"Let's kill him!" Dong Ho said.
"You made this awkward enough, shut up," the smaller man said, "You, what's your name?" he asked in a commanding tone.
"It is out of politeness that when asking someone's name, one must give theirs first," I replied.
The two looked at each other and then the one I didn't know his name said.
"I'm Dong Cho," he said.
"Brothers?" I asked.
The smaller man's brows furrowed, "How did you know? We don't even look alike!"
"Your name… Anyway, so what's going on here, are you hunters? Warriors? Or scavengers?" I asked.
"Warriors!"
"Hunters!"
Each of them replied at the same time. Then the confusion got them, and then they started bickering between themselves.
"Warriors I say! We're the Tiger Warrior Tribe! We have Warrior in our name!" Dong Ho said.
"But we're not the warriors of the village you fool! We're the hunters, we're tasked to get food!"
"But we're warriors at heart!" Dong Ho said.
"Yes, Warriors at heart, but hunters as occupation, don't confuse them!" Dong Cho said.
"…"
"And what about you? Are you a warrior?" Dong Cho, the one with one more brain cell than his companion said.
"Yes and no, I'm more like a doctor," I said.
"What is a doctor?" asked Dong Cho.
"Oh, A healer of sorts…" I said.
"That's not a warrior occupation, a weak man! Yes!" he said "So we can kill him."
"How did you even get to that conclusion," I shook my head.
"Wait, we can't kill him, Grandma Meng has been feeling sick ever since she ate the Black Bell Mushroom. Can you cure her?" asked Dong Cho.
"I suppose I can take a look," I said.
"Then follow us," they said as they guided me forward, spears against my neck.
Though awkward as it may seems, I didn't really care enough to ask them to remove the spears off my neck. I needed to get information and making the 'comfortable' is the best way to guarantee their cooperation.
It took about an hour before we arrived to the front of a massive sized village that was built on the side of a cliff.
Houses were built in an eccentric and intricate way, though most of them were made from wood, they were interlinked by bridges and ropes that allowed access from one house to another. Looking at the people moving about even crossing through the homes of other people just to get to their destination was frankly an eye opener.
They didn't have many boundaries between each other, it feels as if this village is pretty close.
"Grandma Meng is at the top, so head forward," Dong Cho said.
we took a wooden lift that we stood on, Dong Cho called out, "Lift us up!"
and soon, a man, a pretty bulky one, began pulling on a rope that lifted all three of us.
I made sure to reduce my own weight by lightly elevating myself from the wooden floor. If I didn't do that, my weight thanks to the Poison God's Body Cultivation would be too heavy for even the wood itself to carry it, not to mention a man and a rope.
Soon we arrived at the top and then began moving between the homes of people through the small bridges linking them.
After a while of navigating this maze-like village, we arrived at a small hut-like home at the very top of this village.
It stank.
Really stank, so hard that even the smell emanating from the atmosphere due to the serpent constantly being in a planet digestive mode was not enough to cover it.
The two men didn't seem to flinch or react to the smell, they must have gotten used to it.
"Grandma Meng, we brought a Quack!" one of them said.
"Quack?" I frowned.
"Oh, yes, because everyone who said they could treat Grandma Meng failed to do so. And she always calls them Quacks, so we can't tell her you're a healer, she probably does not know what that is!" he said confidently.
"You two fools," I heard, a low clearly old, and jarring voice coming from inside the tent.
"If you know it's a quack why bring it," she added, she sounded clearly disappointed but at the same time expecting it. These two aren't the sharpest tools in the shed, and i could understand her frustration.
"Madam," I said, "I'm a healer, would you mind me taking a look at what's ailing you?" I asked.
"Oh…you don't sound like these fools. Come on in," she said.
Once I entered, I saw nothing but a bed, a pot chamber, and a small rundown looking table.
The bed had several hanging sheets covering all four of its corners, making it impossible to see who is inside it.
I felt a surge of divine sense coming from the woman, and realized that she was a cultivator too.
These two are also cultivators, but they don't seem to realize it, they're cultivating their bodies but not their brains.
"You're not from these lands are you," she said.
"No, I'm from outside," I said.
