Although the white horse manifested through the method of turning poetry into reality could not compare to the teleportation of the Mirror of Retrospection Set and the System Space, its speed was no slower than any of the system's outfit mounts.
In less than three days, Yun Shu reached the Huai River boundary, which was only about twenty kilometers away from Heluo.
With Shen Jue in Wuling Prefecture, nothing could possibly go wrong there.
As long as this world had not completely turned from unreal to reality, Shen Jue remained the male lead of the book. If he accidentally died, the world would collapse along with him, and all their efforts would be in vain.
Therefore, if the Great God wanted to cause trouble and prevent her from interfering, he would absolutely avoid Shen Jue.
After all, Shen Jue did not know how important he was; he was truly the type of person who would sacrifice himself to save others.
As for the north, where everyone had learned the Body Tempering Technique, it would not be difficult for them to protect themselves against the natural disasters caused by the Great God.
At this thought, Yun Shu looked down at the little fox.
“Tongzi, if the world turns from unreal to reality, will it still be affected by the male lead?”
“Of course not! A real world doesn't revolve around any single person.” The little fox tilted its head. “Usually, only novel worlds revolve around their protagonists.”
“Mm, I understand.”
Yun Shu shook the reins in her hand. The white horse neighed loudly and galloped toward Heluo with flying hooves.
No matter which path she deduced, Heluo was the most likely place for trouble to brew. She had to see it with her own eyes.
The closer she got to Heluo, the rougher the road became.
A palm-wide crack had split across the official road, filled with rubble and dried mud. The trees on both sides of the road were tilted haphazardly, some even completely uprooted.
In the air, the scent of dust mixed with damp soil wafted about, making one's throat feel tight and stifled.
Yun Shu reined in the horse and dismounted.
The invisibility effect of the Floating Cloud Hairpin was still active, so she did not have to worry about being seen. She simply held the reins and walked forward.
Crouched on Yun Shu's shoulder, the little fox scanned the surrounding ruins with its amber eyes. “Host, the state of Heluo City looks like it just went through an earthquake...”
“More than once.” Yun Shu knelt and pinched a bit of loose dirt from the ground. The soil layers showed three distinct, alternating colors—signs of being repeatedly shaken and churned. “It has quaked at least three or four times, with the most recent one being just yesterday.”
With that, she stood up, looking past the collapsed dirt slope ahead toward Heluo City.
The city walls were still standing, but a corner of the battlements had collapsed.
Humans were truly too tiny and fragile in the face of natural disasters. She could already envision the tragic state of the city inside.
“Host, do you think Feng Chunya and the others might be...” As the little fox spoke, the rims of its eyes grew red.
Three or four earthquakes.
Not to mention ancient times, where people had little concept of earthquakes, even in modern times with advanced technology, such disasters would result in massive casualties.
The Great God clearly wanted everyone to die.
How despicable!
How could Yun Shu not have realized what even the little fox could figure out? Her heart grew heavier.
“Let's go into Heluo City and take a look.” Leading the horse, she stepped over the widespread debris and walked toward the city gates.
Yet the moment she truly stepped through the city gates, she froze, standing still on the spot.
What was unfolding before her eyes was entirely different from the scenes of devastation and widespread despair she had anticipated.
The ruins within the city were indeed shocking.
Entire blocks of houses had collapsed into mounds of dirt, with thick beams and pillars lying haphazardly across the streets. Cracks riddled the ground, the deepest of which could swallow half a leg.
Yet amidst these shattered ruins, hundreds of temporary tents were arranged in an orderly fashion.
Elderly women carrying hot porridge walked between the tents, and children wrapped in blankets sat under the sun, holding half a biscuit in their hands and carefully nibbling on it.
The little fox's excited voice rang out, “Host, look over there! It's the scholars from Yecheng Academy!”
Yun Shu followed its gaze, and her eyes instantly locked onto the scene.
A group of young scholars dressed in moon-white, cross-collared robes was gathered around a collapsed courtyard wall.
Each of them held a weasel-hair brush, writing with suspended wrists. Ink strokes materialized and hung suspended in the air.
As they wrote more and more poetry, the ink characters drifted toward the collapsed courtyard wall, restoring it to its original state and revealing the people buried underneath.
Seeing this, Feng Chunya and the others immediately rushed forward, desperately clawing away the rubble and gravel to pull the survivors out, then carrying them to the medical tents without a moment's pause.
Unknowingly, they had saved dozens of people using this method. Their seamless coordination made it clear they had done this many times before.
Fine beads of sweat gradually formed on the scholars' foreheads, and their lips turned pale, yet the movements of their hands never ceased for a single moment.
A frail scholar swayed and dropped to one knee, a trickle of blood dripping from the corner of his mouth onto the rubble.
He wiped his mouth aggressively, stood back up, and tremblingly raised his brush-holding hand once more.
“Go rest for a moment. If you keep writing, your body will break!” someone nearby urged.
Turning poetry into reality consumed one's essence and spirit. Overexertion would put their very life at risk.
The frail scholar shook his head. “I'm fine, I can still hold on. There are still people trapped under the rubble in the southern part of the city. We have to hurry!”
The little fox could not help but sigh with emotion. “Host, they are truly amazing. I actually believe in humanity's triumph over heaven now.”
Gazing at the young scholars and the Zhenbei Army, Yun Shu suddenly felt a faint prickling sensation in her nose.
“In the face of natural disasters, humans are like ants.”
“But when ants gather to form a mountain, they can also bear the weight of tripods.”
After watching for a while longer, she walked toward Shen Yu and Pei Wanning, who were talking nearby.
If she guessed correctly, the presence of the Yecheng Academy scholars in Heluo must have been the idea of these two.
Pei Wanning looked at Shen Yu and said, “Second Young Master Shen, if you hadn't had Young Master Fang risk his life to deliver the letter to Xindu City, the mortal realm would probably not have escaped this great cataclysm.”
“News just came from Zhenbei Prefecture that natural disasters have struck not only Heluo but the north as well. Fortunately, we prepared in advance, so the losses are not severe.”
At this point, she paused. “However, there is one thing I do not understand. Why did you insist that I announce to the public that the Divine Lady has returned to the Ninth Heaven, that mortals must stand on their own two feet from now on, and that they must never seek her help for anything again?”
“Is this truly the divine decree of the Divine Lady?”
A trace of suspicion flashed in her eyes.
Shen Yu slightly lowered his eyelashes. “Miss Pei, with your intelligence, I know I cannot hide this from you. But please believe me, I will never do anything to harm the common people, nor will I ever be an ungrateful wretch.”
Pei Wanning's face darkened, and she lowered her voice.
“Have you lost your mind? Forging a divine decree... If the Divine Lady finds out, or if anyone else discovers this, even if the Divine Lady does not punish you, the believers will never let you off!”
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