Rainy Season

Shen Changchuan, whose strength had advanced by leaps and bounds, was in a very good mood.

Now,

he

even felt a desire for an opponent to appear before him, so he could engage in a fierce, exhilarating battle to the death.

Shen Changchuan let his thoughts run wild,

imagining one scene after another:

He would leave Dawan Village and venture deep into the vast mountains, seeking precious Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures, engaging in thrilling hunts with Demon Beasts lurking in the mountains, and finally obtaining precious spirit medicines as his cultivation realm rose at a visible pace.

That kind of life, battling the heavens and earth and struggling against the forces of nature, was just like the life of a cultivation novel protagonist from the webnovels of his previous life. It was enough to make anyone lose themselves in it.

However,

before Shen Changchuan could turn his burning enthusiasm into action,

a sudden downpour completely extinguished the restlessness in his heart,

dragging him back to cold reality.

This was no ordinary rain. It was a relentless downpour that showed no sign of stopping!

Thick, dark clouds had appeared from who knew where. Before Shen Changchuan could react, rain began falling from the sky.

Then,

the rain poured down in unending sheets, continuing all the way to this very day!

When he looked outside,

heavy clouds loomed across the horizon like mountains, blotting out the entire sky. Even in broad daylight, it was hard to glimpse a single ray of sunlight. Wind and rain mingled together, and the whole world seemed to be shrouded in a white curtain.

More than half a month passed,

and the rain poured down without pause, as if it meant to drown the entire world beneath an endless curtain of rain, never to stop!

Shen Changchuan was despairing!

He had never imagined

that there could be rain in this world that just kept falling and falling and falling without ever letting up!

According to the village elders,

this was the rainy season.

A rainy season that lasted one to two months.

That made Shen Changchuan feel even worse.

Although he was inside a spacious house in a mountain courtyard, with its tall walls and roof blocking the endless rain pouring down from the heavens,

during the rainy season,

the air was saturated with moisture, which filled every space.

Everything felt damp. The air was so thick with moisture it seemed as though you could wring water from it!

Though only a little over half a month had passed,

Shen Changchuan felt as if nearly a year had gone by. He was practically growing mold.

And that still wasn't the worst of it.

What was even more despairing was that,

under the constant, plentiful rainfall, swarms of Mountain Leeches began emerging during the rainy season from who knew what corners of the mountains, spreading through the forests.

Everywhere he looked,

from towering trees to low-growing ferns and bushes, Mountain Leeches hung beneath the leaves like tentacles. They swayed with every drop of rain and reached out in every direction, searching for prey.

From a distance, it looked as if the lush trees and plants in the mountains had grown tendrils underneath them, writhing and brandishing themselves wildly in the downpour.

There were so many of them that even the paths the villagers usually walked were often crawling with Mountain Leeches, their bodies bending back and forth like strokes of calligraphy.

Heaven only knew how terrifying such a sight was to anyone who had never seen anything like it before.

And the Mountain Leeches weren't merely frightening to look at. They were genuinely terrifying!

They hung in dense clusters beneath leaves, one end clinging to the foliage while the other stretched out into the air, probing in every direction.

The moment an animal passed beneath them, they would spring into the air and patter down onto its body,

covering its skin in dense clusters,

then burrowing desperately through the skin to suck the blood from its body!

Throughout the process, the animal felt no pain,

not even the slightest sensation!

Before long, its blood would be drained dry. It would collapse to the ground as a dried-up corpse, then rot away beneath the heavy rain!

That sight

was enough to make anyone's flesh crawl!

Shen Changchuan, who had encountered these swarming creatures for the first time in both his previous life and this one, was no exception!

That was why, one day, when he opened the window out of boredom and saw Mountain Leeches hanging from the eaves beside it, stretching toward him as if they meant to leap onto his body,

and then noticed the countless tiny "tentacles" writhing beneath the lush leaves of the big tree outside,

his hair stood on end. He shuddered uncontrollably, and goose bumps erupted across his skin!

The sight was so horrifying

that Shen Changchuan immediately unleashed five Fireball Techniques. Even as the rain poured from the sky, he burned the entire tree outside his window to ashes!

But Shen Changchuan didn't stop there.

Suppressing his goose bumps, he walked several laps around the mountain courtyard, unleashing spells one after another—Wind Blade Techniques, Fireball Techniques, and more—

to clear out the living trees and bushes around him.

Only after he had wiped out every Mountain Leech around the mountain courtyard did Shen Changchuan finally breathe a little easier.

Still, he knew

that this was only treating the symptoms, not the root cause.

In this damp rainy season,

those wretched things would keep crawling along the paths toward him.

