Starting with the titmouse, seventy-two transformations

Chapter 344 Deduction: Even Old Friends Still Hold Swords, One Cannot Completely Discard One's Heart (Part 1)

In the first year, you woke up on a mountaintop, not knowing who your parents were.

However, the heavens sent down sweet rain, and the earth burst forth with rosy light. Wherever it passed, strange phenomena arose, such as miraculous herbs and rare fruits, dried-up springs became sweet again, and old trees sprouted new buds.

You are favored by heaven and earth.

In the second year, you roamed the mountains with boundless energy, working tirelessly without sleep, eating spiritual fruits when hungry and drinking from spiritual springs when thirsty.

One day, you discover a peculiar stone mountain deep in the mountains, covered with strange rocks.

Hard, heavy, and with a very textured feel.

It tastes ten or a hundred times better than any fruit you've ever eaten before.

Later you learned that it was called "copper ore".

You lay on the rocky mountain, eating and drinking to your heart's content, your stomach like a bottomless pit, until you had eaten the entire mountain empty, then you patted your belly and left happily.

You were sleepy, so you lay down on the ground and fell fast asleep.

...

[In the tenth year, you are sleeping, your body growing longer.]

...

[In your thirtieth year, you are still asleep, but your body has already grown to over ten feet tall.]

...

In the 130th year, you woke up from your sleep, lazily yawned, and found that the mountains at your feet seemed to have shrunk a bit.

At this moment, you are already a hundred feet tall, with arms as long as clouds, covered in white hair, and with golden eyes.

You've become a demon.

...

In the 140th year, you searched everywhere in the deep mountains for delicious "stones," but unfortunately, you found very little.

During your visit, you also discovered other similar stones, which were shiny, heavy, and full of texture.

Golden, silvery, and jet black—they're delicious.

But the quantity is ultimately limited, so we can only try it.

You find some creatures in the mountains that resemble you, but unfortunately, they are much smaller than you.

You feel inexplicably close to them, and after becoming familiar with them, you join them.

The tribe's old king treated you extremely well, helped you onto the throne, bowed to you, and called you king.

You've become... the Great Ape King.

In the 141st year, your first year as the Great Ape King, everything felt new and exciting.

You led your tribe to fight tigers and leopards, chase away boars and bears, and conquer other tribes, without ever suffering a defeat.

Many powerful mountain spirits and wild monsters, whether they run on the ground or fly in the sky, challenged you to fight, but you defeated them all.

Those who know what's good for them will submit to you, while the stubborn ones will be smashed into mincemeat.

You dominated the entire mountain range and valley, and the name "Great Ape King" spread among all ethnic groups, where it was accepted and revered.

You've become... the mountain king!

...

In the 150th year, the tenth year as the "Mountain King," you find yourself somewhat bored without any rivals.

Tigers, leopards, jackals, wild boars, and bears in the mountains, and eagles, herons, and hawks in the sky, all treat you with utmost respect.

No one challenges you, no one questions you.

The hard "stones" you like to eat are searched for and dug up by various kinds of birds and beasts, and brought to your mouth.

According to the monsters under my command, this is called "gold and iron," which can be further divided into the five metals such as gold, silver, copper, iron, and tin.

Your head is spinning. How can it be called "gold and iron" or "gold, silver, copper, iron and tin"? Which uncultured monster came up with these names?
The mountain spirits and monsters said that this was the name of a race called "humans".

This tribe possesses a powerful sorcery that allows them to transform the purest "metal and iron" from stones, crafting the sharpest weapons.

A tiger spirit reluctantly offers you a treasure: a long, gleaming "stick".

It is said to be called "Iron Knife".

You open your mouth and bite into that "iron knife," and you feel a crunchy sensation; it's incredibly delicious!

people?
You developed an interest in this ethnic group, but that was all.

...

[In your sixtieth year as the "Mountain King" in your second hundredth year, you feel bored.]

You grew tired of the unchanging cycle of spring and autumn, tired of the cycle of birth, aging, sickness, and death among the apes.

Tired of the mountains' green in summer and white in winter, weary of the rare fruits and exotic flowers, and weary of the mountain spirits and monsters' blind obedience.

You crave battle, carnage, and the roar of blood.

