After Xu Zirong’s interference, Xu Ziyan’s goodwill toward Bai Hua had almost certainly sunk to nothing. Worse, Xu Ziyan was immune to the effects of the Essence-Origin Dao Body. Unless Bai Hua found some way to establish a more intimate connection with him, the Dao Body’s faint natural charm alone would never win him over.
“Damn that Xu Zirong!” Bai Hua ground his teeth. Exceptional partners for paired cultivation like Xu Ziyan were difficult to find. So far, he had discovered only three.
Of those three, Xu Ziyan possessed the strongest yang aura and had never lost his primordial yang. Bai Hua was confident that a single session of paired cultivation with him could even push Bai Hua from early Foundation Establishment into the middle stage.
Yet Xu Zirong had utterly destroyed such a rare opportunity. How could Bai Hua possibly forgive him?
Angry as he was, what had happened could not be undone. He needed to find a way around it.
Gradually calming down, Bai Hua began wondering why Xu Zirong had been so hostile.
His only real encounter with Xu Zirong had been that brief day in the Azure Spirit Secret Realm. Xu Zirong had been cold then, but not openly aggressive. So what had changed?
Bai Hua closed his eyes and carefully reviewed everything that had happened in the reception hall, missing no detail from the moment he entered.
As time passed, the corners of his mouth slowly rose. When his eyes finally flew open, his face was radiant with delight.
“So… that’s what it is…” Bai Hua murmured, then burst into laughter.
“Xu Zirong, Xu Zirong… so you like your older brother?” Bai Hua touched his lower lip thoughtfully and laughed. “Hahaha… how disgusting. I never imagined you’d harbor feelings like that for your own brother.”
“No… I can’t tell Xu Ziyan. If I say it outright, he’ll never believe me.” Bai Hua tapped his forehead lightly and shook his head. “This will be difficult… but I do love a challenge.”
With that, his smile grew increasingly gleeful. “I’d really love to see the look on your face when you find out Xu Ziyan has fallen for me… Ah, wait—it’d be even better if you saw your brother in bed with me with your own eyes.”
Bai Hua ran his tongue across his lips. His handsome face took on a strangely alluring look, and he stroked his smooth skin with a smile of absolute determination.
“Xu Ziyan, your primordial yang will be mine!”
Unaware that someone had secretly set his sights on his virginity, Xu Ziyan had actually left the Fang residence because he had work to do, not simply because he was angry.
Knowing that someone intended to damage the city gate’s defensive formation the day after tomorrow, Xu Ziyan naturally had to prepare.
After buying materials from several shops with Xu Zirong, the brothers soon arrived beside the western gate of Wuti City.
The four great families took turns providing cultivators to guard the city gates, and this month happened to be the Jiang family’s turn. Without that advantage, Jiang Tianye would never have been able to damage the gate formation so easily under the other families’ scrutiny.
Two cultivators at the first level of Qi Refining guarded the gate. At Xu Ziyan’s level, dealing with them would be effortless. He did not even need to hide his actions: he simply had Xu Zirong place a concealment spell on him, and then openly inspected the gate right in front of the two guards.
After all, they could not see him anyway. ╮(╯▽╰)╭
Xu Zirong handled the inspection. His understanding of formations was far beyond Xu Ziyan’s. He carefully examined the array patterns and found that although most were intact, around a dozen nodes showed signs of damage.
“Sabotage?” Xu Ziyan asked.
Xu Zirong shook his head and pointed at several spots. “These appear to be ordinary wear and tear. The formation has existed for many years, so that’s not unusual. But these locations are different. Someone has deliberately altered them.”
“Hmm.” Xu Ziyan nodded, then pointed to a few other problem areas. “What about these?”
“I can’t say for certain. They might be old damage or deliberate changes. But if someone did tamper with them, it wasn’t the same person who altered the earlier nodes. This was done by another group. Whoever worked on these sections understands formations better than the first group. The modifications are extremely well concealed. If I hadn’t known there was something wrong with the array, I might never have noticed them.”
“Another group?” Xu Ziyan froze, then rubbed his aching forehead. “You mean two separate groups of people are plotting against the city gate?”
Xu Zirong nodded.
Xu Ziyan was now at a loss. The original body’s gossip about the events of the previous life had never mentioned that detail. Then again, perhaps the second group had hidden its involvement so well that nobody ever discovered it.
“Now this is troublesome,” Xu Ziyan muttered. Originally, he had known who the enemy was while remaining unseen himself, and that had allowed him to plan ways of preventing the beast assault. But now, besides the Jiang family’s insider, there was another group working against the city, and that worried him.
