Chapter 147 - Leaving Saint City Alone
“Long Yue moved, laying low for two days, and you’ve finally lost patience, departing back to Gu Xia City already?”
In the saint city lord’s manor, saint city lord Shi Buyi reached out to the soul lamp and he mumbled, “You can’t trust me, can you? Suspecting that I’ll make short work of you because you’ve acquired the【Monster God Ming King Art】right? That’s why, you want to avoid me, leaving the saint city as soon as possible back to the little nest you’ve built. My dear disciple, soon, you will come to understand the old saying that the older gingers are spicier than the younger ones….”
“Lang Qingyun, the heart of a wolf filled with wild ambitions, half of his blood belongs to the monster race while the other half is of the Xiao Mang Celestial Race. He suspects you only because he was worrying that you might replace him. So if this soul lamp was accidentally stolen away by him, he must be very happy to tell your whereabouts to your enemies.”
Shi Buyi smiled and said, “How can my own disciple die by my own hand? Wouldn’t it be better to kill him with the borrowed hand of others? Don’t you worry, Lang Qingyun will definitely be able to steal this soul lamp away … what I’m going to deal with, is Yu Xuanji’s teacher, the Lord of Qing Long Keep and Hu Qimei’s teacher, Lord of Luo Ying City — these two old brats, how dare they have their eyes on my【Monster God Ming King Art】!”
Xian Kong Saint City, Qing Long Keep’s assembly building – Yu Xuanji, Hu Qimei, Hei Hu, Hu Qingqing, they all stood reverently below an old man and a beautiful woman whose faces were solemn, while the atmospheric air was also thick and heavy.
“The【Monster God Ming King】is very important, Shi Buyi will definitely prohibit his cultivation technique from being leaked, Xuanji and Qimei will surely be exterminated by him!”
The old man was Yu Xuanji’s teacher, the Lord of Qing Long Keep. He said solemnly, “Now, the problem is, how are we going to send them back safely. With his prowess, Shi Buyi can easily kill either one of us, he could hang us up and batter us!”
The beautiful woman smiled and said, “We split up.”
Lord of Qing Long Keep shook his head and said, “Splitting up will only allow him to break us down one by one, it’d be even worse!”
“No, I mean, splitting up into dozens of groups, and leave at the same time!”
The Lord of Luo Ying City softly clapped her hands, one after another, female Qi Practitioners of the Luo Ying City walked out from the back of the hall, all of them were grasping lutes in the arms. Standing alongside with Hu Qimei, even their clothes and ornaments were the same as Hu Qimei. From appearance alone, it would be nigh impossible to distinguish the real Hu Qimei among them.
“Masks,” Lord of Luo Ying City then behested.
The female Qi Practitioners then raised their hands up and all of them donned masks of the same patterns. While one of the ladies tucked a mask into Hu Qimei’s hands. This additional measure made it even harder to identify the true Hu Qimei among this sea of doppelgangers.
The Lord of Luo Ying City glanced at them and her eyes filled with unbearable grief, “You are all honorable Qi Practitioners of our fox race. Today, for Qimei, I need you all to be her scapegoats, and I don’t know how many of you can make it back to Luo Ying City….”
The female Qi Practitioners answered in unison, “The city lord need not say anymore, for the fox race, we are willing to die in place of Qimei!”
Hu Qimei took a step forward, she turned and knelt down onto the ground, crying and sobbing as she spoke, “Qimei thanks the senior martial sisters….”
The harried sounds of the ladies speaking could be heard, “Quick, quick, get up, the【Monster God Ming King Art】relates to the revitalization of our fox race, it must not be lost. We aren’t doing this for you, but for the fox race!”
The Luo Ying City Lord then turned to the Qing Long Keep Lord and said, “Keep Lord, this is my stratagem – a diversion! Preoccupy Shi Buyi with these look-alikes so that he wouldn’t be able to neglect one in place of another. Like this, he would surely be unable to identify the real Hu Qimei. And not only that, I’ll personally bring one of the ladies myself to attract Shi Buyi’s attention so that Qimei can escape away easier.”
The Qing Long Keep Lord pondered earnestly before saying abruptly, “Alright! My Qing Long Keep will do the same to protect Xuanji! Hei Hu, get me our warriors and form a death squad, let Xuanji return back to the Qing Long Keep safely! And pick the closest-looking one, I’ll personally bring him along to mislead Shi Buyi!”
