Chapter 137

Inside the house, besides the black-clad sturdy man who previously wielded a knife and attacked Yuan Qiu, there were two other black-clad individuals with notable skill; their fierce aura and sharp movements showed that these three were not ordinary thugs, and they might even have come from a military background.

However, even if they came from a military background, inside this house besides Pangzi who is versed in internal martial arts, there is also Little Fat, an unstable variable; thus, these assassins will gain no advantage at all.

The moment we entered the house, the three black-clad assassins simultaneously raised their knives and stabbed at us. Their movements were uniform, showing they were well-trained. Each blade targeted a different person: me, Pangzi, and Yuan Qiu.

But soon, the assassins' stabbing attack ended in failure.

The nearest one was shaken open by Pangzi's backhand, who then snatched away the dagger. Another was punched flying by the violent Little Fat.

The one nearest to me was slammed against the wall by a gust of yin wind. This was done by Murong Jia Jia; she merely blew a breath at that assassin.

"Tell me, who are you?" Pangzi growled, locking one assassin's shoulder and choking his neck.

"Hmph…" the black-clad assassin coldly snorted, then his head weakly drooped.

Upon inspection, black blood was seen slowly seeping from the corner of the assassin's mouth.

Pangzi's face changed; he pried open the assassin's mouth and exclaimed in shock, "Poison fang!"

At the same time, the remaining two assassins, whose mission had failed, simultaneously bit the poison fangs hidden in their mouths and committed suicide.

From the stabbing to their deaths, the whole process took less than five minutes. In those five minutes, the three assassins went from hunters to corpses.

This scene made us feel the situation was grave, even extraordinary; we had thought it was just thieves breaking in, but the three black-clad individuals' actions and bearing clearly showed they were trained death warriors aimed specifically at us three.

"What now?" I spread my hands, staring at the three corpses on the floor, still dazed after a moment.

"What else can we do? Call the police first!" Pangzi said, walking to the phone and preparing to dial the emergency number.

At that moment, Yuan Qiu suddenly pointed at one of the black-clad men and shouted in terror, "It's him, it's him, I remember him."

I and Pangzi both felt a bit puzzled; could it be that this assassin knew Yuan Qiu?

Next, Yuan Qiu's words struck like a thunderbolt from a clear sky, hitting hard at my and Pangzi's hearts.

"I remember him; he is a bodyguard of Brother Wu Chang," Yuan Qiu said, his face deathly pale.

I and Pangzi walked over to him in unison and asked in the same voice, "Are you really sure he's Brother Wu Chang's bodyguard?"

Yuan Qiu nodded without hesitation: "No mistake; I remember that when we first met Brother Wu Chang, he was guarding outside the mahjong parlor. I even accidentally bumped into him when I entered, so I couldn't possibly be wrong."

Yuan Qiu's renewed certainty made Pangzi and me frown; Pangzi pondered for a moment and worried, "Could something have changed in Dong Ling, or has someone betrayed Brother Wu Chang? No, I need to call him to let him know."

Having said that, he prepared to call Fan Wu Chang, but before the number could be dialed, a large hand pressed down on it.

"Hai Sheng, what do you mean?" Pangzi looked at me, bewildered; the person holding down the dial key was me.

I shook my head and solemnly told Pangzi, "Pangzi, don't call yet; this isn't that simple."

Pangzi and Yuan Qiu both looked at me in surprise and said, "What do you mean by that?"

I did not answer, but lowered my head and sank into deep thought.

After a long while, I gave a wry smile and asked Pangzi, "Don't you find Brother Wu Chang's behavior strange last night at the hot pot restaurant? Whether openly or implicitly, his words kept urging us to leave Aomen today. Yet we didn't leave, and the assassins came tonight."

Having said that, I ran to the corpses and tore open their shoulders.

With a puff, a pattern of crossed axes appeared before our eyes; every assassin's shoulder bore this tattoo without exception.

This is the emblem of the Dong Ling society; I had merely guessed they were Dong Ling members, and before tearing their clothes I still harbored a sliver of hope. Once the clothes were ripped open, that hope vanished instantly; their identities were clear—they were clearly internal personnel of Dong Ling.

"Fan Wu Chang, Fan Wu Chang, why would you do this!" At that moment, the image of a black‑clad figure, slightly cold‑hearted yet at times incredibly dull‑witted, flashed in my mind; thinking of him, a hint of disappointment and confusion crossed my heart.

What disappoints me is that I underestimated the place I and Pangzi hold in his heart; I never imagined that our bond of life‑and‑death could shatter in an instant—just moments before we were happily eating hot pot together. Yet tonight he dispatched assassins to kill us without hesitation.

Beyond disappointment, I am even more perplexed: why would he do this? What gain could killing us bring him? Or has he betrayed Dong Ling, or is his ambition swollen, desiring the throne of the dragon head?

"Damn it, they say black‑hat people have no conscience, and now I finally see it—not just lacking conscience, but outright wolf‑hearted and dog‑lunged! I was even turned into an ice sculpture by the Nine Yin Formation while trying to change my luck, and Hai Sheng almost got killed by the Twelve Banners." Pangzi slammed his thigh in anger: "Damn, if I'd known I would have taken back those forty‑seven thousand seven hundred eighty‑eight. Now it's all gone down the drain."

Me: … What time is it now, can you be reliable?

