eurekapd Chapter 28 Seeking only stability
Chapter 28 Seeking only stability
Chapter 28 Seeking only stability
Chen Yi disguised himself as a hunched old man, while the others were chasing after a young martial artist with innate talent, so they naturally couldn't find him.
However, in the mountains, a middle-aged cultivator with a pale face and weary eyes held a tortoise shell in his hand, coldly sensing the direction Chen Yi had left in.
"A twenty-year-old innate martial artist actually has so many spirit stones and a magic weapon. After going out, he transforms into a hunched old man and runs faster than anyone else."
"Kid, you didn't expect my tortoise shell to be able to connect to the location of the jade tablet, did you?"
In the forest, a cunning and sinister glint appeared in the large bags under the pale monk's eyes.
He unleashed his Gale Speed, using the speed of a mid-stage Qi Refining cultivator, and chased after Chen Yi in the direction he had fled.
Beside a river, seven miles outside the valley.
He frowned slightly. In his spiritual perception, there was clearly no aura of any cultivator ahead, but the tortoise shell's senses pointed in that direction.
"Kid, your concealment technique is quite good, what a pity."
whoosh-
He unleashed a fire talisman, a fiery serpent, which swiftly struck behind a rock.
Behind the rock, the jade tablet containing the cultivation technique lay there quietly, without a trace of anyone.
It turned out that Chen Yi had already sensed that someone was following him earlier. He calmly analyzed the people and things he had come into contact with.
Including the magical markings on the body, the only potentially problematic item was this power transfer jade tablet.
Now that I've tried it, it's indeed true.
The pale-faced middle-aged cultivator's expression tightened when he realized the fire serpent had missed its target; he immediately sensed something was wrong.
At that moment, he heard a whooshing sound behind him.
With a sudden whooshing sound, three iron nails, each carrying a faint golden glint, tore through the night, aiming in a triangular formation at the pale cultivator's back.
The middle-aged cultivator turned around hastily, and the small bronze shield in his sleeve swelled up in the wind—
"Clang! Clang! Clang!"
The first two iron nails exploded with golden light on the shield, making his arm numb. The third, however, drew a strange arc, piercing through the protective aura from under his ribs, and spraying blood!
"Jin Hui?! You're not an ordinary innate cultivator—" The cultivator was shocked and furious, but then he saw the hunched old man who emerged from behind the rock suddenly grow larger and transform into a young man, his bronze skin gleaming with a metallic sheen under the moonlight.
Chen Yi gave his opponent no time to react. His explosive power, at the first level of Body Refinement, shattered the rocks beneath his feet, and his body crashed into the middle-aged cultivator like a cannonball.
The middle-aged cultivator grinned maliciously and made a hand seal; the runes on the bronze shield suddenly lit up: "You're courting death!"
"boom!"
Amidst the clanging of metal, Chen Yi's right fist shattered, and the old wounds on the bronze shield's surface instantly worsened.
The cultivator's pupils constricted sharply—a body-refining cultivator? How could this be!
Click!
The instant the shield shattered in two, Chen Yi's left palm, like a venomous snake spitting its tongue, pierced through the fragments and plunged straight into his throat.
The cultivator retreated swiftly, forming hand seals. The jade pendant at his waist exploded with a blue light, only to be shattered by the golden radiance. The hand, its momentum undiminished, gripped his neck and slammed him violently to the ground!
"Peak of the first level of Body Refinement?! Spare me!" Before the begging could even leave his mouth, Chen Yi's knee had already slammed heavily into his dantian.
With a muffled thud as his Qi Sea shattered, blood gushed from the cultivator's seven orifices, his face filled with disbelief and horror.
"Fellow Daoist, wait! I am willing!" He struggled to reach for the storage pouch at his waist, but Chen Yi crushed his wrist with a single foot, bent down and tore off the tortoise shell from the other's waist, his voice as cold as ice:
"If that little shield is useful, would I sell it?"
"No! This is a misunderstanding."
The cultivator suddenly froze—Chen Yi's fingertips flickered with golden light as he swiftly pressed them against the cultivator's brow.
Although the middle-aged cultivator's dantian was shattered, his wrist broken, and his magical power depleted, seemingly rendering him powerless to resist,
Chen Yi didn't make any further moves. As he spoke, the golden light pierced into his ancestral aperture, instantly shattering his spiritual imprint.
