Nanate had just returned from taking a round of the periphery of the floating bit of land they were currently staying on. From the edges of this tiny floating island one only needed to glance down to see the cracked red earth spreading out everywhere. There were small cracks and large crevices running all over the earth below.
Gone was the desert. Neither was the beautiful flora and fauna of the Soundless Valley visible. The only thing one could see till the horizon was cracked grounds. And a slow but steady stream of black miasma flowed out through these cracks.
Beibei was the one who had realized something wrong with the miasma. It was non-poisonous, so it didn't really affect their senses. But she still noticed that the miasma was unlike the black fog of Visionless Path. It did not have any sense of oppression, but as soon as you let down your guard, the fine mist of the miasma started to seep into your body through the skin.
The changes were very faint, and did not come all at once. Yet she noticed it. The way they started disbelieving each other, their actions which went against the beliefs of the team, the minute debates and conflicts.
Thus she decided to relocate onto one of the floating lands immediately. This miasma was far more dangerous than the previous black fog. It seemed that this miasma could control the minds of people. If this went on for long, it was possible that they would turn into mindless puppets controlled by the black miasma.
There were numerous small and big pieces of earth chunks floating all around, about 10 to 20 meters off the ground. Possibly they had broken off from the land when these crevices formed, though they couldn't say what made them float. Nonetheless, these floating lands seemed to be bereft of any black miasma, making it temporarily safe.
The piece of floating chunk they had chosen was as big as a small island. Also this sense of floating in the sky made it a novel experience. Though they stopped fighting, which meant that the affects of the black miasma was limited on this island, they had yet to figure out a way of sucking out the miasma which had already seeped in.
So currently they were stuck on this floating land chunk, while Beibei was trying to figure out how to extricate the miasma.
"Ahhh!"
Nanate had just sat down, when he felt a sharp pain hammering in his brains. Holding onto his head, he fell down on the ground. His face distorted from the pain, and he clenched his jaws to stop himself from screaming again.
After a while, when the pain seemed to have passed, he still held onto his head, rolling on the ground to ease his nerves and muscles, before slowly sitting up. He looked around blankly and saw Kunwa staring at him in nervousness.
"What was that? Did the black miasma attack you? Is it trying to control your mind? Does that mean even up here we can't escape the hold of miasma?"
"Ummm.....sorry, but that was me."
Both turned to stare at Beibei in confusion and disbelief. She was still sitting in the same position as before, but now she had her palms wrapped around her head.
"Are you having a headache as well? Is the miasma inside you attacking you too?"
Kunwa was feeling very worried. If both Nanate and Beibei were controlled by the miasma, then technically, the only person left would be him. How was he supposed to take care of both of them?!
"No. That was my mistake. I noticed that there has been some changes in my sensory perceptions since the last fight in Visionless Path. So I was just trying to figure out what all has changed."
The two of them stared back at her blankly. They were worried that what they were sensing from this conversation might actually be true. Beibei looked at the worry etched all over their faces and sighed internally.
"It seems that now I can not only read minds, but I can also enter a person's mind, and go through all of their previous memories. At least I did manage to enter Nanate's mind. Unfortunately I still can't use this method properly as it seems to take a lot of concentration, mind power and fine control. I think my mental power is still very lacking. I lost control of the stream of energy I has sent into Nanate's mind, which attacked Nanate, and caused me to have a backlash."
The two boys were staring at Beibei speechlessly. Nanate sighed. He wasn't sure if he should be angry that she violated his privacy and hurt him, or he should be glad that she never hid from them whenever she was trying out some new technique.
Every person had their own trump cards, and since these trump cards could basically save their lives in dire situations, cultivators wouldn't even tell their most loved ones about them. However, Beibei never seemed to have any scruples around them. So even though she lavishly used them as her guinea pigs in small and big experiments, he couldn't stay angry at her. Because it also meant that she trusted them with her life.
Nanate laughed, shaking his head in amusement. Despite the cold front she portrayed before others, she was actually a very warm person inside. Despite trying to act ruthless and uncaring, she was never a person who would leave her friends behind as sacrifice when the situation was dangerous. She always tried to push her friends away, and would rather sacrifice herself to buy them time. Not that he agreed with this method.
But then, he couldn't really control the impetuousness with which she went about in her life. She worked very hard, cultivated hard, and also did her best to push herself into dangerous situations. Somehow she believed that only in dire situations did a person really grow.
When Nanate looked around, Kunwa had already scampered off to the far end of the floating land chunk, carrying both Blacky and Pinky. He was too scared of being used as the next target of Beibei's unending weird experiments. He didn't want to suffer anymore, when they were already suffering from the black miasma.
Beibei on the other hand, seemed to have taken a break. The little toddler spirit was floating around her, and both seemed to be immersed in some deep conversation. Nanate watched for a while, a small smile unconsciously forming at the corner of his mouth. Finally he got up and walked over to Kunwa. Beibei looked too busy, and he didn't feel comfortable intruding on their talk.
