Chapter 197: The Chess Game

Luo Qi was slowly drinking a glass of wine at a table in the tavern, his thoughts constantly churning, until someone sat down across from him, and he finally snapped back to reality.

Thick fingers tapped forcefully on the tabletop. "Almost didn't recognize you. Pangzi came over and left a message, saying the Big Civet Cat King wants to meet?"

Luo Qi looked up, finally amused by the spirited one-eyed old man. "How did you recognize me?"

"You really are disguised too much like Du Zhengyi, but after all, I've known him since he was a child. Especially now, he couldn't possibly smile as easily as you do," Wan Pei said, sighing with emotion. "However, kid, I advise you not to pretend to be Du Zhengyi; it's too easy to get beaten up!"

Luo Qi saw a humorous glint in the old man's good eye, and he could no longer hold it back, laughing heartily along with him.

"I'll change into someone else when I go out later; it would be too unjust to get beaten up because of this, I'm not as durable as him." Luo Qi poured the old man a glass of wine, and the Silent Spell in the tavern around them finally took full effect.

The old man smiled and took the glass. "What is he busy with? Did he get beaten up again?"

"It's not really that he got beaten up," Luo Qi said. "It's that his health isn't very good."

The smile on Wan Pei's face vanished instantly, which Luo Qi took note of. "But it's not particularly serious either, the Doctor said it's fine."

"That's good," Wan Pei said, raising his glass to toast with Luo Qi. "May we all live forever."

Although Luo Qi felt depressed, he couldn't help but be amused again, and the glasses clinked together. "Live forever."

Wan Pei finished the wine in his glass and asked, "Did he tell you to come find me?"

"No, he doesn't know I came," Luo Qi said honestly.

Wearing Du Zhengyi's face, Luo Qi pondered for a moment and said, "Last time I asked the Captain two questions."

"To Du Zhengyi's face, I'm really proud of you," Wan Pei said in a gruff voice. "And you succeeded, Du Zhengyi didn't notice at all."

"I'm proud of myself too." Luo Qi straightened his back and adjusted his suit jacket; he had actually bought himself a suit.

He smiled again, a gentle smile that didn't appear easily on Du Zhengyi's face, and then the smile was completely restrained. "I still remember the answer I got last time, word for word, right here—go find the answer yourself, kid, but my suspicions are the same as yours, and you can come find me when you need to."

The one-eyed old man nodded. "You found the answer?"

"The first question isn't important, but the second question is becoming increasingly important. I have some situations I'd like to exchange views on with you." The fake Du Zhengyi, the real Luo Qi, hesitated and said, "I think you must know Guan Yushan."

The old man looked at Luo Qi, but he was also looking at Du Zhengyi; the child he was familiar with and cherished seemed to be sitting right across from him. The child before him mimicked the mannerisms Du Zhengyi used when looking at people so vividly that everything spoke of the familiarity between them.

He raised his hands as if helpless. "What else can I say? I am an old man, and I know everyone with any reputation in most of the living Mage World."

"Then, what exactly is Guan Yushan guarding?" Luo Qi asked.

"Kid, only Pei Shu and the Gushan Guard would know what someone like Guan Yushan is actually guarding," Wan Pei said wearily.

"Then what exactly is sealed under Kongsang Mountain?" Luo Qi suddenly raised his hand, stopping his own incorrect question. "Saying it like this makes it seem like I am ambitiously coveting secrets I shouldn't know, but that is not the case. Let me put it another way. Xingtai Mountain in Shuozhou, why does Guan Yushan live there?"

The old man's one eye looked at him as if weighing him; he knew he had asked the right path, and he had already traveled so far, so far that he could almost no longer turn back.

The old man said, "Xingtai Mountain is a deserted post station, a node that has already become disordered."

"I found a ghost in the deserted village under Xingtai Mountain." Luo Qi interrupted the old man. "It's not that I don't believe such stories meant to coax children, it's that I really made a discovery and want to talk to you openly and honestly."

The old man scrutinized the familiar face before him, wanting once again to see the origin within it. He knew he was facing a clever person, and wearing such a face he was familiar with and loved, even knowing he was not Du Zhengyi, he still felt a sense of closeness in his heart; this brat had gained the upper hand the moment he appeared.

"A place with age is worthy of an old ghost," the old man said, letting the wine glass fill automatically, and took a slow sip. Opposite him, the imposter Du Zhengyi revealed the innocence of a child on his face. He felt a bit like laughing; Du Zhengyi didn't seem to have been this innocent since he was a child.

"Is the Jiangnan Du Clan a supporter of the Lotus Burner?" The innocent version of Du Zhengyi seemed displeased and suddenly abandoned the heavy question from just before. "Were they exterminated because of this?"

"The Du Family has always only been loyal to the Qionglin; why would they bother with a rural terrorist organization?" the old man said slowly.

"Yes, I also know the Lotus Burner doesn't have a history spanning generations," Luo Qi said.

The old man did not take the bait, continued drinking the wine in his glass, and casually echoed him, "Yes."

"Has the Du Family always held a high status?" Luo Qi asked naively, his thoughts seemingly pulled far away. "The Qionglin has always only recognized ability; if the Du Family was that capable in a fight, they should have produced a Venerable, right? Mages with such high status certainly wouldn't bother with an exiled organization."

"Can't you tell from the style of that little bastard Du Zhengyi?" the old man laughed.

"Everyone knows the legendary Lotus Burner is actually just a student group, a bunch of hot-blooded idiots who went down the wrong path; there is no way the Du Family would support such third-rate goods," Luo Qi said. The old man didn't care much about the child's language, but Luo Qi suddenly changed the subject. "Unless some big shot in the Qionglin had similar thoughts; this person appeared earlier than the Lotus Burner, and perhaps the Lotus Burner, like the Du Family, was attracted by this person's ideas. In the end, it is more logical that the Du Family was destroyed in the Qionglin's internal strife."

The old man gripped his wine glass in surprise, staring blankly at Luo Qi.

Luo Qi waved his hand indifferently. "I didn't use Telepathy; I don't have the ability to avoid being detected by an old warrior like you."

He looked at the one-eyed old man. "If it was Pei Shu or his predecessor who consumed the Du Family in an internal struggle, and then had the nerve to brainwash Du Zhengyi into a super soldier, then I can't stand that."

The old man looked at him in astonishment, and he continued to talk eloquently. "To tell you the truth, I don't have any good feelings toward the Qionglin. Everyone is a chess piece for Pei Shu, the leader of the Qionglin's Great Chess Game; Guan Yushan is, Du Zhengyi is, and perhaps even I am. The person playing the big game doesn't care about the life or death of the chess pieces. He didn't care about Guan Yushan's life or death, and even Du Zhengyi's situation isn't very optimistic. Captain, I just want to know a little bit of the truth."