“Xi Yue!” 

Xi Yue had been cleaning up the aftermath of the drinking party. When this shout suddenly came through the dragon-taming chain, the half-puppet was startled and broke a glazed cup. 

Two figures—Lü Chengyi and Zhao Zhenwei—swept like a tornado from the first guard ship to the main ship. One headed for the lower levels of the ship’s hold while the other rushed straight to Xi Ping’s guest cabin. 

The Indignant Cicada crew member who had been trying to poison Lin Zhaoli and bringing him food in the meantime was just passing by. To his astonishment he saw Lü Chengyi, who had always been mild and courteous, arrive at Xi Ping’s door, glance in with his consciousness, then break the door down without so much as a heads up. 

“Senior… Exalted Lü, what’s wrong?” 

Lü Chengyi ignored him. He stood grimly at the door—Xi Ping’s room was completely empty. There was only a broken cup on the floor, the aroma of wine still hanging around it. 

Could this be coincidence? A bored young man using an immortal tool to make mischief, just happening to send Zhao Zhenwei to the guard ship? 

The corner of Lü Chengyi’s eye twitched over and over. 

But if that was the case, why would even his mute servant be gone, without even having taken the time to clean up the broken cup? 

Lü Chengyi turned abruptly and pursed his lips in a whistle. One of the water dragons leading the way in front of the convoy leapt out of the water. Lü Chengyi took a talisman between his fingertips and wrote “Xi Ping” on it. Then he tapped the talisman. It broke into a beam of light and dispersed into the sea, rushing towards the water dragon. 

The water dragon roared, dove back underwater, then turned and headed back towards the area of the convoy. 

“As soon as that brat Xi Ping realizes he’s been seen through,” Lü Chengyi thought, “his first response will definitely be to hide in the water. I have to keep him on the ship.” 

Xi Ping had already taken out the emergency “water-repelling pearl” Pang Jian had given him—when the pearl was thrown into the water, it could hold two people and stay submerged for a year and a half with no problem. 

The pearl had already left his hand when he heard the roar. Xi Ping reached out to scoop the water-repelling pearl back up. 

Damn it! That bum Lü! 

His spiritual sense was suddenly touched once more. Part of it was the dragon-taming chain, part of it was a reaction from his left hand—Xi Yue was nearby and had run into one of the Indignant Cicada traitors. 

The half-puppet Xi Yue had been originally made to hunt down spiritual objects for his master; he was unusually sensitive towards spiritual energy, so he could easily avoid the cultivators on the ship. But the crew were all mortals, and his luck wasn’t very good. When he heard footsteps coming around the corner, he was trapped in a narrow corridor. 

He couldn’t be seen. Xi Yue wanted to go back up on deck at once, but the ship’s hull surged fiercely, and the deafening roar of the water dragon came from the direction of the deck. 

He had no way out. 

Just then, the crew member suddenly stopped in his tracks. 

The next moment, a familiar aura quickly approached. Before Xi Yue could turn around, he was scooped up. Xi Yue’s vision swam. He was stuck under this person’s arm and flew through the narrow passage like the wind, brushed past the dumbstruck crew member, and squeezed into a storage closet. 

In about the space of a breath, the crew member’s footsteps sounded once again. The Indignant Cicada crew member had no idea he had been hypnotized by the junior Tai Sui’s “sleepwalking song.” He kept walking forward without even changing the frequency of his footsteps. 

Xi Ping abruptly let out a sigh of relief and caressed the back of Xi Yue’s head. You were nearly a goner. 

Feeling his hand, Xi Yue went cold. Young master, what’s going on? 

Xi Ping’s head was buzzing. He first instructed Wei Chengxiang: Don’t sign it, A-Xiang. Stall for time, I’ll think of something. 

Then he said to Xi Yue, Wuchang One just tampered with the water dragon array. I sent Zhao Zhenwei there. I didn’t think that Zhao would be one of Anyang’s people. 

Xi Yue was stunned. 

Xi Ping evened out his breathing. This damned shipment convoy. The commander is a traitor, the head of the guard is a traitor among traitors… Ugh, my tongue is about to tie itself into a fucking knot. 

Lin Zhaoli thought he had caught the traitors in the mines by the tail and was prepared to lay down his life to eliminate this evil for Princess Anyang, but he didn’t know fuck all. He was on the “bottom rung” of the complex southern mines. 

Anyang herself was the head of the thieves in the house. She must have been very moved to receive this kind of fawning from him, both funny and irritating, and had casually arranged for Lao Lin to take a sumptuous cruise to the Western Heaven. But she was still only on the “middle rung,” because she also hadn’t thought that the person she had dispatched to send Lin Zhaoli to his death was a genuine article evil cultivator who had already made plans with his co-conspirators to finish off the established foundation Lao Lin and make off with all the goods—Lü Chengyi, as Wuchang One, was on the “top rung” of this dog-eat-dog game. 

