Even the court, which possesses two twelfth-tier mysteries, is no match for the alien race, so what qualifies Prince Pingbian?
"This Prince Pingbian’s Mansion is clearly abnormal!" Zhang Chen’s mind flashed an idea, and his eyes turned to the Fox Fairy Nannan. At this moment, the Fox Fairy Nannan seemed to have noticed something amiss; she was staring at the stele, frowning and pondering with a grave expression.
Zhang Chen’s mind was sorting through countless thoughts, and suddenly a glint of light appeared in his eyes. It seemed he had found a clue: "Everything revolves around the Transformed Dragon and Walking Flood Dragon! At that time, Zhang Shicheng swept across the world and occupied more than half of the Central Plains. He must have gathered the power of the Flood Dragon, right? The reason he retreated to guard the Northern Land and followed rules was probably due to the mysterious deterrence of the Great Victory Dynasty. Prince Pingbian, Zhang Shicheng, gained the Flood Dragon Qi and then used the Feng Shui Secret Technique to attract the Dragon Qi from the True Dragon Tomb, attempting to secretly transform into a dragon. Now that Prince Pingbian’s Mansion is making such a big move, it’s because Zhang Shicheng is about to successfully transform into a dragon, gaining the strength to fight against the ’mysterious’ power of the Great Victory Dynasty. At that time, it truly will be uncertain whose hands the world will fall into!"
Zhang Chen’s mind flickered with countless thoughts, and he felt that he had probably deduced the truth.
Over there, the Fox Spirit stood before the stele, showing a conflicted expression: "It doesn’t make sense! Why is Prince Pingbian’s tombstone here, recorded in Demon Language?"
Zhang Chen didn’t pay attention to the words of the Fox Fairy Nannan. At this moment, his eyes were watching the stele in front of him, then gazed at the Dragon Qi in the sky. Zhang Chen’s mouth revealed a smile; he suddenly felt that serving at the Yellow River was quite good. He decided not to leave, planning to make some moves here and see if there were opportunities to reap some benefits.
After all, it’s Dragon Qi. If something skill-related fell out too, he would profit greatly.
"If I can gain something from this Flood Dragon to infiltrate the Empress Tomb, that would truly be incredible." Zhang Chen murmured to himself.
"Of course, if the opponent fails in transforming into the Walking Flood Dragon, and I seize their fortune, that would be even better! Prince Pingbian dared to plot against me and secretly killed my father, truly deserving a thousand deaths!" A glint of cold light appeared in Zhang Chen’s eyes.
"Truly, karma and retribution never fail; Prince Pingbian plotted against me, but I seized his ancestor’s True Dragon Destiny. When recalculated like this, I’m not losing out!" Zhang Chen rejoiced inwardly.
"Pa~"
The whip cracked in the air, bursting out a sharp call; a rough scolding echoed through the air:
"Everyone, be quick! If you don’t dig up ten pieces of soil today, you won’t be allowed to rest!"
The long whip in the hands of the official swept through the air, frightening the passing laborers like a flock of startled birds. Originally gathered onlookers scattered like wild beasts.
Zhang Chen did not want to stand out, quickly moving away from the stele to begin transporting soil.
With many people and prying eyes here, he dared not have the Fox Spirit take action. Should anyone see the soil inexplicably flying into his basket, he feared he wouldn’t be able to explain it.
At this moment, an official carrying a whip approached the stele, glanced at the ghostly rune on it, and shook his head: "It’s just a ’River Suppressing Stele’ for subduing the Yellow River, what’s there to be so curious about? If you don’t complete today’s task, don’t blame us for not giving you food."
Being an ordinary soldier doesn’t mean having culture; literacy is still rare.
Even Grand Generals can be illiterate. For instance, during the Three Kingdoms Period, General Lv Meng couldn’t read, but finally began learning after being persuaded by Sun Quan, which eventually earned him the saying ’After three days absence, treat them with new respect.’
In this world, writing is extremely precious, making it very difficult to study. If Zhang Xiaohua wasn’t the Crown Prince of Prince Pingbian, he probably wouldn’t catch Mr. Wuliu’s Dharma Eye and be picked to read and learn.
"For now, let’s dig for soil first. I want to see if we can find the burial place of the great tomb! The opponent’s tomb is within ten miles, certainly due to the Divine Dragon’s tail in the sky covering within ten miles."
