The sky was like a gigantic sapphire. A few cotton-like white clouds rolled across the azure expanse, and a man stood atop them, his eyes piercing through the clouds to gaze down below.
He still held a bead in his hand. Within it, the little fox timidly surveyed the mountains and rivers below.
"Walking among the clouds—how many people have dreamed of this?"
An Yang suddenly felt wistful. He remembered the first time he had taken a plane in college. When the plane pierced the sea of clouds and brought him so close to the clouds he saw every day, he realized that the clouds, which looked so soft and seemed as though one could step on them from the ground, were actually so impossibly distant. No matter how high one flew, one could never step on them, or even catch them.
But reality could never be predicted. Magic had turned illusory clouds into something tangible—truly soft enough to step on, like cotton, and capable of carrying someone through the air as if in a dream.
Below them lay Flower Fruit Mountain's Water Curtain Cave.
The mountain was not particularly tall, though it covered a fairly wide area. From above, one could not make out much. It was only possible to vaguely distinguish its lush mountains and clear waters. Yet for a blessed land and grotto-heaven, it no longer possessed the dense spiritual energy and wondrous fortune it had held many years ago.
A river whose water level had fallen during summer flowed down from the mountaintop, forming a hanging strip of silk. It looked like a thin piece of gauze, but fell just short of covering the cave entrance behind the waterfall.
"Flower Fruit Mountain, blessed land. Water Curtain Cave, grotto-heaven."
Only after An Yang drew closer did he