The Tongxin Grass, carrying the ruins with it, landed in Xia Yunzhao’s hand. The bright sky above collapsed inch by inch and darkness closed around them. Wind howled, and the two found themselves back inside the mountain cave.
Shang Shuangze kept one arm around Xia Yunzhao, thrust his sword upward, blasted open the cave ceiling, and flew out with him.
At last, the two had “seen daylight again.”
Xiao Qing bounced out too, its bronze lid opening and closing with a nonstop clack-clack, though no one knew what it was saying.
While they were inside the ruins, Xia Yunzhao had refused to let it out because he did not know whether the place had special rules. Xiao Qing had nearly gone mad from being cooped up.
Xia Yunzhao reached over with both hands and pinched its lid shut. “No swearing.”
Then he added, “Good thing we didn’t bring Xianchan with us.” Otherwise the little cat would have suffered even more.
Shang Shuangze could tell he missed home. “Shall we go back now?”
“Let’s check Yuantong Village first.” Xia Yunzhao had not forgotten that people were still waiting there for them.
It was dusk. Winter evenings were both cold and dark. Shang Shuangze did not let go of him and simply flew them straight to the village entrance before landing.
“Huh?” Xia Yunzhao looked into the village. “Why doesn’t it feel like New Year here at all?”
They had spent more than three months inside the ruins, so the New Year should have passed not long ago. Why was there not a trace of festive atmosphere? He had even regretted missing the holiday while they were trapped inside.
“M-my lord!” A voice called from nearby. Xia Yunzhao turned and saw the same young villager who had led them earlier. The man held an enormous bowl of fragrant stew and looked both shocked and delighted. “My lord, you came out so quickly! Did everything go smoothly?”
“Quickly?” Xia Yunzhao exchanged a look with Shang Shuangze and asked, “How long have we been gone?”
The villager replied, “Counting from the moment you left until now, it’s only been three days!”
Only three days… So the ruins did not merely shrink and enlarge people. Time flowed differently inside as well?
For the two of them, that was actually good news. Three days had not delayed anything. Xia Yunzhao smiled and asked the villager, “Are you bringing food to your grandfather? Sorry to hold you up for a moment, but I’d like to ask where those cultivators are now.”
The villager immediately smiled. “I am delivering food, but not to my grandfather. It’s for the cultivator lords! If you’re looking for them, just come with me!”
Seeing Xia Yunzhao’s expression change, he hurriedly waved his hands. “They didn’t ask for this stew! I volunteered to bring it. We all volunteered!”
Xia Yunzhao: “……”
He cursed internally. Now they’re pulling the ‘voluntary’ routine? I used to ‘voluntarily’ study late and ‘voluntarily’ work overtime too! A bunch of cultivators extorting meat from villagers, as if you people are missing one bite of food!
Naturally, he did not take his irritation out on the villager. He smiled. “Then please lead the way.”
The villager somehow felt Xia Yunzhao was cursing very viciously in his head and suspected he did not believe him. Unsure whether he should explain further, he simply lowered his head and led the way.
The two followed behind him. Shang Shuangze patted Xia Yunzhao’s lower back soothingly. “The villager does not look as though he is lying. There may be a misunderstanding.”
Xia Yunzhao snorted. “There had better be.”
The young villager led them through the village to a somewhat run-down courtyard. Before they even reached it, an impatient shout came from inside. “We already said we don’t want it! Take everything back the way you brought it!”
Xia Yunzhao looked up. Good heavens, the courtyard entrance was surrounded by people. Men and women, old and young, every one of them carrying food, and all of it chicken, duck, fish, or meat. It smelled pretty good too.
He stared. “What’s going on here?”
Only then did the villager explain with a smile. “My lord, after you left, slaughter beasts came down from the mountain to forage in the village. The cultivator lords stepped in and killed all three or four of them! The villagers were incredibly grateful. We offered gold, silver, and spirit pearls, but the lords refused everything. Later, people noticed that they never left the courtyard and thought they might not have anything to eat, so we started bringing meals over of our own accord.”
He placed special emphasis on the words “of our own accord.”
Xia Yunzhao finally understood. “So that’s what happened.” He had thought these cultivators had failed to learn their lesson, but it looked like they were capable of listening after all.
As long as they could listen, everything else could be taught.