The only thing that could stop them

was the dry air inside the house.

There was nothing Shen Changchuan could do about it.

After all, he was only a tiny ant in the Cultivation World, with no power to change the weather.

All he could do was make a token effort to clear the area around the mountain courtyard.

Even so,

an extremely fierce thought rose in Shen Changchuan's heart, and his eyes turned bloodshot.

"When this rain finally stops, I'm cutting down the trees!"

"I'm setting the mountains ablaze!"

He didn't want to experience this horrifying living environment ever again.

There were far too many trees and bushes around the village.

He never wanted to see those densely packed creatures covering the trees again.

The surroundings of Dawan Village

had to be thoroughly changed!

Meanwhile,

partway along the road,

in a cave somewhere in the mountains,

a group of five young people dressed in fine clothes had also been blocked by the rain, which had continued for more than half a month. They had no choice but to take shelter in the cave.

Now they were gathered around a bonfire, grumbling loudly.

"Damn it, no one should have to live in a place like this!"

"Twenty-five days! It's been raining for a full twenty-five days, and there's still no sign of clear skies! And those swarms of disgusting things in the trees outside the mountains are revolting! If we stay here any longer, I'll go crazy if I don't grow mold first!"

"You've got a lot of nerve saying that! Yesterday, you promised to keep watch and stop those disgusting things from getting in. But when I woke up from meditating, there were two Mountain Leeches sucking blood from my arm! Is that how you do your job?!"

"Shen Rongguang, you're talking nonsense! How do you know you didn't bring them in when you went outside to take a dump?"

"Shen Zhifei, you—!"

"Enough. Stop making a scene."

As they were about to start arguing,

a calm voice rang through the cave, cutting off their quarrel.

The speaker was Shen Chongshan, who sat in the middle of the group by the fire. He was tall and broad-shouldered, and gave people a sense of security.

He was also the leader of their group.

Shen Chongshan spoke evenly.

"Traveling outside is out of the question. It's dull here, but we'd better stay put."

"The trees and bushes outside are covered in those disgusting things. The moment you walk beneath a tree, they come springing down at you."

"Even though we're cultivators and can use spiritual light shields to keep those things away, our magical power isn't limitless. If we run out before finding somewhere to take shelter, you can imagine what'll happen."

At that, everyone couldn't help shuddering.

They imagined running out of magical power without finding a good place to shelter,

with their bodies covered in bloodsucking Mountain Leeches until they were sucked dry.

They all shivered at the thought.

That would be absolutely horrifying!

"Let's just endure it for now. Doesn't all this rain show that the place is rich in water and moisture, and might well be home to some kind of heavenly spirit medicine?"

"As long as we find that thing and complete the mission, that person won't forget us, given his character."

Shen Chongshan's steady voice offered them some reassurance.

The others felt more at ease as well.

That was right.

If they could complete the mission of finding that thing, someone with that person's character wouldn't treat them unfairly.

If they could get into his good graces, their futures would be assured.

For a moment,

the mood grew much calmer.

"Brother Chongshan is right."

"Compared with the reward for success, this little hardship is something we can endure."

"But Brother Chongshan, we really have suffered on this trip. Once the rain stops and we reach our destination, how about finding a good place to rest before setting out again?"

"After all, if we're not in good shape, traveling in and out of the deep mountains won't be safe."

Shen Rongguang spoke up from the side, making a suggestion.

At his words, everyone present turned to look at their leader, Shen Kaishan, their eyes full of hope.

Their meaning was plain.

"Fine."

"Xiaoguang, take out the map and see whether there's any territory belonging to the Shen Clan near our destination. If there is, we'll settle down there. We can then send some mortals into the mountains to search, which should narrow down the area we have to cover."

Shen Chongshan nodded, raising no objection.

Indeed,

the rain had put everyone through the wringer.

They had been stuck in the cave for more than half a month. Once they got near their destination, they really should find a good place to rest.

"Brother Chongshan, there's a place called Dawan Village nearby. It belongs to our Shen Clan."

"Which cultivator is stationed there?"

"A lucky kid named Shen Changchuan. He's at the third level of the Qi Induction Realm."

Shen Rongguang glanced over the map and answered casually.

The Shen Clan's head, Shen Fuxing, had more than fifty children, which was still considered a small number among the main branch of the Shen Clan.

So unless a descendant held an important position or had great strength, no one paid much attention to an inconspicuous concubine-born son.

Shen Rongguang clearly didn't know who Shen Changchuan was.

But when Shen Chongshan heard him, he furrowed his brow and spoke up.

"Bring me the map. Let me see it."

Shen Rongguang didn't understand why,

but he still handed the map over.