Xi Ping had succeeded in infiltrating the real evil cultivators’s central altar and pretended to be a god, receiving sacrifices while listening in on their secret plans. He had thought he was sitting above them all, with a commanding view. But instead he had floated up too high, and his vision had been obstructed. 

He said to Xi Yue, This is my fault. I’ve been negligent. I thought that if I kept an eye on the Indignant Cicadas, I’d have it all under control. I ought to have expected this. Anyang has everyone in the mines deceived and has to put on an act in front of Lin Zhaoli every day. If that idiot Lin could bear to put her to the trouble, I figure she’d have infiltrated them and been investigating herself—a genius like that couldn’t possibly send Lü Chengyi as Lin Zhaoli’s sole executioner. 

Xi Yue had never seen Xi Ping so fretful. Even at the Latent Cultivation Temple, when he had been ready to smash himself to pieces and had ordered Xi Yue to go steal the inscription, he had still acted as though nothing were the matter, making Xi Yue think that there really wasn’t anything the matter and nearly making him live the rest of his life full of remorse. 

Xi Yue made an upright proposal: Why don’t we just go out and face them directly? 

Xi Ping held his head down. I don’t need any lousy ideas from you. 

Wasn’t it stupid to think about saying to Idiot Lin “Zhao Zhenwei and Lü Chengyi are both Anyang’s people, and they’re sharpening their knives getting ready to sink you”? How could the old boy’s heart bear that naked truth? He was sure to be shamed into anger. Anyway, he had neither witnesses nor physical evidence. It wasn’t as if he could say “I guess I am Tai Sui”… But the other side might well have evidence. 

Since Zhao Zhenwei was Anyang’s man, what about the other cultivators on board? Xi Ping didn’t know. 

Playing tricks was like playing with fire while facing the wind; if you got slightly distracted, it would backfire and burn you. Xi Ping had learned this lesson at the Latent Cultivation Temple. But back then, it had only been him. Being smashed was no big deal. He’d gotten better after half a year in bed and forgotten the pain once the injury was healed. This time, he not only had Xi Yue with him, he had also gotten a little girl trapped in a den of evil cultivators. 

That Lü Chengyi hadn’t worked it out yet, but soon…

“A-Xiang,” he called impatiently to Wei Chengxiang through the reincarnation wood, “listen to me, forget about it, we can take revenge together later—I’ll help you. Things have gone badly, escape as fast you can now!” 

As Wei Chengxiang pretended to carefully examine the contents of the spiritual covenant, she secretly said to him, “Uncle, we aren’t on a ship, did you forget? We’re in the Exonerators’s immortal tool, under the sea. Where am I going to escape to?” 

Xi Ping closed his eyes and bit the tip of his tongue to force himself to calm down, then focused on Lü Chengyi. 

He saw that the water dragon’s movements had alerted Lin Zhaoli, too. 

“What’s going on?” Lin Zhaoli’s cabin was next door to Xi Ping’s. He came out and saw Lü Chengyi standing in front of Xi Ping’s door with a strange look, then frowned and said peevishly, “What’s the matter with that precious Viscount now?” 

Lü Chengyi looked up at him. 

Lin Zhaoli was short-sighted and full of himself, but he was still an established foundation. Between open-eyed and established foundation, a “half-immortal” became an “immortal”; the distance between the two was like a chasm. It wasn’t everyone who had the abilities and natural endowments of Heaven’s Design Pavilion’s Pang Jian; Lü Chengyi and Zhao Zhenwei put together wouldn’t be worth a wave of Lin Zhaoli’s sleeve. 

Lü Chengyi put on a reluctant expression and said, deliberately ambivalent, “I’m not precisely sure what’s happened myself, but the Viscount of Yongning has an immortal tool that I think is somewhat improper. I wanted to ask him about it.” 

Lin Zhao said, “What immortal tool?” 

“Something like a transport array,” Lü Chengyi said awkwardly. “Transport arrays are prohibited on the convoy ships, but this is the Viscount’s first time here, so he may not know the rules. He was joking around with Commander Zhao and used something that transported Commander Zhao right to the first guard ship. Commander Zhao thought this improper, so he told me to come ask.” 

Just then, Zhao Zhenwei ran over, head covered in sweat, just about to tell Lü Chengyi that Xi Ping was gone, and unexpectedly met Lin Zhaoli’s eyes, which were like stars on a winter night. He had a guilty conscience and was so scared his legs went weak on the spot. 

But Lin Zhaoli gave him a cold look and said, “Sobered up?” 

Zhao Zhenwei stuttered and didn’t dare to answer. 

Lin Zhaoli snorted. “Where are the two transport points? Take me to look at them.” 

