Chapter 917: The Boy Taking Shelter From the Rain

The sky suddenly brightened, and a faint golden light spread from the horizon through the morning mist, wrapping the mountains.

At the foot of the mountain, the county town that had been sleeping all night began to wake up gradually, and the people took to the streets one after another, starting their day-to-day lives.

And on the top of this not-too-small mountain, on the ten-meter open space that looked like a bald head, there was a strange boulder lying horizontally.

The boulder was about one person tall, and the stone body was eroded by wind and rain, showing a human-like appearance.

Not only that, the place where the boulder was most severely eroded by wind and rain happened to correspond to the nine orifices of a person. It can be said that it was born and raised by nature. It didn't look like a boulder, but like a stone man who had not yet given birth to spiritual wisdom.

At this time, if a practitioner passed by this place, he would find that this stone man had not yet been officially born, but had learned to use the nine orifices to inhale and exhale the surrounding spiritual energy, and could even gather the sun's light and absorb the essence of the sun in the early morning with secret methods.

This was definitely not something that a mere stone embryo could do. It must be enlightened by a great supernatural being to help it give birth to spiritual wisdom in advance.

In this world, it is the most difficult to turn earth and stone into spirits, compared to the spirits of birds and beasts, plants and trees.

Because of this, their potential after becoming spirits is also the greatest among all living beings.

Most of the earth and stone spirits that were enlightened by great supernatural powers have become mountain gods and land gods canonized by the heavenly court, and some have been taken in by real great supernatural powers as their surrounding warriors or even disciples.

And those who have survived enough years and born spiritual intelligence on their own are even more amazing.

The most typical example is the stone monkey that made a big fuss in the heavenly palace.

Therefore, once a truly accomplished practitioner passes by this place and finds the stone man, he will be tempted and take it away.

Because of this, in order to avoid becoming a vassal of a Taoist monk, this stone man will only quietly absorb the essence of the sun and the moon at sunrise and sunset and in the middle of the night every day. At other times, he pretends to be without intelligence and unconsciously inhales and exhales spiritual energy to avoid causing too much noise and alarming the practitioners in the Taoist temples around this mountain.

It was lucky that it had been three years since Zishan Zhenren had been cast into this stone fetus.

During these three years, he was cautious and careful, constantly attracting birds and beasts to roost, and enduring the moss climbing. Finally, he had not encountered any accidents and had successfully cultivated to the present stage.

Feeling the spiritual light gradually filling up in his body, Zishan Zhenren felt a long-lost excitement in his heart.

"Seven days, another seven days, I can trigger the heavenly tribulation, overcome the tribulation and transform!"

By then, he can finally gain the ability to act independently and leave this ghost place where birds and beasts shit!

At the same time, because of the stone fetus, the apprentice system that had been shelved for three years can finally be put on the agenda and studied carefully!

Thinking of this, Zishan Zhenren calmed down his excitement a little and opened the system panel in his soul.

It has been three years since he obtained this apprentice system. In addition to practicing, Zishan Zhenren often interacts with the system, studies the functions of the system, and explores the secrets behind the system.

But unfortunately, this system seems to be artificially retarded. Apart from some basic commands, it is impossible to communicate with him.

And most of those basic commands have not been unlocked yet.

Currently, there is only one task panel that can be opened, which has a novice task called [First Apprenticeship].

Although this system is far from his expectations, Zishan Zhenren still dare not underestimate it.

Because the reward for this novice task is too generous!

Just accepting an apprentice can reward him with a full hundred years of magic power cultivation.

If Zishan Zhenren can complete it in the stone embryo stage, he can not only transform instantly, but also directly skip the initial little demon stage and become a stone spirit with a hundred years of cultivation.

With such cultivation, plus the magical powers he has mastered, at least it will not be a problem to get along in the mortal world.

But unfortunately, he can only think about such things now.

After all, who would be willing to worship a stone as a master for the immortal genius that he, Zishan Zhenren, has taken a fancy to?

Thinking of this, Master Zishan sighed, and immediately began to look forward to his journey to the human world after his transformation.

At the same time, in the small county at the foot of the mountain, outside Baozhi Hall, a handsome young man carried a medicine basket on his back, picked up a scroll, walked onto the street, and walked straight towards the back mountain outside the city.

Neighbors and villagers passing by would greet the young man with a smile.

The young man also smiled in response, and his temperament, as gentle as jade and as warm as spring breeze, made all the neighbors who responded feel much better.

"Brother Xu, are you going to the mountains to collect herbs today?"

A slightly smiling voice came from the side.

The young man turned his head and looked at the middle-aged scholar who was eating soup noodles at the stall, and nodded with a smile: "Yes."

"Did you bring an umbrella?" The middle-aged scholar asked, and then explained with a smile, "I see that Wang Ma's Da Huang is listless today and doesn't go out. Maybe it's raining."

The young man thanked him warmly, took out a paper umbrella from his backpack, and waved it to the middle-aged scholar.

The middle-aged scholar laughed and waved his hand, signaling the young man not to delay here.