Under the scorching sun, with the sun hanging high, Zhang Chen leisurely transported soil, pondering how he could draw the opponent out.
A basket of soil was filled and well-packed, then Zhang Chen carried the yellow soil to the assigned spot. An official came forward to inspect the soil in Zhang Chen’s basket, once confirmed there was no falsifying, they handed Zhang Chen a specially made bamboo stick.
Collect ten bamboo sticks, and you can eat two meals today. If not enough bamboo sticks are gathered, there will be no food.
Indeed, there are only two meals in this era!
Not far away, on the cracked riverbed, Zhang Chen held a spade, watched the apathetic laborers use a spade to clear the river silt. The sky was cloudless, the sun baked the masses dry and thirsty, and the protective yellow mud on their bodies had long since dried.
Fortunately, under the Yellow River’s riverbed, water could always be dug out; otherwise, everyone would die of thirst.
But the sun in the sky was too big, too hot, baking the riverbed dry, yet water vapor constantly steamed out, making the Yellow River riverbed like a large steaming pot.
"Time for lunch!"
Suddenly, a sound of a gong came from afar, then a group of laborers threw down their tools, running towards the camp, automatically lining up.
Zhang Chen was no exception, drifting with the flow behind the crowd all the way to the camp. Upon arrival, dozens of large pots were set up in the camp, in which wild vegetables and rice porridge were boiled into a big pot. Everyone took their own utensils to line up.
There were ready-made ceramic bowls in the camp. Zhang Chen looked at the dirty ceramic bowls, feeling sickened by them. The ceramic bowls hadn’t been cleaned properly, leaving no appetite.
Fortunately, Zhang Chen mastered the Water Control Technique, slipped the bowl into his sleeve, and then saw water flow appear in his sleeve, turning into an automatic dishwasher. Once the ceramic bowl was cleaned, he went up, allowing the cook to ladle a spoonful of vegetable porridge into his bowl, then walked to a corner to drink porridge. Suddenly, he noticed a scent of meat.
Following the direction of the meat scent, Zhang Chen saw soldiers in the distance setting up a bonfire, roasting whole lamb.
The roasted lamb was golden and crispy, sweet and tasty, very tempting, shimmering golden hues under the sunlight.
Could Zhang Chen endure this?
He directly summoned the Fox Spirit, who went straight for the lamb, secured an entire leg of lamb, then used Illusion Technique to obscure everyone’s sight and came to Zhang Chen’s side.
Without caring about the heat, Zhang Chen eagerly devoured the roast lamb.
The soldier roasting the whole lamb suddenly exclaimed, "Damn it! Where’s my lamb leg? Which little brat stole it when I wasn’t looking? This was for the Grand General’s lamb leg!"
The cook cursed, but there was nothing he could do; they couldn’t search extensively for a missing lamb leg.
With tens of thousands of people here, before completing the search, the lamb leg would unquestionably be in the thief’s belly.
As he gnawed the lamb leg, Zhang Chen listened to the cook’s swearing, and his gaze turned to the pondering Fox Spirit: "How powerful really is your Illusion Technique? What’s its upper limit?"
He felt the other’s Illusion Technique was against the heavens! The Fox Spirit actually managed to conceal himself at the bottom of the eyes of thousands, clearly eating a lamb leg while surrounding people took no notice of him.
"Mainly it’s because ordinary people’s Essence, Qi, and Spirit are too weak, incapable of seeing through my Illusion Technique. As for the officials here, they are merely mansion soldiers, not qualified as blood-hardened official troops. Moreover, they manage tens of thousands of laborers, standing too dispersed, unable to converge their blood energy. If there were veteran soldiers who had seen blood, formed a thousand-man array, my Illusion Technique would probably be broken in one face-off." The Fox Spirit said.
"I see." Zhang Chen felt more assured.
In truth, so-called Illusion Technique is merely Spiritual Power distorting perception. For those veteran soldiers with strong Qi Blood who’ve killed people, their spiritual will honed on the battlefield, using Illusion Technique to confuse and influence them is as difficult as climbing to the heavens.
The soldiers in charge of watching over the officials here were all merely mansion soldiers, moreover, the number wasn’t too large, just four or five hundred.