"Wait, what did you just say?" Murong Jia Jia, who had been teasing Little Fat nearby, suddenly spoke, frowning and staring intently at Pangzi.

Pangzi scratched the back of his head and gave a foolish laugh: "Nothing, I was just complaining—Fan Wu Chang still owes me forty‑seven thousand…"

"No, I meant the previous sentence!"

"My previous sentence…" Pangzi muttered, trying to recall, then suddenly realized: "It's the Nine Yin Formation and the Twelve Banners—those were used to change the fortune of Chen Zheng's ancestral home."

"Nine Yin Formation, Twelve Banners—can you explain in detail how to set up this formation?" Murong Jia Jia's face suddenly turned grave.

"Uh… Pangzi was at a loss for words," he stared at Murong Jia Jia in bewilderment, not understanding why she suddenly asked about this.

"Pangzi, stop stalling—quickly tell Jia Jia the principle of this formation!" Something out of the ordinary must hide a monster; Murong Jia Jia's expression made me feel this matter was fishy, at least definitely not as simple as it appears on the surface.

Under my urging, Pangzi found a chair, sat down, and slowly began to explain the principle of the Nine Yin Formation to Murong Jia Jia.

After a long while, Murong Jia Jia's face grew increasingly grave; even as a spirit body, a pallor still faintly showed on her visage.

"Pangzi, honestly tell me where you got this formation." Murong Jia Jia's voice had already lost its strength, and when she asked this question her tone trembled strangely.

"It's recorded in our family's notes; during the late Republican era, an ancestor of my Wang clan used this Nine Yin Formation to break the feng shui of a scorching land, and it was written in the genealogy, passed down through generations." Pangzi's tone could not hide his pride, completely oblivious to Murong Jia Jia's solemn face as he boasted with flying spittle about the legendary glory of the Wang family.

After Pangzi finished recounting his Wang ancestor's glorious deeds, Murong Jia Jia finally sighed, looking at him with resignation: "Pangzi, what you said is correct—this formation can indeed improve the yang‑sha land's feng shui. However, its name is not Nine Yin Formation but Nine Yin Twelve Yin Divine Formation."

In Murong Jia Jia's tone, besides the exasperation toward Pangzi, a hint of panic flickered in her expression.

We all felt curious at once and hurriedly asked her what the difference was between the Nine Yin Twelve Yin Divine Formation and the Nine Yin Formation Pangzi had set up.

Murong Jia Jia glanced at us, slowly shook her head, and said: "The difference isn't great; the Nine Yin Formation Little Fat mentioned earlier is actually a fragment of the Nine Yin Twelve Yin Divine Formation. However…" She paused, then continued: "The origin of the Nine Yin Twelve Yin Soul Formation is astonishingly vast; to clarify its origin we must start from the great war between the Yellow Emperor and the Jiuli witch tribe."

"Uh… that's stretching it a bit far, isn't it? It's even tied to the Yellow Emperor now!"

Ignoring the three dazed like wooden chickens, Murong Jia Jia slowly exhaled and said with firm certainty, word by word: "Its origin is inseparably linked to the witch tribe's All‑Heaven Twelve Divine Killer Formation."

Murong Jia Jia's words plunged the three listeners into shock again; immediately Pangzi let out a puff of laughter, the first to laugh.

"All‑Heaven Twelve Divine Killer Formation, haha, that's just something from novels, right?" Pangzi said to Murong the beauty, "Turns out you ancients also read novels." He slapped his thigh and laughed hysterically, tears streaming down.

Suddenly two sharp gleams flashed in the air, shooting straight at Pangzi, making his whole body break out in gooseflesh and feel chilled to the bone.

"Well, Murong beauty, you keep talking; I'll just crack a joke to liven the mood, yeah, that's right, I'm just livening the mood." Meeting the deadly gazes of me and Murong Jia Jia, Pangzi hurriedly wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, feeling guilty.

I gave him a cold snort, then told Murong Jia Jia, "Continue, ignore him."

In my view, although the All‑Heaven Twelve Divine Killer Formation seems somewhat illusory, I certainly do not deny that it actually exists in this world; within the Daoist Sect, formations like the Two‑Instrument Formation, Four‑Symbol Divine Formation, and Seven‑Star Layout are transmitted in some major schools.

To ordinary people, aren't all these formations just illusory, boundless fantasies? Since these formations have been passed down, we also cannot deny the possibility that the All‑Heaven Twelve Divine Killer Great Formation exists.

Moreover, Pangzi's Nine Yin Formation set up at Chen Zheng's ancestral home—outside the formation, aren't there twelve flags corresponding to the twelve directions, reflecting the heavenly trend of Become Capital?

In my opinion, the reason Fan Wuchang sent assassins to kill us is undoubtedly inseparably linked to this Nine Yin Formation, because on the night the formation was completed, he urged us to leave Aomen the next day. If you say there's no connection, even a fool wouldn't believe it.

Moreover, to understand the full story and analyze Fan Wuchang's motive for assassinating us, we must clearly know the origin and function of this Nine Yin Formation, as well as the Heavenly Twelve Gods and Evil Spirits Formation that is closely related to it.

So, the three of us sat quietly beside Murong Jiaja, listening to Murong Jiaja recount an ancient tale that sounded fantastical yet seemed to have actually happened..