The Song Dynasty was the king for thirteen years before he knew that he was Tianlong.

Chapter 436 An Unusual Change Occurs (Seeking Monthly Tickets)

What happened? Zhao Ti looked puzzled and pushed open the courtyard gate.

Zhao Ling'er was leading a large goose and a brightly colored rooster, which was clucking excitedly and chasing after a greyhound.

The greyhound whimpered as it ran, but Zhao Ti immediately saw through its act. Not only did it feign distress, but it also ran slowly, keeping a distance of about a foot from the geese and roosters, making them think it would catch up soon, when in reality it was far from being able to.

"What are you doing?" he asked, frowning.

The greyhound leaped behind him and hid, peeking out cautiously to look at Zhao Ling'er.

"I, I, Big Pot, I'm playing with Wangcai..." Zhao Ling'er tightened the two ropes in her hands, pulling on the goose and the rooster.

"Is this how you play?" Zhao Ti said, "Hurry up and untie the chickens and geese and let them go. Isn't it time to eat? Come inside with me and have a meal."

"I finished eating a long time ago!" Zhao Ling'er's eyes darted around. "Where did you go, Da Guo? You're back so late, and you're still wearing the new clothes that Mother made for you when Uncle came last time?"

"I'm going to see a friend, to have tea and discuss poetry," Zhao Ti said. "After dinner, don't let those two run around outside. Let them go back inside and read."

“Fine…” Zhao Ling’er replied unhappily, “Then I’ll take you to the back of the house and untie you.”

Zhao Ti nodded, watching Zhao Ling'er drive the chickens and geese to the back of the house before going inside to eat dinner.

After eating half of the food, Zhao's mother suddenly asked, "Where did Ti'er go? Why does she smell so strongly of perfume?"

Zhao Ti's expression immediately hardened, and it took him a long time to say, "I'm going to have tea and discuss poetry with some friends."

"Are there any women?" Zhao's mother's lips curved into a smile.

"Yes... there is." Zhao Ti buried his head and quickly finished the last bit of rice in his bowl, then hurriedly stood up.

"Oh?" Zhao's mother smiled and said, "Is it the Qin family's daughter, or that girl from the Zhuge family?"

"Huh?" Zhao Ti walked out of the room, saying as he went, "It's not anyone's family, just ordinary friends having tea. There were several of us. Mother... I'm going to study."

As he spoke, he walked out of the house, turned to the side, and pushed open the door to enter his own room.

At this moment, Zhao's mother looked at Zhao's father sitting in the chair. Zhao's father snorted, "Instead of studying properly, he's wandering around outside drinking tea, and even having affairs with women. He's completely neglecting his duties. I'll go ask him about it."

“Why ask? Ti’er is not young anymore. It’s only natural for him to make a few friends. Although there are women among them, there are more than two of them. What’s there to say?” Zhao’s mother said.

"Summer is over, and the autumn exams are just around the corner. If you don't study hard now, you'll regret it if you fail," Zhao's father said, wiping his forehead with displeasure.

“It’s just a preliminary examination. How could my son not pass it and become a scholar? Ti’er is already so old. If you go and ask questions, it might incite rebellion in your heart and backfire, and it might even delay your studies,” said Zhao’s mother.

"What kind of twisted logic is this..." Zhao's father stared wide-eyed at Zhao's mother.

"Just don't ask, and don't urge him to study too much. Ti'er should know what he's doing," Zhao's mother said, shaking her head.

“A doting mother spoils her son, a doting mother spoils her son…” Zhao’s father said indignantly, then stood up and walked out.

"Where are you going?" asked Zhao's mother.

"I'll go take a walk behind the house and pick some fruit to sell in town tomorrow," Zhao's father said angrily.

“Aren’t fruits freshest when picked in the morning? If you pick them now, the stems and leaves will be dry and wilted by tomorrow morning. Who will you sell them to?” Zhao’s mother said as she tidied the table.

"I...I'll eat them myself if I can't sell them." Father Zhao, his face dark, stepped out of the wooden door and headed towards the back of the house. Suddenly, he raised his voice, "Ling'er, why aren't you back studying so late? What are you doing? Hurry up and go back inside!"

Hearing the commotion outside, Zhao Ti's lips twitched. At this moment, his internal energy was incredibly strong, and he could hear the conversation between his parents. He shook his head and continued the lessons he hadn't finished that morning.

As darkness fell and the bright moon rose high in the sky, he added some oil to the lamp and continued his studies until midnight. Then he drew the curtains and began to practice the Four Illuminations Divine Skill.

A moment later, he was enveloped in four-colored light, and everything in the room swayed slightly, appearing illusory and unreal in the four-colored radiance, as if it did not actually exist.

Zhao Ti practiced the Great Circulation of Qi, and felt that his meridians had expanded many times over, and even his dantian seemed to have grown much larger, all due to the surge in his internal energy.

