Chapter 23: Part 3

With that, he stood up, his sleeves flaring with anger, and walked straight out the door.

Qu Ning glanced anxiously at Ye Jianggui but had no choice but to follow out.

Qu Wu sneered and also followed.

Watching the Qu family leave, Ye Jianggui turned to Ye Fengwan with a stern expression and asked, “Why didn’t you listen to me?”

Ye Fengwan exhaled softly and replied, “The food the Qu family sends over now is getting more and more perfunctory. I’m afraid before we find a way to heal your legs, you’ll starve to death from malnutrition.”

Ye Jianggui said testily, “It’s not that easy to die.”

Ye Fengwan moved closer, sitting beside her, and ingratiatingly hugged her arm: “All these years, you’ve seen it too. It’s nearly impossible to cultivate high-quality organic food within the Safe Zone. My project has also hit a bottleneck. Wouldn’t it be better to look elsewhere? Maybe there’s a new chance?”

And also, this time, her sister had nearly died for her. She couldn’t be sure what situation might arise next time she went on a mission, or whether it would implicate her sister again. But as long as she stayed beside her, all sorts of possibilities existed.

Now that the Qu father and son had basically locked onto her, she could only temporarily lay low and take a step back.

Ye Jianggui looked at her: “The honey last time was sent by someone from the New Land, so you’re taking this chance to go see?”

Ye Fengwan nodded: “That’s one reason.”

“But what if the Qu family tries to make a move against you?”

Ye Fengwan smiled: “I’m not the kind to just sit and wait for death.”

“Is there someone in the territories to protect you?”

Ye Fengwan nodded again.

Ye Jianggui sighed, turned her wheelchair, and said, “Go, then.”

Ye Fengwan grabbed her hand and said, “Don’t worry. I’ll find food and a way to remove the toxins from your legs.”

Ye Jianggui shook her head: “I’m used to being like this now… If you find a better place to go, just go.”

Ye Fengwan laughed: “What better place is there? Once we get past this hurdle, we’ll always be together in the end. And when I get there, I’ll video call you every day.”

Ye Jianggui nodded: “Okay.”

…

As Ye Fengwan packed her bags and set off for the New Land, Ruan Ming was carrying a basket on her back, searching in the mountains.

Little Calico followed at her feet, meowing as she sniffed around.

After messaging Ye Fengwan the morning prior, she worried about the two sisters’ situation and wanted to do something for them.

So, early the next day, she went up the mountain.

Since the honey incident, she increasingly felt the mountain bordering the swamp on her territory was extraordinary.

First, she went near the beehive at the top to search, using her detector. But it was mostly yellow or red-lit shrubs, nothing edible.

After half a day’s busy work with no results, she was about to head back when she realized Little Calico was gone again.

She was startled at first, then felt a surge of joy.

Last time before finding the honey, Little Calico had run off on her own first too.

She immediately held her breath, focused, ears twitching slightly as she carefully searched for Little Calico’s sounds.

Maybe because the distance wasn’t far, she soon heard “meow meow” cries and the slurping sound of water being lapped.

Following the direction of the sound, she discovered it came from below the cliff.

Ruan Ming approached and peered down. The extreme height difference immediately made her legs weak. She hurriedly lay down flat, using the ground beneath her for support.

Only then did she cautiously poke her head out, fighting intense vertigo as she looked down along the cliff face. There, on the nearly vertical rock wall, halfway up the mountain, Little Calico was crouched by a spring, drinking water.

This sight made her head spin. She didn’t know when Little Calico had climbed down there. What worried her even more was that while felines were good climbers, they were also timid. She might’ve gotten down, but might not be able to climb back up.

For a moment, Ruan Ming was at a loss. She wondered if she should go home, get Ah Yuan to buy a long rope, and rappel down to rescue her.

But could Little Calico hold on that long?

Not to mention, the swamp at the base of the cliff below—at a glance, it was densely covered in black scales. Hundreds of crocodiles were down there, waiting.

One misstep, the little one falls, and it’s straight into a crocodile’s belly.

Ruan Ming could only call Little Calico’s name from the top of the cliff.

Little Calico hadn’t realized the danger at first. But after drinking its fill, it looked down and got genuinely frightened, meowing loudly.

Ruan Ming was frantic and couldn’t help scolding, “That’s what you get for going down there! Now you can’t get back up. Don’t look down! Just come back up the way you went down!”

But how could Little Calico understand human speech? It opened its mouth and meowed urgently, as if telling her to come down quickly and rescue it.

Ruan Ming said helplessly, “Just wait. I’ll call Ah Yuan right now and have him bring a rope.”

Even if she got a rope, Ruan Ming truly couldn’t imagine tying herself to it and going down that cliff. Forget the vertical slope, there were also the crocodiles at the bottom. Either one was enough to make her legs tremble and her scalp go numb.

Just as she was about to turn on her wristband to make the call, two low bleating sounds came through.

Ruan Ming jolted and quickly looked down.

There, on the cliff’s ledge, she didn’t know when three blue sheep had appeared, walking step by step towards Little Calico’s location, seemingly drawn by the small, crystal-clear stream seeping from the cliff’s halfway point.

Blue sheep were the rock-climbing champions of the animal kingdom. Ruan Ming was astonished to see them here. At the same time, the answer inside her heart was almost bursting forth.

Mutated beasts also had picky mouths. Little Calico was like that, and these blue sheep must be the same. That small stream on the cliff ledge was definitely no ordinary thing!