The young man smiled in response, thanked him again, and then walked towards the city gate.

After leaving the city and coming to the back mountain, the young man looked at the sky above his head, took out the scroll from his backpack, and read as he walked.

Yesterday, I was lucky. Most of the herb bushes I found were not picked, but they had already filled the backpack.

Today, when I go into the mountains to pick herbs, I only need to revisit the old place, without searching, which saves a lot of effort.

In addition, he is already very familiar with this road. Even with his eyes closed, he can reach the end, which is a good opportunity to read more.

Not long after, the young man arrived at the place where he left yesterday. Then he became energetic, put away the book, and walked into the herb bush.

After two-thirds of the medicine basket was filled, the young man straightened up, rubbed his sore back, and subconsciously looked up at the sky.

"Tick tock..."

A drop of rain fell on the young man's handsome face.

The young man was startled for a moment, and then he realized something was wrong. He quickly took out the paper umbrella from the basket and opened it.

"Wow--"

There was a piercing sound, and the young man's heart skipped a beat. He quickly put the paper umbrella down, and sure enough, he found a scratch about a foot long on the right side of the paper umbrella.

It turned out that the boy was too hasty in holding the umbrella and did not notice the branches sticking out of the trees next to him.

When the paper umbrella was opened, the umbrella surface hit the branches and was easily scratched by the protruding branches.

"This is bad!"

Feeling annoyed, the young man quickly picked up the medicine basket and ran toward the road with a broken umbrella.

At this moment, God seemed to feel that the foreplay had been laid and the main course could begin.

As a result, what started as light raindrops quickly turned into a downpour in just a few seconds.

Countless raindrops fell from the sky, hitting the leaves around the boy and the paper umbrella in his hand, making the already broken paper umbrella even worse.

The boy was originally running wildly on the road, but when he saw the wind and rain blowing in his face, blowing the cracks in the paper umbrella further, he had no choice but to slow down and walk slowly on the mountain road washed by the heavy rain.

"Unlucky..."

"If I had known better, I would have listened to my sister and used the new umbrella she bought."

The young man thought depressedly while holding an umbrella and walking on the mountain road.

Suddenly, the young man felt the paper umbrella in his hand sink, and a familiar but ominous voice sounded again.

His eyes widened, and he looked up in panic. He saw a black shadow falling from the sky and landing on his paper umbrella. Then he jumped forward and threw himself at a strange-shaped stone beside the road.

The young man took a closer look and found that the black shadow was a young yellow fox.

And the stone it ran toward was the so-called Stone Mountain King that the woodcutter talked about.

The reason why it is called a tiger is because its shape resembles a bent human being. Whenever heavy rain falls, woodcutters going up and down the mountain can always see some small animals taking shelter under this stone.

It's as if the stone bent down on its own initiative, providing a haven for the creatures in the mountain.

Thinking of this, the young man suddenly realized that the fox must have come here to shelter from the wind and rain.

"What a bad luck!"

The young man smiled bitterly, raised his hand to cover his eyes, and looked at the even more damaged paper umbrella above his head.

At this time, after three attacks from branches, foxes, wind and rain, the hole on the umbrella had been expanded to an irreparable point.

The pouring rain finally didn't just hit my face, but poured down from the damaged part of the paper umbrella above my head.

Feeling the water flowing across his cheek, the boy sighed, put away his paper umbrella, and hurried forward.

When passing by the 'Stone Mountain Lord', the young man's footsteps suddenly stopped.

He looked at the water-soaked books in the basket on his back, feeling a little distressed, and then turned to look at the little fox curled up under Lord Shishan, using its tail as a mattress. After thinking for a while, he finally decided to rest here for a while.

The black shadow gradually covered the field of vision, and the little fox was suddenly startled and quickly raised his head and looked forward.

I saw the young man carrying the medicine basket and squeezing into the cramped space in the arms of ‘Shishanjun’ with an apologetic look on his face.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, the situation is forcing me to do anything, Xiaosheng can't do anything, you and I can only make do with it!"

"..."

The little fox opened his watery eyes, glared at the boy, bared his teeth in dissatisfaction, then stood up and moved to the side.

The young man was startled for a moment, then chuckled, cupped his hands and said, "Thank you, thank you!"

After that, one person and one fox crowded into this small space, waiting quietly for the heavy rain to stop.

At the same time, unknown to this person, Master Zishan's spiritual consciousness covered a five-meter radius, and his soul manifested. He looked at the handsome young man reading the book in his arms with black lines on his head.

Two years ago, a female fox had difficulty giving birth at his place. It was only through his spiritual energy that she successfully gave birth to her child.

In other words, this little fox was born and grew up under the eyes of Master Zishan, and he was an old acquaintance of him.

But this young man, who had only appeared in this place in the past few months, and had no interaction or connection with him, was so shameless that he competed with a little fox for shelter from the rain.

Really...

Master Zishan shook his head and looked up at the sky, hoping that the heavy rain would stop soon.

Perhaps someone heard his voice, the heavy rain actually gradually became lighter and then stopped.