He slowly circulated his internal energy, gradually drawing it from all parts of his body back to his dantian, like a hundred rivers flowing into the sea, making his dantian incredibly full in an instant.

As the practice ended, it was nearly dawn. He secretly thought that he would probably master the technique in another two or three days, even sooner than he had expected.

With the Four Illuminations Divine Skill fully mastered, four pillars of light form around the body, making it impervious to all evils and poisons. The inner strength reaches a state of perfection, its power unimaginable, and few in the world can compare to it.

Zhao Ti got out of bed but was wide awake. He walked around the room and looked at his left arm. Recently, the Demonic Severed Arm had been behaving itself and hadn't caused any trouble, which he guessed was related to his increasingly powerful skills.

With high martial arts skills, one can split mountains and sever rivers, fight against demons and monsters, and even kill extraterrestrial demons. Suppressing the severed hand of a dead demon should be a piece of cake.

Zhao Ti walked for a while, then sat back down at the table and drank some water. He still wasn't sleepy. He thought for a moment, then got up and went to the box by the wall. When he opened it, he saw a small crystal coffin on top, with the dim yellow light shining into the box, shimmering with an incomparably soft glow.

He gently picked up the small coffin, went back and placed it on the table. He carefully removed the coffin lid with two fingers, and saw the tiny figure lying quietly inside, seemingly fast asleep.

Zhao Ti looked thoughtful. The Heavenly Demon was a strange creature. Even after death, its body did not change much. The severed hand was the same. Even after being cut off for countless years, it remained unchanged.

From this perspective, the fact that demons devour each other and consume the bodies of their dead kin on the battlefield is probably not just a matter of brutality and ferocity.

Is it because the body is extremely difficult to decompose and dissolve, even if burned by fire, it is not easily destroyed, and if buried in the ground, it will remain intact for many years, so this is why it is done this way?

Eating one's own kind may increase one's own magic power, and it is also a custom of the Heavenly Demons. Only by burying the corpse of the other party into one's own body can one be considered to be at peace.
This cannot be considered from a human perspective. Humans believe in burial for peace and that the body should be buried intact, supposedly so that one can enter the cycle of reincarnation and have a next life. But perhaps the tradition of the demons is that burial in the body of a member of their own race is considered the greatest liberation?
Looking at the person in the coffin, Zhao Ti suddenly had a thought: this tiny creature might not be enough for him to eat in one bite.

But then he shook his head and chuckled to himself. He wasn't a demon, so why would he have such a strange thought as to eat the other party?

But then he suddenly thought, if demons aren't considered human, then... it probably wouldn't matter if he ate them, just like a human eating birds, fish, or beasts.

The crow had said that many of the demons of various races ate people, so it was normal for people to eat demons, right? No, no, Zhao Ti was startled by his own thoughts and hurriedly shook his head. Even if people could eat demons, he would not eat them, let alone a little demon as exquisite and graceful as Yu Ling, who seemed to embody the beauty of heaven and earth.

His gaze was fixed on the Feather Spirit inside the coffin, who looked like a sleeping alien princess, as if she could wake up at any moment, open her eyes, speak, fly out of the coffin, and soar through the air.

Zhao Ti was so engrossed in watching that he didn't realize it until almost half an hour later, when he finally let out a soft breath. Then, his eyelids started to droop and he felt sleepy.

He glanced at the oil lamp in a daze, then slumped onto the table and fell into a deep sleep.

About fifteen minutes after he fell asleep, his left hand, which was under his head, suddenly trembled slightly and then slowly came out from under his head.

The movement of withdrawing his left hand was extremely slow and cautious, as if afraid of waking him.

Then the left hand rose up on the table in the shape of a human, as always, facing the small crystal coffin, motionless.

After a moment, it seemed to have mustered up great determination and moved forward little by little until it came to the small crystal coffin.

Its index finger, like a person's right arm, hesitated and raised, as if it wanted to push the small crystal coffin further away from Zhao Ti, so that Zhao Ti's breath could not touch it.

Just as it was about to touch the crystal coffin wall that shimmered with soft light, a very faint, almost inaudible "whimper" sound suddenly came from inside the coffin.

This sound would be extremely difficult to detect unless it was the dead of night, and even ordinary people would not be able to hear it in quiet conditions.

But the left hand sensed it; it jerked violently, as if struck by lightning, and froze instantly, motionless like a clay or wooden sculpture.

In just a few breaths, it seemed to bristle and bounced high on the table, raising its entire arm. Then it fell back down, frantically retreating as if trying to find a place to hide. But there was nowhere to hide as it crawled around on the table. Finally, it slipped back under Zhao Ti's head with a "whoosh," trembling like a leaf.

