Chapter 8: The New Year, Approaching
"Come in."
With the sound of the door pushing open, the study door swung wide, revealing the stable hand from the detached residence.
This ordinary-looking man with chestnut-colored short hair and a stutter first respectfully paid his respects to Joshua, then began to narrate the reason for his visit with a face full of self-blame. The man stammered, gesturing with his hands, and it took several minutes to make things clear—in short, for some unknown reason, in the stable, Joshua's Dragon-Blood Warhorse suddenly refused to eat its feed and angrily drove everyone out of the stable.
"My Lord, that's, roughly, the, situation, like, this."
Listening to this stuttering stable hand, who was covered in mud and bore hoof prints on his clothes, was pure torture, as could be seen from the expressions on Joshua and Ying's faces: "Right, now it's, in the, stable, pacing, back and, forth, just, won't, eat, My Lord, you..."
"Enough, I understand."
Immediately raising his hand to stop the stable hand from continuing, Joshua stood up, his expression serious: "Go change your clothes first. I'll go check on the situation now... Ying, do you want to continue resting for a while, or come out with me?"
Hesitating for a moment, although she wanted to go with the warrior to see what was wrong with Black, Ying felt that her head was still in a mess, as if a lot of information was flowing through her mind without leaving any trace.
"Forget it, you stay here."
Able to tell that his Divine Mechanism really seemed to be feeling unwell, Joshua gave the order: "If you want to sleep, go back to your room and lie down for a while."
He added another sentence: "That's an order."
"...Mm."
Seeing the silver-haired girl agree, Joshua nodded with satisfaction. Then he strode out of the study and headed toward the stable outside.
The stable was not far from the detached residence. Soon, the warrior arrived in front of this building constructed from Northern Grey Pine Wood. It was now dusk, the setting sun about to fall, the accumulated snow not yet melted, and his footsteps on the ice and snow made a crunching sound. Before he even entered, Joshua heard an irritable long neigh and the sound of something being smashed.
"Seems like it really is angry."
Murmuring to himself, he strode into the stable. Joshua swept his gaze around and saw wooden fragments scattered all over the ground. The tall black Dragon-Blood Warhorse was pacing back and forth in this cramped space. Its eyes were bloodshot from congestion, and it let out long neighs from time to time. Then, with a toss of its head and a sweep of its tail, it knocked everything around it into a mess.
But strangely enough, even though it was so irritable and angry, when the warhorse saw Joshua, the increasingly violent and aggressive temperament gradually subsided. And when the warrior reached out to touch its head, this fierce horse, which had directly smashed through the fence and stable door, actually docilely stuck out its tongue and licked his hand.
"Pretty well-behaved."
Somewhat puzzled, Joshua stroked the fur along Black's neck, looking around in confusion. If he hadn't known clearly that the wood shavings and fence debris were the work of the creature before him, no one would believe that this gentle horse could have done such a thing.
"Why was it angry before?"
Asking himself in a low voice, he then tried to probe the inside of Black's body with Battle Qi. The warrior found nothing unusual. Although its vitality was exceptionally strong, this was not abnormal but rather the effect of the dragon blood—back when Joshua rode Black all the way from the Orc Canyon on the Northwestern Plains back to the Northern Lands, traveling for seventeen days and nights without rest, Black showed no obvious signs of fatigue. The hot dragon bloodline provided it with a continuous source of power.
This was still relatively mild. Some creatures with a higher concentration of dragon blood could even gain the ability, like dolphins, to have one half of their brain asleep while the other half remained awake. For creatures at that level, according to common sense, they would never have true sleep in their entire lives.
Battle Qi had no effect, so Joshua used the system to check his warhorse's condition again—an unusually detailed data report scrolled across the screen, but there was no abnormal data either. However, according to the system display, the warrior was pleasantly surprised to find that, apparently due to accompanying the warrior in battle multiple times and experiencing several major fights, Black's level had increased by several ranks. It was now considered a powerful mount at the Silver High-rank level!
"It actually meets the conditions for bloodline purification. I didn't expect you to have such good talent."
