Chapter 255: The Cowardly City Lord Tong

While the three of them were lost in long contemplation, Du En had already quietly left the courtyard.

"Is it really related to the City Lord?"

The matter of Chiwu was still fresh in his mind.

That time was a similar situation; the problem was passed from the lowest level all the way to the highest, with the root cause lying with Cui Wei, the local City Lord.

In fact, it was quite logical, because the lord of a city controls all internal and external affairs; if they want to pull something, it is difficult to avoid their eyes and ears.

In other words, if there really is something going on, nine times out of ten, it is the City Lord leading the way!

Therefore, Du En decided to strike at the heart of the matter this time and go directly to the City Lord's Mansion to investigate!

By virtue of his Traveling Walker authorization, he could enter the City Lord's Mansion of a small city without obstruction.

Although that was all it allowed—he still could not casually step into the confidential areas of the City Lord's Mansion—it was enough to stake out the place and wait for the local City Lord.

However, once he snuck into the City Lord's Mansion, Du En discovered that he might have thought wrong.

Because inside the City Lord's Mansion of Lin'an City, everything seemed very normal; there was no "golden house hiding a beauty" or any situation involving a gathering of many female cultivators as concubines.

Either those women and female cultivators had already been killed, or they simply did not exist here to begin with.

Judging from the minute details in every aspect, it leaned more toward the latter.

"Since I'm already here, even if I really guessed wrong, I can still ask about the situation and see if the local City Lord knows anything."

Holding this thought, Du En did not choose to leave, and he soon staked out the local City Lord.

Moreover, the situation he encountered while staking him out made things seem a bit off again.

Tong Wenrong, with his honest face and potbelly, was currently walking in a secluded corner of the City Lord's Mansion.

He was the City Lord of Lin'an City; although his Golden Core was already perfected, his strength was quite average—he was just a strong third-rate figure.

Facing the moonlight and starlight, humming a little tune in high spirits, suddenly, someone pressed a magical artifact against his lower back. The sharp edge spitting out from it made his legs tremble and his whole body turn cold—judging by that, it must be a top-grade Tier 3 artifact!

Woe is me!

Tong Wenrong's expression changed, and his voice trembled: "Hero! This hero! Let's talk this over, please don't be impulsive, don't be impulsive!"

Facing this situation, Du En did not change his expression, and imitating the tone of Inspector Zhen, he simply said: "From the Inspection Guard, City Lord Tong Wenrong, your crimes have been exposed!"

He had heard the name on the road while coming here, and the Inspection Guard was naturally non-existent; after all, this was a border city, and it would not normally be subject to inspection.

However.

As soon as his voice fell, *thump! *

Tong Wenrong collapsed directly to the ground, wailing and shouting: "I was wrong, I was wrong, I shouldn't have done that, I shouldn't have!"

Hmm?

Was there really something fishy?

Du En had originally just felt that this dignified City Lord was acting sneakily, and perhaps there was some trickery involved, so he thought he would try to bluff him—he didn't expect to bluff it out of him directly!

Or was this guy playing a game of "retreating to advance," deliberately acting cowardly and weak?

After all, his performance had quite a few loopholes, all of which were deliberately left exposed.

Thus, he pondered and said coldly: "Lead the way."

This statement was actually vague and ambiguous, making it hard for people to grasp his meaning.

Lead the way—lead to what kind of way?

If Tong Wenrong were truly acting, and truly had a guilty conscience, he would show various corresponding reactions when faced with such words.

Especially if it involved the matter of female cultivators outside the city, and since this City Lord's Mansion had no "nightingales and swallows," it could only mean he was truly practicing some evil art, like that Cui Wei; he should have rebounded from the bottom and started fighting like a trapped beast!

Du En was already prepared to detonate his magical artifact.

However, Tong Wenrong gave the theoretically most normal, but actually most abnormal, answer in the current situation.

"Yes, yes, yes, I'll lead the way, my lord, I'll lead the way."

Du En felt increasingly suspicious, silently using his magical artifact to urge him forward, following the path this guy led him on, and the more he looked, the more he felt that perhaps he had hit the mark by accident?

Then, Tong Wenrong led him back the way they came, not daring to look around on the road, and just like that, honestly, he arrived at a remote corner of the City Lord's Mansion.

There was a small hut here, with various strict isolation measures, and even Du En's divine sense could not probe through it.

However, he was not overly vigilant at this moment, only feeling that he had truly hit the mark by accident.

Because Tong Wenrong was openly applying the City Lord's Mansion's defensive measures; this could not possibly be something hiding treasonous or evil deeds.

If that were really the case, the Hub City's regular patrols that audit the sub-nodes of every City Lord's Mansion to determine if they are normal would have caught this guy; how could the abnormality here have lasted so long?

As his thoughts raced, Tong Wenrong had already undone the seals and opened the door.

In an instant, light shone into Du En's eyes!

It was a room full of low-grade spirit stones, piled up to the brim, dazzling to the eyes; there must have been ten million of them!

"You..."

"It's all here, my lord! They sent it, I took it, and in the end, I put it all here!"

Tong Wenrong lay on the ground, wailing incessantly: "I was just terrified of being poor, I really couldn't help but do this, but, but, I really didn't have the guts, so they are all here, I didn't dare spend a single cent!"

Du En: "..."

Even someone as calm and unruffled as him could not help but have his emotions ripple with a hint of subtlety at this moment.

But he was who he was, and in the blink of an eye, he returned to normal, grasping the main point: "Why are they only low-grade ones?"

"This... I really didn't dare to be greedy for high-grade ones, and I was afraid that mid-grade ones would still be too much and attract attention, so, in the end, I only dared to take the low-grade ones and put them here; looking at them and touching them from time to time, I felt satisfied."

Tong Wenrong spoke from the heart, without any of the demeanor of a City Lord, almost hugging Du En's thigh, extremely anxious: "Really, Inspector, I haven't spent a single cent, I've even kept accounts! They can be confiscated, I can testify, I will be a state's witness for you, don't kill me, don't send me to the battlefield!"

Seeing him like this, Du En could not help but ask: "You, a City Lord, how are you so weak?"

Ten million low-grade spirit stones are equal to one hundred thousand mid-grade spirit stones, which are equal to one thousand high-grade spirit stones.

In other words, his room full of spirit stones was actually not much at all; according to regulations, at most it would be a fine of several times the amount, which was not a big deal.

After all, as the master of a city, the value of the various items passing through his hands every day far exceeded this; in fact, for a dignified City Lord to only privately take this much was already a very small amount!

Furthermore, if one only embezzled one thousand pieces in a hundred years, then calculated out, that is only ten pieces a year!

Ten high-grade spirit stones, what are you afraid of?

Is it really necessary to collapse directly to the ground?

"Ah?"

Tong Wenrong looked astonished and gave his own answer: "It is always like this; it is mainly for the sake of showing it to the side of Rotten Forest, so the three generations of City Lords have all been people like me!"

(End of this chapter)