At this thought, Ruan Ming’s heart pounded furiously.

Seeing the blue sheep approach, Little Calico bared its teeth and yowled at them.

But the three blue sheep were unfazed. Along the tiny crevices of the cliff, they stepped cautiously over, nearing the small spring.

They lowered their heads and started drinking.

Little Calico saw these large creatures weren’t afraid of it. It wanted to show its might, but its predicament was poor, so it could only huddle in a crevice and meow pitifully.

Ruan Ming grew anxious and shouted to Little Calico, “Climb onto their backs! Blue sheep can traverse cliffs. Follow them until you reach flat ground, then come home!”

Little Calico couldn’t understand. It eyed the blue sheep warily.

The blue sheep paid no mind to such a tiny thing and lowered their heads, continuing to drink.

Seeing the large blue sheep getting closer, leaving it no room to retreat, Little Calico suddenly got angry. With a yowl, it arched its body and leaped, pouncing onto the head of the leading, largest blue sheep, tightly gripping its horns.

Clearly, the spot on top of the blue sheep’s head was much wider and more comfortable than the crevice it had been crouching in.

The blue sheep being ridden didn’t seem to mind.

Creatures capable of moving freely on sheer cliffs walked with extreme caution every step. They were definitely not short-tempered beasts. And since Little Calico wasn’t heavy, it was allowed to ride there.

Watching from above, Ruan Ming couldn’t help but sigh in relief.

As long as it followed the blue sheep off the cliff to flat ground, Little Calico would be safe.

Lying at the cliff’s top, she watched the three goats and one cat below, memorizing the sound frequencies of the goats. She planned to follow them once they finished drinking so she could retrieve Little Calico.

These goats drank slowly. Ruan Ming wasn’t sure where they came from, or if they’d always been on her mountain.

If they were goats on her mountain, how wonderful that would be.

Ruan Ming daydreamed, and her eyes lit up at the thought.

She didn’t plan on catching them for meat. With just a few goats, if they were edible, the priority would be to pen them and breed them.

If those crocodiles below were edible, that would be great. So many of them, you could never eat them all.

Thinking this, she stared intently at the swamp at the cliff’s base. The muddy water below seemed to be in turmoil, with several crocodiles fighting over something.

Ruan Ming observed carefully for a long while before realizing these crocodiles were fighting for the spot beneath the spring water.

And these crocodiles weren’t all the same color. Centered around where the spring water fell, they fanned out. The closer to the spring, the lighter the scale color; the farther away, the darker they were.

An incredible thought began spreading in Ruan Ming’s mind.

As her thoughts ran wild, she heard “meow meow” sounds. Ruan Ming turned her head to see the goats, having drunk their fill, heading back. Little Calico rode on the lead goat’s head, its little paws clutching the large horns tightly.

Ruan Ming quickly stood up, locked her ears onto the little creature’s sounds, and followed from the other side of the mountain.

After walking for about half an hour, as the sounds grew closer, Ruan Ming looked up. Roughly twenty meters ahead stood three blue sheep, and on the head of the leader sat Little Calico.

The blue sheep eyed Ruan Ming warily and stopped.

Afraid of scaring them, Ruan Ming took a few steps back, then called to Little Calico on its head, “Little Calico, come back.”

Little Calico glanced at Ruan Ming, nuzzled the big horn, then finally meowed, jumped off the goat’s head, and ran toward Ruan Ming.

Ruan Ming crouched down and scooped up Little Calico. Feeling its warm body and the purr at its neck, her anxious heart finally settled.

She didn’t go any closer to disturb the goats. If they were originally on her two mountains, as long as the spring water was there, they wouldn’t leave easily.

Holding Little Calico, she turned and headed back.

The goats behind her stood in place for a long time before disappearing into the depths of the jungle only after her silhouette vanished.

Ruan Ming’s ears also caught the sounds of their departure. She took the detector from her pocket and touched its probe to the still-damp fur around Little Calico’s mouth.

“Beep.”

Green!

Even though she’d already guessed, seeing that green light flash, Ruan Ming’s heart pounded wildly.

Her territory had a natural, pollution-free, drinkable spring!

This was absolutely something to be excited about.

She’d never imagined the land her father left her was such a treasure. He must have been too busy with other things back then and hadn’t had time to explore the mountain’s secrets.

With a spring, goats, cats, and bees, she was absolutely the happiest and wealthiest Territory Lord.

The spring water flowed out from inside the mountain, so the source must be somewhere within the mountain itself. As long as she found the source, she wouldn’t need to dangle off the cliff to fetch water.

If Institute Director Ye drank this water, her condition surely wouldn’t be so bad.

And Ye Fengwan, those marks on her neck—she wondered when they would fade.

Ruan Ming didn’t want to think about yesterday’s photo, yet that snow-white neck seemed engraved in her mind. Whenever she thought of anything related to Ye Fengwan, it would jump out when she wasn’t paying attention and take over her whole mind.

She sighed softly, held Little Calico with one hand, and took out her wristband with the other, composing a message: Has your neck gotten any better today?

Ye Fengwan, sitting in the off-road vehicle heading to the New Land, saw the wristband message and her originally expressionless face finally recovered a trace of warmth. She replied: Not better. Hurts. I wish you could blow on it for me.

Ruan Ming’s steps abruptly halted because of this message. She stared at the words above, unsure of how to respond.

Little Calico, seeing she had stopped, struggled to get down.

She released the little cat and crouched on the ground. Then, slowly, she typed back: Okay, I’ll blow on it for you.