The Ji family head was a clever old fox, and Xia Yunzhao had no desire to make relations with them too strained. As long as these Ji family cultivators listened and did not cross his bottom line, he would make sure they lacked neither pills nor equipment in the future.
The other villagers had never seen Xia Yunzhao or Shang Shuangze, but their bearing alone made it obvious the two were no ordinary people. Everyone hurriedly cleared a path.
Xia Yunzhao reached the courtyard gate and said, “It’s me. Open up.”
With a creak, the tightly shut gate opened. The cultivator who had been scolded earlier stood behind it, impatience still on his face before he could wipe it away. The moment he saw Xia Yunzhao, his scalp tightened. “City Lord! You’re back. Did everything go smoothly?”
The Ji family cultivators inside heard him and all rushed out. Ji Hongyu even came carrying the fruit platter. “City Lord! You’re back?”
Wei Xuening and the other two greeted him from the fruit platter as well, their voices sounding like mosquito hums.
Xia Yunzhao walked over holding Shang Shuangze’s hand and flicked a finger. A transparent Tongxin Grass fruit flew into the fruit platter and dissolved into a fine mist of water.
Wei Xuening and the other two immediately returned to normal size. The moment their feet touched the ground, they hurriedly thanked him.
Xia Yunzhao waved it off and smiled. “The moment I came back, I heard that you killed several slaughter beasts and saved the entire village. Well done.”
The Ji cultivators had just witnessed the transformation and immediately felt their young City Lord truly was formidable. The ruins possessed such strange abilities, yet he had emerged so quickly and had actually found a way to restore the three female cultivators.
Praise from a powerful person carried more weight. Being surrounded by grateful villagers had barely affected them, but one compliment from the City Lord left several of them unable to suppress the corners of their mouths.
The cultivators all cupped their hands. “City Lord, you praise us too highly. They were only four lowest-level slaughter beasts. It was a trivial effort, hardly worth mentioning.”
Xia Yunzhao nodded. “Since it was only a trivial effort, then if you encounter something like this again, lend a hand.” Without waiting for their reaction, he turned to the villagers. “Thank you all for your generous hospitality, but we still have matters to attend to, so we won’t stay for the meal. Please take the food home. We have imposed on the village these past few days, and we’ll be leaving now. If anything strange happens here again, please send someone to Qingxi City and leave word at Wanglai… Qingming Pavilion.”
That had been close. He had nearly blurted out Brother Du’s place again. There was no helping it. The name came too naturally.
He led the group away. The villagers wanted to stop them but did not dare.
One older woman could not hold back. She reached out and grabbed someone, coincidentally catching Ji Hongyu. Her voice trembled. “M-my lord, you helped our village so much. How can you simply leave? How are we supposed to thank you?”
Ji Hongyu froze. For the first time, he seriously looked at an ordinary mortal. Tears shone in the old woman’s cloudy eyes, and the intensity of her gratitude was so strong he almost did not dare meet her gaze.
He seemed to understand, just a little, why the City Lord had ordered them to save people…
Ji Hongyu gently removed the woman’s hand and smiled as he pointed toward Xia Yunzhao ahead. “Everything we did was on the City Lord’s orders. If you want to thank someone, thank him.” He smiled again. “Without that one instruction from him, even if slaughter beasts had eaten every person in your village, we would not have lifted a hand.”
As Ji Hongyu said it, a faint confusion arose in his own heart. Was I really that indifferent before? It was clearly just the lift of a hand. Why had I never once thought to lift it?
The older woman withdrew her hand and cautiously asked, “May I ask the name of that City Lord?”
Ji Hongyu waved and hurried after the group that had already gone some distance. “Our City Lord’s surname is Xia, and his given name is Yunzhao.”
* * *
Although they had been away from home for only three short days, their return to the valley was still met with an exceptionally enthusiastic welcome from the little cat.
Xianchan was much more agile now. It grabbed Xia Yunzhao’s clothes and climbed into his arms, rubbing its furry head against him while making aggrieved little mew-mrrp sounds. No one knew what it was saying, and even its tiny tail had stopped sticking up.
Xia Yunzhao supported it with one hand and called Yun Yi over to ask how Xianchan had been.
He learned that ever since they left, Xianchan had waited at the valley entrance. Aside from eating, drinking, and relieving itself, it had barely moved, and it even slept at the entrance.
