What Then?

Chen Xu leaned on his cane, hunched over as he listened to Ugly Monkey's incessant babbling all the way through Little Bamboo Grove.

Sure enough, he failed to find another suitable stone shard. Forget stone shards—even unsuitable little pebbles had become exceedingly scarce on the ground.

Ugly Monkey clapped its hands and burst into laughter again. "It's over, it's over! Young man, do you understand now that the world is fraught with hardships, and not something a bellyful of hot blood can solve?"

It let out a series of shrill, bizarre cackles, the grating sound enough to throw anyone's mind into turmoil.

Hearing it, Chen Xu felt his chest heave as a surge of Vital Blood rushed straight to his head. It made him want nothing more than to smash all the bamboo slips on the spot, then turn around and give Ugly Monkey a vicious punch.

His fist had already clenched tight, but the blister on his left hand pressed painfully against his palm.

Chen Xu instantly came back to his senses. The pain spread gradually from his palm. He took a deep breath and ignored Ugly Monkey's chatter, then turned and walked to a slender green bamboo nearby. Suddenly, he raised his right hand and fiercely chopped at one of its joints.

Crack!

Though he used his bare palm as a blade, Chen Xu's strength was exceptionally concentrated. Vital Blood surged through his body, yet when it reached his palm, the force erupted within the space of an inch.

Chopping bamboo was like Wood Chopping—strike its weak point, cut at its vital spot.

In an instant, the green bamboo snapped with a crash and toppled sharply to one side.

Chen Xu exerted force with his right hand and swiftly cleared it away. In three strokes and two cuts, he stripped every thin branch from the bamboo pole.

His movements were deft. He chose a suitable node, set the bamboo pole into a triangle, then chopped it apart at the node once more.

In the end, he obtained a bamboo tube roughly half a foot long.

Chen Xu still had a small round, blunt pebble left over from polishing the stone shards earlier. He gripped the pebble in his palm, stood the bamboo tube upright, and struck along its grain.

Crack, crack! The bamboo tube instantly split along its grain into four pieces.

Chen Xu selected one piece. Holding that round, blunt pebble, he trimmed its edges and ground its bevel. Under his hands, the bamboo piece gradually acquired a sharp edge.

Looking at it more closely, how was this still some mere bamboo piece? It had clearly become a bamboo knife!

Ugly Monkey was dumbfounded. At some point, its babbling had stopped. It merely followed close at Chen Xu's side, watching him send force through an inch of space as he carefully carved answers onto the bamboo slips with the bamboo knife.

Chen Xu's Vital Blood was abundant, his mind quick, and his control of force skillful. In his hands, this bamboo knife proved even more useful than the stone shards from before.

In no time at all, he had carved answer slips up to the twenty-second, twenty-third... and twenty-fifth.

Just then, Ugly Monkey suddenly said, "Scholar, the fastest among those people has already finished thirty questions. He has left the Bamboo Grove and entered the second layer of the Star Array."

Crack!

The tip of the bamboo knife in Chen Xu's hand slipped aside and snapped cleanly in two.

Chen Xu did not care. He picked up the round stone from the ground and ground the broken tip for a while, restoring the bamboo knife.

"Monkey," Chen Xu said as he continued carving answers with the bamboo knife, "do you know the greatest difference between humans and animals?"

Ugly Monkey's oversized ears fluttered, its bulging eyes widened, and it asked in a muffled voice, "What is it?"

"It is because humans can make tools." Chen Xu smiled. "Under any circumstances, people can make tools and change their environment.

The ancient forefathers possessed nothing. In that primordial world where danger lurked on every side, they were not the strongest in body, nor were their claws and fangs the sharpest. Yet they could use everything around them that could be used, crafting stone knives, stone axes, bone spears, bone swords...

Using tools in place of claws and fangs, they hunted wild beasts and protected themselves.

They ate raw meat and drank blood, and so they learned to drill wood to make fire and cook their food.

Their skin was fragile, and so they learned to tan hides and make clothing.

They could not withstand bitter cold, scorching heat, wind like blades, and frost like swords with flesh alone, and so they learned to build houses.

No, they did not merely learn. In nature's evolution, they created miracle after miracle.

From weapons to flame, from language to writing, from barbarism to civilization!"

Chen Xu spoke slowly, his leisurely voice sounding as though he were merely chatting idly about the rise and fall of ages.

Yet for some reason, Ugly Monkey, crouched beside him, felt every hair on its body stand on end. Beneath its sparse fur, tiny bumps rose densely across its monkey skin.

Ugly Monkey stood with its mouth open and eyes wide, the blood vessels at its neck throbbing and trembling.

Chen Xu continued carving words and answering questions. He completed the twenty-ninth bamboo slip, then the thirtieth... and then picked up the thirty-first blank bamboo slip.

"The greatest difference between humans and animals is that humans can create civilization and history amid adversity, honing wisdom and kindling flame.

What if we have nothing?

What if the world is perilous and people's hearts are no longer as they once were?

What if a single gate determines life and death? What if there are ranks of three, six, and nine—high and low, noble and base?

No. That is because you do not know that besides being good at creation, humans are equally good at destruction."

Chen Xu laughed. When he turned his head, Ugly Monkey suddenly let out a strange cry and kicked back with its thin monkey legs.

Bang!

Just like that, Ugly Monkey fell flat on its backside right before Chen Xu.

Ugly Monkey shrieked "Awoo, awoo!" then sprang up violently and darted into the misty Bamboo Grove in a few leaps, vanishing without a trace.

At the same time, a new message suddenly appeared in Chen Xu's sea of consciousness within the Cauldron Scripture:

[You have captured Three Taels of Heart Monkey Dust Flame. This item possesses unique spirituality and has been stored in Embers Kitchen. God of Cookery Recipes, Three Taels of Red Dust Crisp, can now be unlocked.]

There was such a surprise?

Chen Xu froze for a moment, then laughed again.

Sitting in the fog-shrouded Bamboo Grove, one leg lame, he carved bamboo slips with his bamboo knife. Yet at that moment, he leisurely recited, "The world is thin, human feelings cruel; rain sends dusk away, and flowers fall easily..."

"What then?"

Chen Xu laughed heartily. He filled the fortieth bamboo slip, then carved upon the forty-first.

He did not see that Ugly Monkey, which had originally gone far away, had somehow returned through the mist.

Only, Ugly Monkey no longer showed itself. Instead, it climbed a bamboo pole and hid within the fog, secretly poking its head out to observe Chen Xu.

From time to time, its belly still swelled and shrank as it made sounds difficult for others to hear. "Monkey Lord is furious! This young man has no martial virtue. He looks mild and gentle, without the slightest trace of Baleful Intent, but who would have thought he was actually a mad scholar!

Senior Brother absolutely must not accept this child into his sect. Otherwise, once we go out into the world, how could we still have any good reputation? This kind of madman will ruin it all!"

Ugly Monkey ranted in a furious flurry. Only after a long while did a refined, gentle voice say, "A Sun, you are not angry because he is mad. You are angry because you cannot outdo him in madness, aren't you?"

Ugly Monkey let out an "Awoo!" and grew even angrier.

Bamboo leaves rustled through the mist, and Ugly Monkey scampered away again in the blink of an eye.

It swore that this time, it would never come to see this rotten scholar again.

A quarter of an hour later, a monkey figure with huge ears and bulging eyes once more quietly approached Chen Xu through the mist.

By then, Chen Xu had already carved a full fifty bamboo slips.