Lin Li stopped dwelling on it and began looking around for a quiet, sheltered spot suitable for resting and eating lunch.
Turning to look off to the left, he saw several long-collapsed, ruined buildings standing in the distance. Their walls were mottled with age, while broken bricks and crumbling remnants lay scattered everywhere.
Several enormous boulders stood around the buildings, their surfaces covered in lush green vines. The vines twisted and coiled around them, trailing down along the stone.
Quite a few huge, strange flowers hung from the vine branches, swaying gently in the intermittent breeze and carrying an air of ancient desolation and secluded stillness.
Those collapsed buildings were far too dilapidated to serve as a temporary resting place.
The space between several giant rocks, however, was filled with dense vines woven and tangled together, naturally forming a sheltered area like a sunshade or rain canopy.
The vines blocked the light overhead, casting a broad patch of cool shade across the ground—just right for stopping to rest.
Lin Li quietly made up his mind to go over and inspect the place more closely, to see whether it was suitable as a temporary rest spot.
Five or six minutes later, Lin Li arrived beneath the shade cast by the vines. Unhurriedly, he took out the camping gear he carried with him and laid it out piece by piece.
A gentle breeze drifted through the distance, making the entwined vines sway softly. Their branches and leaves rubbed and brushed against one another, producing a faint, gentle rustling.
Before long, wisps of cooking smoke slowly rose and drifted away through the mist.
Lin Li made himself a simple lunch: a fragrant serving of egg fried rice, a bowl of delicious beef ball soup, and a plate of refreshing stir-fried greens.
Though the