Chapter 583: Conspiracy

Mo Hua looked at this little thing, even smaller than himself, sighed, then felt a little annoyed.

Such a young cultivator, and they still kidnapped him…

That gang led by Jiang the Eldest truly deserved more than death.

He should have fed them a few more Fireball spells…

The eatery was dilapidated, scorch marks everywhere.

The child looked around, grew even more afraid, his little face deathly pale, tears glimmering in his eyes, but he still held them back and didn't cry.

Mo Hua asked softly, "Are you alright…"

The child stole a glance at Mo Hua, then slowly nodded.

Mo Hua asked, "What's your name?"

The child was about to speak, but opened his mouth, as if remembering something, then shook his head and said nothing.

Mo Hua was briefly startled, then understood.

This child probably didn't dare speak his surname.

Once the surname was spoken, people would know his identity, and it might be used by those with ill intentions to extort his parents.

For such a young child, having some wariness was always a good thing; Mo Hua didn't mind.

He asked again, "Then what should I call you?"

The child thought for a moment, saw that Mo Hua's gaze was clear, his features kind, and although older than him, not by much.

Much better than those fierce, evil-looking bad people…

Only then did he say timidly, "Father and Mother call me 'Yu'er'…"

"Yu'er?"

As brilliant as jade, as fine as jade.

Giving this name meant hoping their child would grow up gentle and warm as jade.

Mo Hua asked again, "Where are your father and mother?"

Yu'er's expression fell, and he shook his head.

A kidnapped child not knowing where his parents were was only normal…

The child's face was pale; these past days, he had clearly been frightened and worried.

Mo Hua felt a pang of heartache, thought for a moment, then said, "Then I'll take you to find your father and mother…"

Yu'er's dim eyes suddenly lit up, holding a faint, humble hope, and stared blankly at Mo Hua:

"Really…?"

As if afraid Mo Hua was tricking him, a fragile, longing hid within his gaze.

Probably after being kidnapped, he had been hurt by the wickedness of human hearts, and no longer dared to trust others…

"Mm, if they can't find you, your father and mother would surely be heartbroken…"

Mo Hua said gently.

Yu'er's tears fell like pearls, "I… I miss my mother…"

"Let's go," Mo Hua said.

"Mm." Yu'er wiped his tears and nodded.

Mo Hua lifted him out of the box.

Yu'er saw the scene around him clearly—a group of cultivators, their deaths wretched—and his little face went paler still. He looked at Mo Hua:

"These bad people… were…"

Mo Hua looked solemn and said, "I don't know who killed them…"

Yu'er was taken aback.

Mo Hua thought for a moment, then with a perfectly straight face began to talk nonsense: "I was traveling to Qian Province to study, passing through here, and just wanted to find an eatery to fill my stomach…"

"But the moment I stepped into the eatery, this was the scene I saw…"

"These cultivators were killed by someone unknown, died clean as a whistle…"

"I noticed something off about the box, so I opened it and saved you…"

……

Mo Hua described the whole affair as if it had nothing to do with him at all.

He was merely a passing, unknown, kind-hearted young fellow.

Yet Yu'er looked at Mo Hua with suspicion:

"Really?"

Mo Hua nodded earnestly.

Yu'er glanced at Mo Hua, then at the corpses all over the floor—no matter how he looked at it, something felt off.

This child was quite sharp…

So Mo Hua said, "Let's hurry and go, or your father and mother will surely worry about you…"

Those words pulled Yu'er's thoughts back.

"Mm-mm." Yu'er nodded rapidly.

Mo Hua took a cloak from his storage bag and draped it over Yu'er.

It was a cloak used for concealment—back in South Yue City, he had used it with Senior Brother and Senior Sister when they were tailing someone covertly.

On it was a concealment array Mo Hua had drawn himself.

Although only first-grade, the sky was darkening now, and it was enough to fool the eye.

More of those traffickers would be coming later, so being cautious was always wise.

"This is..."

Yu'er, covered by the cloak, looked puzzled.

"Don't ask yet. Put it on."

"Oh."

Yu'er nodded obediently, clumsily wrapping the oversized cloak around himself.

Suddenly he looked around, his expression turning sorrowful, as if reluctant.

Mo Hua asked in confusion, "What's wrong?"

Yu'er glanced at the scattered corpses on the ground and whispered, "These people... have parents too, don't they? If they're dead, won't their parents... never see them again..."

"Won't they... be heartbroken too..."

Mo Hua was startled.

