The Martial Arts Arena had been tense and suffocating, shrouded in the terrifying atmosphere of the Heavenly Dao's pressure, as if doomsday had arrived. Then Lu Ya called out, "You can do it!" and shattered the mood in an instant, leaving things strangely relaxed.
Golden Peng, standing atop Kun's head, hesitated. His frigid divine sense swept across every blade of grass and tree on Floating Mountain.
A short distance away, a baby suddenly began wailing.
Lu Ya looked over.
Ning Zhongzi came walking toward them, carrying an infant girl.
Ning Zhongzi paid no attention to the Kunpeng Brothers.
She had once seen Lu Ya send Wine Fox Immortal rolling onto a bed from across the room. She trusted him completely, and with her strength, there was nothing she could do about the situation anyway.
After giving Wine Fox Immortal some simple treatment, her maternal instincts had suddenly flared up, and she'd begun looking after the baby.
Gazing at the infant in her arms, she seemed to see Liu Xuanye as she'd been years ago. A faint maternal glow softened her bright, lovely face.
This was the first time Lu Ya had seen Ning Zhongzi's maternal side. Her whole demeanor seemed to warm in an instant.
Curious, he leaned closer for a look.
Only then did he realize that the baby in Ning Zhongzi's arms was half snake!
Her upper body was human, and her lower body was a snake, just like Nuwa.
Lu Ya couldn't help thinking: first there was a half-fox, and now a half-snake...
This Immortal Realm really was a mess!
It seemed that beast-human relationships weren't just rampant in games; there were plenty of them in the real Immortal Realm, too. If half-beast immortals weren't infertile, who knew—perhaps every immortal would have beast blood.
Just then,
Muyu Feifei saw the baby crying. Her fear gave way to curiosity, and she hurried over to make faces at the child.
As she did, she sang the nursery rhyme Lu Ya had taught them, which shared her name.
"Two tigers, two tigers, run so fast, run so fast. One has no ears, the other has no tail. How strange, how strange... Awoo..."
Snake Baby suddenly fell quiet, as if she'd really seen two tiger heads.
Then came that final, all-too-real "awoo."
In an instant, Snake Baby began crying even harder.
Waaah, waaah, waaah~
Her cries were heart-rending and earth-shaking. They seemed even louder than the commotion the Kunpeng Brothers were making in the sky.
Lu Ya's eye twitched. The two little brats' performance, pretending to be tigers pretending to be fake tigers, made his scalp crawl.
Ning Zhongzi was fiercely protective of the baby. With a wave of her hand, she delivered two sharp knuckle raps to Muyu Feifei's head.
"How is this our fault?"
Muyu Feifei was furious. Baring her teeth, she argued her case.
"Snake Baby's hungry. She wants milk!"
"I'm only six hundred years old. I don't have any milk."
"Me neither!"
With that, they both looked at Ning Zhongzi.
"..."
Ning Zhongzi's brows twitched. Two more sharp raps landed on their heads, and Muyu Feifei fled, clutching her head.
Back when she'd raised Liu Xuanye, Ning Zhongzi had hired a wet nurse and supplemented her with specially refined child-rearing pills.
She'd never nursed a child herself. She was an immortal maiden without a partner—where would she get any milk?
Ning Zhongzi took several pure pills from her spatial ring. But when she brought them to the baby's mouth, she hesitated and gave up.
Lu Ya's gaze drifted a little over a foot lower. So she only looked the part. No use at all.
Ning Zhongzi's ears turned scarlet. She kept her eyes lowered to the infant and didn't dare look Lu Ya in the eye again.
Though Lu Ya had only been curious, his gaze pure and free of any improper thoughts...
She herself couldn't manage to be so pure.
Just then, among the Beast Immortals a short distance away, a Black Sheep Matron with a sallow face and a gaunt frame heard the baby crying. She mustered her courage, got to her feet, and walked over in trepidation.
"I don't know if a snake infant can drink sheep's milk. If she can, I still have some..."
"She can drink it."
Only then did Ning Zhongzi breathe a sigh of relief. She hurriedly handed the baby to her.
Turning her back to the others, the Black Sheep Matron opened her robe. As she gently soothed the wailing Snake Baby, she let the infant suckle. At last, Snake Baby quieted down.
After that brief interlude, the atmosphere on the battlefield grew even more oppressive.
Gales howled through the Martial Arts Arena. The Immortal Sect pressure that churned through the air was so heavy it was hard to breathe.
The Beast Immortals were utterly bewildered.
Those were two Nine Star Immortal Sect Masters. Even Sect Master Liu and Wine Fox Immortal together didn't add up to nine stars. They were doomed to see their sect destroyed, so why did they still have time to nurse a baby?
Meanwhile, Golden Peng, perched atop Kun's head, withdrew his divine sense. After confirming there were no experts or anything amiss, he let his terrifying spiritual pressure surge once more and thundered in a cold voice:
"Doom is upon you, yet you still put on a show. I'll send you to the Pure Land now."
"My Pure Land can't be without Kun meat..."
