Crossing the Palace Fighting Fox Harem

Chapter 347 Mountain Ghost Tribe

Ji Anni immediately covered her mouth, not daring to make any more sounds. She nervously lowered her head and looked down. Through the heavy branches and leaves, she saw more than a dozen small figures gathered under the tree.

"No, something is wrong..." Long Mohan shook his head gently and muttered to himself.

"What's wrong?" Ji Anni leaned close to his ear and whispered.

"They don't have any weapons on them. It doesn't look like they are here to search the mountain."

After hearing what Long Mohan said, Ji Annie opened her eyes wide and looked carefully again, and found that it was just as Long Mohan said, the group of figures did not hold swords in their hands, but each of them was holding a bunch of branches.

"What are they picking up branches for?" Ji Anni, who had only used gas stoves and electric stoves since childhood, did not realize at first that picking up branches was for making fire.

Long Mohan stared at her incredulously. "What? What else can they do? They are not here to search the mountain for people, but to collect firewood."

"Collecting firewood?" Ji Anni was shocked. "Are they going to make a fire? What for? To cook?"

In Ji Annie's thinking system, there are only two purposes for making a fire, one is to eat, and the other is to keep warm.

Long Mohan was angered by Ji Anni's ignorant expression and said in a low voice: "Idiot, they want to burn down the palace!"

"The palace is on fire?" Ji Anni was horrified and screamed.

"Shh." Long Mohan quickly covered her mouth and warned, "Be quiet, do you want them to find out?"

Ji Anni then realized that she had made a mistake again. She looked down in horror to see what the group of rebels were doing below her.

Fortunately, the group of rebels under their feet looked around and found nothing suspicious, so they lowered their heads and continued to collect firewood.

"Yes, I almost forgot, they have surrounded the imperial palace..." The more Ji Anni thought about it, the more scared she became. If the imperial palace was really burned down, what would happen to Prince Ming, Hua Rong, Yue Mao and so many other people?

Long Mohan said calmly: "I'm afraid it's not that easy. Have you forgotten? There is Taoist Yuan Rong in the palace."

Speaking of Taoist Yuan Rong, Ji Anni suddenly remembered an old story.

It was when Yun Zhen was outside the palace that a group of strange paper foxes rushed into the palace. After discovering that the weakness of these paper foxes was water, Taoist Yuan Rong used some kind of magic to summon wind and rain, causing a sudden rain and destroying all the paper foxes in the palace. Since Taoist Yuan Rong knew how to summon rain, there was no need to be afraid of these arsonists.

The reason why Long Mohan was not worried at all was probably because he was well aware of Taoist Yuan Rong's magical powers.

At this time, the group of rebels who were collecting firewood had gradually walked away.

Ji Anni turned her head and looked around carefully again, and found that there were still many people gathering firewood in the woods. She thought that they were really going to set a fire and burn the palace to ashes.

"Why did these rebels rise up? Is it because your taxes are too heavy? Or is it because your politics are corrupt?"

Ji Anni advocates peace. If the taxes are too heavy, then they should be reduced. If there is political corruption, then corruption should be eradicated. As long as everyone takes a step back, there is a solution.

But Long Mohan shook his head and said, "Neither, they want to force me to move to another palace."

"Move the palace?" Ji Anni was confused again, "Why move the palace?"

The Anti-Imperialist Society made such a big fuss, it turns out that it was not to force the emperor to "abdicate" but to force the emperor to "move". Isn't this too exaggerated?

Long Mohan said, "It's a long story. Actually, most of the members of the Anti-Imperial Society are descendants of the Mountain Ghost Tribe. Long before the founding of the Tianyou Holy Dynasty, they lived at the foot of this mountain for generations and regarded this mountain as a god. But Taizu blasphemed the gods in their hearts, using violence and tyranny to raze the sacred mountain to the ground and build a palace here. After encountering strong resistance from the Mountain Ghost Tribe, Taizu forcefully expelled the Mountain Ghost Tribe from the country and drove them to the south. So since the founding of the country, rebellions in the south have emerged one after another and have become more and more intense. Recently, they have occupied the southern capital and proclaimed themselves king."

"So the reason they rebelled was to take back their original place of residence and protect the holy place in their hearts?" Ji Annie suddenly realized, but why does this sound a bit like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?

Long Mohan said: "Not entirely. They are more motivated by a legend that is circulated among the mountain ghosts. It is said that destroying the sacred mountain will offend the gods and lead to destruction."

"But so many years have passed, and there hasn't been any disaster." Ji Annie shrugged.

It seems that the legend is just a legend. The Tianyou Holy Dynasty has been passed down to Long Mohan, the third generation. Apart from the ghost king who sealed himself in the cave outside the White Tiger Gate, there seems to be no dangerous factors that can cause destruction. The key to unlocking the seal of the ghost king is Xue Lan. As long as Xue Lan's demonic power does not awaken, the ghost king will sleep forever.

Ji Anni thought for a moment and asked again, "So, it seems that Taizu encountered the fox demon when he was playing in the mountains as a child? Children who play in the sacred mountain should live near the sacred mountain, and people who live near the sacred mountain are the mountain ghost tribe, right? Could it be that Taizu is also a member of the mountain ghost tribe?"