He hadn't expected this child to be so pure and kind-hearted...

Even though Jiang Laoda and these others had kidnapped him...

Mo Hua thought for a moment: not understanding the wickedness of human nature, being too innocent, might not be a good thing—but this child was only four or five years old; at this age, it was better to remain innocent.

The world could accommodate countless wicked people, and countless selfish ones.

Why then could it not accommodate a single kind-hearted child?

Mo Hua thus said "kindly," "Don't worry—these people had no parents."

Yu'er froze, then stared in shock:

"Can people really have no parents?"

Mo Hua said, "Most people have them, but some are different—they have no parents."

Yu'er's understanding was overturned; he remained dazed for a long while, but after careful thought, this kind stranger who had saved him didn't seem to have any reason to lie.

Yu'er's heart felt a little better.

If they had no parents, then no one would grieve for them when they died...

That was almost a good thing...

Yu'er nodded, silently thinking to himself:

"It's really great these bad people had no parents!"

Having reassured Yu'er, Mo Hua surveyed the surroundings and erased all traces of the array patterns he had just deduced, calculated, and inscribed, along with the marks of breaking the array.

The crates...

Mo Hua thought for a moment, took apart the crates into wooden planks, and stored them in his storage pouch.

These planks bore residual, unknown array patterns.

They should be kept aside for careful study later.

Then Mo Hua pointed a finger and cast a Fireball Technique, utterly destroying the remaining two storage crates, burning the scattered wood shavings into charcoal and mixing them together.

Mo Hua's movements were clean and swift, taking only about ten breaths in total.

Yu'er blinked, unable to help asking:

"Brother, why are you so skilled at this...?"

Mo Hua paused, then replied without changing expression:

"I learned it from a kind uncle—it's experience for traveling outside..."

"So children must study hard, or they'll suffer greatly when they walk the cultivation world!"

Yu'er didn't fully understand, but nodded seriously anyway.

Everything was tidied up; all traces were erased.

Time to leave.

Mo Hua took Yu'er's hand, concealed their forms, and left the eatery.

A young cultivator of about ten, and a smaller one, walked hand in hand toward the distant Qingzhou City...

But the sky was dark, their forms hidden—no one saw them...

After Mo Hua left, a few minutes later, four or five black-robed cultivators arrived at the eatery.

Their faces were covered in black cloth, indistinct; only their eyes, cold and sinister, were visible.

But that coldness and sinister gaze turned to shock and disbelief upon seeing the eatery's condition.

"Where are the people?"

"All dead?!"

The black-robed cultivators all drew in sharp breaths.

"Who did this?"

"Don't know..."

"Where's the 'merchandise'?"

The black-robed cultivators immediately released their spiritual senses, scanning the surroundings; moments later, they spotted the shattered fragments of the storage crates in the corner of the eatery.

"Were they... torn up?"

Everyone found it hard to believe.

"No..." one black-robed cultivator frowned, "no flesh or blood remains..."

"And the crates... don't look right..."

"Where's Mr.'s crate?"

"Was it taken apart? Or destroyed?"

"The box bears Mr. Tu's array—who could dismantle it? The box lives, the person lives; the box breaks, the person dies..."

"Not necessarily. Qianzhou has countless capable people—nothing is impossible..."

Several people argued fiercely.

Suddenly someone asked: "Big Brother, what do we do?"

The cultivator called "Big Brother" also wore black robes; from his attire, he seemed unremarkable, except for his eyes, which glowed with inner brilliance, sweeping left and right like an eagle stalking and a wolf watching.

The black-robed "Big Brother" looked around and rasped:

"Old Man Jiang and the others... looks like they were ambushed—killed clean..."

"This time's 'cargo'—box and all—were stolen..."

"Black eats black?" someone asked in confusion.

The others shouted angrily: "We gave prior notice—who on the road has the guts to steal our 'cargo'?"

"Men die for wealth, birds die for food—this 'cargo' was too rich to ignore; nothing's too bold..."

"Even if it's black eats black, who has the strength to swallow it?"

The black-robed Big Brother's gaze darkened as he scanned each face, thinking deeply:

"The ground is still warm, charred black—this is the trace of an array..."

"The array's power is great, but its setup is complex..."

"That means someone learned the news in advance, set up this array here beforehand, then used its power to ambush and kill twelve men—including Old Man Jiang!"

"And snatched our 'cargo' right from Hukou!"

"Master Tu calculated it—there's no mistake, unless..." The black-robed Big Brother's gaze turned sharp, "…one of us is a traitor, leaking the information!"

