Su Yuntian did not dare to be careless. He observed the lake to prevent any accidents.
It was not until Su Meng swam to his side and left the lake that the solemn expression on his face eased a little.
"Who's at the bottom of the lake?"
Looking at his daughter, who was covering her chest with her clothes and whose wet black hair stuck to her cheeks, Su Yuntian was furious.
"I can't see clearly."
Su Meng, who had an apple-shaped round face and sparkling eyes, huddled in the grass holding her clothes and shouted, "He didn't do anything to me. I was just frightened by his sudden appearance."
"That person should have no ill intentions." He Rong kept persuading his old friend to calm down.
Su Yuntian had a cold face, but he still stared at the lake.
Under the dim sky, the lake surface, illuminated by the light of the golden chariot, looked very peaceful with some fragmented light.
distance.
Many of the subordinates loyal to Su and He also stopped what they were doing and looked at the lake curiously.
After a while, someone really did break through the surface of the lake and looked around in confusion.
The man appeared in the middle of the lake, quite far away from them, with water plants stuck to his messy hair, and he looked quite disheveled.
He held up a spear in the lake. On the long spear shaft were fishes strung together like a string of candied haws.
"It must be a misunderstanding."
He Rong smiled slightly, held down the short blade in Su Yuntian's hand, and said, "He is too far away from Su Meng. He definitely doesn't want to murder Su Meng or spy on her."
Su Yuntian breathed a sigh of relief and suddenly shouted, "Little brother!"
When Pang Jian heard the voice, he looked and saw Su Yuntian, He Rong, and the shattered golden chariot.
"Crescent Lake."
He also instantly realized where he was at the moment.
This freshwater lake in the Cenji Mountains looks like a crescent when viewed from above, so his father called it Crescent Lake.
At the center of Crescent Lake stands a towering mountain, and the Black Water Pond should be at the other end of the mountain.
Unlike the Black Water Pond which was listed as a restricted area, the Crescent Lake area was a garrison he was very familiar with.
As a freshwater lake, Crescent Lake is rich in fish and shrimp. Wild animals often come to drink water nearby. It is also the place where he catches wild animals and rests.
He didn't expect that at the bottom of Crescent Lake, there was a crack in the rocks, which contained a secret stone passage leading to the Black Water Pool.
When he saw the familiar territory, Pang Jian suddenly felt much more at ease and was no longer worried.
Hearing the man by the lake shouting continuously, he looked at Su Yuntian and He Rong in the middle of the wide Crescent Lake.
Soon, he guessed that this group of people should be the same as Zhou Qingchen and Ning Yao, and they were also the so-called exploration and search team of the seven major families.
After a slight hesitation, he swam towards Su Yuntian.
However, he did not actually swim to the shore where Su Yuntian was standing, but went ashore a little further away from the two of them.
He dug out flint and wood from an area of weeds and dead trees near the lake and started to light a fire and roast the fish.
He was very familiar with Crescent Lake. Since the lake was big enough, he had kept spare materials at several points along the lake.
He had similar secret spots in various areas of the Silent Mountains, some of which even had reserves of dried meat and food.
When he started a fire, took the fish off the dragon-patterned spear, and changed to another wooden pole to roast, Su Yuntian and He Rong talked about it in surprise.
"He is very familiar with this place. Also, he seems to have prepared firewood, oil and salt long ago." He Rong stroked his chin and said thoughtfully: "He should be a local."
"Just go over and ask."
After Su Meng, fully dressed, walked out of the bushes, she rolled her eyes at the two sneaky people, walked straight to Pang Jian, stared at him curiously and asked, "Were you fishing under the lake before?"
"Um."
Pang Jian looked up at her and saw that the little girl was about the same age as his sister Pang Lin, about thirteen or fourteen years old.
She has a pair of bright big eyes on her round little face and two pigtails that swing around, making her look very powerful.
"My name is Su Meng. I was washing myself in the lake just now. Did you see anything?"
Su Meng asked fiercely with her hands on her hips.
Pang Jian shook his head and said casually: "The Crescent Lake is very big. I was fishing deep underwater and didn't notice there were people above."
"Crescent Lake?"
Su Meng looked at the lake and thought the name was very appropriate. Seeing that Pang Jian had explained it, she restrained the ferocity in her eyes and asked in surprise, "Are you familiar with this place?"
"I'm a hunter from Linshan Town. I often go hunting in the mountains, so of course I'm familiar with this place."
Pang Jian said calmly.
At this time, Su Yuntian and He Rong also followed.
The two looked at Pang Jian. He Rong, who was always cautious, looked at the dragon-patterned spear on the ground and asked, "Do you know how to practice?"
Pang Jian's expression remained unchanged as he made up a story: "There was an old man who came to the Cenji Mountains a few years ago to look for spiritual materials to make medicine. He asked me to lead him."
"I helped him find the spiritual material he wanted, and he taught me a method of cultivation and gave me this spear."
Although He Rong had some doubts in his heart, he did not continue to ask.
"My name is Su Yuntian, this is my daughter Su Meng, and this is He Rong."
Su Yuntian made his identity clear and put down his guard. He said casually, "It's not peaceful here recently. There are some complicated situations. We came from the other side of the Ceji Mountains."
"Little brother, since you are a hunter from the Cenji Mountains and live in the nearby Linshan Town, can you tell us if you have found anything unusual recently?"
Su Yuntian humbly asked for advice.
Pang Jian grilled fish and replied calmly, "Not long ago, huge dry bones fell from the sky. Then there were..."