"Outside? As in another island?" she asked.
"No, outside the serpent," I said.
"There he goes again, this madman, he thinks that we live inside a snake, what a crazy man!" Dong Cho said.
Dong Ho then hit him on the head, "Shut up you idiot, why did you say that, if grandma Meng Knows he is a crazy man she'll yell at us!" the other guy said trying to sound as quietly as possible.
"Pardon these idiots, how is the outside? The Vast Expanse…" she said.
"It's the same, do you wish to know of it?" I asked.
"Yes, please do tell this old woman of what happens outside, I've been here since I could remember, and all I know of the vast expanse is from the stories of the people who spoke of a world outside this world…"
"Then let me check up on you first as I tell you all about it," I said.
She then removed the drapes for just a bit allowing her hand out.
Her hand was black as if charred, and you could barely see her blood veins, they were pulsing ever so slowly one would find it strange that she still lived.
I lightly pressed both my index and middle fingers on her wrist and began inserting miniscule amounts of Qi to try and understand her situation.
"Currently," I said, "The four corners of the Vast Expanse are in a bit of a turmoil," I said.
Then began explaining what was going on between the four, and how the events that led up to the increased aggression between the Fire Domain and the Wind Domain started, and how everything in the Vast Expanse feels as if it's a ticking time bomb.
Words after words came out as I explained more and more about it, and she never interrupted me and just calmly listed.
I hinted at the two to bring me a few tools as I was extracting a bit of blood from her hand and began concocting a cure.
She had eaten a Black Bell Mushroom, those aren't uncommon, and their cure is pretty simple, only this one was clearly a mutated species since it caused this much damage to her body, but it's just skin destruction, easily repaired with a few tonics and invigorating pills along with the cure to the mushroom.
Not a long time after, I had given her a small bowl with a mix of mashed herbs turned to a broth.
"Eat this slowly, you should see improvement in your condition by night, and a complete recovery in a month's time," I said.
"Oh, thank you, I was so engrossed in your story I didn't even realize you had finished…but this story feels like it's lacking something," she said.
"What could it be lacking?" I asked.
"What's your role in the story? I mean, how come you came here, you said that the Poison God's event happened, and the serpent came. But you never gave any details on how you ended up in the stomach of the serpent,"
"Every Story has a hero, and I'm not the hero of this story, there was no point in telling the point of view of an irrelevant person," I shrugged.
"Those who speaks words as humble as this are bound to greatness…So you have told your story, I'm sure you wish to hear ours," she said.
"Of course, I wish to understand what happened here, and how you all ended up being trapped in this place.
"I haven't been born before our planet was consumed, I believe it was close to a thousand years now…" she said. "Whenever the serpent eats, it is rare, extremely rare for anything to live, but life somehow finds a way, and the few people who survived the consumption banned together and created communities. Some prospered and many failed and perished…and it was always due to the Day of The Great Flood…"
The two brothers shuddered at the mention of this name and this brought me some interest to the topic.
"The Day of the Great Flood?" I questioned.
"Yes, it is the day when most of us perish… I've been through one of them, and survived due to a miracle… but I suppose we're not going to make it this time…" she said.
I frowned, what is she talking about.
"The seas rise, and when they do, they begin eating away at the land itself, corroding and eroding it until nothing of it remains. And even if a few peaks remain afloat, the fumes and poisonous smoke that results from the land being consumed is enough to suffocate everyone.
I and a few other cultivators were able to survive the last flood simply because one of the mountain peaks stood strong and long enough for the flood to retract back. And in the five hundred years that followed, another planet was consumed and these are their offspring's and the survivors."
"Interesting," I think I understand what's going on, it's simply the serpent's digestive acids. "How do the animals survive though? I've seen cattle on my way up here," I asked.
"That happened only because one of our former leaders had a tool that he could use to store animals and living creatures, it was then stolen since it was considered an arc that could be used to save others from certain death, and we've yet to uncover its whereabouts," she said.
So we're basically stuck inside the stomach of the serpent and living on borrowed time.
"How long did the last Flood happen?" I asked.
"Five hundred years…"
"Oh that means…"
"Yes, it should happen again during this year…"
"Shit…"
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