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Pain disappeared as quickly as it came.
After leaving the hidden courtyard, Gou Monan’s face showed no sign of his earlier agony. Although there was still no trace of his smile, Ye Zichen could tell that he was much calmer.
Using Gou Monan’s own words, his pain wouldn’t change anything. He had no way to bring Dahai back to life. All he could do now was get revenge on his behalf.
From this, it was clear that Gou Monan was a rational sort.
In the blink of an eye, several days had passed. Ye Zichen wasn’t the last person to escape the corridor. At least, over these few days, they encountered a scattering of experts in succession.
All of them were strangers.
They all looked like former reclusive elders who, now that the mausoleum had descended, wanted to strive to reach new heights one last time before the era reached its end.
These seniors were nowhere near as welcoming as Gou Monan. When they saw the pair of them, these experts would simply stare at them from afar, nod lightly, then turn and leave.
This wasn’t friendliness, either…
The way Ye Zichen saw it, they just didn’t want to create unnecessary trouble for themselves. Besides, after entering the mausoleum, they’d all been separated from their companions. That Ye Zichen and Gou Monan stood together meant that they’d reached some sort of agreement.
Who knew what would happen if they recklessly approaching the pair of them?
That twisted murderer’s moves had only grown more pronounced. Over the past few days, the victims had only increased. As such, everyone in the palace was on edge. If they ran into anyone but an old friend, they’d assume that the stranger was that murderous fiend.
Meanwhile, in the bamboo grove on the Yao-Sealing Pagoda’s fourth floor.
Ye Zichen wanted to merge the fourth layer with the others. That way, things would be much livelier. And who knew? Perhaps the yao imperial experts’ would be in a good mood and instruct the other Yao servants! However, when Ye Zichen suggested this, they immediately rejected his proposal.
Ye Zichen had no choice. All he could do was send the Yao Divine General level experts down to join the others. The fourth layer was now the three imperial experts’ exclusive residence.
After the other few ruler-level yao servants left, the fourth layer seemed even quieter and lonelier than before.
“What put you in the mood to visit, anyway? Kid, aren’t you busy hunting treasures? Isn’t every moment precious?”
Cang Xiong sat proudly in his chair, gnawing the several-dozen-centimeter fruit in his hand. He’d been like this ever since leading Ye Zichen out of the corridor; when he saw Ye Zichen, he was even more self-important than before.
From time to time, he’d even arch his brow as if saying “Aren’t I amazing?”
Ye Zichen had learned from Qing Lan that the fruit Cang Xiong was eating was actually a variety of peach. He liked peach juice, so he’d eat several of them a day.
But Ye Zichen had never seen such large peaches in all his life.
Even the largest genetically modified peaches of the Modern Realm were less than a tenth the size.
“The outside is too dangerous, so I’m hiding in here.”
It was Cang Xiong who’d led Ye Zichen out of the corridor. At the end of the day, Ye Zichen really did owe him a favor. That was why, despite Cang Xiong’s attitude, he didn’t fire back as he normally would have. Instead, he smiled peaceably.
To his surprise, Cang Xiong actually nodded. He took another bite of peach, then said, “I sensed that the ambient yin energy was rather dense earlier.”
“Who’d say otherwise? This is a mausoleum! Why’d they have to make a mausoleum look like some imperial palace? Also, I’ve yet to see even a shadow of a ghost. It’s strange, though. Logically speaking, a place like this ought to be thoroughly booby-trapped, yet there’s nothing protecting the pill and artifact storage rooms. Whoever finds them can just go in and take them,” said Ye Zichen.
Ye Zichen hadn’t been in too many mysterious realms, but the ones he had visited were as he said: it wasn’t so easy to claim the treasures within. This Transcendent Mausoleum or Divine Mausoleum, whatever you called it, was really strange. The pills and talismans were just lying there. If you found them, you could take them, without overcoming any traps at all. You could say it was like a race. Whoever got to the treasures first got to keep them, unless something unexpected happened.
When those inside ran into other people, none of them would try and steal from each other, either.
The palace was just too enormous. If no one was there when you found treasure, and no one saw you leave the treasure room, no one knew that you had treasure on you. From the outside, it seemed everyone had treasure.
As such, everyone seemed to reached some sort of understanding: Don’t advertise your wealth. When you see someone else, nod and leave. No one is to attack anyone else.
Perhaps it was just because the various pills and talismans were nothing precious. It would be like fighting over a larger piece of fly meat; it just wasn’t worth it.
“But based on what you’re saying, shouldn’t you be out there hunting treasure?” Cang Xiong’s coarse voice boomed like thunder, hurting Ye Zichen’s ear drums.
“The outer perimeter has already been all but cleared out. Now, everyone’s trying to figure out a way to get into the palace proper. Also, I also just said that it’s dangerous out there. My cultivation ranks at the bottom of those present. What if I wander aimlessly and get myself killed?” Ye Zichen didn’t know what else to say.
They couldn’t get into the interior of the palace. This was every expert in the mausoleum’s biggest concern.
It was strange, though; Ye Zichen had spent this time exploring practically the entire perimeter, yet he’d never once encountered Yang Jian, Gu Li, or any of the others. Gou Monan said that the outer palace had four separate regions, so his friends might be in the others. However, they might still run into each other in the interior.
