"Coward who bullies the weak and fears the strong!" Xiao Man gave a middle finger to the sky.
Rumble, another bolt of heavenly lightning struck from above. Xiao Man dodged it, but the lightning inexplicably pursued her, striking her again and sending her flying backward to smash against the mountain wall.
"Shameless!" Xiao Man gritted her teeth in hatred. Just wait. Once she escaped this place and cultivated to godhood, she would make this thieving heaven taste the sensation of being struck by heavenly lightning!
Xiao Man looked at the boundless sea, then at the barren island with not a single tree. To prevent her escape, the other party had indeed gone to great lengths. However, who said one needed wood to go to sea? There were countless ways to travel the seas, not all of them involving boats!
Xiao Man spent three days weaving a fishing net from the small grasses on the island to catch fish. The fish in the sea were large and ferocious. If she could catch one and control it, she could use the giant fish to travel to her desired destination.
Unfortunately, while her idea was grand, reality was cruel. All the fish Xiao Man caught ended up as her meals. These fish were incredibly fierce and lived freely. Taming them was far from easy, especially since her beast-taming techniques were only rudimentary, not nearly enough to control such ferocious beasts!
"I refuse to believe I can't even handle you featherless beasts!" Xiao Man pondered her beast-taming skills. In the past, she was either on the run or heading towards an escape, never having the time to properly learn beast-taming. She decided to seize this opportunity and use these sea beasts for practice.
The beast-taming art itself was obscure and difficult to comprehend, and coupled with the difficulty of communicating with the sea beasts, Xiao Man's progress was slow. However, she was not in a hurry. With Xiao Junyan out of danger and no immediate worries, as for the Demon King, she figured Xuan Xin and the Demon Lord wouldn't let him off easily. He was too busy fleeing for his life to bother with Xiao Junyan.
Day after day, Xiao Man diligently honed her beast-taming skills. Finally, she achieved some success. She leaped into the sea, and a large fish instantly surfaced, carrying Xiao Man towards the distance. However, after several days of travel, Xiao Man found herself back on the original small island!
"Despicable, shameless, and utterly without integrity!" Xiao Man cursed loudly. She had thought that with the sea beast as transportation, she would surely be able to leave this wretched place. To her surprise, this wretched place, apart from a few small islands, had no exit. It was a small world designed specifically to imprison wicked individuals!
And on these small islands, without exception, each imprisoned a person. Some had already turned to bone, some were still desperately enduring, and some were mere spirits, all denied liberation!
Xiao Man sat there, the sea beast resting on the water. This was a self-contained small world, much like a wilderness. There must be an exit, but she needed to find it herself!
"Thieving heaven, do you think this can trap me?" Xiao Man said fiercely. "Once I release all the people imprisoned here, find a way out, and let them all go!"
Xiao Man did as she said. She immediately rode the sea beast out to sea, heading towards the nearest small island. There were bound to be people within this place who understood this small world, perhaps offering clues to escape.
However, when Xiao Man reached the nearest island, it was deserted. Only traces of lightning strikes remained, indicating that the person originally imprisoned here could not withstand the power of the heavenly lightning and had long since vanished into ash.
"Someone must still be alive!" Xiao Man refused to give up and set off for the next island. She visited over a dozen islands without finding a single living person. Xiao Man felt a sense of defeat. As she stepped onto yet another island, she looked at the empty altar and sighed, sitting down on it.
"Could it be that I am the only living person here?"
"Dream on! You want to hog this place all to yourself? Did you even ask if I agree!"
A figure appeared behind her. Xiao Man turned around in surprise, only to see an old man in tattered clothes holding a skewer of roasted meat, eating with relish!
"A living person!" Xiao Man was so overjoyed she almost wept. She had actually seen another person! She lunged forward, startling the old man, who kicked her into the sea.
"What kind of monkey is this, so startling? Eat some more meat to calm your nerves."
Xiao Man climbed out of the sea. The old man was roasting meat by the shore. Seeing Xiao Man emerge, he ate his meat while scrutinizing her.
"What kind of monkey are you?"
Xiao Man lay back on the shore, panting, and said, "I am human, not a monkey!"
The old man stuffed all the meat into his mouth. "Are you a monkey here to steal my meat?"
Xiao Man sat up, looking at the old man with a bewildered expression. Had this person been imprisoned for too long and gone mad?
"Junior Xiao Man, may I know your esteemed surname and given name?"
"What? Do monkeys have names?" The old man looked at Xiao Man with disdain, as if she were crazy.
Xiao Man covered her forehead with her hand, realizing this person was difficult to communicate with. She didn't rush. She caught a sea beast and began roasting meat. Since her spiritual energy was unusable and she couldn't communicate with her spatial ring or the Tongtian Tower, she was fortunate to possess excellent wilderness survival skills, knowing what ingredients would make her food more delicious.
The old man watched Xiao Man add some grass juice while roasting the meat, his gaze filled with curiosity. However, smelling the rich aroma of the roasted meat, he couldn't help but swallow, then lunged to snatch it, only to miss.
"A wild monkey is just a wild monkey, no respect for elders."
"A monkey that speaks human language is also strange," Xiao Man had calmed down from the initial excitement of meeting another human. "Monkeys that steal human food will be captured, their skulls pried open, and their brains eaten raw."
Upon hearing this, the old man leaped three feet into the air, keeping a safe distance from Xiao Man, and stared at her warily with his cloudy eyes.
"Where did you come from, you wild monkey, and why do you slaughter your own kind?" the old man roared angrily.
Xiao Man ate the roasted meat in large bites, observing the old man from the corner of her eye. "Are you a monkey?"
"Aren't you?"
"Well..." Xiao Man thought carefully. "I am human, not a monkey."
"Humans are just evolved monkeys!"
Xiao Man didn't argue with the old man. She handed him a skewer of roasted meat. "Do you want some roasted meat?"
The old man slowly approached Xiao Man step by step, then snatched the roasted meat from her hand. He retreated a considerable distance, ensuring he was safe, before sitting down and eating the meat with a satisfied sigh.
The old man's face was obscured by dense fur. Xiao Man couldn't see his features clearly, but she knew he must be quite old and had likely been here for a long time, possibly knowing something.