"Geez....you little person! You have so many things attached to your soul! Do you think that your soul is a dumping ground?!"
Beibei looked at the toddler in surprise, a frown slowly forming on her forehead. Things attached to her soul? What kind of things?!
The toddler looked at the confusion and surprise etched on Beibei's frown and sighed. He was right. This girl didn't seem to know that there were many other creatures who had also made a contract with her. He could sense them because he had made a soul contract with her. However, even he couldn't get through to them, despite having a contract channel.
It seemed that there was something blocking the channel of communication between the girl and her contracted beasts and servants. Moreover, he had searched, yet there was no obvious spiritual barrier within her. Or else even he would have been blocked.
Which meant that the barrier was psychological. Either she herself had created the barrier, or there was something else controlling her mind, due to which she possibly couldn't remember these contracts which she had made previously.
Either way, it was troubling. As her soul contracted spirit, he needed to figure out where the problem lay, and help her in sorting it out. Otherwise even he might be affected by it in the future!
Beibei kept thinking about what he had said for some time, but finally put it to the back of her mind. There were more important things which she needed to figure out right now.
"Tell me something. How is it possible for an inanimate object like a land or mountain to develop its own spirit? Also, why did the soundless valley suddenly start allowing sounds to flow through it again?"
Beibei stopped the toddler from answering, and gestured to the two boys to come and join them. She had a feeling a lot of important things were going to be discussed, and didn't feel like wasting energy in repeating these dialogues to them separately. Kunwa and Nanate walked over and joined them. Blacky and Pinky sprawled near the two boys, rolling about trying to find comfortable positions on the hard ground.
"Well, technically, anything can develop its own spiritual consciousness in this world. There is a very strange type of element in this world, which is present in everything - air, water, earth, stones, beasts, humans, everything. We call it Spiritual energy. Technically, I am not the spirit of the mountains or the valley. Rather the stones in the seven mountains of the valley have the power of absorbing large amounts of this spiritual energy present in its surrounding.
The stones themselves have a very small power of absorbing the sound waves around them, thus reducing the intensity of the sound in its vicinity. However, the more spiritual energy it absorbs, the more the original power of the stone grows. These seven mountains have existed for a very, very long time. It is far more older than these lands itself.
And thus the spiritual energy stored in these mountains is far greater, and hence enhanced the original power of the mountain rocks. Thus the valley settled around the seven mountains turned into the Soundless Valley, where almost no sounds could pass through."
Beibei and the other two glanced at each other in surprise. Though they had somewhat come to similar conclusions, actually learning about it was still more amazing.
"But.....why do I feel that ever since I made....or rather you forcefully made the contract with me....this power of the mountain changed?"
"Well....that is true. I am not actually a spirit of some mountain or valley...as Monmona mistakenly thinks."
The three stared at him with wide eyes. Looking at their curious expressions, the toddler who was a few hundred thousand years old, couldn't help sighing in his heart. Why did it feel like he had unexpectedly and unwillingly become a teacher for a bunch of kids! Patience....he needed to have patience! This girls aura was way too enticing. Till he figured out the reason behind this unreasonable attraction he had for her aura, he couldn't ignore her.
"When a large amount of spiritual energy congregates in one place, many a times the dense spiritual energy forms its own consciousness. This takes a very, very long time to develop, and if this spiritual consciousness is left untouched, then over time it can also form its own body, and thus become a spiritual entity with a life and mind of its own."
Saying this, the toddler grinned widely, turning a finger to point at its own self. The three of them stared at him in wonder and amazement. Beibei then frowned, trying to catch the thread of what the toddler was trying to say.
"So technically, all the spiritual power in the valley and mountains was a part of you. And when you made the contract with me, all this spiritual power was taken back by you. And the valley and the mountains itself became empty of the spiritual power it had stored for so many years. And thus the power of 'Sound Absorption' became very negligible once again?!"
"Hmmm.....that is why Monmona and the her entire tribe will have to shift from the valley. The valley has now lost its greatest defense structure. Also, now that someone has already decided to enter the portal and follow the path of the hidden families, their need to stay on in the valley has also disappeared."
Beibei and Nanate looked at Kunwa, nodding at his statement which made sense.
"But if you say that you and the mountains are older than the lands, then where did you all come from?"
"Oh, we were all brought here from the outside."
"Outside? What is this outside?! We have heard this so many times, but I don't remember seeing any place called 'Outside' on the maps!"
The toddler, looked at them in confusion, but seeing them looking equally confused, his confusion slowly turned to shock as he turned circles around their head. Finally he stopped before them.
"You don't really think this is a real world.....do you? Don't you remember how you yourself came inside this place? You all have come from the outside world yourself.....how come you don't have any memories?"