The Monkey King

Quietly lowering their altitude, Yang Chan and Yue Chao flew low over the treetops, and their eyes began to search the dark woods.

Yang Chan looked solemn, with her brows furrowed and her slender fingers clasped from time to time. In comparison, Yue Chao seemed much calmer.

In the camp, Kuroko, who was unconscious on the ground, moved his hands slightly, raised his head hazily, and opened his eyes. The next moment, his eyes widened suddenly, he clenched his trident and stood up with a leap.

"How did I fall asleep?" In panic, he glanced sideways and saw that the monkey was still sleeping peacefully, and then he breathed a sigh of relief and calmed down a little.

Putting down his trident, he sat cross-legged next to the monkey. At this moment, he saw two people circling back and forth in the sky in the distance.

"Is this...human?"

…

After searching for a little longer, Yue Chao became a little worried: "How come he can't find it? Logically speaking, he will definitely come out when he sees us."

"What if he can't see it?" Yang Chan looked at Yue Chao, his expression becoming more serious: "According to what Short Mouth said, the monkey was already unconscious when we met them..."

"Even if Uncle Master is unconscious, what about Lao Niu? Are both of them unconscious?"

"If they meet the heavenly soldiers..." This thought flashed past, and Yang Chan shook his head violently to throw the thought out of his mind.

What will happen if a wounded old cow or a comatose monkey encounters the heavenly soldiers?

She didn't dare to think about it.

She hovered blankly in the air to calm down her breathing, and then shouted: "Keep looking!"

After circling the woods in the valley for a while, they discovered the camp. There were no sunspots and monkeys in the camp, only three monsters.

Seeing that the three unwary little demons were still sleeping soundly, Yue Chao simply cast a spell to make them sleep even harder.

The two landed generously in the simple camp and began to search around. After a while, Yue Chao found a few monkey hairs.

"Where did you find it?" Yang Chan snatched it away and examined it carefully under the moonlight.

"Here." Yue Chao said, pointing to the couch made of leaves.

Yang Chan immediately bent down and touched the leaves with her hands, feeling the faint warmth: "He was just here."

"How do you know it's Uncle Master's hair?"

"Anyway, it can't be these three little monsters. There is a fourth monster in this camp, and it just left. Chase him!"

With a flick of his sleeves, riding on the wind, Yang Chan flew ten feet away.

"They say that our uncle is paranoid. I think Junior Sister Yang Chan is even more paranoid than our uncle, especially when it comes to things related to him."

Looking at Yang Chan speeding away, Yue Chao could only sigh helplessly and follow him.

On the rock, under the shadow of the moon, Subhuti and Qingfengzi looked at the two people one after another from a distance.

Qingfengzi turned his face and asked, "Master, won't you take this opportunity to take your junior brother back?"

"You can't take it back with you." Subhuti pursed his lips and smiled faintly: "If Wukong goes back, he will definitely explain everything to his master. But if he explains clearly, he will never go back."

After saying that, Subhuti turned around and let out a long sigh: "It's better to let him go. He lost his walking stick. Turn around and ask your fifth junior brother to bring him another one. This time the weight can be slightly smaller. Put it higher.”

"Disciple, please obey your master's orders."

A gust of cool wind blew past and slightly lowered the branches, and the two people on the rock had disappeared without a trace.

In the dark woods, the short Heizi ran like crazy with a monkey on his back, drops of sweat dripping down his hair. In the panic, he even lost his trident.

Suddenly, he seemed to feel something and quickly rolled onto his side, taking the monkey with him into the grass next to him.

Overhead, the moon and Yang Chan passed by.

"He's moving, in this direction!" Yang Chan's excitement as she held the jade slip was palpable: "He's still alive... He's still alive!"

On the ground, Heizi lay in the grass and looked up at the two people's retreating figures. He gasped and swallowed blankly: "Who are these two people? They don't look like heavenly soldiers."

Looking down, he saw the monkey lying next to him.

In terms of strength, it is not too difficult for him to run with a monkey on his back. But from a height perspective... the monkey was a whole lot taller than him, and it was indeed very unpleasant to carry on his back.

But can you just ignore it if you don’t want to please it?

Standing up slowly while holding on to the ground, Heizi carried the monkey on his back again, let out a long breath, and stepped out of the grass to walk back. But before he took a few steps, he suddenly held his breath and froze.

Big beads of sweat slid down the short fuzz on his forehead.

Behind him, Yang Chan and Yue Chao were staring at Heizi quietly.

"Who are you? Why are you running?" Yang Chan put one hand on the hilt of the sword and shouted loudly: "Put him down!"

"It should be the little demon who escaped together, don't get excited." Yue Chao glanced at Yang Chan and sighed helplessly.

"Definitely not. Otherwise, how could he not know us? If he knew us, why would he run away?"

With a clang, the sword was unsheathed.

The sound made Heizi's heart suddenly thump.

He didn't know what the cultivation level of these two humans was, he only knew that he would never be able to deal with them.

"Just leaving Brother Monkey like this?" he thought to himself.

His brows that were originally splayed with shock slowly gathered together, and he gritted his teeth and ran wildly. But before he could take two steps, he found that his feet were caught by a tree vine sticking out from somewhere. When his whole body tilted, he suddenly felt something pulling the monkey away from him.

Not caring so much, he turned around and hugged the monkey's feet tightly.

"Let go——!" Yang Chan hung in the air and hugged the monkey tightly.

"Let go—!" Heizi raised his head and roared loudly, his hands holding the monkey trembling.