The hither seal’s spiritual seals had vanished, but it was only an open-eyed immortal tool, after all. An established foundation cultivator could still catch a sliver of leftover aura. 

Lin Zhaoli passed a hand over the leftover aura of the spiritual seal and thought it was familiar… He seemed to have sensed this aura somewhere else recently—where was it? 

On the way, Lü Chengyi and Zhao Zhenwei exchanged a veiled look. Lü Chengyi suddenly said, “Commander Zhao, when you were transported, did you notice anything wrong on the first guard boat?” 

Zhao Zhenwei stuttered, “N-no, I was scared sober at once…” 

Lin Zhaoli paused: right, the water dragon array was on the first guard ship, and the water dragons were going to enter the water tonight! 

He turned towards the water dragon cabin, pushed aside the good-for-nothing Zhao Zhenwei, and charged in. 

He saw that the four water dragons in the array, which had previously been lively, seemed to have been bewitched; the four dragons were head to tail, going in circles mechanically. 

Lin Zhaoli rolled up his long sleeves. When one of the water dragons swam by the edge, he made a grab in midair and picked it up. 

The water dragon left the array and spasmed. Then a fierce look appeared on its face. It attacked indiscriminately, snapping its jaws towards Lin Zhaoli! 

Lin Zhaoli grabbed the water dragon by its weak spot; at the same time, he gave a quiet rebuke and placed a talisman on the water dragon. 

The water dragon arched stiffly. Then, black gas spurted out of its mouth, the stench assaulting the nostrils. The water dragon’s body relaxed. The shadow in its clouded eyes dispersed, its eyes once again became clear, and it looked at Lin Zhaoli in confusion. 

Lin Zhaoli, his expression grave, threw it back into the array. The other three dragons seemed to think some foreign creature had come and immediately stopped circling, surrounding the clean water dragon, full of hostility. Before they could attack, Lin Zhaoli abruptly slapped the water dragon array, “cleaning” the mud from the heads of the other three dragons as well. 

After the water dragons entered the sea, their bodies would grow up to a hundred zhang long, their roars turning to rain, their breath turning to mist. If these water dragons had been released into the sea after being tampered with, they would have capsized the convoy. 

This wasn’t mischief. This was extreme malice! 

Lü Chengyi put on a show of shock, saying, “What…what is this?” 

“A hypnotic art from Shu, used for large-scale hunts of spiritual beasts living in groups,” Lin Zhaoli said coldly. “They can make spiritual beasts attack each other. Before being subdued by the Southern Sage, the water dragons also amounted to spiritual beasts.” 

“How would a kid just out of the cottage know of a hypnotic art from Shu?” Lü Chengyi first muttered to himself, then said, “Wait, I think that servant of his wears a dragon-taming chain on his neck!” 

Hearing this, Lin Zhaoli frowned. Then his expression changed abruptly—he had just remembered what that familiar aura from earlier was. 

On the night he had led people to scout out Southern Shu’s encampment, he had been responsible for attracting the notice of the Shu and sent his subordinates to search for the spiritual stones that had gone missing from the mines. When his subordinates had been about to find the way, the spiritual beast pool had suddenly collapsed and even attracted the Chu, who had only wanted to see more chaos. 

At the time, there had been a faint, peculiar aura at the overturned bottom of the spiritual beast pool, identical to what he had sensed just now! 

It was Xi Ping who had collapsed the spiritual beast pool. He had been working with the Shu! 

Lü Chengyi took the opportunity to add, “Lin-shixiong, Shu’s Lingyun Sect often resorts to insidious tricks. You’ve been staying next door to the Viscount of Yongning these past few days. Have you felt unwell?” 

Hearing this, Lin Zhaoli was startled. He quickly sank his consciousness into his flesh and bones and inspected himself from top to bottom several times, inwardly reciting a miasma clearing spell three or four times. Seeing that there was nothing out of the ordinary, Lin Zhaoli finally relaxed. Maintaining his haughty pose, he sneered, “How could I be unwell? A kid who’s only just begun to cultivate—even if I stood here and let him scheme against me to his heart’s content, what could he do to me?” 

Xi Ping, witnessing this scene: “…” 

I’m begging you, sir, don’t brag. 

Xi Ping had never felt so oppressed in his life. Idiots were just like the limited edition products Cui Ji put on its shelves—you had to fight for them. First come, first served, and if you didn’t snatch one up, someone else would get there before you! 

“Thank heaven.” Lü Chengyi exchanged another look with Zhao Zhenwei and said, “How truly fortunate…” 

When a low level cultivator poisoned a master, it would only work if the target was unprepared. In the early stages, Mirage Powder had no symptoms, and an ordinary person wouldn’t scan his own body with a miasma clearing spell for no reason. Once the drug took effect after three doses, no medicine would work against it. But supposing the established foundation cultivator was paranoid and thought people were always trying to kill him, and checked himself for poison daily, he would certainly be able to detect a toxin created by an open-eyed cultivator. 