At these words, all of them turned pale.

"Big Brother, you know me..."

"Big Brother, I am utterly loyal to you!"

"Big Brother, my life is yours—I even broke my ancestral vows..."

"Big Brother..."

They all spoke passionately, swearing their loyalty.

Seeing each one's sincerity, the black-robed Big Brother frowned, withdrew his gaze, and said coldly:

"We'll deal with this later—the priority now is to recover the 'cargo'..."

"The array still radiates warmth, the sword qi hasn't fully dissipated—the battle ended recently; the enemy may not be far..."

The black-robed Big Brother pondered a moment, frowned, and said:

"On the way here, did you see anyone suspicious? Or a child?"

The others exchanged glances.

To avoid detection, they had disguised themselves and arrived from different directions, converging nearby.

Along the way, they were too busy rushing to pay attention to anything else—so they noticed no suspicious figures...

The black-robed Big Brother muttered curses: "Useless fools!"

His eyes, like those of an eagle and wolf, imprinted every detail of the surroundings into his mind; he bit his teeth so hard he nearly shattered them.

So close!!

So close—he had almost seized the little Young Master with the unique bloodline!

Once delivered to Master Tu as a blood offering for the Divine Lord, I would have earned great merit—future transformation of blood and marrow would be within reach!

Snatching the son from the tiger's den, secretly crossing the Chen River.

Master Tu had calculated everything!

I had arranged everything!

It was just this damn detail!

The black-robed Big Brother's eyes slowly turned blood-red, veins like cracks, terrifyingly grotesque; his voice became hoarse, no longer human:

"If I find out who ruined my plans, I will devour your flesh alive and drink your blood..."

"I will make you die a wretched death—eat every one of your relatives and friends clean!"

The black-robed Big Brother's voice was suppressed and rasping, as if he could not contain the cruel killing intent surging in his chest.

The other black-robed cultivators all bowed their heads, faces pale, trembling and silent.

The air grew increasingly deadly, thick with the stench of blood.

The black-robed Big Brother's face twisted; his hands trembled as he pulled out a wine flask, gulped deeply, wiped the blood from his lips, and only then felt some calm.

"Pursue!"

The black-robed Big Brother ordered.

They all exhaled in relief and bowed quickly: "Yes!"

They rushed out to pursue.

One black-robed cultivator stepped forward—but as he reached the doorway, a sudden gale surged, the wind like blades, slicing him into four pieces, blood spraying everywhere.

A graceful Young Master appeared in the ruined eatery, fanning himself with a paper fan, his face as cold as frost.

"Where is the child?"

His gaze was icy as a blade.

The black-robed Big Brother looked at him, sneered, and muttered:

"Young Master Gu..."

At the same time, dozens of cultivators in uniform Daoist robes appeared, surrounding the entire ruined eatery.

The black-robed Big Brother glanced around, his gaze even more contemptuous: "Dao Ting Si hounds..."

Young Master Gu looked at the Black-Cloaked Brother and smelled the stench of blood on him; his voice turned icy.

"You demon-tainted beast—whose skin are you wearing?"

The Black-Cloaked Brother smiled at Young Master Gu.

"All people wear masks of hypocrisy, their hearts filled with evil thoughts—aren't you the same? I merely wear a more hypocritical skin than you, and harbor evils more genuine than yours…"

Young Master Gu refused to waste words with him and demanded:

"Where's the child?"

The Black-Cloaked Brother pointed to the eatery. "You saw it yourself—I arrived like this. The child you came to save was taken by others…"

"Perhaps even…"

The Black-Cloaked Brother smiled with a sinister softness. "Already been torn apart."

Young Master Gu roared: "Fine, fine—then leave your life behind to accompany that child to the grave!"

The Black-Cloaked Brother sneered. "Your Gu family, and these Dao Ting Si dogs—you can't touch me."

With no common ground, battle was imminent.

Young Master Gu wielded his paper fan; each sweep sent out dense wind blades, each one lethal.

The Black-Cloaked Brother refused to reveal his true strength, relying only on his flesh and the foul, bloody aura around him to clash with Young Master Gu's wind blades and the Dao Ting Si cultivators.

As they fought, both sides deliberately avoided the eatery, as if neither wished to damage the clues within.

It was a brutal battle; neither side showed mercy.

But since this was merely a second-grade prefecture, neither Young Master Gu nor the Black-Cloaked Brother could fully unleash their power, making it impossible to truly fight to the death.

