"Chou!!!" Li Meirong didn't notice Chou's warning as she was too busy getting excited over the fact her little companion finally woke up!
Feng Huang's ruby crystal shell rattled sideways as she thought at this point, there will be no more surprises, but another one just popped out of the blue!
The hovering turtle saw how Li Meirong bent down and carefully picked up the little plant spirit from the ground right onto her palms with such gentle care, ignoring her existence entirely.
The girl nodded her head and greeted the plant with sheer happiness. Obviously, they were communicating non-verbally.
So, he was her spirit plant…
Feng Huang's darkened eyes resembled the shade of dried blood. She couldn't help tasting bitterness at the thought. Oh, her treasure trove had already been plundered…
In the meantime, Li Meirong was making sure Chou was alright. She enthusiastically jumped straightaway into telling him of all the events he missed out on. "Are you sure you're fine? That vile man cut off your precious vine! Oh Chou, you don't know what happened next, Snowball turned into a huge fox, defended me and then just when he tackled Sheng Jing Wu, the vile man disappeared into a puff of smoke! He popped up right behind me and dropped me inside the volcano!"
Chou lifted a forest-green leaf from each of his regrown vines and covered his little body as if to hide a "gasp" of surprise. 'Oh no, master! How did you manage to stay alive??'
Li Meirong rambled on, "Somehow when I fell into the lava, a blue flame surrounded me and protected me from it! Then I was absorbed inside a barrier underneath the lava which Feng Huang created and then next thing we knew, both of us ended up in this dimension! The dimension claims it belongs to me, but I'm not sure. It gave me food and drinks, but it couldn't offer me headache pills or even a mobile phone! Afterwards I went to explore the rooms inside the building and discovered a library with heaps of cultivation manuals...Oh! And I finally cultivated for the first time, I nearly died trying. I owe Feng Huang a lot, she guided my consciousness when I was lost."
Chou was already used to his master's strange and uncommon vocabulary. By now he was familiar with her talking about peculiar devices such as "cars", "toilet seats", and now "Mobile phones." He paid it no heed. Li Meirong kept singing praises about this Feng Huang fellow, but Chou didn't see any vermilion bird around.
Ah, his master named another creature with her stupid ideas!
He turned his green coloured plant figure around and glared at the sullen, floating reptile.
The turtle stared back at him with what Chou could only describe as obvious envy. Aha, this turtle is bad news and his master is gullible enough to fall for her tricks.
Not while he's around!
Ever since Chou lost his "limb" and had to rest, he worked hard to restore his missing vine. To his great surprise, as he continued to cultivate inside the dimension, he received a great boon and his spiritual level had ascended yet again.
Chou also noticed the dimension his master owned was rich with spiritual essence, as expected of his master with her godly aura! If only she wasn't so silly, she would have already been a cultivator with enough power, becoming a force to be reckoned with.
Up until now, Chou could only communicate with other plants and Li Meirong, since she was his blood-contracted master. He was able to understand other's speech but unable to speak back. As for his vision, he could only make sense of shapes and view other living organism's energy flow, but not able to truly see.
Now, it was time for a change!
He turned into a high ranked spirit plant using Li Meirong's special blood, capable of increasing one's cultivation, and combined with the dimension's rich spirit essence, it was only a matter of time for results to bear fruit.
Becoming a high ranked spirit plant came with a lot of perks, it shouldn't take too long for him to reach a human form with his unprecedented cultivation speed.
Li Meirong brows knitted as she noticed Chou staying quiet while staring at Feng Huang. He did tell her not to include the turtle, is he going to make another huge fuss like he did with Snowball?
"Little Chou, this is Feng Huang. Why don't we add her to our little family, it will be more lively this way!" Li Meirong said, already showing her stance on the matter.
Feng Huang moved to hide her expression. A mix of emotions clouding her ruby red eyes. She tried to use Li Meirong repeatedly, but wasn't this girl the perfect example of a candle shining for others at the cost of its own life?
Guilt piled up heavily in her heart. Honestly, Feng Huang never had a good impression of humankind, Yet seeing the way Li Meirong was treating Chou so generously made her want to be treated the same way. Joining others as a little family didn't sound all that bad.
As Feng Huang remained absorbed in her own thoughts, Chou was "upgrading" himself.
Suddenly, a pair of pitch black eyes formed on the top part of his chubby plant body. A few centimeters below his eyes, a small hole grew bigger and stretched into a thin line. His "glare" turned into a physical display.
"Chou objects!" Chou's angry, youthful voice spoke out loud for the first time.
Li Meirong couldn't believe her senses, the little plant just grew a pair of eyes and mouth and talked!
"C-chou you…"
Chou's thin mouth stretched further into a full smirk, "Chou grew strong enough to change shape!"
"That's amazing, little Chou, Good job!"
The man eating plant teetered on Li Meirong's palms, feeling proud.
Li Meirong was astounded but also incredibly happy, she was brimming with tears of joy, as though her own child came back from school with a perfect test score. She knew that for spirit plants to have the ability to change their forms is an endeavor far more difficult than it is for spirit animals, and requires twice the work. It is considered exceedingly rare to encounter a spirit plant of such a high level as Chou. He was probably the only spirit plant in the sect capable of such a feat.
But why is he so against Feng Huang joining?
"Chou, this is great! I know you oppose this, but don't you think now that we have both grown stronger, we should consider adding another addition to the family-" She tried to convince him once again but was cut off.
"No, master! Chou knows that master is a little silly, so Chou will think for both of us this time. It's bad enough that you picked up the evil fox, now you want this evil turtle too? No no no. Chou does not allow!" Chou had no eyebrows, but his narrowed eyes and the curve of his mouth were noticeable enough to portray his evident displeasure. He sounded an awful lot like a motherly figure scolding her unruly daughter.