Chapter 288 – Moonlake City (II)

Chapter 288

Moonlake City (II)

… right.

The system indeed spawns the most insane shit ever, doesn’t it? But it also meant that the task itself would be proportionally difficult.

As far as my immediate reaction, it was quite obvious: there’s something sapping Life Qi of everyone here, stealthily, without any notice. There’s really just one answer, isn’t there?

But also, how?

It’s one thing to plant some vines in the middle-of-nowhere village where nobody can truly source an answer to the misery, but this was a heavily trekked area–far more so than even Silvercrest City, with an abundance of strong cultivators coming and going on a yearly basis–and, yet, it still somehow remains undetected.

I glanced over at the still waters, wondering just what lay beneath that calm surface; was it vines again? Or maybe something else?

The closer we got to the city, the more excited the kids got, happily chattering away about what they wanted to do. It’s been a while since we’ve had any of the luxuries that a civilized place offers, and it was clear they were yearning for them.

“Hot, freshly baked bread,” Xi Zhao declared. “With a spoonful of strawberry jam!”

“Corn,” Wan Lan said. “I’ll buy some flamed corn.”

“A full chicken!” Dai Xiu said. “I’ll buy the whole chicken and eat it all by myself, without any of your dirty paws touching it! Humph!”

“Ale,” Rayce said. “I really want to drink some ale.”

“What does ale taste like, Junior Brother?” Dai Xiu asked, and Rayce, as though finally recognizing he’d let something slip he shouldn’t have, quickly responded.

“Utterly bitter,” he said. “It coats your mouth, and it stings like someone stuck a thousand needles in there.”

“A-ah! Why would you drink something so horrible?! Never! I will never drink ale!”

At some point, Lao Shun took the front, as he was the only one who had ever been to this place, though there wasn’t much point to ‘leading’ just yet, as it was just a long, curving limestone path that paralleled the shore’s shape.

Surprisingly, there were no city walls or gates, as there were no guards ‘checking’ people in, but I did notice slight vibrations in space any time somebody would move into the city, so there was likely an array doing that work. Even so, we had to line up–considerably–behind about two hundred people walking on foot, just like us. And, just like us, their clothes looked like they’d seen better days.

All the while, any time a flying chariot or another would appear, they would gently descend and land at the central square before the group disembarked.

Though the city had a certain design to it, it still felt very much like an organic sprawl–there wasn’t much rhyme or reason to the way structures were organized, though there at least seemed to be a concept of districts present.

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I was most interested in the piers and the houses floating at their sides–if it magically remained dry, it was actually kind of my dream home. I’d always had this fantasy that Yas used to laugh at, where we bought one of those bungalows with a hatch leading to the sea below, where I’d be able to wake up in the morning, put on a pot of water for coffee on a stove, and while waiting for it to boil, dip through the hatch and have a morning swim.