Early the next morning, Little Lingxi woke naturally. Served by the trembling, excessively fawning innkeeper, she had breakfast—though she found it rather distasteful, she reluctantly ate a little. A'Yu only dared to stand in the corner. Only after Little Lingxi told her to eat did she carefully sit at the table and have the first filling meal of her life with meat, vegetables, and white rice. Her eyes brimmed with tears, but she did not dare let Little Lingxi see, so she desperately held them back.
After eating and drinking her fill, Little Lingxi patted her little belly and beckoned to A'Yu, who stood nearby watching her eagerly. "Let's go!"
"Yes, Miss Lingxi." A'Yu hurried after her at a trot.
Little Lingxi took A'Yu's hand and walked to an open area outside the inn. Closing her eyes, she sensed the direction, then drew a line through the air with her little hand.
Bzzzz!
A silver gateway, seemingly formed from countless fine spatial runes, appeared soundlessly before them. Beyond it lay distorted, rippling spatial turbulence.
"Off we go!" Little Lingxi pulled A'Yu forward and stepped into the gateway.
A'Yu only felt her vision blur as a dizzying sensation of Heaven Turning Earth Treading washed over her. Frightened, she quickly shut her eyes and clutched Little Lingxi's hem tightly. When she finally felt solid ground beneath her feet and the dizziness faded, she timidly opened her eyes—and froze.
Before her was no longer the dusty, filthy, cramped, dilapidated Black Rock Town. Instead, she saw a spectacle so grand and magnificent that even her dreams had never imagined it!
They stood atop an enormous white jade plaza that soared into the clouds. Its surface was smooth as a mirror, reflecting the flowing rosy light in the sky. In the distance stood towering palaces