Chapter Twenty-Eight: The Seven-Colored Pheasant

Gu Weiyu lingered for a moment in a small mountain valley before making her way eastward. The air was thick with dampness, and as her spiritual sense swept over the area, she could see countless insects crawling beneath the shelter of grass and leaves. The constant rustling in her ears sent shivers down her spine. It made her recall her earlier days of gathering herbs—ignorance truly is bliss!

Suddenly, a small grayish-white figure appeared within her spiritual perception. Gu Weiyu’s heart leapt: it was the Gale Hare, mentioned in the “Compendium of Demonic Beasts.” Its lips twitched as it nibbled on the grass before it.

She had been fretting over where to find a Gale Hare, and now one had delivered itself straight to her! Without hesitation, she activated her movement technique, Thunderflash, darting nimbly toward the forest ahead. At the same time, her fingers twitched—Vine Command!

A vine silently shot up from the earth, wrapping itself around the feeding hare’s belly and restraining it. Startled, the Gale Hare began to struggle violently, leaping three meters away with the vine still attached.

But Gu Weiyu was already upon it. She pounced and seized the hare just as it tried to escape. The hare’s red eyes fixed on her, and with a kick of its legs, it opened its mouth to bite her arm.

Well, this rabbit was fierce!

She grabbed its long ears and gave it a hard swing, sending the hare into a dizzy stupor. Only then did she deliver a firm smack to its forehead. The Gale Hare let out a sharp, brief cry and went limp.

Looking at the hare in her hand, Gu Weiyu hesitated. The task required its pelt. Did she really have to skin the rabbit herself? But it looked so cute—she found it difficult to go through with it.

After much hesitation, she carried it to a nearby brook she’d seen earlier and began to gut the Gale Hare. The process was painfully unpleasant, and as this was her first time skinning a rabbit, it took all her strength and perseverance before she finally managed to obtain her first hare pelt.

She put the pelt away and eyed the remaining rabbit meat. Remembering the delicious hare she’d tasted once, she packed the meat into her storage pouch as well.

As she crouched by the stream to wash her hands, a sharp pain shot through her fingertip. Startled, she raised her left hand to find a slender worm latched onto her finger, sucking away.

What was this thing? Gu Weiyu shook her hand with all her might while searching her mind for an answer, but the worm clung tighter with every shake.

Heavens! With her right hand trembling, she seized the worm and yanked it off. It felt slick and sticky in her grip, making her stomach churn with disgust as she flung it as far as she could.

A stinging pain throbbed at her fingertip—the worm had bitten through her skin, and now blood seeped from the wound. For an ordinary insect with no trace of spiritual energy, its bite was surprisingly vicious!

A chill ran through her. She’d been careless, thinking she could simply wash her hands without checking the water with her spiritual sense, only to fall into this trap. Fortunately, the worm wasn’t poisonous—otherwise…

Gu Weiyu left the brook behind. The wound was small and had stopped bleeding, but the lingering pain put her on high alert.

There were too many unknown dangers lurking in this forest. One misstep could easily cost her—someone at the mere fifth layer of Qi Refinement—her life.

Soon after, she found several more Gale Hares and caught them the same way. Learning from her earlier experience, she decided not to bother skinning them. Her storage ring had more than enough space—she’d just throw them in whole!

In less than an hour, she had caught ten Gale Hares. Along the way, she also found three fig plants and several other medicinal herbs, which she carefully placed in a box reserved for such finds.

But something puzzled her: after all this time, she hadn’t seen a single sign of a Rainbow Pheasant.

Just as she began to doubt whether Mount Wen harbored any Rainbow Pheasants at all, a loud and resonant crow echoed from the forest ahead—“Cock-a-doodle-doo!”

Gu Weiyu’s eyes lit up. How fortuitous—she’d searched high and low, only to find one without even trying!

Sweeping her spiritual sense forward, she saw two Rainbow Pheasants pecking at the grass. Upon closer observation, she noticed that only one had a long, resplendent tail; the other’s tail was nearly non-existent and rather drab.

She recalled the “Compendium of Demonic Beasts” stating that only the males had rainbow-colored tail feathers—so these two were a pair.

The male circled the female with his head lowered, calling out and showing off attentively. The female, meanwhile, maintained an air of aloofness, clucking only occasionally.

Gu Weiyu crept forward and chose a hidden spot among the shrubs to try her trick again.

This time, she needed to control two vines at once with her Vine Command. At first she thought it would be easy, but as she maintained the effort, her spiritual sense began to strain and her head throbbed.

Startled, her focus slipped just as she was about to ensnare both birds, and her plan nearly fell apart.

With no other choice, she sacrificed the female and concentrated all her power on binding the male Rainbow Pheasant.

The captive bird flapped its wings and struggled, shrieking as it occasionally spat out faintly red flames. The female, having escaped, clucked in alarm and flew toward the woods.

For a moment, the forest rang with the calls of pheasants. Annoyed, Gu Weiyu knocked the male unconscious with a slap, and peace returned.

She picked up the male bird and counted the tail feathers at its rear, almost wishing she could smack it harder—there were exactly nine, not one more or less!

She stowed the bird in her storage ring, but could still faintly hear the female’s shrill, panicked cries echoing through the woods.

That silly pheasant—wasn’t it just giving away its location to every predator around?

No wonder there were so few of them; they were probably all done in by their own stupidity!

Irritated, Gu Weiyu moved toward the source of the incessant clucking, intending to deal with the noisy female pheasant. Who knew—perhaps she’d stumble upon another heroic male coming to the rescue?

In the dense undergrowth, she found the female pheasant crouched in its nest, neck stretched high as it clucked nonstop. She could just make out several pale green eggs in the nest.

Gu Weiyu couldn’t help but laugh softly—what a stroke of luck! She could clean up the whole lot at once.

Wasting no time, she decided to deal with the female first. She made no effort to conceal her presence; this pheasant was clearly not the brightest. She approached the nest openly, fingers moving as she cast Entangling Vines.

Countless vines erupted from the ground, bundling the female pheasant into a neat green parcel.

Gu Weiyu lifted the bird aside and, with a wave of her hand, swept the nest and its eggs into her storage ring.

The pheasant, realizing her eggs were gone, seemed to lose its mind, letting out short, rhythmic, piercing cries—cluck-cluck, cluck-cluck…

The headache-inducing racket made Gu Weiyu want to silence her with a smack. But just as she raised her hand, she sensed something was wrong: the forest was filled with the sound of flapping wings, growing nearer by the second.

She instinctively extended her spiritual sense—and what she saw made her heart freeze.

At some point, the entire mountainside had become swarmed with Rainbow Pheasants, converging on her from all directions.

Surely there couldn’t be that many “heroes” coming to the rescue? Wasn’t this a bit excessive?