Having gotten no information from Little Gray, the bird-hunting duo began analyzing the situation again.
Lu Ming felt very lucky to have scraped through his encounter with the old ancestor here.
"We didn't get the clues we wanted from Little Gray. Not a single bird on Mount Tai has seen a white swallow. Searching like this is pretty much like looking for a needle in a haystack."
He squatted on the steps.
"Little Gray is the best-informed bird on all of Mount Tai. If even he hasn't seen You Yan, maybe that Spirit Swallow isn't on Mount Tai at all. Could the Queen Mother have gotten it wrong? Maybe he's on some other mountain, like Mount Hua or Mount Heng."
Wen Ning leaned against the stone pillar beside the steps. He, too, found this troublesome.
"The Queen Mother probably wasn't wrong, but 'near Mount Tai' covers a lot of ground. He might not be in the woods on the mountain. Mount Tai has so many temples, caves, and valleys. Little Gray only patrols this area. There must be places he can't reach."
"Since the birds on the mountain haven't seen him, let's ask down below.
"Besides the birds and beasts, there's another well-informed group on Mount Tai: the land gods."
Lu Ming's eyes lit up at Wen Ning's words.
"That's a great idea! I know the Land God of Mount Tai. I've met him before."
Hearing Lu Ming say he knew him, Wen Ning said,
"Let's start with the nearest one and ask around the villages at the foot of the mountain."
The two headed down the mountain path.
They found a Land God temple at the foot of the mountain.
Knowing exactly what to do, Lu Ming crouched outside the temple entrance and knocked on the ground three times.