Xia Yunzhao’s heart immediately ached. Who would have expected the most carefree little creature in the household to develop separation anxiety?
Thinking about it, though, this time not only had Xia Yunzhao and Shang Shuangze left, they had taken Mingyun and Xiao Qing with them too. Xianchan was not close to the magical-treasure spirit, the Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish, or Yun Yi. Of course it had been miserable.
Not far away, the magical-treasure spirit looked up, then obediently continued scattering spiritual energy through the herb fields. Aside from Yun Yi, it was the most diligent worker in the household, though this was the only job it knew how to do.
They were all good children. Xia Yunzhao beckoned the magical-treasure spirit over, rubbed it a few times, and praised it. Then he lowered his head to rub the kitten’s head, gently pinched one tiny ear, and apologized seriously. “I’m sorry, Xianchan. We didn’t bring you because we were afraid it might be dangerous. Big Brother promises that next time, as long as there’s no danger, we’ll take you with us, okay?”
Xianchan gazed at him with gray-blue eyes. “Mew…”
Xia Yunzhao supported its little bottom and held it out toward Shang Shuangze. “Here, you say something too.”
Shang Shuangze rubbed Xianchan’s head with the pad of his finger. Xianchan liked this cool, aloof second master very much too and tilted its head to rub against him. Then Shang Shuangze said, “I’ll get you some dried fish in a little while.”
Xia Yunzhao burst out laughing and elbowed him. “The child is sad. What are you saying?!”
Shang Shuangze met his gaze with a smile. The meaning was obvious: a tiny cub like this could not understand a long speech anyway. Better to give it more dried fish.
Blue-green light flowed. Xiao Qing had come out on its own again. Its lid popped open and slammed straight down toward Xianchan. Then it hopped up and tried to cover the cat two more times. Xianchan immediately perked up and leaped after it.
Xiao Qing hurried away, pausing only to strike a smug pose at Xia Yunzhao and transmit a fuzzy thought: See? Cheered up already.
Xia Yunzhao shook his head with a smile. “Let them play. By the way, speaking of the Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish, has it been doing well lately?”
People said fish were the quietest pets, and apparently they were right. Even though the fish in their household was already rowdier than most, Xia Yunzhao often forgot it existed.
Now that he had remembered it, he hurried over to check. Before he even reached the pond, a bright red head surfaced.
When they approached, the Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish immediately sank again. Pretending not to care, it made a circle underwater and descended to the bottom.
Xia Yunzhao said regretfully, “Looks like it still isn’t very familiar with us.”
Shang Shuangze watched the fish repeatedly glance upward and looked as though he wanted to say something.
Xia Yunzhao carefully examined its scales. “It looks even redder than before. Its condition seems excellent…”
He thought the fish was much easier to raise than bettas, koi, and the like. His father had gone through a fishkeeping phase once and even sought out supposedly easy breeds. In the end, he discovered that the secret to keeping fish well was changing the water often and changing the fish often. Eventually he decided that was far too cruel and stopped raising them.
The Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish was nothing like that. Since arriving, it had barely needed any care. At most it got a bite whenever Xia Yunzhao made cat food for Xianchan. Its scales were redder than when it first arrived, and the gauzy fins of its tail had grown larger. When they unfurled, they looked dreamlike, like a flower blooming underwater.
And besides… “Is it my imagination, or has the concentration of water-attributed spiritual energy around here increased by a lot?”
Shang Shuangze said, “A Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish can increase the concentration of water-attributed spiritual energy. The greater the increase, the more it likes this place.”
“Really?” Xia Yunzhao crouched and patted the surface of the pond. “I’m honored to have earned your approval.”
The Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish made an awkward circle underwater, swam beneath his fingers, surfaced, rubbed once against his fingertip, then darted away.
Xia Yunzhao blinked in surprise, then laughed. “It’s so smooth, and it barely smells fishy at all.”
Shang Shuangze glanced at the Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish and said, “Haven’t you wanted to practice Little Cloud Rain beside the pond? Why not try now?”
Xia Yunzhao was also curious what Little Cloud Rain would look like amid such abundant water-attributed spiritual energy, so he readily agreed.
Compared with the Earthfire Art, he had used Little Cloud Rain far fewer times and spent much less time practicing it. As a result, it had never broken through. At most, his little watering can had become a bigger watering can.