Ye Zichen and Gou Monan had split up in search of a pathway to the interior. Considering that Ye Zichen’s cultivation was rather low, he told Ye Zichen to find a safe place and protect himself. Then, if he discovered anything, he’d come back to Ye Zichen and inform him.
Such considerate arrangements actually made Ye Zichen rather embarrassed and uncomfortable. However, when he saw Gou Monan’s solemn expression, Ye Zichen nodded his agreement.
He didn’t know how long it would be until Gou Monan came back with news, though. He silently took a bottle of a peach-flavored beverage out of his spatial ring. Just as he was considering what to say next, Cang Xiong came to a sudden stop.
Suddenly, everything went black before Ye Zichen’s eyes. When he looked up, he saw a pair of enormous eyes staring intently at him.
He was so scared, he practically spat, “What are you doing?”
“If you had something good on you, why didn’t you take it out to share earlier?”
Cang Xiong directly tossed the peach he as holding aside, then snatched the peach drink right out of Ye Zichen’s hands, as if he were a bandit.
It was just a little bottle of fruit juice. Given the size of Cang Xiong’s mouth, it was barely even a mouthful.
In the blink of an eye, the bottle was empty. Cang Xiong’s huge eyes stared at the bottle. When he saw it was really empty, he licked his lips, as if savoring the last remnants.
“Do you have any more? Give me a little more!”
When Ye Zichen saw Cang Xiong’s burning gaze, he knew he was truly infatuated with the honey peach juice.
Thinking back to what Qing Lan had told him, Cang Xiong liked eating peaches because he liked the juice.
Why hadn’t he thought of this earlier? From the look in Cang Xiong’s eyes, so long as he gave him peach juice, Cang Xiong would do whatever he wanted!
Even though the Heavenly Court had long since started mass producing honey peach juice, Ye Zichen couldn’t make it seem too cheap.
“Aren’t you embarrassed to even ask? It wasn’t easy for me to get that bottle! It was made from immortality peaches. Do you know what those are? In tens of thousands of years, you might only find one! It was just a little bottle. I’d planned to split it over several occasions and savor it, but look at you! You drank it all! Hurry up and compensate me!”
Ye Zichen put real emotion into it; he was completely on point. In terms of acting, he’d long since attained perfection.
Although Cang Xiong had no idea what an “immortality peach” was, if one only appeared once every couple thousand years, it had to be a treasure. And from Ye Zichen’s expression, he really did seem deeply aggrieved.
Cang Xiong couldn’t help but look at the bottle on the ground and laugh sheepishly. “Look at you! It was just a little juice! I’ve got tons of peaches here. I’ll pick as many as you want for you!”
“Can those lousy peaches compare with immortality peaches?” Ye Zichen glared.
Cang Xiong’s peaches really couldn’t even begin to compare with immortality peaches. He was a simple, straightforward type, and when he saw how angry Ye Zichen was, he really didn’t know what to do.
Finally, he scratched his head and said, “Alright, I’m sorry! How about this? I led you out of that corridor earlier, didn’t I? How about we call us even!?”
“Even…?” Ye Zicehn pursed his lips, seemingly unwilling. Little did Cang Xiong know, on the inside, he was awash with delight.
Just one bottle of fruit juice could make Cang Xiong react like this. It seemed he’d found this musclehead’s weakness. If he was so passionate about fruit juice, wouldn’t it be easy to put him to work going forward?
But then, there was still Qing Lan.
He was undoubtedly far stronger than Cang Xiong, but he’d been cool and aloof this whole time, and he’d yet to express any particular interest in any given thing.
“Brother Gu, are you there?”
“Consider yourself lucky. I’ll let it go, this time.” Ye Zichen glared at Cang Xiong once more, then left the bamboo grove.
Cang Xiong knew he was in the wrong, so even when Ye Zichen glared at him, he just nodded, bowed, and smiled apologetically. Only when Ye Zichen left the fourth floor did he exhale and sit down.
He looked at the bottle before him. “I hadn’t realized this little toy was so valuable. But then, the flavor really was quite good.”
“You! You’re always far too simple-minded. Can’t you tell he was just pulling one over on you?” Qing Lan couldn’t help but laugh and shake his head.
Cang Xiong stared at him. “Boss Qing Lan, what do you mean by that? Are you saying he tricked me?”
“I have no idea if he was telling the truth about the fruit juice’s origins or not, but he said he didn’t have any more. Thatwas definitely a lie. He definitely wants to use the fruit juice to lead you around by the nose. Let me ask you this: if he told you that, so long as you helped him once more, he’d give you another bottle, what would you choose?”
Cang Xiong licked his lips and recalled the juice’s flavor. After drinking it, his ordinary peaches seemed bland by comparison. If Ye Zichen really offered him more juice in exchange for a favor, he didn’t think he’d refuse.
He nodded slightly. When Qing Lan saw this, he laughed. “Isn’t that right?”
“Hmph! That kid’s as devious as can be. But then, if he really does offer me more of that juice, I don’t really think I’d be coming out behind.” Cang Xiong grinned.
“Brother Gu!”
After returning to their designated meeting spot, Gou Monan called out to Ye Zichen. Ye Zichen, who’d only just emerged from the pagoda, then turned and walked out from a nearby corner. “I’m over here!”
“Brother Gu, you scared me! And here I thought something had happened to you!” Gou Monan still looked worried. Then, without waiting for Ye Zichen to respond, he reached out and grabbed him by the wrist. “Hurry up and follow me! I found a way into the palace interior!”