Chapter 235: Ren Li

Regarding Ren Li's sentimental reminiscence at this moment, Du En, who felt no such sentiment, was slightly distracted in his calmness.

He was thinking about how much spirit stone he could get by selling the wreckage of the third-tier array, which was now basically scrapped after he had forcefully broken it, and the second-tier items obtained from Yun Ying also needed to be sold, as they were of no use to him anymore.

Of course, they were actually still somewhat useful for now.

His drifting thoughts were merely a fleeting touch, gone in the blink of an eye; his movements were methodical, having already retrieved a bottle of recovery pills from among them, opened the lid, confirmed it was correct, and immediately stuffed it directly into Ren Li's somewhat chattering mouth.

Gulp, gulp...

After swallowing and spitting out the bottle, Ren Li's attention returned to the present, and he couldn't help but grumble: "Can't you just be straightforward, untie one of my hands, and let me take the pill myself? Is that not okay?"

"Just as a precaution."

What precaution?

Ren Li was subconsciously stunned, then thought of the various anomalies in Chiwu City, and spoke: "Will something happen tonight?"

"Mm, soldiers of the Inspection Guard have already sent the news up; if it really is some very critical intelligence, then tonight, it will definitely detonate the situation directly."

"So that's how it is... Let me talk about my experiences here; perhaps it can be of some help to your judgment of the situation."

While silently refining the pill in his belly to recover from his injuries, Ren Li began to speak about his experiences before and after coming to Chiwu City.

After he broke through to the Foundation Establishment stage, he had actually always kept in mind the matter of helping Shi Lei find his son, so he had been constantly looking for a suitable opportunity.

And as he kept looking, he really did find one.

In the recent period of time, roughly within the last ten years or so, the production quantity of third-tier Red Leaf Parasol Trees in Chiwu City could only barely meet the targets set by the Hub City, and there was simply no surplus at all.

This led to the relevant inventory over at Yunyi City soon hitting rock bottom.

Starting from this, he quietly pushed for several years, finally attracting the attention of his master, that Great Cultivator of Yunyi, and thus, Ren Li finally received formal and compliant permission to represent Yunyi City and come here to negotiate, to see if there was any way to obtain an additional supply of some third-tier Red Leaf Parasol Trees.

"This is the normal procedure; the targets set by the Hub City are aimed at the overall situation, and our Yunyi City is a special major city, a regional hub city; if there are additional needs, one can go and communicate with the corresponding city..."

"I know these things."

Ren Li was still somewhat stuck in old routines and subconsciously began to explain extra details.

But Du En already knew these things, so he calmly interrupted him.

This made Ren Li freeze for a moment; this time, he really started to feel uneasy in his heart.

However, he still continued to speak: "This counts as using public office for private gain, but in fact, it only accelerated this matter, because the Red Leaf Parasol Tree is quite special; it is said that the original tree species once bathed in phoenix blood, so the offspring derivatives have leaves as red as flames and blood, shaped like flying birds."

Hm?

This was something Du En did not know.

He did not interrupt and silently continued to listen.

"However, as soon as I arrived, I first encountered the various prevarications of the City Lord Cui Wei, and then, after painstakingly searching like looking for a needle in a haystack and spending quite a long time, I finally locked onto a person named Bai Sun, but when I immediately took action, I ended up empty-handed; the other party had actually absented himself without cause, suspected of fleeing, and was gone!"

"Of course I didn't believe Cui Wei's rhetoric; how could it be such a coincidence that they disappeared just as I found them! Moreover, the negotiations regarding this Chiwu City were also very unsmooth, and coupled with the nature of that guy Yun Ying, I suspected at the time whether they had colluded together, so I continued to investigate until about ten days ago, when I found the pile of corpses over at Bald Mountain."

Speaking to this point, he felt a bit awkward.

Because he had just made a move at the time, wanting to capture a corpse that had undergone corpse-transformation to investigate, but he didn't expect to be quickly discovered by the mastermind, lured into the mountain forest, ran aimlessly for a whole night, and in the end, couldn't even keep the zombie he had in his hands, which disappeared in the blink of an eye.

Mumbling vaguely through this part of his experience, Ren Li quickly moved on to what followed: "I realized something was wrong, so I changed my mind, sent my subordinates to secretly stake out the city gates to watch for the target person, while I acted on my own to continue exploring the cause of the anomalies."

"That group of people inside and outside the city gates, are they your subordinates?"

"Yes, have you seen them?"

Ren Li couldn't help but be stunned, thinking that some conflict had occurred between the two sides; after all, he was actually a bit uneasy about the character of those subordinates of his.

But Du En only shook his head and then nodded.

"They didn't see me; I saw them."

Understood.

Ren Li nodded and continued: "The things that followed were that guy Yun Ying suddenly finding me, interrupting my planned actions, and forcing me to flee to this mundane realm, but I didn't expect to be chased here anyway."

Thinking about it now, it was also normal; after all, there was still Gao Feng, a Golden Core stage cultivator, lurking in the dark; he could avoid Yun Ying's eyes and ears, but it was hard to escape Gao Feng's tracking.

"That guy probably seized upon my long absence to speak ill of me in front of Master, and only then was he able to take the opportunity to run over here; I didn't expect him to risk violating the great prohibition just to ambush and kill me."

"However, I have figured out the reason now; you have already formed a Golden Core, wouldn't that scare him? After all, he is already at the Foundation Establishment perfection, with the pressure of other Golden Core senior brothers and sisters above him; if I were to start a fire in his backyard, coming with a pincer attack from front and back, he definitely wouldn't be able to accept it!"

For the sake of his own fundamental interests, Yun Ying could only choose to take the risk!

When Ren Li said this, Du En had basically sorted out the sequence of events.

So he asked: "When you made the reply letter back then, was that guy just now present? Or rather, were any of your other senior brothers or sisters present?"

"Hm? There were... wait, could it be?! Tsk! So that's how it is; this time I was actually just an incidental target, their real goal was you all along!"

Ren Li quickly understood the crux of the matter, and couldn't help but feel a little bit depressed in his heart, feeling that he had truly been looked down upon, but the fact was just like that; without the unexpected major factor of Du En, Yun Ying would have continued to endure and pretend.

After all, he would not easily let Ren Li catch up, and once he broke through to the Golden Core stage, he would have to face the competitive pressure of other senior brothers and sisters, so under those circumstances, he wouldn't do anything rashly, lest he be caught with evidence or something.

Ultimately, it still came down to his fundamental interests.

"Then now, how should I explain this to Master?"

After his depression, Ren Li couldn't help but feel some anxiety.

Because no matter what, Yun Ying was after all a disciple of the Great Cultivator of Yunyi, who also strictly forbade his disciples from killing each other.

And now, one was injured and one was dead; Ren Li felt that his side was still easy to explain, even if he came to the mundane realm by crossing boundaries, it actually belonged to a kind of trumped-up charge, which could be big or small, and there shouldn't be any problem.

But Du En's side was the one who actually did the deed!

He was worried about his old friend's situation.

(End of chapter)