Hei Hu bowed, turned and left while Yu Xuanji said shudderingly, “Teacher….”
The Qing Long Keep Lord laughed and said, “Don’t you think too much, as long as you live, everything will be worth it. Rest assured, your teacher won’t die, I’ll live long enough to see you ascend to be the next Lord of Qing Long Keep!”
Yu Xuanji went all down onto the ground and kowtowed, “If your disciple, I, survives this, I’ll never forget what teacher and the other senior martial brothers have done for me today!”
Lord of Qing Long Keep supported him up by the arm and said, “The one that enlightened and warned you all was the closed door disciple of Shi Buyi, Long Yue? He is worth making friends with. Sadly, the time is not our friend, we don’t have time to meet with him. From what I see, he is in an even more dangerous position, Shi Buyi will definitely not let him walk away alive. But judging from his intelligence, he would’ve known of his precarious situation already. I am certain that he will surely leave the saint city as soon as possible!”
It was midnight and the moon was at its zenith. The Xian Kong Saint City was inundated with killing intent. Although the totem pillars on the sides of the streets have illuminated the city to be as bright as day, other than this saint mountain itself, the surroundings were completely steeped in darkness.
In the Fengbo Palace, there were dozens of coffins among the congratulatory gifts from the major forces. Naturally, Zhong Yue would not bring any along with him; and he did not bring any of the gifted soul weapons either, he had concerns as to whether these soul weapons were marked and that if he were to bring them along, they would provide a beacon with which his enemies could traced him down.
These past two days, he had extracted all of the Gold Qi and Wood Qi out from the soul weapons that the envoys had gifted him to nourish his five elemental Sword Qi. However, other than the coffins and soul weapons, he had brought along all of the medicinal pellets given by the major forces.
There were quite some high caliber medicinal pellets among the gifts, and if he was hurt, these medicinal pellets could have saved his life!
“Now, it’s time to leave this chaotic saint city and return back to the Gu Xia City. Although that place was still dangerous, the Gu Xia City belonged to the Gu Hongzi and with his wild ambitions and high aspirations, he would not tolerate any other monsters wreaking havoc in his territory! Especially when I’m one of the lords under his territory despite having become the closed door disciple of the saint city lord. Surely, he wouldn’t sit by and watch as I’m exterminated by the other forces!”
Rays flashed in Zhong Yue’s eyes and he walked out of the Fengbo Palace under the cover of darkness and headed straight for the city gate.
Just as he left, the next moment, the servants in the Fengbo Palace all moved, they went out and reported his movements to the monsters that were hiding beside the Fengbo Palace.
It was never a problem for the major forces that held resentments against Zhong Yue to bribe the servants in the Fengbo Palace.
The saint city was menacing with dangers and perils. One after another, Qi Practitioners of the major forces moved and waited on the side of the pathway to Gu Xia City, lying in wait to ambush him.
Meanwhile, Lang Qingyun had also smoothly ‘stolen’ away Zhong Yue’s soul lamp without any difficulties, he thought in his heart, It is true, Shi Buyi wants Long Yue to die, that’s why he purposely let me stole the soul lamp away!
Zhong Yue stood before the city gate of the Xian Kong Saint City, he turned back and looked at the grandiose saint city. He knew that once he stepped out of this saint city, his life would be at stake, and along the way, there would be foul wind and bloody rain, it was still uncertain whether if he could make it back to the Gu Xia City!
He turned and walked into the shade, allowing the darkness to completely engulf him.
This was a night where the fish and dragons danced, a night where he left the saint city alone.
And the night that was destined to be stripped off from its usual calm and peace.
Just as Zhong Yue left the gate, figures began to dash out of the saint city. They were wearing masks and their clothes were the same as Yu Xuanji. Then, there were ladies following behind, leaving the city, this time, their clothes were the same as Hu Qimei — they have all scattered out, diverging from one another to disappear into the darkness.
Meanwhile, the Qing Long Keep Lord and Luo Ying City Lord also brought one man and lady along with them into the shadows.
“These two old cunning foxes, but if you think you can bring out the【Monster God Ming King Art】like this, wouldn’t you be underestimating me?” In the city lord’s manor, rays flashed in Shi Buyi’s eyes as he sneered coldly.
