The Imprisoned Mallard

"Help! Someone's going to die!"

"I can't move my body, I can't speak, I have no ability to resist at all!"

"These ugly women have been tormenting me day and night. I can't stand this living hell anymore!"

"Please let me go back! I'd rather be threatened and beaten by that wicked woman every day than come to a place like this again!"

Mental state and emotions do indeed guide each other's orientation; Zhang Xuezhou never expected the mallard duck to feel so desperate.

Compared to the monotonous mood simulation of mallards, Zhang Xuezhou simulates a wide variety of mood changes.

He tested it many times over the past few days and finally achieved the same feeling as the mallard, and also heard the mallard's heart.

But this listening seems to be one-way; Zhang Xuezhou can hear the voice, but the mallard seems unable to hear his thoughts and never responds according to them.

"Is this how Donghua has always obtained information about me?"

Compared to Donghua, Zhang Xuezhou is the weaker party in terms of strength.

Compared to the mallard, Zhang Xuezhou is the one with superior strength.

This contrast in strength seems to have given Zhang Xuezhou the ability to listen to his inner voice, putting him in a more dominant position during the journey.

The inner thoughts were not the mallard's current inner thoughts, but rather the accumulated thoughts over a long period of time, which allowed Zhang Xuezhou to quickly understand what he had recently experienced.

A glint flashed in Zhang Xuezhou's eyes, and numerous images flashed through his mind like a revolving lantern.

Like the images he perceived on the tree chair and the giant tree seed, these images precisely recorded the various things, big and small, that he perceived when his heart was fluctuating.

The mallard had very little control over his body; not only was he unable to move, but he even had some difficulty opening his eyes.

In the mallard's field of vision, most of the images are dark and blurry.

The few images that are barely discernible are because Zhang Xuezhou is lying down, and only the women's heads can be seen bowing.

This is definitely not a good angle for observation; no matter how beautiful a woman is, she's no different from Ji Wuyan.

Even if mallards and Zhang Xuezhou share the same human aesthetic sense, they could never have a good life from this perspective.

The mallard duck in the Donghua Hall still had some room to move around. After entering Zhang Xuezhou's body and forming a kind of Incantation Technique- like 'initiator,' this life of being conscious but unable to move his limbs was comparable to severe torture, especially since the mallard duck also had the ability to feel its limbs.

This is likely why Donghua couldn't help but teach Zhang Xuezhou a lesson in the past.

"This duck is already on the verge of death after only half a month, while Donghua has endured it for over thirty years. No wonder the mallard duck always says Donghua is expressionless, as if his heart is dead. If I had experienced that kind of life for a long time, I would also be heartbroken!"

"Donghua's strength far surpasses mine, so why can't he control my body?"

Many things are only realized in hindsight; Zhang Xuezhou only learned about the situation after experiencing it firsthand.

He watched the mallard ducks go through all that happened, and when the sounds and images faded away, Zhang Xuezhou found himself sitting on a tree chair.

The tree chair is not shaped like a throne, but rather like a triangular stool made of tree branches.

Zhang Xuezhou identified the tree chair while navigating the twisted path. He even tried to touch the chair and had a contest in its area.

From not being able to see clearly to touching, then to competing, and finally sitting down, a long period of time had passed.

Donghua once mentioned the power of the World Tree as binding force and prisons, and the 'prison' mentioned here may be related to being trapped in the body and unable to move.

Zhang Xuezhou reached out and stroked the tree branch chair, which didn't seem too large to him at the moment.

This time, he did not receive the information about the World Tree's growth again, and he did not experience any special sensations when he touched it.

In the endless darkness, the chair resembled a ship carrying Zhang Xuezhou, bringing him a sense of security.

What are the manifestations of the World Tree's power binding force?

Zhang Xuezhou could understand the pain of having his three souls and seven spirits torn apart, he could understand the helplessness of losing control and being controlled, and he even understood the strangeness of his body being controlled by other consciousnesses. But Zhang Xuezhou could not understand why he felt nothing at all.

Donghua's statement that the World Tree possesses binding power could not have come out of thin air; rather, it suggests that the World Tree has indeed had a significant negative impact on Donghua.

But Zhang Xuezhou didn't actually feel it at the time.

He sat on the tree chair, gazing into the distance, and could Chu Lands sense the mallard duck, a kind of Incantation Technique incantation, waiting for him to guide it.

He only needs to take one step forward, and Zhang Xuezhou will return to his body, while the mallard will be stuffed back into the altar area.

This transformation was completely unconstrained, and Zhang Xuezhou did not feel like he was being manipulated or controlled.

All that's needed is for the giant tree seed and the tree chair to complement each other, and Zhang Xuezhou will be able to reach this place.

"That world was Donghua's initial landing point, while the real world is his final landing point. Back then, he failed to cross dimensions, his body was destroyed, and he could only flee in panic with his soul. His rapid descent was hindered, so he could only leave a mark through a special method before rushing into reality. This time, he seems to have a different plan. Instead of reincarnating and being corrupted, he used the same method as before to leave a mark, which created an extremely complex traction relationship and thus formed two versions of me!"

Sitting on the tree chair, Zhang Xuezhou gestured continuously, feeling as he pondered and clarified many issues.

After Donghua's defeat and escape, he once again entrusted his divine soul to the World Tree, whereupon he was likely ambushed, thus seeing an opportunity to break free from the World Tree.

Many things became clear to Zhang Xuezhou, but he did not feel the binding force of the World Tree.

"If I inherit everything from Donghua, but don't want to repeat the same mistakes, there are many things I might only be able to learn through Donghua!"

Zhang Xuezhou and Donghua have irreconcilable conflicts, but Zhang Xuezhou wants to obtain relevant information from Donghua, which is undoubtedly a difficult task, especially since he is currently at a disadvantage and Zhang Xuezhou often feels a sense of crisis that his future is uncertain.

He could only consider this possibility before quickly abandoning the plan.

"This should be the method to adjust the travel time!"

There is no precise time in this darkness. What seems like a moment of opening and closing your eyes can last a long time in your perception, but the time spent thinking can also be quite long.

Zhang Xuezhou felt as if the three legs of the tree branch chair had been rotated at an angle. He wasn't overturned, but he heard the desperate cries of the Zhang Xuezhou duck again.

"I'm going to die! I'm going to die! These wicked women actually used so many needles to prick me!"

"I shouldn't have betrayed my old master. If I hadn't betrayed him, I wouldn't have fallen into Zhang Xuezhou's hands. If I hadn't fallen into his hands, I wouldn't have been used as a tool for time travel. If I hadn't been used as a tool, I wouldn't have suffered like this. And even if I did suffer like this, he would definitely still complain that I'm incompetent!"

"If that bastard Zhang Xuezhou finds out I haven't taken good care of his body, he'll definitely hang me up and beat me when we get back, he might even kill me!"

"That heartless thief was truly ruthless; he was nothing like the kind and gentle old master!"

Amidst the endless murmurs of the mallard duck, Zhang Xuezhou managed to glimpse a foot-long silver needle through a slit in his eye.

This is probably Yi Shuo giving him acupuncture.

Although Zhang Xuezhou suffered from various physical ailments and his Law Power were suppressed, Zhang Xuezhou was genuinely not ill.

The medical malpractice of Chunyu Tiying splitting his head apart was still vivid in her mind.

The thought of medical procedures that people debated—whether they worked or not, they actually did—made Zhang Xuezhou restless.

He took a step forward, and in an instant, amidst the shrieks of the mallards, he completed the substitution and opened his eyes.