The identity of Taizu has long been known to everyone in this world, but as a visitor from another world, Ji Anni discovered for the first time today that the Tianyou Holy Dynasty was a dynasty established by the minority tribe, the Mountain Ghosts.

Long Mohan said, "That's right. Not only Taizu, but even some of the wealthy and powerful families in the court are descendants of the Mountain Ghost Clan. For example, the Liu family of the Ministry of Personnel, his family is the founding father of the Taizu era."

"It turns out that the new captain is from the mountain ghost tribe." Liuguang's smirking face immediately appeared in Ji Anni's mind.

Long Mohan nodded.

"So, aren't you also from the Mountain Ghost Clan?" Ji Anni then remembered that Long Mohan was a descendant of Taizu, so he should have inherited the Mountain Ghost Clan's bloodline.

Compared to "An", "Kang", "Yang" and so on, the surnames "Long" and "Liu" are relatively rare. It turns out that they are a minority - Ji Anni suddenly realized.

As soon as she finished speaking, her stomach made a long "gurgling" sound. Ji Anni was so frightened that she quickly covered her stomach and looked at Long Mohan embarrassedly.

Since yesterday, she has not eaten anything except a few sips of water. It is remarkable that her stomach has not grown so full until now.

"Are you hungry?" Long Mohan raised his head and looked around, searching for something among the dense branches and leaves.

Ji Anni followed his gaze and scanned the leaves around her. Suddenly, she found that there were many small red fruits dotted among the dark green leaves. These small fruits looked like apples and hawthorns. Ji Anni had never seen them before and thought that they were probably the local specialties of this world.

Long Mohan stood up, stepped on the branches, picked a big, round red fruit from above his head, and threw it to Ji Annie.

Ji Anni held the fruit, looked at it left and right, sniffed it with her nose, and then put it to her ear to listen.

Long Mohan was amused by her appearance and asked, "Why? Haven't you eaten it before?"

As he spoke, he picked a few more red fruits and threw them to Ji Annie at his feet.

Ji Anni could no longer hold the fruits in her hands, so she had to use her skirt to pocket the wild fruits that Long Mohan had picked.

"Okay, okay, we can't finish eating. Come back soon." The fruits in Ji Anni's skirt were almost piled up into a small mountain, and Long Mohan kept throwing fruits down.

After hearing Ji Anni call to stop, Long Mohan stepped on the branches and slowly returned to sit beside Ji Anni. Ji Anni had been observing Long Mohan's movements carefully. The more she watched, the more she felt that he was a tree climbing expert who was no less than herself. It was fine for her, a wild child raised at her grandfather's house since she was a child, but why was Long Mohan, a child who grew up in the palace, so good at climbing trees?

Ji Anni couldn't help but ask, "Brother, who taught you to climb a tree?"

"Do I need to be taught to climb a tree? I was born knowing how to do it." Long Mohan boasted without thinking, and laughed arrogantly, "There are also such trees in the palace. When I was a child, I often climbed up the tree to pick fruits."

"No wonder you climbed the tree so quickly just now, you've been practicing since you were a kid." Ji Anni laughed, and suddenly felt that Long Mohan was also an interesting person. Although he looked sinister now, his hobbies when he was a child were similar to Ji Anni's, both of them were naughty kids who liked to climb up and down everywhere and couldn't sit still.

"Your stomach is growling with hunger, yet you're still talking so much? Eat quickly." Long Mohan picked a large, red, smooth fruit, wiped it on his sleeve, and handed it to Ji Annie.

"There's no direct connection between talking and being hungry, right?" Ji Annie took a bite and bit off half of the big fruit.

The flesh was crisp and sweet, and tasted very similar to an apple, but juicier than an apple. When she bit into it, the juice gushed out like a fountain, wetting Ji Annie's chin.

"Don't talk while eating." Long Mohan is not Ji Anni's brother, but Ji Anni's mother. Seeing that her daughter had so many problems while eating, she couldn't help but teach her a lesson.

"I, I... I didn't expect it to be so juicy..." Ji Annie tried hard to swallow the half mouthful of fruit pulp in her throat while trying hard to defend herself, not wanting to delay for even a second.

"Okay, okay, stop talking." Long Mohan couldn't bear to watch it anymore, and used his sleeve to help Ji Anni wipe the juice off her chin and neck. Fortunately, the juice was not sticky, just like clear water, and it disappeared with a wipe.

"You eat too." Ji Anni knew that Long Mohan hadn't eaten for two days, so she generously picked a big fruit and handed it to Long Mohan.

Long Mohan took it and smiled, but was reluctant to take a bite. It seemed that he was thinking about something more important than filling his stomach.

"What's wrong? What are you laughing at?" Ji Anni tilted her head and looked at his somewhat melancholy smile.

"You're laughing at me for mistaking you for Zhao Ji..." Long Mohan shook his head slightly, feeling that the old self who firmly believed that Ji Anni was Zhao Ji was very ridiculous.

The strange and changeable expressions on Ji Anni's face were definitely not something the previous Soji would show.

As long as her demeanor changed while she spoke, it seemed as if her appearance also changed, and she was completely different from the previous Soji. Even that identical face was not enough to be an obstacle to confuse them.