Free Web NovelChapter 163: Chapter 163: The Recording Device from Mu Tangfeng
"Master, you want to see footage of them running, don’t you?"
Xiao Du voiced Shi Lan’s thoughts exactly. She nodded eagerly. It continued, "I can scatter some of my seeds, and they can share the real-time footage they see with us. But this consumes a lot of spiritual power. Do you want to try it, Master?"
"Yes."
Shi Lan didn’t hesitate. She didn’t have much going on recently, and her spiritual power would normally recover with a night’s sleep.
Still, she hadn’t expected Xiao Du to give her such a wonderful surprise. ’Doesn’t this mean I basically have a mobile surveillance system?’
She couldn’t help but gush, "Oh my god, my Xiao Du is the best! You’re the most amazing spirit body in the whole world! I love it, I love it."
Nestled in Shi Lan’s spirit sea, Xiao Du shyly curled the leaf on its head and confessed in kind, "I love you too, Master."
As it spoke, its spirit body seeds silently fell to the ground. They drifted on the wind in every direction before finding places to take root, sprouting into tiny green mushrooms.
Soon, images began to form in Shi Lan’s mind. Wherever Mu Tangfeng and Jiang Xia ran, the little mushrooms switched the feed to show her.
To any onlookers, Shi Lan’s eyes were glazed over, her gaze distant as if her mind was elsewhere. Only she knew that she was watching a live broadcast.
She saw that Mu Tangfeng and Jiang Xia were running at roughly the same pace. The overall gap between them wasn’t large; Jiang Xia would fall a step or two behind Mu Tangfeng, only to surge ahead a moment later. They kept trading the lead back and forth.
The route they’d chosen was a three-thousand-meter loop around Chang’an Village. Since both men had high spiritual power, their physical fitness was naturally excellent, so this distance wasn’t particularly difficult for them.
They completed the first lap in just five minutes, their breathing still steady.
The two men shot each other a glare, then both turned to look at Shi Lan in perfect sync. Unfortunately, Shi Lan was engrossed in the feed inside her head and didn’t notice.
The surrounding crowd, on the other hand, erupted in enthusiastic applause. "They’re so fast!"
Soon, they started the second lap.
On the second lap, both Mu Tangfeng and Jiang Xia noticed the little mushrooms by the side of the path. Shi Lan’s green mushroom spirit body was too unique to miss. Besides, their sensitivity to her spiritual power had grown, so they recognized it almost instantly.
Forgetting all about the race, Mu Tangfeng slowed down and couldn’t resist crouching to gently stroke the little mushroom.
Logic told Jiang Xia this was the perfect chance to pull ahead, but who could resist the temptation of Lanlan’s spirit body? He crouched down to touch it too.
Knowing Lanlan’s spirit body was there made them feel as if she herself was watching. The two of them had been growing a bit bored with the run, but now they were like cats on catnip, their competitive spirit reignited.
Flying overhead, Uncle Gao and Aunt Gao noticed something peculiar. At certain points, the two runners would stop for a moment and crouch down, though they couldn’t see what they were doing.
Aunt Gao’s mid-air vision wasn’t as sharp as Uncle Gao’s. She patted his fluffy wings. "What are those two kids doing? Why’d they stop again?"
Uncle Gao looked, his expression just as baffled. "It looks like... they’re stroking mushrooms? Green ones, at that."
"Hmm? There are mushrooms this time of year?"
It wasn’t that Yaoxing’s winters were so harsh that nothing grew at all. In fact, the planet was known for a certain type of pine tree. However, with houses, furniture, and everything else being high-tech these days, many plants had become obsolete. As a result, these pines now grew profusely in non-residential areas.
Still, Aunt Gao had never seen a mushroom on Yaoxing before, much less a green one in the middle of winter...
She muttered, "Couldn’t be some kind of toxic, invasive species, could it? Once this is over, we need to get everyone together to find them and pull them all up."
Uncle Gao listened patiently and nodded, telling her to hold on tight to his feathers so she wouldn’t get chilled by the wind. Then he continued flying forward.
Shi Lan didn’t feel anything strange when Mu Tangfeng and Jiang Xia touched Xiao Du’s offshoots. The sudden appearance of their faces up close, however, was a bit of a shock.
But they were handsome, after all. Even from this unflattering low angle, their nostrils were perfectly symmetrical and delicate. In fact, their noses looked even more defined, and the angles of their jawlines were sharp.
Shi Lan silently admired the two magnified, handsome faces for a moment before they finally resumed running.
After a while, she was completely unfazed by the two of them periodically leaning in to check on the mushrooms. She just wanted it to be over so she could see the final result.
Thankfully, despite their intermittent stops, they finished all ten laps in under an hour. At the last moment, Mu Tangfeng broke into a sprint, finishing just two seconds ahead of Jiang Xia.
Jiang Xia was furious, mentally kicking himself for not speeding up as well. Still, the result wasn’t embarrassing. With such a tiny gap, Mu Tangfeng had no real bragging rights.
’As for the bed... hmph. I’ll begrudgingly let him have it for a month.’
’I’ll definitely win it back next time!’
Shi Lan pulled her consciousness back, and Xiao Du immediately retracted its offshoots. Without the constant supply of nutrients from those prison bigwigs, the longer its offshoots remained scattered, the more of her spiritual power they would consume.
And it couldn’t bear to tire out its master.
And so, after the race was over, when Aunt Gao dragged Uncle Gao along to go "pick" the mushrooms, they found nothing at any of the spots. In the end, they had no choice but to let it go.
That night, Mu Tangfeng finally claimed his right to use the big bed. Shi Lan set up the same floor bedding Mu Tangfeng had used before in the guest room for Jiang Xia. A deal was a deal, so he accepted his loss, hugging his blanket and turning his back on that irritating guy.
As for Mu Tangfeng, he finally got a peaceful night’s sleep.
The next day, however, Jiang Xia was back to his training routine. Seeing this, Mu Tangfeng felt a renewed sense of pressure and also picked a spot to go for a run.
The two men stuck to their own one-hour workouts without disturbing each other. Meanwhile, Shi Lan, feeling a rare moment of boredom, took out the video recorder Mu Tangfeng had given her.
He had given it to her the previous night, telling her she should watch it.
Shi Lan’s spiritual power had been quite drained the day before, so she had fallen asleep almost immediately. Now that she finally had a moment, she couldn’t contain her curiosity any longer and decided to play it.
She vaguely remembered this device. She’d actually helped him buy it a while ago. She never thought that after all this time, it would find its way back to her.
Shi Lan pulled the curtains shut, found a blank section of wall, and started the projection.
This type of recorder was very cheap, considered relatively obsolete technology in this world. It was a lot like a modern projector, but it was more compact—about the size of her palm—and would automatically levitate and play the recording when she pressed the button.
The projected image was perfectly clear, unaffected by the texture of the wall behind it.
Shi Lan hit play. The first thing that emerged was a soft, soothing melody that was instantly relaxing.
Then, the frame slowly panned down. A figure appeared, kneeling on the floor in a set of pink-and-white pajamas, only his back visible.
Shi Lan recognized Mu Tangfeng at a glance. The background was the guest room, and as for the pajamas, he had specifically ordered them online. Though they were on the pink side, Shi Lan had seen him wear them before. He didn’t look effeminate at all; instead, he gave off a surprisingly domestic, husband-like vibe.
Right now, however, Shi Lan was more confused about one thing: Why was Mu Tangfeng kneeling?