Zhong Yue did not take the shortest path back to Gu Xia City, instead, he first turned to the direction of Southwest, the path he had chosen was thirty thousand miles longer than the shortest route!
The Southwest region of the East Barren was where the south keep — Yan Qiu Keep was positioned at. The location connected the East Barren and South Barren together, and it was close to the Gu Xia City, but the only thing was that taking a detour would naturally increase his travel distance.
Zhong Yue traveled quickly in the dark. He did not fly in the clouds, opting to stick close to the ground. This was mainly due to the unneeded attention he would attract if he were to fly in the air. There were many bird species among the monsters; eagles, hawks, cranes and others. Their eyes were sharp and flying in the upper air would leave him vulnerable to their keen eyes. This would pose a significantly greater risk as compared to flying close to the ground.
The forest blurred beneath his feet as Zhong Yue zipped past. He didn’t use the Golden Crow Wings due to the fact that they emitted a blazing fire when operated, something that would be a detriment to his escape under the darkness of the night.
He was instead, using the Jiao Dragon visualization art given to him by Ao Fenglou to step on the Jiao Dragons beneath his feet while they quietly slithered in mid-air to carry him forward. Although their speed couldn’t compare to the Golden Crow wings, they were not too slow either.
Suddenly, Zhong Yue could hear sounds of wind blasting behind him, he quickly turned and looked behind — a male and female monsters were wearing masks, flitting at a great speed in low-air towards him, the lady even had a lute in her arms!
“Brother Xuanji and Qimei!”
Zhong Yue’s heart palpitated in shock, just when he was about to call them, he suddenly felt a surge of obscured psyche surging past, it was like a silver thread cutting through the air!
What a terrifyingly strong psyche!
Zhong Yue distorted his body like a Jiao Dragon in mid-air and in an instant, his body had already made dozens of maneuvers as the psyche like silver tread slipped past him by a hair’s margin!
His psyche erupted out and reached out to the thread’s source, extending out in all directions. Zhong Yue’s heart was shocked as the psyche-formed thread was incredibly long, his psyche had reached out a hundred miles and he had yet to reach its end!
The psyche-formed thread’s length encircled the perimeter of the Xian City Saint City in a guillotine. Zhong Yue was already a couple hundred of miles away from the saint city. That circumference would make at least over three to five thousand miles, which means that, this thread of psyche would be of the same length!
Following after that, the man and lady that continued to rush forward suddenly had a line of blood appear on their necks shortly before their heads fell off from their bodies. The two dead corpses plummeted down onto the ground.
“Xuanji! Qimei!”
Zhong Yue’s body stunned, he then flew down to the ground, and as he flicked his finger, the two masks on the heads were pushed away, revealing the countenances of two strangers.
“Not Xuanji and Qimei! It must be a diversion to shadow the real Qimei and Xuanji in their escapes!”
Zhong Yue startled, although they were not Yu Xuanji and Hu Qimei, they were still strong and powerful Qi Practitioners, ones that stood in the level of Awakening. But in the face of the silver thread psyche, they were killed before they could even put up a fight!
And furthermore, the power of the thread was not channeled through any skills or visualizations, it was just purely psyche by itself, and yet, it was capable of killing two experts so easily!
“The saint city lord has moved, most probably the Lord of Qing Long Keep and Lord of Luo Ying City will move also, or otherwise, there wouldn’t be any Awakening Qi Practitioners that are willing to die in place of Xuanji and Qimei!”
Rays burst out from Zhong Yue’s eyes and he immediately turned and left, “The Xian Kong Saint City has turned into a war zone, I must leave now!”
While at the same time, the monster Qi Practitioners from the major forces that were waiting on the route to Gu Xia City were getting impatient, they were waiting to ambush Zhong Yue but who knew that he had not made his appearance at all.
All of a sudden, a laughter came from the shadows, “Hehehe, the dragon race didn’t take this route, he took a detour headed towards the Yan Que Keep-Savanna Wasteland, and yet, you are all for him here, how could you possibly see him here?”
“Who are you?” The Qi Practitioners shouted loud in question.
In the darkness, six eyes like lanterns appeared, their owner laughed and said, “There is no need for you all to know my identity. It’s more than enough for all you to know that even the saint city lord is unable to bear a dragon becoming his disciple….”