He knew the plot of the novel, so he could prevent the western gate from being compromised. If all four gates remained secure, it would be very difficult for demonic beasts to enter the city and massacre its inhabitants.
But the discovery of a second group of saboteurs left Xu Ziyan at a disadvantage. He could not reveal the entire truth, and even if he watched the gate guarded by the Jiangs, who could guarantee the other conspirators would not simply switch to another gate when they discovered that one could not be breached?
Xu Ziyan tapped his forehead in frustration and wondered how likely Patriarch Jiang would be to expose him if he tried playing the mystic prophet again.
His conclusion was that someone as intelligent as Patriarch Jiang would probably keep quiet even if he knew Xu Ziyan was lying, out of consideration for Dao Lord Luo Yun.
Once he realized that, Xu Ziyan relaxed. He might not be able to warn them openly of the coming beast assault, but he could certainly tell them that someone had sabotaged the gate’s defensive formation.
Inspecting the formations would not take much time, and Jiang Tianxing would hardly object to such a minor precaution. Once signs of deliberate damage were found, Jiang Tianxing would raise his guard without Xu Ziyan having to explain everything. With a few carefully chosen hints, he might also send more people into the surrounding forests to search for traces of demonic beasts.
Demonic beast assaults relied heavily on numbers. With so many beasts gathering, they could hardly avoid leaving tracks.
In the previous life, Wuti City had fallen and suffered such swift slaughter partly because of inside collaborators, but also because this little city was some distance from the Far Western region and its inhabitants had grown complacent.
“Let’s go back.” Xu Ziyan turned to leave. But just as he took his first step, a shout rang out in the distance. “Who’s skulking around over there?!”
An idea flashed through Xu Ziyan’s mind, and he pulled Xu Zirong into a narrow alley. Hearing the shout, the two gate guards were startled and hurriedly formed a hand seal. Red light flared beneath the gate, and an enormous formation appeared.
“A Shadow-Tracking Formation?” Xu Zirong looked surprised for an instant, then quickly released a multitude of blood lice to divert its target.
Once the crimson formation appeared, the entire gate was sealed off. The two cultivators watched an old man who happened to be passing by. Terrified, he huddled against the harness of his mule and trembled too hard to move.
The old man did not dare move, but the guards did not attack him. Although he was standing in an unfortunate spot, there was not a trace of spiritual power about him. He hardly looked like the suspicious figure they had been warned of.
An elderly man with a sinister expression suddenly appeared beside the gate. His gloomy eyes swept over the surroundings. Finding nothing, he activated the formation’s power again. When he sensed the information it returned, his expression changed abruptly.
The elder’s face darkened further. The two gate guards were so frightened they scarcely dared approach him. Only a few breaths had passed from the elder’s warning to the activation of the formation and his appearance, yet they had detected nothing.
The old man trapped in the center of the array clearly could not be a powerful expert. Whoever Elder Qi had detected must already have escaped some distance away.
“Useless trash!” Elder Qi roared, sweeping his sleeve angrily at the two guards. They dared not argue and only ducked their heads, enduring Elder Qi’s torrent of abuse.
Elder Qi was a guest elder of the Jiang family, notorious for his violent temper and sinister disposition. Although no one had proof, rumor held that he was vindictive and had found excuses to kill everyone who ever offended him.
The two guards were barely at the first level of Qi Refining, hardly better than mortals. In fact, if they had been any more capable, they would never have been assigned such a menial job as guarding the city gate.
Elder Qi stalked away with a gloomy expression. Today’s incident had given him a bad feeling. Only one day remained until Jiang Ying’s wedding, and he urgently needed to confer with a certain person…
“There’s something wrong with that man,” Xu Zirong said gravely, watching Elder Qi leave.
“Hmm?” Xu Ziyan looked at him questioningly.
“If a Shadow-Tracking Formation has been installed beneath this gate, no one could modify the defensive formation without being noticed. Shadow-Tracking Formations aren’t particularly useful for defense, but they make it impossible to tamper with a gate’s array undetected in an area they monitor. Unless… the person controlling the Shadow-Tracking Formation deliberately relinquished control of it.” Xu Zirong narrowed his eyes. Brother had worried earlier that he could not identify the Jiang family’s insider. Jiang Ying had named one suspect when they spoke, but suspicion alone was not solid evidence. Xu Ziyan could hardly take action against Jiang Tianye on that basis.