He formed a hand seal and recited, “Summon clouds, gather water; let rain fall upon my fields, blessing all directions…”
The surrounding water-attributed spiritual energy responded at once and gathered toward him. Even the surface of the pond began to ripple.
The Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish poked its head out of the water and stared fixedly at Xia Yunzhao. Just as his spell was about to take shape, it suddenly leaped high above the surface and spat out a streak of red light that landed on him.
Xia Yunzhao noticed nothing, but Shang Shuangze beside him was astonished. Was that… an aura of auspicious fortune?
The Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish seemed much more listless when it fell back into the water. Its tail flicked once, then it sank to the bottom and stopped moving.
Xia Yunzhao spoke the final line of the mnemonic formula and pointed at the sky. “Little Cloud Rain!”
Boom!
Dark clouds churned across the sky in an instant. Lightning split the heavens, violent winds rose, thunder roared, and the next second heavy raindrops came crashing down!
Never mind anyone else. Xia Yunzhao himself was soaked to the skin in an instant. “…This is my Little Cloud Rain? Since when was it this powerful?” Little Cloud Rain had turned into Great Cloud Rain!
Shang Shuangze took his hand and circulated spiritual power, raising a protective barrier around him. “Let’s go back to the cave dwelling. Xiao Qing and Xianchan have already gone inside.”
Xia Yunzhao nodded and looked back at the pond. Through the rain hammering the water, he could only make out a blur of red. After thinking for a moment, he took out a handful of Qi-Replenishing Pills and scattered them into the pond. “Cultivate properly, Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish.”
With that, he went indoors with Shang Shuangze.
A short while later, the Crimson-Cloud Brocadefish’s tail moved. It caught the falling Qi-Replenishing Pills and began swallowing them.
The rain was genuinely enormous. All of Qingxi City, and even the entire Liancui Mountain Range, was drenched through.
Fortunately, it was already late. Most ordinary people had gone home, and only a handful of unlucky cultivators still outside were caught squarely in the downpour.
That night, rain poured from the heavens as a figure carrying a saber raced through the storm. The pursuers behind him fell farther and farther away. He glanced back and sneered.
Luckily for him, this downpour had come when it did. Otherwise, he might not have shaken off those dog-nosed trackers.
Qingxi City’s gates were already closed, but he did not hesitate. He flew directly over the wall and headed straight for Wanglai Pavilion.
Bang, bang, bang!
Du Yan was awakened by the pounding on the door. He yanked it open roughly and found Zhong Yundu standing outside, soaked from head to toe.
Zhong Yundu brushed past him and walked in, water dripping everywhere. His first words were, “Emergency. Xing Wenyu has disappeared.”
Du Yan was just about to say that if even a Golden Core cultivator like Zhong Yundu could not do anything, what use was coming to him…
Zhong Yundu shook the water from himself and delivered his second sentence. “Get those two little lovebirds over here. Yan Sikong has gone mad, and Qingxi City is about to face a catastrophe!”
* * *
Xia Yunzhao had brought back the ruins left by True Lord Tongxin and his Dao companion. The spirit-herb garden inside was extraordinarily rich, instantly filling in most of the gaps in his Complete Collection of Pill Recipes. A mere Hundred-Herb Viscera-Opening Pill was no longer worth mentioning.
Beyond that, the books and jade slips in the white-jade pavilion’s study were also extremely valuable.
Most concerned the Dao of plants and herbs, but principles connected across disciplines.
For example, Xia Yunzhao had been thinking about Tongxin Grass, the crowning achievement of True Lord Tongxin’s Dao companion in the Dao of plants. It was only one spirit plant, yet it possessed the ability to contain vast space within something tiny, like Mount Sumeru within a mustard seed. Its potential was not confined to medicinal use.
Elio’s Notes: “Mount Sumeru within a mustard seed” is a Buddhist image for something immense contained within something tiny. Cultivation fiction often uses it for miniature worlds or vast spaces held inside very small objects.
Could the Dao of pills work the same way?
To save time and avoid delaying the New Year, he moved the time formation over and began researching while cultivating.
He adjusted the time formation to a one-hundred-to-one ratio. More than three months could pass inside while only one day passed outside. Studying this way was immensely satisfying.
