Chapter 152: Chapter 142: Changes 4

“This isn’t good. The Tao Family is suspected of colluding with Xue Ying, yet at the same time, they’ve been sending all their people to join the siege to prove their innocence. Now they’re stuck between a rock and a hard place…” Lu Xuan shook her head slightly.

Before she could finish, a sudden commotion erupted from the dense crowd in Qingfeng Temple’s front courtyard, near the main gate.

Wang Chengdong of the Wang Family sighed.

“The reason I brought this up is to remind Observatory Master Lin that it would be best to cut ties with the Tao Family as soon as possible, unless absolutely necessary.” His gaze shifted to the commotion, where a handsome young man was walking slowly through the main gate, a longsword in hand and a black, silver-trimmed, beast-patterned bundle on his back.

The young man’s face was slightly haggard, but his distinctive features were still instantly recognizable. It was Tao Xuehai, who hadn’t been seen in a long time.

Instantly, a series of greetings for “Senior Brother Tao” rang out. The surrounding temple disciples had always held this handsome and magnanimous senior brother in high regard.

He gave a simple nod in return, his gaze passing over the crowd and landing on Lin Hui, who was seated in the main seat.

SWOOSH!

The next second, his figure flickered, crossing dozens of meters in an instant. Tapping his toes on the edge of the arena’s ropes, he used the momentum to flash forward again, appearing a few meters in front of Lin Hui and dropping to one knee.

“Tao Xuehai greets Master!” He lowered his head, the tension in his body finally easing.

Although he hadn’t spent much time with Lin Hui, he could feel clearly that the kindness a pure person like Lin Hui showed him was without any ulterior motives.

Therefore, after leaving the deceitful Inner City, it wasn’t until he returned here that he could truly relax.

“…” Lin Hui stood up, squinting as he sized up Tao Xuehai, then waved for a disciple to take him away to rest.

But before the nearby disciple could go over, they heard Tao Xuehai raise his head and speak via voice transmission.

“Master, there is no need. I only came back to visit you this time. Also, this year’s Illusory Dragon Lotus has been placed in my residence in the temple. You can go and retrieve it at your convenience. I still have matters to attend to and must go back. The next time I come… it may be a very long time.”

“You’re injured… In your condition, why are you still going back?” Lin Hui frowned, replying via voice transmission.

Inner Strength voice transmission was just controlling one’s Inner Strength, condensing it into a beam, and sending it directly to the other person’s ear. The method wasn’t difficult, but it required a high degree of precision.

He had quickly mastered this method while studying Inner Strength techniques.

“There are people in my family who need looking after… I have to go back…” Tao Xuehai replied in a low voice.

The Tao Family was vast and powerful. For such an Inner City Great Clan to need a junior like him to help look after things… one could only imagine how terrible their situation had become.

“You… Don’t go back. Just stay here. No one will blame a junior like you,” Lin Hui couldn’t help but urge.

“…” Tao Xuehai didn’t reply. He simply cupped his fist, stood up, bowed, and then turned to leave.

The Tao Family was now in a precarious situation. They had suffered heavy casualties in the repeated sieges on Xue Ying. At a time like this, he had been lucky enough to break through to the Circulation realm, which barely qualified him to help his older sister and brother avoid secret plots.

Now, with the family in decline, his grandfather dead, his uncle dead, and his parents heavily injured in the sieges, his strength, though only at the Circulation realm, was precious at a time when many experts had fled and scattered like birds. This was because while his power was not enough to protect people, his speed and Body Technique were enough to carry them away from danger!

Everyone watched him leave without a word.

Lin Hui was the same. The Tao Family had been, in a way, crushed by Xue Ying and the forces behind him. And they weren’t the only great clan in the Inner City to have recently met such a fate.

After all, more than one Priest and High Priest had died or been injured in the repeated sieges. Both sides were now out for blood.

The fall of every High Priest meant the fall of a great clan from the clouds.

“Let’s continue the tournament,” Lu Xuan suggested.

