Big dreamer

At night, Shen Luo sat alone in front of the guest room window. A dim yellow oil lamp was lit on the table next to the window. On the table were a purple talisman paper and three cyan talisman papers.

On the purple talisman paper were drawn the runes of the Shattered Armor Talisman, and on the three pieces of green frost paper were drawn the runes of the Thunder Falling Talisman, all of which were already completed. They were all drawn by Shen Luo on the way to Yuzhou.

Among them, the Thunder Falling Talisman was okay. Although the success rate was not high, it consumed green frost paper, but the Armor-Shattering Talisman consumed the more precious Ziyun Paper.

Even though Shen Luo had the experience of drawing talisman in dreams and practiced it thousands of times on white paper and yellow talisman paper, when he actually painted it, he still consumed all the purple cloud paper he had spent all his savings to finally complete the talisman. Such a picture.

He stared at the cloud-covered sky outside the window, and could only see a blur of bright light hidden in the clouds. The sinkhole below was completely dark, and he could not see anything clearly.

According to the records in the travel notes, the Blue-Eyed Golden Toad is the bloodline relic of the Yue Palace Jade Toad. It is born with the ability to absorb the moon soul through the practice of looking at the moon, so it accumulates extremely pure moon soul essence in its body.

However, this creature is timid and cautious by nature, and it lies dormant underground all year round, making it difficult for ordinary monks to discover it.

Only during the rainy season every year, the sky is covered by clouds for a long time, the moonlight cannot shine on the earth, and the golden toad cannot absorb the moon soul, so during this time, it will fall into a dormant period.

When the rainy season passes, there will be a thunderstorm. At that time, the golden toad will reawaken, boldly leave its hiding place, and be exposed to the moonlight to replenish the previously consumed moon soul.

This time is the best time to capture it. If you miss it, you will have to wait at least another year.

This was also an important reason why Shen Luo decided to look for this object first.

After looking at it for a while, Shen Luo put the talisman on the table into his sleeve, blew out the oil lamp on the table, returned to the bed, sat cross-legged and meditated, and continued to practice. Although his practice speed was not fast, he could not stop.

…

In the early morning of the next day, Shen Luo opened the window and glanced at the cloud-covered sky. He frowned for a moment. Suddenly, he held up the table next to the window with one hand, flipped nimbly, and jumped out of the window, facing outside. It flew down.

His window was adjacent to the cliff of the sinkhole. There was no place to stay, and his body fell directly into the sinkhole.

It wasn't until he fell more than ten feet that he grabbed a protruding rock with one hand and hung himself on the cliff.

Shen Luo twisted around and saw a row of towering ancient trees more than ten feet away from him.

He immediately released his grip on the stone wall, pushed off the cliff with both legs, and turned over a semicircle in mid-air, falling silently to the top of an ancient tree not far away.

After approaching, he reached out and grabbed the top of an ancient tree, slightly buffering the force of the fall, and then nimbly slid towards the branches below. After a few repetitions, he landed smoothly on the ground.

After landing, he didn't move in a hurry. Instead, he took out a mountain talisman from his sleeve and waved it around. After seeing nothing strange on it, he put it back into his arms.

The tiankeng is quite quiet in the early morning. Apart from the chirping of insects, there is only the sound of "rustling" wind through the forest.

Shen Luo remembered that the travelogue mentioned that the place to catch golden toads was next to a crescent-shaped lake in the center of the sinkhole, so he went straight to the center through the dense forest without stopping.

Walking in the dense forest, Shen Luo found that the temperature at the bottom of the sinkhole was much lower than outside, and there was a thin layer of white frost on the branches and leaves of the trees and trees beside the road.

He picked off a leaf and rubbed it gently, and the frost on it immediately melted.

Shen Luo frowned slightly, dropped the leaf petals in his hands, put his hands in his sleeves, and walked forward slowly.

His mood was relaxed, and he looked left and right along the way, as if he was really on a sightseeing trip.

Not long after, he arrived at the center of the sinkhole and saw the crescent-shaped lake from a distance.

The water on the lake is clear and green in color, reflecting the clouds in the sky.

Beside the lake, there was a familiar figure, bending down to pick up a handful of water from the lake, bringing it to his mouth and taking a sip.

"Brother Ao..." Shen Luo called softly and walked quickly towards the man.

"Brother Shen, good morning." Ao Hong, who was standing by the lake, didn't show the slightest surprise. He straightened up and greeted Shen Luo with a smile.

It's just that when he looked at Shen Luo, his eyes seemed to look past him and towards the dense forest farther behind.

Shen Luo was aware of it, but still pretended not to notice anything.

In fact, when he took off the leaf, he had already noticed that someone was secretly following him.

He exchanged a few polite words with Ao Hong, and the two walked side by side, chatting while walking toward the other side of the sinkhole.

The cliff on the other side of the sinkhole is convex and concave. From a distance, it looks like a naturally formed eaves, covered with smooth green moss.

Shen Luo looked from a distance and saw three ropes hanging down from the cliff. Three figures were hanging on them. Each of them had a huge bamboo basket with a knot tied to their waist, hanging from the protruding part of the cliff. Under the flying rock.

The three of them were the Yanyan pickers whom Shen Lui met in the lobby of the inn yesterday, except for the masked woman.

The three people fell together on the cliff, adjusting their postures and positions up and down, and skillfully peeled off the bird's nests that were as bright and white in color and shaped like bowls from the cliff.

Shen Luo and the two stopped at the foot of the cliff, looking up at the movements of the three of them.

The short-bearded old man among the three seemed to feel something. He lowered his head to look at the two people under the cliff, smiled and said hello: "You two gentlemen are so elegant. Come here early in the morning to enjoy the scenery."

"It's very pleasing to see these people picking bird's nests skillfully," Shen Luo said with a smile.

After all, these people were not really familiar with each other. After exchanging a few words, Shen Luo and the others said goodbye and left.

After returning to the inn from the stone staircase on the cliff, Ao Hong went back to his room first, while Shen Luo had breakfast in the lobby before going back.

After returning to the house, Shen Luo sat back in front of the desk. He was about to close the window and start meditating, but out of the corner of his eye, he suddenly saw a two-finger-wide note on the desk.

His eyes narrowed slightly, and he glanced at the note. There were eight big characters written on it: "Don't be greedy for the golden toad, or you may hurt your life."

Shen Luo raised his eyebrows with a look of hesitation on his face.

This sentence seemed like a reminder and a threat. For a moment, he couldn't figure out who had left it.

"Could it be Ao Hong? He saw me going to the tiankeng to search for him today. He wanted to stop me but couldn't express it clearly, so he left a letter to warn me?" Shen Luo was confused, shook his head and pondered.

He didn't touch it with his hands, he just swiped it casually, and the note flew into the air and was crushed to pieces by a stream of water.

"Could it be the masked woman? She must have been the one who secretly followed me in the forest before, but why did she leave me a message?" Shen Luo rubbed his chin and thought again.

After a while, he couldn't think of a reason, so he had no choice but to give up.

In short, no matter who it is, whether it is a well-intentioned persuasion or a malicious warning, he will never give up.

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