"If you don't let go, I'll kill you!"

"Come on! Kill me!"

Yue Chao couldn't stand it anymore, crossed his hands, rolled his eyes at Yang Chan, and said to Heizi: "Little guy, we are here to save him."

"Save...save him?"

"Yes. If you don't want to save him, you can take action directly. There is no need to rush."

Only then did Heizi let go slightly.

Yang Chan held the monkey aside, put it on the ground and began to nervously check the injuries on her body.

Heizi stood aside and watched carefully.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Yue Chao walked up to Heizi, lowered his head and asked, "What is your name? How did you meet him?"

Heizi didn't say anything, and Yue Chao could only walk away boredly.

After a while, Yang Chan wiped his sweat, let out a long sigh, and smiled lightly: "It's okay, it's okay... he's fine."

"He is the most energetic monster I have ever seen. How could something happen?"

Putting the monkey's hand on her shoulder, Yang Chan struggled to help the monkey fly up.

Yue Chao also wanted to follow, but Heizi shouted from behind: "Where are you taking him?"

Turning back, Yue Chao looked at Heizi and said, "You come too."

He stretched out his hand to grab it, and a burst of spiritual power bound Heizi who was about to dodge.

…

Late at night, the stars were shining brightly, and in the sky thousands of miles away, a heavenly soldier spread his wings and walked through the clouds and mist.

When he reached the depths of the clouds, he raised his head and suddenly climbed up. He soon stood out from the clouds and hovered.

In front of him was a huge piece of land flying in the air like a pan!

This so-called land does not have mountains and water like the land in the world. It is round in shape, with a diameter of a hundred miles, and is as flat as a mirror. It is lined with pavilions and brightly lit, and heavenly soldiers flapping their wings can be seen everywhere in the sky.

Surrounding the land are huge military ports.

The ships are endless like an army phalanx, and the waves and sword flags on the densely packed masts are fluttering in the wind.

In the surrounding clouds, warships were constantly coming and going.

This is the headquarters of the 300,000 Tianhe navy - Yunyu Tiangang.

Strictly speaking, the location of this land belongs to the mortal world, but due to the thick clouds, it is not visible at all from the ground. And the so-called 300,000 Tianhe naval forces are not just 300,000.

Due to the expansion of the limit, the actual number of Tianhe Navy troops now exceeds 450,000, which is a full 50% over-staffing. If you include logistics and personnel stationed at military ports scattered around the country, this number may exceed 600,000.

But even in this situation, they were still short of manpower.

It is said that Marshal Tianpeng still wants to expand, but he only suffers from insufficient financial resources to support it.

In heaven, all materials are circulated in the form of currency, and this currency is gold. Heaven allocates funds to the army according to its establishment, and the army uses gold to purchase the supplies it needs from the treasury of Heaven, including food, weapons, etc. Gold is also used to pay the heavenly soldiers.

The overstaffing means that most of the expenses of the Tianhe navy are no longer allocated by the heaven, but the rewards obtained by conquering the demons on the ground.

From a certain perspective, this is one of the reasons that drives the Tianhe navy to actively participate in the mortal battle against demons at all costs. In order to adapt to the mortal battle against demons, they even moved their headquarters to the mortal world.

Because of this, they won the reputation of "Heavenly Sword".

Of course, not every army in Heaven is overstaffed. For example, the Nantianmen Legion, known as the "Heavenly Shield", has no super staff.

According to the establishment, the amount of funds allocated by Heaven to the Nantianmen Army was a quota of 400,000 troops, but the actual number of Nantianmen Army was only 200,000.

The excess naturally fell into the general's pocket. In the mortal world, this situation has a special name, which is empty pay.

The less personnel there are, the less they want to participate in the war, and the less they participate in the war, the less they need extra personnel. It is a vicious cycle. In the end, the Nantianmen Legion spends most of their time hiding in Nantianmen to retire.

As a result, the saying "sharp sword and corrupt shield" among the heavenly gods spread widely. This is also the origin of the irreconcilable contradiction between the Nantianmen Army and the Tianhe Navy.

In the middle of the land, at the top of a fifteen-story tower, the highest power holder on the land was repeating a meeting that must be held every day.

"Marshal, this is the plan for using troops in Luzhou, Beiju. The general wants to send the Thunder Department to conquer, please give me your approval." A man with a scar on his face, who looked to be middle-aged, held a booklet with both hands. Putting it on the table in the canopy, he bowed and retreated into the queue of more than ten generals.

Tianpeng, who was sitting on the high platform, glanced at Zhezi and rubbed Qingming's point: "It seems that several warships of the Thunder Department have been transferred by Tianqin in the past few days? Is this okay?"

"The general will have confidence." The general punched himself in the chest, and his armor clanked.

"Then I'll do as you say." He dipped his brush in some ink and gave instructions. He took his own seal and stamped it. Tianpeng handed the fold to the other party: "Tian Ren, this time Tian Nei will be your Lieutenant General, just in case."

"Thank you, Marshal." The general named Tianren respectfully stretched out his hand and took the fold back.

A general hurriedly walked in from the attic, came to the canopy, bowed and whispered in his ear: "Marshal, the fairy in colorful clothes is here and wants to see you, marshal."

Canpeng's hand paused slightly, and he was silent for a moment, then said: "Tell her I'm busy, next time."

"Already told her, she said wait."

"Then let her wait."

"Also, King Shiguo is here, taking Nezha with him."

"Come to ask for someone?"

The general nodded slightly.

Canopy raised the corners of his mouth and said with a smile: "Let them wait too!"