He looked at the shattered golden chariot and said, "Not long after, I saw this chariot, a huge sailing ship, and a white tower sinking."
Hearing this, Su Yuntian and He Rong exchanged glances.
Suddenly, there was a clear eagle cry sounded above the heads of several people. Everyone looked up and saw a dark gray eagle circling above their heads.
This dark gray eagle looked at the people below with strange eyes, and frequently looked at Pang Jian.
It flew back and forth in the air, as if observing Pang Jian from different angles, as if wanting to confirm something carefully.
Pang Jian was a little annoyed by the eagle's gaze. When he wanted to draw his bow and shoot the strange eagle to death, he suddenly remembered that his usual bow and arrow had been discarded outside the Black Water Pond.
The eagle flapped its wings above their heads, and after flying for a while, it flew towards the other end of the mountain.
"Little brother, if you don't mind, please be our guide."
After the eagle left, Su Yuntian took the initiative to invite him and said with a smile: "We are not familiar with the Cenji Mountains. We have just come here not long ago. I am willing to pay a reward."
Pang Jian, who had grilled several fishes, was already feasting on them. He mumbled, "I'll think about it."
…
The other side of the mountain.
Blackwater pool.
Luo Hongyan, who was possessed by Ning Yao, suddenly closed his eyes and connected with the eagle hovering in the air with a divine thought, observing the world below from multiple angles through the eagle.
After a moment, she hummed, "I found you."
Behind her, a gray shadow clearer than Roman was floating quietly. It was Hong Tai from the Dark Ghost.
This dark ghost leader who had cultivated to the marrow cleansing realm still fell into her clutches. She extracted his soul and condensed it into a "spiritual evil", turning it into a slave she could command.
"That guy never left the Black Water Pond, but he emerged from the other side of the lake. This means there is a secret passage at the bottom of the pond."
"I just don't know if the dark giant anaconda with only an animal soul is with him."
Looking at the black water pool, Luo Hongyan thought that since Pang Jian had left, perhaps the "Dark Anaconda" from the fifth realm would go with him.
Luo Hongyan, who wanted to explore the Black Water Pond, thought for a while and sighed, "The phoenix marrow was sucked into the bronze door by that kid. Only the skeleton of the dark giant anaconda is left under the water, and I can't take it away."
She immediately dismissed the idea.
After a while, her eyes lit up slightly and she suddenly thought of a brilliant new idea.
She was wearing a red dress and appeared in Ning Yao's sea of consciousness as a spirit, looking at Ning Yao who was imprisoned in the dark with a hazy figure.
"Ning girl, tell me your situation in detail, and don't force me to take it through soul searching. I plan to use this body of yours for a while, and I hope you can cooperate."
"If your soul is searched, your soul will no longer be complete afterwards. You don't want that, do you?"
She threatened with a smile.
Ning Yao was vague and illusory, her soul flickering like a candle in the wind, and she asked in a trembling voice, "What do you want to know?"
"Everything that happened after you met that boy."
Half an hour later, the circling eagle flew over.
Luo Hongyan looked at the cloth bag that Pang Jian had thrown away when he terminated his employment relationship with Ning Yao, and smiled as she squatted down and picked it up again.
She landed on the eagle in the form of Ning Yao and smiled sweetly: "I want to use this bag of silver again."
The eagle suddenly flew up.
Several "spiritual demons" like Hong Tai and Luo Meng transformed into drifting gray clouds and followed the flying eagle to the other side of the mountain.
…
Crescent Lake.
After eating and drinking, Pang Jian stepped on the fish bones on the ground and put the oil, salt and matches back in their original places, and then covered them with grass leaves.
Immediately, he stood up holding the dragon-patterned spear and said coldly, "I should go now."
He rejected Su Yuntian's invitation.
He knew that He Rong and Su Yuntian were indeed from the two bottom families of the seven great families, and the direction these two families wanted to go was exactly the Black Water Pond at the other end of the mountain.
—He has no intention of returning to the Black Water Pond.
In the bamboo basket on his back, there were many spirit stones for his cultivation. He would never starve to death in the Cenji Mountains, and he did not have such an urgent need for money at the moment.
He just wanted to get away from the crowd and find a place to test his body that had been tempered twice by the Phoenix Marrow.
With the Su and He families around, it was inconvenient for him to do anything.
"Okay, we won't force you. By the way, since you were fishing under the lake, why did you turn a blind eye to the broken pieces of the golden chariot?" Su Yuntian asked with regret.
Pang Jian replied: "I thought no one would come, so I thought I would check the gold items after I caught fish and had enough food and drink. Now that you are here, I don't have any ideas. I can't rob you anyway."
Su Yuntian laughed dumbly: "You are not greedy, and you know when to advance and when to retreat."
He called an old servant over with a light shout, and asked the old servant to take a purse and hand it to Pang Jian, saying with a smile: "It's just some small change, just consider it as a reward for asking you for information. When you leave the Cenji Mountains, silver... will still be of some use to you."
Pang Jian was a little surprised, but he didn't refuse politely. After taking it, he said, "See you later."
After he left, the people from the Su family and the He family stayed in Crescent Lake.
They followed Pang Jian's example and went to catch fish under Crescent Lake, and cooked them using the firewood left by Pang Jian.
A group of people were grilling fish around a fire and eating happily when a woman suddenly came up alone and shouted from a distance, "Where is Pang Jian?"
"Ning Yao!"
…
(End of this chapter)