The brutal fight lasted half an hour.

In the end, the Black-Cloaked Brother, gravely wounded, fled.

Young Master Gu's breath was weak—he was clearly badly injured too.

All the other black-cloaked cultivators lay dead.

Young Master Gu ordered: "Record their appearances. I'll settle accounts with each one later."

One enforcement officer went to check, then returned moments later:

"Young Master, I can't make them out…"

Young Master Gu stepped forward and saw—these black-cloaked cultivators had all been seeded with demonic poison; after death, demonic energy had destroyed their flesh, corrupted their meridians and spirit roots, leaving only black, stinking, foul clumps of meat—no identity could be discerned.

Young Master Gu cursed: "Cowards! Filth!"

"Cowards!"

"You dare embrace demonhood, but lack the guts to leave your faces behind!"

Now, they could only investigate under the pretext of "missing cultivators."

But this was useless.

Cultivators go missing for many reasons.

Some are delayed on missions;

Some are assassinated by treacherous cultivators;

Some get trapped in secret realms during expeditions;

Others simply rebel against family arrangements and run away…

The causes were too complex.

One could not assume a missing cultivator had fallen to demonhood.

Neither sect nor family would admit it—nor permit investigations—for the sake of cultivation interests and their reputations.

The more Young Master Gu thought, the angrier he grew; he waved his hand and shredded one black-cloaked cultivator into pieces.

But anger was useless—the whereabouts of Young Master An were far more urgent.

He examined the scene himself and reached conclusions nearly identical to those of the black-cloaked cultivators.

Jiang Laoda and the others had been killed—or severely wounded—by a second-grade earthfire array.

This was clearly a premeditated, carefully planned ambush.

No one could have suddenly decided to set up an array and kill these traffickers…

A cultivator with such power wouldn't use such clumsy methods—he could have wiped them out with a flick of his finger.

Moreover, over half the traffickers died from tiny second-grade fireball spells.

This was surely to conceal their true cultivation methods—using such common fireball spells to kill…

No cultivator would ever devote serious effort to mastering such a trivial fireball spell.

Then there was the matter of Young Master An's disappearance…

The black-cloaked cultivators didn't seem to be lying.

Someone had beaten them to it…

Young Master Gu frowned.

"Black eats black?"

"Or is there another motive…"

"Young Master An is the offspring of two great clans—who among the powers or cultivators would dare target him…?"

"And who would dare intercept him mid-transit, 'kidnap' Young Master An…?"

"And not fear disturbing karmic threads or stirring heavenly fate?"

The hardest part of this matter was how the heavenly fate had been obscured and the karmic threads concealed—no divination could reach it…

Who could possibly do this?

Young Master Gu's mind was a tangled mess.

A moment later, he thought of how his cousin had been consumed with anguish and unbearable grief after the child went missing, and his heart felt as if torn by knives.

Gu Young Master's gaze grew colder; ignoring his own injuries, he ordered, "Those severely wounded rest for now; those lightly wounded, follow me to continue the pursuit."

"The spiritual energy here has only just dissipated—we should still be able to catch up…"

One Gu Diansi hesitated and said, "Young Master, should we still pursue…?"

They had already chased for days without food or rest, exhausted, and just fought a brutal battle—this made even those who had been lax and indifferent now feel overwhelmed.

They were Dao Ting Si personnel; even if the Gu family was powerful, they could not treat them like this.

Gu Young Master's gaze sharpened, and he sneered:

"Don't blame me for not warning you—if anything happens to that little Young Master, you, and all your brothers, will have your skins peeled off!"

The Gu Diansi's heart jolted.

Only then did he realize the rumors he'd heard were all wrong.

That little Young Master was not the Gu family's little Young Master!

If he wasn't the Gu family's little Young Master, then who was he…?

The Gu Diansi felt as if a bucket of cold water had been poured over his head; he couldn't help shuddering.

"Young Master, rest assured—we will spare no effort to find the little Young Master!"

Then he scanned the group, "Quickly take your pills—once your injuries improve, set out immediately!"

Though the men were dissatisfied and confused, they knew the matter was grave and dared not delay; they hurried to recover their strength…

But Gu Young Master's gaze turned toward the distance, his expression shadowed.

"Yu'er… who has taken this child…?"

I'll try hard to add one or two extra chapters by month's end.

I'll also try to get Xiao Mo Hua into Ru Sect sooner.

Of course, effort doesn't always yield results.

If I fail and don't add extra chapters, consider me silent on the matter…

(End of Chapter)