

Behind the mountain was an endless desert.

The ground was cracked, and there was almost no life in sight. The vast desert had only a few dead old trees and a couple of fighting rats.

On one side of the mountain, it was lush and green, while on the other side, it was barren.

The sea was dangerous, but the land was no less so, especially for a monkey.

"Do you still want to go?" The canary struggled to stand on the monkey's shoulder and sighed, "I am a bird, always flying. I have never been sensitive to the distance on land, until..."

"Until the incident at sea?"

"Yes."

The stone monkey was silent, squatting on the mountaintop, staring at the desert to the west for a long time.

"Canary, you've been here before, right? This is the Southern Continent, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"If I want to cross this desert, how long will it take?"

"It took me about six days to fly over it." The canary lowered her head, hesitated for a long time, and then continued, "There are wolf packs in the desert... After crossing the desert, there is a human town. Although there is a forest, there are hunters in the forest... And beyond that..."

The canary did not continue, but her meaning was clear.

There were almost no safe places for the stone monkey on this land, and the journey was a series of such places—hunters, wild beasts, deserts...

The cold wind carried sand and stones past the stone monkey, ruffling his fur.

He had thought about the journey ahead, but he was still too naive.

Tang Sanzang's journey to the West to obtain the scriptures involved eighty-one trials, and the stone monkey was not as favored, at least not by the demons who lusted after his flesh.

But...

The journey ahead was not just about whether he could achieve immortality; whether he could survive and reach his destination was a huge question.

Go back?

He had been lucky to cross the sea last time, but would he have the same luck this time?

At that moment, his mind was a mess, and a thousand words finally condensed into a curse that the canary did not understand: "Damn desert!"

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