On the surface, it was a suggestion, but in reality, she was subtly reminding Lin Hui to just let the matter go. It was best not to get involved in the Tao Family’s affairs.

She meant well. After all, she was representing her older brother, Liu Wu Jun, so she was naturally on Lin Hui’s side.

“No matter how arrogant Xue Ying and his people are, they wouldn’t go so far as to attack a young kid who isn’t even a Priest. You don’t need to worry about Tao Xuehai’s safety,” Wang Chengdong reminded him.

“I know…” Lin Hui sighed. Watching Tao Xuehai’s figure flash several times and disappear through the main gate, he knew the kid had come specifically to say goodbye and deliver the Illusory Dragon Lotus.

He had left in front of everyone to dispel any suspicion that he might be staying at Qingfeng Temple.

Although it was a naive method, Lin Hui could sense the simple, honest desire in his heart not to involve anyone else.

“Continue.” Lin Hui waved his hand and sat down again.

It was as if nothing had happened. As if Tao Xuehai had never been there at all.

Soon, the preliminary rounds began. Disciples went onto the stage one by one to display their swordsmanship. Their Body Technique Sword Speed was clearly more than a notch faster than Qingfeng Temple’s previous standards.

The representatives of the great clans who were interested in recruiting had a glint in their eyes as they watched.

They had only heard that Lin Hui had a great reputation and was powerful, but now it seemed the strength of the entire Qingfeng Temple had improved by a large margin.

Just by looking at the interested expressions on the representatives’ faces, any discerning person could tell that the time for Qingfeng Temple to truly put down roots had arrived.

After this tournament, many of the remaining great clans would likely shift from their previous wavering attitudes and start sending their elite disciples here to study martial arts.

Qingfeng Temple would also become thoroughly integrated with the dozen or so surrounding towns, until they were inextricably linked.

*

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「On the streets of the town.」

Tao Xuehai sped across one eave after another, his body never touching the ground. With just a light tap of his toes on the edge of a roof, he would launch himself forward.

Like a low-flying bird.

Before long, he was out of the town and had reached the plains on the outskirts, near the Fog Area.

This area happened to be near the Gale Plain, where Lin Hui often came to practice his swordsmanship.

In front of the entrance to the Fog Area, a caravan was resting.

The caravan’s people, carts, and horses were all bundled up tightly, draped in thick brown furs.

The group was led by a middle-aged couple.

The couple’s faces were stiff, their features pale, but their eyes were exceptionally bright and alert. They had clearly used some special Disguise Technique to conceal their faces.

Seeing Tao Xuehai return, the couple slowly rose to their feet.

“You’re back? Is it done?” the middle-aged man asked in a low voice. He couldn’t hide the Inner City accent in his tone.

“Yes. In the future… are we really not coming back?” Tao Xuehai looked back at the hazy silhouette of Xinyu Town in the distance.

“Perhaps one day we will, but not now. Someone in the Moon Tower is targeting us. Your uncle’s death was suspicious. They said it was related to Xue Ying, but…” the man replied in a low voice.

Tao Xuehai fell silent.

The people in the caravan silently prepared for the various tasks required to enter the Fog Area.

After waiting for another ten minutes or so, the entire group slowly started moving again, heading resolutely into the fog.

The group quickly entered the fog. Ning Xiang propped up spherical voids one by one. All the voids linked together like a string of pearls, moving steadily forward through the mist.

The entire group consisted of about a hundred people, all of them silent and taciturn. Most were family units of a husband, a wife, and their children.

These were all the remaining members of the Tao Family. This migration also represented their withdrawal from the great turmoil in the Inner City, a reshuffling that was ostensibly caused by the matter of Xue Ying.

After traveling for about an hour, a low laugh suddenly echoed from above, through the fog.

“Tao Mengzhi, Ruan Yuling, where do you think you’re escaping to with so many fine things?”

The caravan came to an abrupt halt. Everyone looked up tensely.

White light flared around the leading couple’s bodies as they stared up into the air.

There in the fog, a giant, dusty-gray moth was flapping its wings, slowly descending and diving toward them.

