Chapter 176 - Malrez Stone Clan

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Knowing Ming could hear her eased Xinyi's heavy heart. As if a burden fell from her shoulders. All they needed to do was to heal the river and he would be healed too.

His condition was more on the optimistic side now. And made her enthusiastic to read through the first Sorceress book again. She reviewed the part about the stone. 

Her excitement grew as she found one paragraph telling that near spirit lands, a spirit vein full of power stones existed. These stones were used to get life essence from the Kore and get essence from the spirit landforms to send it to the power chain. 

"There should be a power vein somewhere around here." Xinyi shouted. "Kaosma, do you know this?"

"Of course. This cave is actually full of power stones."

"So we need not move the stone bed, in that case." Xinyi said with the same enthusiasm.

All eyes went to the walls. Lengshui, fox-spider and the two Godingans only stared at the walls, dumbfounded. However, Nianshi, Meirga, and Xinyi could sense a slight power from the walls but were almost non-existent.

"Are you sure? Why can't I feel them?" Lengshui said.

"Me, too." The fox-spider said.

"It is here, but something is shrouding its presence." Nianshi said and about to dig a hole in the wall but Xinyi stopped him.

"Wait, look at the walls. What are those images?" Xinyi pointed a finger on the colorful drawings on it. "Chameleon, what is the meaning of those paintings?"

"I honestly don't know. It was already there when I came here."

"How about this stone bed?"

"It was already here too. So don't ask me what about it." Kaosma kept on shaking his head.

His negative answers frustrated her. "Did the late Sorceress tell you something when she moved the river here?"

"Not all. After moving everything here, including me, she left without saying a word."

"That's weird. But anyway, can anyone tell me the meaning of these images?" She looked at Nianshi. "Were you here when the river was moved?"

Nianshi and Meirga moved to the walls, smoothing their fingers on the paintings. 

"No. The lady usually traveled on her own and left me to work on different tasks like capturing abusive Chiangdas."

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"Why was that?"

Nianshi sighed. "Her reason was so we can cover many tasks at the same time. We did finish a lot of work in a year after that. So I don't know the other places she went or whatever she did. She never talks much either, and I never ask too. I respected her privacy." 

"Okay, that explains well. Now, can you translate these images? I think it's telling a story. This might help us heal Ming. The books I read never covered much about healing landforms."

She went near the door and gazed at the images. It showed many men with bended backs and with opened palms. Circle objects in different sizes floated right above their palms. "What are those above their palms?" 

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Everyone went to her side. 

"I think they are stones. They depicted the same actions. They could be stone Chiangdas."

"They are indeed stone Chiangdas." Nianshi said and pointed on a cryptic writing above it. "The words written here were a language of a famous stone Chiangda clan hundreds of years ago. They were famous for their powers heralded by kings. I came across their writings when the late Sorceress asked me to investigate their disappearance. I never thought the lady found them.

"I found one young man imprisoned for stealing who taught me the language in exchange for his freedom. He said his father studied different languages and learned it from him."

"What's written here said this place is the ancestral land of the Malrez stone Chiangda clan. But the people left after a great ancestor named Apa Dunou died."

The story went on as Nianshi translated the writings with the images.

"Apa Dunou was the great Chief of the clan but he reached the age where he had to pass on the Chieftainship to the next in line but all of his sons had already died so he had to choose someone else. Let me see…" Nianshi stopped, trying to figure out the images drawn near the words.

Headache. If these were words, it would have been easier to translate. He was pretty bad when it comes to images. The late Sorceress had told him that countless times. Why did the writer have to combine words with images? This puzzled him.

The images were people gathered around the two men in the middle. One depicted the image with a headdress, so this could be Apa Dunou. The other one could be the successor, but the people surrounding held stones in their hands. Some even held huge ones. 

Then underneath were images which differed totally from the rest. What was going on here? Nianshi thought there was more than one writer or ill.u.s.trator on these walls.

"That line said there were disagreements that led to a fight, causing Apa Dunou to become unconscious for days." It was the fox-spider who spoke this time.

All of them jerked their heads on it, making it uneasy. 

"How do you know so much?" Lengshui asked, feeling inferior this time.

"Hey! I have nothing to do inside that stone room, so I snuck out to Fengfu City or to other city libraries and spent time reading books. I even went to the previous governors' houses to read books in their study."

"In your human form?" Lengshui gasped.

"Of course, silly. How can I go there in my beast-like form? I'm too big for an ordinary spider. They might try to capture me and would surely end up badly for the ordinary humans."

"Show us now. Your human form, I mean," Xinyi said.

They all stared at it with intense eyes, making it gulped in pressure. "Fine, I will."

In that instant, his body morphed into a pretty little girl with white hair and wearing a white long robe.

"Eh! A girl?" The men loudly yelled.

"Who said I'm a boy? Stop staring at me. I hate that."

"So you mean there are books about these languages and images in those libraries you went to?" Nianshi interrupted because it was a kind of peculiar to find such books in cities such as Fengfu although this place was considered being rural and near the border.

"Yes. Most of the books with these images were just plain ill.u.s.trated children stories and didn't say anything about Chiangdas. But how can't I recognize one as a spirit guardian? Some were written extensively for ancient language learning, but no one bothers to read them. They were only left for the dust and spiders like me. And I find them fascinating."

This enlightened them that there were Chiangdas who left books about their languages in different ways. Maybe with the thought of preserving their language. Xinyi surmised.

"Go ahead, spider. Read. I can only read the words, but those images are beyond me, though I hate to admit it," Nianshi said but with no trace of shame.

The fox-spider's chest puffed up. Hearing the mighty dragon admit defeat made her feel those readings were worth her time. She never thought Nianshi would easily give way for her. And it was an honor.

The fox-spider coughed a little. "Okay, here we go."

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