It's not that the mountains and rivers are weary, nor that the flowers and moon have faded, but rather your heart...

It moved.

In the 201st year, amidst the cries of birds and beasts and mountain spirits, you resolutely departed.

The journey was no more than a hundred miles, yet you felt a pang of reluctance. After all, you had spent decades together; even beasts have feelings. So you secretly turned back, intending to leave behind some spiritual spring water, exotic fruits, rare flowers, and precious plants…

But the whole mountain was filled with jubilation.

Birds and beasts howled, spirits laughed, demons danced wildly, and everyone wept with joy.

They are celebrating your departure, they are very happy.

You then realize that your existence is like a mountain pressing down on them.

If you don't leave, they will be bound by you and will never have a chance to get ahead.

You left dejectedly, then suddenly felt happy again, thinking to yourself that it was for the best.

Let's part ways amicably.

...

[In the 210th year, you have been away from the group for ten years, heading north, unrestrained and carefree.]

Along this journey, you will eat gold and swallow iron, climb ice and lie in snow, eat wind and drink dew, and feel that the world is vast and boundless. Even if you live your whole life, you will probably never reach the ends of the earth.

You recall when you were a "mountain king," a monster once said that humans possess great power, supernatural abilities, and boundless magic, capable of living as long as heaven and earth and shining as brightly as the sun and moon.

I feel longing.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find a way in.

But cultivation, such as absorbing the essence of the sun and moon, is something you are born with.

Perhaps, this is also a way out?

...

In the 220th year, you grew tired of traveling and settled down in a remote mountain.

Every day at noon, one inhales and exhales the purple aura coming from the east from the cliff top, the essence of the sun and moon, and gradually increases one's spiritual cultivation.

Watching flowers bloom and fade, observing clouds drift and gather, appreciating the waxing and waning of the moon, listening to summer thunder and winter snow...

The mountains are still the same mountains, and the water is still the same water.

But in your eyes, it seems a little different.

You were born of heaven and earth, blessed by destiny; one night's sleep is equivalent to several reincarnations for other living beings.

Perhaps you have never truly seen through the world, the mountains and rivers, the sun, the moon and the stars.

Is it right?】

...

In the 240th year, after sitting on the mountain and observing the moon for twenty years, you gained much. Your mind gradually calmed down, your wisdom increased, your Taoist practice improved, and you were able to gather the golden evil spirits from all directions.

But something is always missing, it's not quite perfect, as if there's a layer of paper between us, it's easy to break with just a poke, but we don't know where to poke it.

Was it a lack of opportunity?

Your mind is clear as a mirror; you know the reason.

You are born divine, and since you can remember, you have been making great strides and progressing in your spiritual path, without any constraints.

The situation I encountered this time was both unfamiliar and novel.

Where do you expect the opportunity to come from?

...

In the 248th year, after eight more years of observing the mountains, rivers, sun, and moon in the mountains, the opportunity finally arrived.

One day, a woodcutter was cutting firewood deep in the mountains. The mountain path was slippery, and he accidentally fell off a cliff, landing on a gnarled pine tree on a steep cliff.

You initially didn't want to pay attention, but after a glance, you suddenly felt a surge of interest.

So you stepped in to save him and gave him two spiritual fruits, thus beginning a karmic connection.

The woodcutter was extremely grateful and addressed him as "Lord Mountain God".

Not long after, he took his son into the mountains and offered pigs, fish, chickens and other small animals as sacrifices.

On a whim, you casually picked a tree branch and, in front of the woodcutter and his son, casually gestured with it a couple of times.

You should know that you are the Great Ape King, with natural martial arts skills. Although your movements are casual, they represent the pinnacle of your skills and a return to simplicity.

If one can grasp even a fraction of this, it will be enough for them to establish themselves in the world.

Since then, every New Year's Day, woodcutters would bring their children into the mountains to offer sacrifices and pay homage.

I treat you like an ancestor.

...

In the 270th year, the old woodcutter died.

Over the years, thanks to the two tips you taught me, that kid from back then has made quite a name for himself.

They purchased land outside the mountains and built a village, which they named "White Ape".

And you also learned from him that the land outside the mountains belonged to the Yue Kingdom.

The Yue Kingdom?

(End of this chapter)