Feeling his warhorse's body, its strong muscles and sturdy physique made the warrior very satisfied: "Good. The stronger you are, the stronger I become. As long as you can withstand my power, my combat effectiveness on horseback can also increase rapidly. You need to work hard too. When you reach Silver High-rank, I'll give you a surprise."
"Xilili!"
Black seemed to understand human speech and responded excitedly.
This was not just idle talk. Joshua knew several methods for purifying bloodlines. As long as he found some powerful auxiliary materials, he could purify the dragon blood or other bloodlines within Black, even allowing it to break through to the Gold Realm.
Leaving other things aside for now, a mount at the Gold Realm—this was truly one of the most extravagant things in the world.
At this moment, the stable hand had changed his clothes and hurried over. When he entered the stable and saw Black neighing softly under Joshua's hand, as docile as a kitten, the man's eyes widened in utter disbelief.
What the hell, swearing by his thirty-two years of experience with horses, when that horse had kicked him in the chest and sent him flying earlier, its expression was completely different!
"Oh, you're here."
Patting Black's head, Joshua turned sideways and said to the stable hand: "Looks like it was just throwing a tantrum earlier, or maybe it had too much energy from its improvement in strength... Anyway, go check if you have any physical discomfort. If you're injured, go collect some medical compensation first."
"No, My Lord, it's just, a bit, painful, that's, all. After, all, I've, been, taming, horses, for, so, many, years."
The stable hand replied haltingly.
"Then go prepare some feed first."
Shrugging, the warrior glanced at the feed trough that had been kicked over on the ground and added: "Prepare a bit more meat. I can tell it doesn't eat much grass anymore."
After confirming that there was nothing unusual, Joshua returned to the study and continued processing other documents.
But the warrior did not notice one thing... his passive skill had actually activated once before he entered the stable, and had driven something away.
Black remained in the stable, eating the carefully prepared beast meat feed in large mouthfuls. Occasionally, a flash of red-gold light flickered in its eyes, releasing a burst of pressure, but then this trace of red-gold immediately vanished without a trace.
The voice that had been whispering strange things in its ear back and forth had disappeared. The restless bloodline power within its body had also calmed down under Joshua's soothing touch. It could finally settle down and eat something.
Mm, both sides of its head felt a bit itchy, as if something was about to grow out...
...Time passed, and in the blink of an eye, several more days went by.
There was nothing noteworthy in the main city during winter. After finishing the accumulated administrative affairs, Joshua enjoyed a rare period of leisure.
December 31st, Year 831 of the Falling Stars Era, the day before the New Year. Another heavy snow fell from the sky.
Walking out of the church, standing amidst the swirling snowflakes, Joshua seemed to be in quite a good mood.
Probably because of the system, or the enhanced self-healing ability brought by the Steel Armor Breathing Art, the wound on his left arm was healing faster than the old priest had imagined. It wouldn't require one or two months of rest; it would probably be completely healed in about two or three weeks. The bone scaffold had already grown completely. Now, all that was needed was for Battle Qi to gradually strengthen these new bones, restoring them to the toughness a Gold-rank warrior should have.
On the street, although it was snowing, many people were bustling about busily.
The Northern Lands were simply too cold. With the current weather, the perceived temperature, with the wind blowing, was at least minus thirty to forty degrees Celsius. This temperature made it impossible to hold large-scale celebrations for the New Year. However, even so, everyone would hold banquets at home, spending the New Year with family and friends. Even single people would gather together, partying through the last night of the year.
Felled pine trees were continuously brought in from the city gates and distributed to every household. As a symbol of evergreen leaves, the Northern Holly Pine represented 'long-lasting peace and happiness.' Using it to decorate the New Year's banquet was a long-standing custom among the people of the Northern Lands.
"Speaking of which, it's time to prepare."
Unconsciously, he was about to welcome his first New Year since his transmigration. A smile involuntarily appeared on Joshua's face: "If my memory is correct, then as the lord, I still need to do one thing during the New Year."
Looking around this city that belonged to him, his gaze seemed to penetrate the stone walls, seeing every cluster of blazing flames of life. The warrior nodded with satisfaction and then walked toward the detached residence in the western part of the city.
For this matter, he needed to call Ying.
—And the new year was about to arrive.