Since Xia Yunzhao entered the time formation, Shang Shuangze naturally went in with him.
Now that he had the Hundred-Herb Viscera-Opening Pill, Xia Yunzhao quickly advanced to late Foundation Establishment.
Early Foundation Establishment required tempering the skin, bones, and flesh. Mid Foundation Establishment tempered the internal organs. Late Foundation Establishment was the stage for tempering every meridian in the body.
The “unfortunate” part was that Xia Yunzhao’s meridians had already been tempered again and again by the secret-realm core. In both breadth and resilience, they were not merely superior to those of other Foundation Establishment cultivators. They were no worse than the meridians of an ordinary Golden Core cultivator.
In other words, advancing to Great Completion of Foundation Establishment was now only a thought away.
Since his foundation was already secure, there was no need to be timid. Xia Yunzhao was just about to push straight into Great Completion when the surrounding spiritual energy suddenly became chaotic.
The disorder was not inside his body but in the spiritual energy of heaven and earth around him. Xia Yunzhao’s eyes snapped open. Disturbances in ambient spiritual energy were rare. Someone might be breaking through, an extraordinary treasure might be appearing… or someone might have started fighting!
He instinctively looked beside him. Shang Shuangze was gone!
Without hesitating for even a moment, he left the formation.
Outside the formation lay a surrounding orb of spiritual power. The moment it sensed his aura, it rubbed against him affectionately. Xia Yunzhao had no time to indulge it. He raised a hand and broke through, immediately sensing violent spiritual-power fluctuations outside the valley along with familiar sword qi.
The sword qi was as sharp as ever, but carried neither killing intent nor anger. Xia Yunzhao immediately relaxed. Whatever was happening could not be too serious.
He ordered Yun Yi to carry Xianchan indoors, then summoned the magical-treasure spirit and Xiao Qing with a lift of his hand. One step later, Xia Yunzhao was out of the valley.
Then he froze in shock. “…What are those things? Is this a zombie siege?!”
Shang Shuangze glanced back, shifted, and appeared beside him. “Finished your seclusion?”
“No. I felt something strange in the spiritual-energy fluctuations and came out to look.” Xia Yunzhao was still staring down in shock. “What are all those things?”
At the valley entrance, humanoid monsters packed the ground so densely that Xia Yunzhao almost thought the Human Plague that had vanished with Fang Wenyuan had returned.
But compared with the Human Plague, these creatures were much harder to look at.
At least the Human Plague had retained complete human forms. These monsters were missing arms and legs. No, more accurately, even if nothing remained but an arm or a leg, that severed piece would still crawl across the ground toward the valley entrance.
Xia Yunzhao watched one monster’s foot fall off. The creature and its foot immediately went their separate ways, both continuing toward the valley.
The air was filled with the rancid smell of rotting flesh.
Xia Yunzhao nearly retched.
“Hold your breath.” Shang Shuangze took out a plain white silk handkerchief and tied it behind Xia Yunzhao’s head.
It was one Shang Shuangze often used and carried his distinctive cool, clean scent. Xia Yunzhao immediately felt much better.
“The outside world hasn’t ended while we were in there, has it? Let’s hurry to Qingxi City and see…” Before he could finish the sentence, a massive black saber suddenly flew in from the distance!
The black saber spun into the horde like a scythe cutting wheat and sliced through the entire group. It struck at a very specific height, neither the waist nor the neck, but across the chest. The monsters’ arms fell away, their torsos collapsed, and no blood flowed.
The monsters that had kept moving even after being hacked apart now fell still like a pile of corpses.
A familiar lazy voice drifted over. “These are living-human puppets refined by Yan Sikong. Their weakness is the heart. He wants to seize Qingxi City, and these are the vanguard he sent ahead.”
Xia Yunzhao’s first reaction was, “Brother Du!”
His second was confusion. “Wait. Living people refined into puppets? And why does he want Qingxi City?”
Two figures approached. One was Du Yan, and the other was Zhong Yundu.
Du Yan pointed at Zhong Yundu. “I heard it from him. Ask him.”
Zhong Yundu raised a hand and caught the returning black saber. He lifted his chin in greeting. “Little brother, sister-in-law. Long time no see.”
