Chapter 132: Return to the Valley

Ou Xiaolu had no idea about the Grand Circus Hotel, much less what had happened there. After returning to the dormitory, he merely told Miguel to take care of Charles’s leave request before leaving the Stone Creek campus with Aro, Booth, and the others.

This time, Ou Xiaolu’s car was absurdly crowded. Aro was sprawled across the back seat, Booth occupied the passenger seat, while Xiaoyou and Emilia were squeezed on top of Aro.

They traveled in this cramped fashion to Ou Xiaolu’s valley, where they happened to see people from Sun God Design Company surveying the terrain.

When they saw Ou Xiaolu arrive, their chief designer, Kakarot, hurried over to explain the current progress. Since most of the details had already been worked out with Ou Xiaolu, they had come this time to determine where the trees would eventually be planted and examine the surrounding soil to see what kind of grass would grow best.

Once all that was settled, the construction company could move in.

Sun God Design Company had selected the most renowned construction company in Xinyi for Ou Xiaolu. As Kakarot put it, the company was somewhat expensive, but it had large helicopters capable of transporting materials into the valley.

Besides, Ou Xiaolu was not the one footing the bill. As long as the cost stayed within budget, this company could do the best job.

Ou Xiaolu had no strong preference regarding which construction company they used. He pointed toward Aro and the bear lying beside the pool.

“These two are my pets. Make sure the construction workers know that. I don’t want any problems later.”

Aro even nodded solemnly at Kakarot, indicating that he would be staying here most of the time in the future.

Kakarot was not at all surprised that Ou Xiaolu kept two ferocious beasts as pets. He assured him, “Don’t worry. I’ll explain everything clearly.”

“Good. I’ll leave it to you. Oh, and tell them not to damage the pool’s surroundings. I’m quite fond of this place. Also, they’d better not wander along those two mountain trails. They could be dangerous.”

“Of course. Don’t worry. There won’t be any problems.” Kakarot agreed readily, then told Ou Xiaolu that once everything was finalized on his end, the construction company could move in the following day.

After seeing Kakarot and the others off, Ou Xiaolu led everyone to the edge of the pool.

“How about we put the portal here?”

At that moment, Xiaoyou happened to notice the Sun Coral Egg beneath the pool, its shell almost completely cracked open. She cried out excitedly, “Isn’t that the Sun Coral Egg? Is it about to hatch?”

“Almost. It should happen within the next day or two. If you want, you can stay here with the bear and keep watch.” Ou Xiaolu turned to the others. “Who’s coming down with me?”

“Me!”

“Together!”

“Roar!”

Ou Xiaolu looked around and saw that everyone except Xiaoyou was preparing to follow him into the water. It was clear that the pool’s depth of more than seventy meters posed no real difficulty for any of them.

Ou Xiaolu nodded at Xiaoyou. “Then stay here and play with the bear. We’ll be back shortly.”

With that, Ou Xiaolu was the first to jump into the pool. Because he possessed the Underwater Breathing Card, he could breathe freely beneath the surface without being affected in the slightest. Aro cultivated the Lung Meridian and practiced breathing techniques, so moving freely underwater was no problem for him either.

Booth and Emilia, however, surprised Ou Xiaolu somewhat. He had not expected either of them to have the courage to go underwater.

After the four of them entered the pool, Ou Xiaolu first led them on a circuit around the Sun Coral Egg. He took another look at it. Several days had already passed, yet the thing was still in the process of hatching. Ou Xiaolu had no idea when it would finally emerge.

After circling around the egg, Ou Xiaolu led everyone to the two rock caverns he had discovered earlier. He pointed them out, then brought everyone into the smaller one.

Once they reached the cavern floor, Ou Xiaolu explained, “I found two caverns like this in the pool: this one and the one we just passed. This one is smaller, only about fifty square meters. The other is considerably larger, around seven hundred square meters. My plan is to place one color of the Rainbow Gate here. In the future, whenever we want to come to the valley, we can simply walk through the Rainbow Gate.”

Emilia had no idea what the Rainbow Gate was, so she stood there in bewilderment. Aro and Booth, however, understood the situation. They exchanged a glance and nodded. After all, Ou Xiaolu needed a quick way to return to the valley. The ride in the car today had been unbearably cramped.

Seeing that no one objected, Ou Xiaolu took out the Rainbow Gate Card and pointed at the center of the cavern floor.

Countless red lights appeared from the void. They danced freely before everyone, gradually forming red crystals as thick as a person’s arm.

Before anyone could touch them, the crystals began to break apart on their own. Some split into palm-sized shards that spread across the ground, while others fused together to form pillars.

In the end, a red crystal gate covering roughly ten square meters, standing five meters high and three meters wide, appeared before them.

Ou Xiaolu glanced around the dim cavern, then took out a flickering streetlamp and planted it in the ground. The lamp was not particularly bright, but at least it allowed them to see their surroundings clearly.

“All right, that should do it for now. Once we have enough people, we can station a few here to keep watch. That ought to be sufficient.”

Emilia was fascinated. She ran back and forth around the crystal gate, touching it repeatedly. Finally, she looked up and asked, “Ou, what is this thing for?”

“No matter where I am, I can open a door. After that, you can use it to teleport here.”

“We can’t open the door ourselves?” Emilia asked curiously.

“No. I’m the only one who can open it. But anyone can use it to teleport. It’s very convenient.”

“Oh.”

After hearing that, Emilia stopped asking questions. Even without the ability to teleport, she could run fast enough, so it made little difference to her.

For Booth and Aro, however, it was a rather convenient ability.

After setting up the red Rainbow Gate, Ou Xiaolu and the others went to the larger cavern. Though it appeared spacious, the air inside was not very good.

The moment Emilia entered, she said, “I don’t like this place.”

“I don’t like it either. That’s why I originally thought we could use it as a secret dwelling. Once construction begins aboveground, I’ll find a way to bring one or two lines down here and install a couple of ventilation shafts or something similar. If anything major happens in the future and we need somewhere to hide, we’ll have a place to go.”

As he spoke, he prepared to install the hidden door here. That way, from the outside, it would appear that there was only one cavern beneath the pool.

Aro suddenly said, “Instead of doing that, why not open another passage leading in here and seal it with the hidden door? Then you could use this place to raise large pets that wouldn’t be convenient to keep in the real world.”