Zhao Ti was sleeping soundly when he suddenly felt something was wrong under his head. He made a slight movement and pressed his left hand down heavily, preventing it from even trembling.

At this moment, his face was directly facing the crystal coffin, and almost every breath he took sprayed onto it. The light from the crystal coffin became softer and softer. Looking through the coffin wall, a tiny black shadow could be seen moving inside, and then it stopped, as if it had never happened at all.

But his left hand, positioned beneath Zhao Ti's head, clearly sensed this scene, yet it was being pressed down tightly, its five fingers now spread out, as if resigned to its fate...

"Big Pot, Big Pot, wake up!" A knocking sound came from outside the window.

Zhao Ti opened his sleepy eyes: "I understand."

Although he agreed verbally, for some reason he was still very sleepy and thought he would rest for a while longer, so he closed his eyes and fell asleep again.

"Big pot, big pot, time to eat! You'll be late for school if you don't eat soon..." There was a "bang bang bang" sound coming from the door. It was bolted from the inside, and Zhao Ling'er couldn't open it, so she turned around and ran to the window.

"Lazybones, get up!" The window was opened immediately. The crow beside him did not stop him, but looked curious, wondering to himself why his brother was sleeping so much today.

Zhao Ling'er leaned out the window: "Big Brother, why are you still sleeping?"

Zhao Ti woke up with a start, wondering why he had fallen asleep again when he had clearly been awake.

He immediately sat up and said, "Okay, okay, I'll go eat right away."

"Huh? A big pot, what's that?" Zhao Ling'er suddenly exclaimed curiously.

"Ah, what..." Zhao Ti glanced at the small crystal coffin on the table, hurriedly covered it with his sleeve, then closed the lid and quickly stuffed it into his pocket.

Zhao Ling'er quickly climbed onto the windowsill, then jumped into the room, asking in a very strange tone, "Big pot, what's this?"

Just as Zhao Ti was about to speak and explain that it was just an ordinary crystal, he saw that Zhao Ling'er's gaze was not on the crystal coffin, but on the demon-summoning banner and golden gourd on the corner of the table.

"What... what is this thing?" Zhao Ling'er's eyes were a little blank as she walked straight ahead.

Seeing that she wasn't talking about the small crystal coffin, Zhao Ti breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Little sister, how did you jump in through the window? This is just a hollow iron gourd painted with copper lacquer."

"A hollow iron gourd painted with copper lacquer?" Zhao Ling'er approached the demon-summoning banner, reached out and touched the gourd, muttering, "Why does it look so dilapidated?"

Zhao Ti laughed and said, "This gourd is an antique. It must have been damaged during a time of war, which is why it looks like this. There's nothing strange about it."

"Oh..." Zhao Ling'er looked up at Zhao Ti: "Is it an antique?"

Zhao Ti nodded: "It is indeed an antique. Otherwise, since it is made of cast iron, it would be used to make other items. It is a pity that it is an antique. Let's keep it as a decoration."

After he finished speaking, his expression turned serious: "You still haven't answered me why you jumped in through the window?"

"I, I..." Zhao Ling'er's gaze fell back on the golden gourd: "The door to the big pot wasn't open, so I couldn't get in and had to jump out the window. By the way, big pot, where did this gourd come from?"

Zhao Ti said, "Why are you asking such detailed questions? It's just a lump of iron, not fun at all, only good as a decoration."

Zhao Ling'er's eyes darted around: "I've never seen an iron gourd before, that's why I'm curious. What was the purpose of making such an iron gourd in ancient times?"

As she spoke, she reached out with both hands to lift the gourd, but although Zhao Ti could lift it without too much effort, Zhao Ling'er was only a nine-year-old girl and couldn't move it much. After wobbling a few times, she didn't ask Zhao Ling'er to lift it down.

"Don't move it, or it will fall and hurt your foot." Zhao Ti immediately stopped him, steadied the gourd, and said, "It was picked up in what seems to be an ancient battlefield in the suburbs. Don't touch it anymore. Let's go eat."

“Okay…” Zhao Ling’er agreed and went out with Zhao Ti. When they reached the door, she couldn’t help but turn back to look at the gourd.

Zhao Ti asked, puzzled, "It's just an iron gourd, not some toy. Why are you so curious?"

Zhao Ling'er swung her two little braids, a hint of confusion on her face: "I just find it very interesting. It seems, it seems... I've seen this gourd somewhere before?"

"Stop talking nonsense. You want to play with everything. You've ruined all the fruit trees, chickens, and geese in the yard. Don't even think about trying to get your hands on the things in my room." Zhao Ti pulled her sleeve and threw her into the main room. After a quick wash, he also went to eat.

After finishing his meal, he went back inside to put the small crystal coffin away, then picked up his schoolbag and went out to attend the state school.

(End of this chapter)