Human-Faced Peach

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Several piercing whistles rang out in succession through the forest. Five figures shot between the black ironwood trees like arrows loosed from a bow.

Lu Changsheng took the lead, his green robe becoming a blurred afterimage amid the dim woods, with Tu Jiao and the others close behind. After roughly the time it took to burn an incense stick, the trees ahead gradually thinned, and broad swathes of daylight spilled down through the gaps in the branches and leaves—

Whoosh!

The five of them burst out of the dark Blackiron Wood forest one after another, and the view before them suddenly opened up to reveal a lush, verdant valley.

Spiritual energy swirled through the valley, while mist drifted like gauze in the morning light. The mountainsides on either side were not especially steep, their slopes blanketed in soft green grass and dotted with all manner of exotic flowers and herbs—Seven-Colored Jadeflowers with dew rolling over their petals, Iceheart Lotuses as crystalline as jade, Starlight Grass emitting a faint fluorescent glow... As the breeze swept through, the fragrance of flowers mingled with the fresh scent of vegetation and washed over them, leaving them clear-headed and refreshed.

From deep within the valley came the faint murmur of running water.

"There's running water ahead."

Murong Taxue spoke softly.

Following the sound, the group passed through a patch of flowers and found a pool of emerald-green spring water before them.

The spring emerged from a crack in the mountainside, gathering into a clear pool about thirty feet across. Its water was green as the finest jade, so transparent that every pebble on the bottom could be counted. Most remarkable of all, a thin layer of spiritual mist hovered over its surface. Strands of spiritual energy rose with the water vapor, and