Looking up at the Giant Kun's enormous head, Lu Ya couldn't help thinking of a legendary delicacy. He couldn't wait to show off his cooking skills.
Just then, he noticed that Wine Fox Immortal seemed a little off.
After downing a pot of wine, her eyes were half-lidded, smoldering with heat.
Her pale, lovely face flushed in an instant, the color matching the blood that soaked her body. Her steps were weak and unsteady, and she swayed like someone drunk.
Her coarse, dark-yellow robe was torn to rags on one side and stained red with blood on the other. She showed no sign of dejection. Instead, it fluttered in the wind like a battle robe.
Looking up at the Kunpeng Brothers, she found herself thinking of many things...
She pulled a thin hemp thread from the hem of her coarse robe, then took a bloodstained bamboo sliver from her bosom.
She made a tiny hole in the sliver, threaded the hemp through it, and hung it between the snowy valleys of her chest.
Then she tossed her emptied wine gourd into the air.
The wine gourd grew with the wind, quickly expanding to the size of a mount. She rode it up into the sky, charging straight for the heavens.
She would fight!
She had to fight!
Lu Ya looked up.
He saw Wine Fox Immortal's petite figure riding the wine gourd toward the Giant Kun in the sky, like an ant charging at a god.
Dark clouds rolled.
The Giant Kun looked down on all beneath it.
Time stood still, like an oil painting.
Lu Ya couldn't help admiring the woman.
Even at the peak of her strength, uninjured, it would have been hard for her to overcome the gap between a three-star and a nine-star Immortal Sect Master. And now she was suffering from three severe injuries...
She must have a reason she has to fight, too.
Lu Ya figured that was fine. He could use this chance to see what this work... this woman had up her sleeve. Besides, with him there, no one would die, and any injury could be healed in an instant. This fight was child's play to him; for Wine Fox Immortal, it was just the trial she needed.
Besides,
He had a vague feeling that this fox had plenty of other tricks up her sleeve, especially the one curled up inside her Immortal Platform...
This woman might be even more complicated than he'd imagined!
Above the clouds, atop Kun,
Golden Peng sneered when he saw Wine Fox Immortal riding her gourd toward him.
"You overestimate yourself."
His feet lifted off the Giant Kun's head, and his body slowly rose. A black robe covered him, billowing in the wind until he looked like a black specter with no limbs.
"I'll play with her. You go kill Liu Xuanye, to soothe the soul of our late friend Yunzhongzi."
A shriek rang out overhead as Void Kun slowly pulled its enormous body out of the dark clouds.
Its gaze fell on the Black Boat perched on the Bamboo Platform atop the Bamboo Spring Sect's mountain. In its eyes, the shadow of an old friend appeared.
Then it sped through the air, charging furiously toward Little Bamboo Spring Mountain.
A terrifying gale swept along in its wake, flinging some low-level Beast Immortals into the sky.
Lu Ya's green robe snapped and fluttered in the wind.
He watched the Kun as it rushed away.
That colossal body, that savage speed...
It was breathtaking.
But he didn't move. He trusted Liu Xuanye.
A one-star Immortal Sect Master against a nine-star vicious beast.
Yet Liu Xuanye didn't appear.
Only three thousand swords rained down from the sky,
stabbing toward the colossal Void Kun.
At the Martial Arts Arena,
The Beast Immortals had suffered inhuman torment in the past, and its shadow still haunted them.
So even now, they remained prostrate on the ground, kneeling and too afraid to look up at the sky.
Lu Ya thought it over, then walked up to them and put on a stern expression.
"Wine Fox Immortal is risking her life to protect you. And this is how you repay her? With your heads bowed?"
Not a sound came from the crowd.
After a long while, a timid rabbit girl weakly raised her head.
"I-I'm sorry."
Gradually, more Beast Immortals worked up the courage to look up.
A cat immortal pricked up both ears. She was frightened, but forced herself to watch the sky.
A burly Ox Immortal straightened up.
A Pigeon Immortal cooed...
Before long, three Beast Immortals at the Immortal Master level also sat upright one after another.
They saluted Lu Ya with an immortal bow, then all looked up at the sky.
At the very end, even the pale-faced Little Weasel Immortal raised his head.
He was kneeling in the farthest corner from Lu Ya, staring at him with a pair of bloodshot eyes as he trembled, ignoring the fierce battle in the sky.
The other Beast Immortals were all afraid of the Kunpeng Brothers. He was the only one afraid of Lu Ya.
In Lu Ya's eyes, he seemed to catch a glimpse of an even hungrier craving for flesh than before.
Lu Ya cleared his throat and addressed them.
"You'll have to fight as hard as the Sect Master and Wine Fox Immortal from now on. Otherwise, you'll get eaten. Understand?"
"..."
The crowd looked utterly baffled. Only Little Weasel Immortal trembled with fear, nearly losing control and burrowing into the ground to escape.
After getting his audience of onlookers in order, Lu Ya found an open spot and sat down, quietly watching the two spectacles unfold.
Gazing up at the Kun's head, which blotted out the sky, he suddenly remembered the name of that legendary dish...
Looking Up at the Stars.
Before you continue