The 40th drop of water

  Tang Yan's eyes were fixed on the front, staring at Xuan Yuan Yue's chest, where a pair of towering peaks rose high. His mind recalled the scene from earlier. The snow-white peaks were like those he had seen in snowy landscapes before, except for the two vibrant red plum blossoms that stood alone at the summit. Although they weren't very large, Tang Yan was certain they were slightly bigger than peanuts. Thinking about Xuan Yuan Yue's behavior, Tang Yan wanted to tell her that the only way out was to "squeeze milk" to get through the difficult days, but he didn't dare say it out loud and only muttered it in his heart.

  "What are you looking at while I'm talking to you?" Xuan Yuan Yue quickly discovered Tang Yan's line of sight, and a shy expression floated onto her face as she asked.

  "I was thinking, let's just get through the day by milking, oh no, I mean, tomorrow we'll go search in the mountains and see if there are any mountain springs or streams!" Tang Yan said, withdrawing his gaze from Xuan Yuan Yue's chest.

  "Hmm, I think so!" Xuan Yuan Yue said with a frown after hearing Tang Yan's words.

  "Alright, since there's nothing else to do, let's all get some rest earlier. Little junior sister, there's still some water left in the wooden bucket, you go wash up with it!" Tang Yan said, pointing at the small wooden bucket beside him to Zi Lan, his little junior sister.

  "Oh!" Zi Lan didn't say anything, just nodded and then picked up that little water to the place where Xuan Yuan Yue had bathed earlier.

  Tang Yan didn't run over to sneak a peek, he just glanced at Xuan Yuan Yue's lower abdomen and seemed to say: "This white tiger is really fierce, but honestly, it's also tender and white, I like it!"

  Tang Yan sat down beside him, entered the Snow Boundary space, and began his final sprint. He continuously circulated the Devouring Dragon Technique in his body, compressing the fighting energy into his dantian. Repeating this process over and over, until he couldn't compress it anymore, Tang Yan hastily exited the Snow Boundary. Then, in reality, he once again activated the Devouring Dragon Technique, directing a thread of fighting energy from his body towards his dantian. Because his dantian was already compressed to its limit, when he added just a bit more fighting energy, it finally burst open with a loud "bang" like an over-inflated balloon.

  A strong surge of Dou Qi emanated from Tang Yan's body, dispersing several dozen meters around him with Tang Yan as the center. Meanwhile, Tang Yan sat cross-legged on the ground, his eyes tightly closed. He focused his mind to feel the strong Dou Qi inside his body retreat like a receding tide, quickly returning to his Dantian and making it slightly larger and brighter than before.

  He finally broke through to the One-Star Grandmaster, and afterwards Tang Yan only circulated his Heavenly Cycle Technique a few times on the spot, solidifying the Star Stage in his Dantian before entering Snow Peak to continue practicing his swordsmanship.

  Regarding Tang Yan's breakthrough, Zi Lan and Xuan Yu, who were sleeping, knew about it, but they didn't get out of bed. They just opened their sleepy eyes to take a glance outside before continuing to sleep. Only Zi Lan, the little junior sister, looked at Tang Yan as if he was a monster. In the short time she spent with him, she saw that Tang Yan would break through every few days, although the intervals were getting longer. However, compared to others who needed to spend one or two years to achieve it, he could do it in just a few days.

  "If my father were still alive, wouldn't I have become his wife by now and be sleeping in the same bed with him? Or would I be sleeping in the mountains?" For some reason, this thought floated into Zilan's mind. In a daze, she felt as if someone had kissed her small mouth, but she didn't open her eyes, instead falling asleep with a sweet smile on her face.

  In the mountains, whether it's winter or summer, every morning is shrouded in a thick layer of white fog, and everything around is damp. Fortunately, Tang Yan set up tents for Zi Lan and the others to sleep in, otherwise their clothes and hair would be wet when they got up. The birds in the morning really get up early, chirping non-stop at dawn, as if calling out for spring.

  In the early morning, a young man carried a wooden bucket in the mountains, collecting water droplets left on the leaves of trees, one drop at a time, into the bucket.

  "Damn it, being a nanny for others isn't this tiring. Forget it, for the sake of my future happiness, no matter how tired I am, it's worth it!" Tang Yan cursed as he stared at the half bucket of water in the small pail, which had taken him more than two hours to fetch, equivalent to one and a half days' time in the snowy wilderness.

  Soon, Tang Yan returned to the side of the tent and saw that it was still early. Originally, she had planned to let them sleep a bit longer, but today they had to find a source of water before nightfall. Tang Yan urged them to set off earlier, and under her urging, Xuan Yuan Yue and Zi Lan lazily crawled out from inside.

  Tang Yan, who was waiting outside, suddenly lit up his eyes, wide open as if he was afraid of missing this beautiful scene. Looking at Xuan Yuan Yue's chest, the two plump and round snow peaks protruded from the collar, revealing a deep snow valley, and the white and tender mountain peaks slowly rose and fell with her breathing.

  "Ah, you're still looking! You pervert!" Xuan Yuan quickly discovered that he was exposed and immediately covered his chest and cursed.