"you--"
"puff!"
The sound of the skull cracking was drowned out by the flowing river.
Chen Yi shook off the bloodstains from his hands and skillfully took the storage bag and tortoise shell.
Only after confirming that the corpse no longer exhibited any residual soul energy did they flick a wisp of flame to incinerate it, and then throw it into the river.
Under the moonlight, he put away the tortoise shell and jade tablet, his figure hunched over again, and quickly disappeared into the misty riverbank.
Returning to where he had hidden his storage bags, Chen Yi carefully hid both the middle-aged cultivator's storage bag and the original storage bag belonging to the Dong family's mid-stage Qi Refining cultivator.
He left with only spirit stones, cultivation technique jade tablets, and tortoise shells.
Half an hour later, several people appeared by the river. Looking at the signs of a fight and the shattered fragments of magical artifacts, they all showed expressions of astonishment.
The burly man who had threatened Chen Yi was especially terrified.
After the trade fair organizers came to investigate, their expressions turned serious, and they quickly dispersed the crowd.
The gray-robed elder was examining the small bronze shield that had been shattered in two on the ground, his expression extremely serious.
"A body cultivator at the peak of the first level of body refinement has actually infiltrated."
He sensed something was wrong and quickly left.
Suddenly, two sword lights appeared in the sky.
A cultivator at the ninth level of Qi Refining landed with two other cultivators, the pointer on the array plate in his hand pointing to the two small bronze shields on the ground.
"Third Elder, this is Dong Mingcheng's defensive magic weapon. The fluctuation of the magic imprint after the bronze shield shattered is unmistakable."
The Dong family elder, at the ninth level of Qi Refining, locked his divine sense onto the gray-robed old man before him.
The old man in gray immediately knelt down and explained in detail how he organized the trade fair.
"A young man in his early twenties, a martial artist of the Innate Realm, possibly a peak first-tier body cultivator?"
The elder of the Dong family squinted as he pondered.
"It seems that the remnant of the mortal martial artist who came into contact with Zhao Jingwu back then was him."
"The blood pact is signed. From now on, you will be the Dong family's secret agent. We will continue to organize such transactions. If that young martial artist with innate abilities reappears, do not act rashly. Just secretly send us a message."
"Yes, sir!"
The old man in gray signed the blood oath of enslavement, his heart bleeding.
The elder of the Dong family put away the two bronze shields and activated them using a special technique. He then used the array plate in his hand to collect a wisp of energy from them.
The pointer on the array started spinning rapidly, pointing straight to a certain spot in the mountains.
"Elder, we've found the thief!" The subordinate's face lit up with excitement.
"Chase!"
The three of them rode on their swords, the sword light flashing rapidly until they landed in a very inconspicuous spot in the dilapidated mountain forest.
Guided by the pointer on the array plate, the three dug out a storage bag from the ground, which was printed with the words "Dong Family".
"Elder, it should be Mingcheng's storage bag."
The third elder of the Dong family looked grim. "It must be that petty thief who killed Mingcheng."
"That thief is so cautious, he didn't even bring his storage bag with him."
"Search everywhere!"
Three sword lights rose up separately, searching the mountains and forests.
It took a full half hour for the sword light to gather again, and the attempt failed.
Another half hour passed,
Chen Yi, who had activated the Concealing Breath Technique to its maximum extent as firmly as a rock, rose from under a rock in the forest, went to a tree root three miles away, dug out a jade tablet and a tortoise shell, and then left.
The situation was urgent, and to ensure everything went smoothly, Chen Yi buried the jade tablet, the tortoise shell, and the spirit stones while he was taking cover.
Even in the worst-case scenario, I'd rather give up those material possessions and just seek a safe haven.
It seems the other party has no way to trace the jade pendant and tortoise shell, so carrying these two items should be safe.
As for those spirit stones, he can't spend them right now, so he's not in a hurry to get them. He'll take them when he needs them later.
Otherwise, carrying a bunch of spirit stones in the Dong family would make a sound when walking on the road, which is hard to explain.
As for this kind of trade fair
Now that he's been exposed to the Dong family, Chen Yi won't be coming back.
Upon returning, he immediately instructed Huo Sanniang to sever all contact with the trade fair from the outside world.
(End of this chapter)