The moth was grayish-brown overall, with a furry surface and regular, tea-colored stripes.

Its abdomen was lined with more than ten pairs of legs, and on its back was a massive, white, trough-like platform where several sparse black figures stood.

As the moth rapidly approached, its size magnified at an extreme rate.

By the time it was nearly overhead, the moth had become a behemoth, more than ten meters long and seven or eight meters wide.

From the platform on the moth’s back, four figures leaped into the air, scattering and landing on both sides of the caravan.

“Yan Long… Chen Changjun… What, you really think you can take advantage of the Tao Family just because we’ve fallen on hard times?”

Among the couple at the front of the caravan, the man also leaped into the air. With a few swift dashes, he landed on a cargo cart in the middle of the group and surveyed his surroundings, his voice cold.

“Of course we wouldn’t be enough on our own… Although you two are injured, you’re still bona fide High Priests. But what if we add *them* to the mix?”

The leading black figure chuckled sinisterly and looked up at the fog in front of the caravan.

Two tall men in strange, mismatched black and white attire were slowly walking out of it.

“The Qinghe Sect!? The Black and White Blade?! You…!?” The couple’s expressions changed drastically as they instantly recognized the newcomers’ identities.

*

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「Inside Qingfeng Temple.」

The tournament concluded smoothly, and the new top ten were selected.

Huang Shan, Qiu Yiren, Chen Sui, and Wang Hongshi were still there. The few newcomers were older disciples who had been seen before, such as Ding Shu and Xiaohu.

Yes, Xiaohu was no longer the person he used to be. He had officially completed the Seven-Section Quick Sword Body Tempering and had achieved profound skill in the Nine-Section Swift Sword, managing to narrowly unseat the previous tenth-place holder and successfully advance.

This made Lin Hui nod slightly, feeling a measure of gratification. His frequent guidance of Xiaohu and Xiaopang had not been in vain.

Looking at the two, who were now a head taller than before, he felt a bit dazed for a moment. Unconsciously, the little runts from before had started to grow up, gradually showing the heroic air of young men…

After the tournament rankings were decided, there was an awards ceremony, followed by a post-competition reception for introductions and networking.

The reception was an idea Lin Hui had learned by combining his knowledge from the Inner City School and his past life.

Allowing the representatives of great clans, who were interested in hiring or arranging marriages, to mingle privately with the top ten disciples at the reception would yield a higher chance of striking a deal.

He himself saw off the representatives from the major powers who had come to show their support. Factions like the Rain Palace and the Inspectorate could absolutely not be slighted.

He was busy until it was nearly dark before he returned to his residence in the back to rest.

But as soon as he returned to his courtyard and stepped through the door, he felt that something was wrong with the aura.

Because he had lived in this courtyard for so long, he knew every single detail of his surroundings by heart.

And because of his Purgatory Aura, he had recently been paying close attention to controlling his perception of the surrounding auras, afraid that he might accidentally let his own leak out and corrupt those around him.

These past few days, he had already noticed that some temple disciples had become short-tempered, yet their strength had paradoxically increased significantly.

Their physical constitution was inexplicably improving, and many couldn’t find the reason, but Lin Hui knew the source. He reassured everyone, explaining that it was an improvement to his exclusive Body Tempering Secret Medicine and told them not to worry.

But in reality, it all stemmed from the Purgatory Aura…

At this moment, he could clearly feel that something was wrong.

There were two extra people in his courtyard.

SWISH!

He flashed in an instant, appearing behind the rockery by the pond, where he saw the two extra people.

Tao Xuehai was holding a pale young woman in a purple dress. He was collapsed by the rockery, unconscious and covered in blood.

There was a slip of paper beside them.

With a thought, Lin Hui’s Inner Strength stirred up a slight breeze, which blew the slip of paper into his hand.

’Change their names and faces. Keep them safe. My gratitude is endless. —Tao.’

Lin Hui silently crumpled the note until it disintegrated into dust and scattered in the wind. He looked at the unconscious Tao Xuehai and the young woman, and sighed softly.

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