  "It's just a look, it won't get pregnant, how can you say that I'm your lifesaver, for the sake of saving you this lost little lamb, my junior sister and I ended up like mountain savages!" Tang Yan pointed at the disheveled hair on Zilan's head.

  "Don't look anymore, turn your face away!" Xuan Yuan Yue scolded, while her small hands were tidying up the clothes on her body.

  The purple orchid next to him smiled and looked at Tang Yan, pulling him aside, looking embarrassed, with a red face asked Tang Yan: "Did you do that to me last night?"

  "What's that?" Tang Yan didn't understand what she was saying.

  "It's that one!" Zilan brought her index fingers and thumbs together on both hands, then tapped them against each other, as if making a kissing gesture towards Tang Yan.

  "No way, I didn't even kiss you last night!" Tang Yan said in denial, seeing her blush.

  "No? That's strange, was I dreaming last night?" thought Zilan after hearing Tang Yan's words.

  "Little sister, did you dream of me kissing you? Come on, tell me what's going on. Hey, where are you going? Tell me first!" Tang Yan said, looking at Zilan whose face was as red as a peach blossom in March.

  "Leave you alone, rascal!" Zilan threw out a sentence and slipped into the tent to gather her clothes.

  Indeed, Tang Yan was also too bad. He couldn't help but kiss Zi Lan's little mouth last night, and this morning he didn't admit it, making Zi Lan think she had a sweet dream last night. Zi Lan is not as beautiful and plump as Xuan Yuan Yue, which is a fact, but Zi Lan is also a great beauty. If placed in the 21st century, female stars are not as beautiful as Zi Lan. Sometimes Tang Yan wonders if this world specializes in producing beauties. Even among his mercenary group, there are several women who look quite good.

  Tang Yan loves Zi Lan, but also has a little possessive mentality towards Xuan Yuan Yue. He can't tell if he really likes her or not, maybe it's just the male desire to possess. Especially last night, when he saw Yue Er naked, Tang Yan wanted to possess her body even more, and then love her well, embracing two beauties living in a secluded place, living a happy and carefree life.

  Hehe, you can say that Tang Yan is very simple-minded, or you can say he's very naive. However, he's really easy to satisfy, as long as he gets what he wants, he's satisfied. If he gets this top-quality beauty as his wife, wouldn't that be even more satisfying? Previously, he thought that after entering university, marrying a beautiful MM would be enough, but now there are two national-treasure-like beauties in front of him.

  "There's some water here, you guys can wash up a bit, and then we'll continue on our way. But remember, don't use it all up, we still need to drink some later!" Tang Yan said, pointing at the small wooden bucket beside Xuan Yuan Yue.

  "Didn't you say there was no water? How did you get some, and were you intentionally peeking at me while I was bathing last night?" Xuan Yuan asked Tang Yan, who had somehow managed to procure half a bucket of clear water.

  "How dare you say that if it wasn't for you using it all up last night, I would have been able to collect dew drops one by one in the courtyard this morning?" Tang Yan scolded her.

  "Are you really going to collect dew?" Xuan Yuan Yue's tone softened upon hearing Tang Yan's words, and then she looked at him with a moved expression: "Sorry, I misunderstood you again!"

  "Don't get so worked up, I'm doing this for Little Shifu's sake too! Who do you think you are?" Tang Yan said.

  "You, you..." Just as she was getting excited and moved, Tang Yan poured cold water on her, causing Xuan Yuan Yue to get angry again, wanting to scold but unable to.

  On the other hand, various people are searching for Tang Yan's whereabouts. Unfortunately, when they found Tang Yan's carriage, there was no one inside, and even the four horses had starved to death on the road. However, they will not give up, and they are sure that Tang Yan is on the road between Fengdu City and the next city. With the power and speed of Dou Huang, they should find Tang Yan soon.

  However, the problem is that they spent half a day going back and forth on the official road but still couldn't find any trace of Tang Yan. They only found some signs of fighting and bloodstains on the ground, and when they looked around at the mountains and forests on both sides, they knew that Tang Yan might have entered the forest on the other side. Of course, you could blindly search endlessly in another direction, or maybe you'd get lucky and head in the right direction towards Tang Yan.

  "Master, we've heard from a mercenary group in Fendou City that they indeed parted ways with the kid from Quanmen here!" A figure appeared beside the middle-aged man.

  "Hmm, I suspect they've entered the mountain forest. You guys search around the periphery and see if you can find anything. I heard that two people from the royal palace are about to make a move, and the ancient Murong family is also taking action. We have to be one step ahead of those guys." said Jianzong to Bian.

  "Yes, Patriarch!" After finishing speaking, he immediately disappeared on the spot. It seems that their strength is at least at the level of a Dou Wang.

  Soon, Jianzong found many demon beast corpses in the mountain forest, which seemed to have died naturally and were not killed by hunters. There were no wounds on their bodies, and at least dozens of corpses were found along the way. Looking at these corpses, he muttered: "What caused this? They won't be collective suicide, will they? Or is it man-made?"

  Seeing these things, he felt that there was something in the mountain, a demon beast? As long as it wasn't a demon beast of the transformation level, he wouldn't be afraid. Besides, this area had never heard of any fifth or sixth rank demon beasts existing, only second and third ranks, so he wouldn't be afraid.