Xia Yunzhao: “……”
He glanced at the utterly unbothered Shang Shuangze, then turned back. “Brother Zhong, why are you here? Where’s Brother Xing?”
Zhong Yundu had not a shred of Golden Core dignity. “I came looking for reinforcements. Xing Wenyu was taken. He’s waiting for us to rescue him!”
Xia Yunzhao had been out of the valley for less than fifteen minutes and every piece of news he heard was explosive. His brain could barely keep up. “Wait. Brother Xing was taken? By whom? How do we rescue him? And what is going on with Yan Sikong? Why does he want Qingxi City? Start from the beginning!”
Zhong Yundu rubbed his chin. “From the beginning? All right. I was born in Xianlin City…”
Xia Yunzhao: “……Not that beginning!” Did this man have no sense of urgency whatsoever?
Zhong Yundu laughed, then grew serious. “Xing Wenyu has always wanted to take back his meridians. He and I wiped out two minor families subordinate to Puppet Gate to force Yan Sikong to show himself. But Yan Sikong was even more patient than we expected and never reacted.”
“While the two of us were operating near Puppet Gate, we noticed something strange. Demonic qi was appearing throughout Puppet Gate territory much more frequently than elsewhere. We investigated. Some mortals affected by it fled in terror, while others acted as though nothing had happened and continued living exactly as before.”
“I had no idea what those mortals were thinking, but Xing Wenyu said something was wrong. Later he secretly infiltrated Puppet Gate to investigate. I don’t know what he discovered, but when he came out, he told me Yan Sikong was refining living-human puppets and planned to seize Qingxi City. He told me to hurry over and warn you.”
“Halfway here, Puppet Gate started hunting me down. That told me something had gone wrong on his end. When I went back to find him, he had disappeared.”
Xia Yunzhao’s frown deepened the more he listened. “Take back his meridians… Weren’t Brother Xing’s meridians destroyed?”
Zhong Yundu laughed. “Which gossip version did you hear? There are several versions of his story. Yours is one of the more believable ones. There’s even a version claiming he refined Yan Sikong into a puppet! His meridians weren’t destroyed. Yan Sikong transplanted them into his own body. Xing Wenyu really did detonate his own Golden Core, though.”
At that, Zhong Yundu sneered. “Yan Sikong only had one True-Spirit Pill. Managing to break through to Nascent Soul once was already his ancestors burning high incense for him. He wants to break through a second time too? Of course he’d have to resort to crooked methods. Otherwise he’ll remain Golden Core for the rest of his life!”
Beside him, Du Yan looked at this particular brother and seemed to want to say something: You’re Golden Core too, you know…
Xia Yunzhao thought about it. He had heard the story from Xu Ziyu, which meant Xu Ziyu had been fooled too. Seriously, was any information in the cultivation world reliable? So far, aside from information he had actually purchased from intelligence shops, nearly everything he heard elsewhere contained mistakes or gaps. He was becoming afraid to trust any of it.
Shang Shuangze suddenly asked, “Puppet Gate cultivates puppet methods by beginning with wooden figures, then gradually cultivating the puppet’s form and soul. How can they refine living humans?”
“How would I know?” Zhong Yundu spread his hands. “I’m not from Puppet Gate. Though living people should follow instructions better than wooden ones, right?”
After saying that, he saw Xia Yunzhao was still thinking and asked, “Little brother, got any ideas?”
Xia Yunzhao considered it. “I don’t know why Yan Sikong wants Qingxi City. But tell me, which do you think is more attractive to him, Qingxi City or Xing Wenyu?”
Zhong Yundu’s interest sharpened. “Oh? What do you mean?”
Xia Yunzhao said, “From what I know of Brother Xing, he definitely left himself a contingency. He has no cultivation right now, yet he could stroll into Puppet Gate and come out in one piece. There’s no way he simply vanished. My guess is he’s setting a trap for Yan Sikong.”
“Yan Sikong wants Qingxi City, but he wants Xing Wenyu dead even more. Now Xing Wenyu has disappeared. Wouldn’t Yan Sikong have to go looking for him?”
Zhong Yundu suddenly understood. “So that’s it! I knew a man with more schemes than a beehive has holes couldn’t possibly get caught that easily. Brilliant! It really has to be you two brothers. Your minds are crooked as hell!”
Xia Yunzhao: “……”
Do you even know how to talk? Do you?!