Ten thousand grass-mud horses were baring their teeth and jeering wildly in his heart when Mu Bai suddenly looked up and saw a figure bounding toward the mountaintop in a few flying leaps beneath the moonlit sky.
"Chen Laosan, wait for me!"
Apart from Madam Seven Emotions, Mu Bai had never seen anyone in this village leap so high. Who could it be but Chen Laosan, who had been paralyzed for over a decade?
"Village Chief, this old man can't wait for you. You're too slow."
"Then why don't you grant me a pair of wings that can fly? Take me flying..."
"Good idea! Village Chief, you're too clever."
Mu Bai stared, dumbstruck. He had merely spouted some nonsense, and that counted as being too clever? Chen Laosan pointed a finger, and a pair of fins sprouted from Mu Bai's back, flapping noisily.
"Fish can fly too?"
"Of course. Haven't you heard of 'flying fish'?"
"Isn't that swimming?"
"Never mind that. Off you go!"
Chen Laosan grabbed Mu Bai and leaped into the air, then let go. Mu Bai furiously flapped the fins on his back and actually began to fly. Just as delight and surprise filled his heart, he sensed surging undercurrents in the pitch darkness all around, as though he had entered the depths of the sea. He could feel large fish or enormous shoals swimming past him from time to time.
So this is the underwater world? It's pitch-black. Can't someone light a lamp?
As he muttered inwardly, two enormous lanterns suddenly lit up. By their crimson radiance, like two red suns, Mu Bai saw clearly that a mountain range had actually opened its eyes.
He started in fright, and the mountain range closed its eyes again, plunging everything back into darkness.
Ever since entering the lake