Reasonably speaking, Lin Zhaoli ought to have taken two doses of Mirage Powder by now. Saying that there was nothing amiss with him meant that he had never been poisoned at all! 

Given the Venerable Lin’s idiocy, he certainly couldn’t have avoided the poison on his own. Someone must have removed the toxin for him—in other words, ever since boarding the ship, Xi Ping had known what they were planning! 

Zhao Zhenwei simply didn’t dare to think about it closely. As soon as he thought about it, he felt his guts about to tear; the good-for-nothing could hardly keep his innards together. There was only one thought left in his mind: “It’s over, it’s all over.” 

Lü Chengyi, meanwhile, thought, “That Viscount of Yongning is such a profound schemer, yet he couldn’t tell that that good-for-nothing Zhao was like me, one of Anyang’s people. That shows that Heaven’s Design Pavilion doesn’t understand what’s going on in the southern mines. From beginning to end, they’ve only had their eyes fixed on us Indignant Cicadas.” 

But where had the leak been? 

How could there be such a coincidence? He had just finished tampering with the water dragon array when Zhao Zhenwei was tossed onto the first guard ship. It was as if someone were watching his every move…

Lü Chengyi narrowed his eyes. He had only revealed the information to one person: Miss Sixty, their new holy woman. 

That little girl knew too much. And, starting from the day he had told Old Nine to mention it, he had been able to communicate with her through the reincarnation wood. These were certainly Tai Sui’s methods. It must be true that Tai Sui’s consciousness and hidden bones were attached to her. 

But they had all overlooked the fact that she hadn’t opened her spiritual eyes yet, so her body couldn’t be snatched. She had her own mind…

The “holy woman” had perhaps already betrayed them. 

Though he didn’t know how a mere mortal like her could do that under Tai Sui’s nose, it was clear that under these circumstances, that was the only reasonable explanation. 

Heaven’s Design Pavilion, Pang Jian, Xi Ping… What excellent methods. 

But who said that god only helped good people? 

Lü Chengyi turned and said to Zhao Zhenwei, “Commander Zhao, please give the order for the whole convoy to stop and hunt down the evil cultivator.” 

Zhao Zhenwei said, “I…” 

“Wait,” Lin Zhaoli said, interrupting him. “That’s wrong.” 

As soon as Lü Chengyi frowned, he heard Lin Zhaoli continue, “I mean it’s wrong of you to say ‘evil cultivator’—you’re too distant from the sect and perhaps haven’t heard. This Xi Ping was originally a disciple from this year’s class at the Latent Cultivation Temple. Apart from him, the other new disciples are all still there. He was able to leave the mountain ahead of schedule because he was chosen by the inner sect.” 

Lü Chengyi’s heart stuttered. 

Zhao Zhenwei simply said, dumbfounded, “Th-the inner sect? Which peak?” 

Lin Zhaoli expelled a breath through his nose, seeming exasperated and bewildered. “Flying Jade Peak, General Zhi—I don’t know whether this person was bad to begin with and got into the inner sect by using some evil art to bewitch General Zhi, or whether, as a young disciple with no experience, he was targeted by evil cultivators after leaving the mountain… Anyway, I’ll first use my consciousness to locate him. You two control him. Don’t harm him. Wait until I write a report to the sect and to Heaven’s Design Pavilion.” 

Hardly had he spoken than the consciousness of an established foundation cultivator covered the whole convoy. The water dragons at the bottom of the sea came up uneasily. Under this absolute force, Xi Ping instantly had nowhere to hide! 

Lin Zhaoli tossed out a talisman and fixed on Xi Ping, then calmly drew back his consciousness. “Go get him.” 

Zhao Zhenwei immediately turned his head to look at Lü Chengyi: We’re dead. What should we do? 

Lü Chengyi ignored him. He lowered his head and accepted Lin Zhaoli’s orders. 

Then Lü Chengyi turned quickly and personally took some people to get Xi Ping. As soon as he was out of Lin Zhaoli’s sight, his hand, hidden in his sleeve, pulled out a talisman and tossed it into the water without anyone knowing. 

“There’s nothing to be done,” Lü Chengyi thought. “We’ll have to bury these people here ahead of schedule.” 

Meanwhile, Old Nine, waiting for the holy woman to inspect the spiritual covenant, felt the communication tool that he carried heat up slightly. Surprised, he thought, “Isn’t Senior One already in contact with the holy woman? Why would he contact me in private?” 

To keep the holy woman from getting paranoid, Old Nine excused himself and left Wei Chengxiang’s room. Outside the door, he quickly took out the immortal tool and looked at it. After just one glance, he gave a start. 

It said: I suspect the holy woman of betraying us. Force her to sign the spiritual covenant and attempt to alert Tai Sui.