Chapter 66: Lu Qingluo Is Back!

Chapter 66: Chapter 66: Lu Qingluo Is Back!

Jin Xiao cupped his hands. "Yes!"

Forcibly suppressing the anger in his heart, Li Xun looked at the "miserable" Fang Xu before him and asked, "How did you get this letter?"

Fang Xu cupped his hands. "To report to the Crown Prince... after I was abducted that day, I was taken to a cave by that shaman, who planted a Poisonous Insect in my body.

"Just when I thought my life was forfeit, the Poisonous Insect actually seemed to have eaten its fill and crawled out on its own.

"I found this letter in that cave."

He had already thought up these excuses on his way to the Government Office. The shaman’s methods were bizarre, and assuming Li Xun wouldn’t know about every type of Poisonous Insect, Fang Xu had casually fabricated this lie.

"You are quite lucky." As expected, Li Xun did not doubt his words. He casually took out a scarlet Elixir from a pouch in his robes, handed it to Fang Xu, and said, "This is a fourth-grade Qi Blood Pill.

"Considering you brought such important news to me, the Crown Prince, I am rewarding you with this.

"As for whether you can survive, that will depend on your own fortune."

"A fourth-grade Qi Blood Pill!?" he thought, staring at the Elixir in Li Xun’s hand in astonishment. The Wu Family Ancestor, Wuhuan, had refined Qi Blood Pills for half his life and could only occasionally produce second-grade ones. Yet Li Xun was giving away a fourth-grade pill just like that. It seemed the royal family had quite a few high-level Pill Masters.

"Thank you, Crown Prince!" To Fang Xu, a fourth-grade Qi Blood Pill was undoubtedly extremely precious. His schemes had merely been to dispel Li Xun’s suspicions toward him and conveniently eliminate Wuhuan in the process. He never expected to reap such a benefit as well.

"Go back. If you don’t die, rest for a few days and come find me," Li Xun said, waving his hand.

Fang Xu hurriedly cupped his hands, then walked back home, trembling and unsteady.

EXHALE— He was very unaccustomed to this extreme weakness. However, he had to maintain this state for a few more days; otherwise, recovering too quickly would inevitably arouse Li Xun’s suspicion.

Sitting cross-legged on his bed, Fang Xu retrieved one of the twelve second-grade Qi Blood Pills he had obtained earlier from the hidden compartment underneath and swallowed it. Forcibly controlling the starved cells throughout his body to prevent them from absorbing this Qi Blood Power, he used his consciousness to guide the energy into the second Acupoint Secret Treasure. It had been some time since he advanced to the Second Realm of the Martial Disciple stage, and the Qi of Chaos in his second acupoint was down to barely a fifth of its original volume. Fang Xu wanted to use this time to quickly achieve a breakthrough.

The current situation was treacherous and unpredictable. Relying purely on wits and schemes to navigate it was never secure; only by raising his own strength could he cope with the sudden changes that might arise at any moment.

After a night of cultivation, the Qi of Chaos in the second Acupoint Secret Treasure had been reduced to less than a tenth. The awakened secret treasure energy didn’t give Fang Xu much of an obvious sensation. A large part of this was due to his body’s severe deficiency in Qi and Blood, which prevented him from effectively using his Qi Blood Power to integrate this energy into himself. Fortunately, this situation was only temporary. Once his Qi Blood Power was replenished, everything would return to normal.

After the sky grew bright, Fang Xu did not go to the courtyard to cultivate. Chu Muyun woke up early to prepare breakfast. She curiously came to Fang Xu’s room, but upon seeing his emaciated, skin-and-bones figure on the bed, her face went instantly pale with fright!

"Fang Xu!?" Calling out cautiously, Chu Muyun worriedly wheeled her chair over to him.

"Mu Yun." Awakening from his cultivation state, Fang Xu gave a faint smile. However, his entire face was currently nothing but skin and bones, making his smile look incredibly eerie.

"Fang Xu, what happened to you?" Chu Muyun asked, her face full of worry.

Fang Xu shook his head. "It’s nothing. It’s just a result of my cultivation. I’ll recover in a few days."

Hearing this, Chu Muyun breathed a slight sigh of relief. "As long as you’re okay. I’ve made breakfast; I’ll bring it to you," she said, turning her wheelchair to fetch the food for him.

"No need for the trouble." Fang Xu quickly got up, stepped behind Chu Muyun to push her wheelchair, and said, "I’ve just lost some weight, but I can still move around." During his cultivation last night, even though he had tried his hardest to prevent his body from absorbing the Blood Qi Power, a small amount was inevitably absorbed by his cells. As a result, he had recovered a good amount of strength and no longer looked like he was on the verge of dropping dead at any second like the night before.

Arriving in the courtyard with Chu Muyun, Fang Xu quickly washed up and brought the food out. The stockpile of Blood Food in the kitchen had bottomed out. The only remaining piece of low-grade Blood Food weighed around a hundred catties at most, nowhere near enough for the two of them for more than a few meals. He could tide himself over with Qi Blood Pills, but Chu Muyun was in a critical period of recovery and needed a steady, continuous supply of Blood Food.

He had previously planned to go into the mountains to haul back the fierce beast corpses he had hidden. However, after following Li Xun into the mountains to track down the shaman, being ambushed, and then being hunted by those Martial Artists, he simply hadn’t found the time to retrieve them. Fang Xu figured that those beast carcasses had probably already been devoured by other wild beasts. In the current Fenglin Town, with Lu Zhiyuan taken away and the Blood Food Shop closed, the only ways to obtain Blood Food were either to buy it from other towns or to go hunting in the mountains himself. He figured the Wu Family’s bounty was likely still active, so it was better to hold off on that for now.

After finishing breakfast with Chu Muyun, Fang Xu dove straight back into his room to continue cultivating. He wanted to try and refine all the remaining Qi of Chaos within his second Acupoint Space today, and then break through to the Third Realm of the Martial Disciple stage!

At noon.

Two fast horses appeared on the official road leading from Qinghe County to Fenglin Town. Riding one of the horses was none other than Lu Qingluo, who had left Fenglin Town a few days ago. The other rider was a young man whose facial features bore a somewhat striking resemblance to Yun Wan.

"How much further?" the young man asked, his brows furrowed slightly.

Lu Qingluo looked at the road ahead and replied, "Not far. We should reach Fenglin Town in an hour at most."

The young man didn’t say another word. He cracked his whip hard against the horse’s back, increasing their speed once more. Riding all the way from Huangzhou Prefecture, the two of them had already run several top-tier steeds to death. The two horses they were currently riding had just been swapped out in Qinghe County Town.

On the night Yun Wan disappeared, Li Xun had pondered for a long time before ultimately writing a letter to the Huangzhou Yun Family about the matter. Yun Wan’s father, Yun Tianming, had long since learned about the extreme dangers of the Tilan Mountain ruins from his younger brother, Yun Tianhe. His daughter sneaking off to brave the Tilan Mountain ruins had caused Yun Tianming great worry. Just as he was preparing to send someone personally to Fenglin Town to inform his sister, Yun Jin, Lu Qingluo arrived in Huangzhou with Yun Wan’s Jade Pendant. As a member of the Yun Family’s Direct Lineage, Yun Wan’s younger brother, Yun Qing, simply couldn’t believe his sister would be so impulsive. After seeing the Jade Pendant in Lu Qingluo’s hands, he relentlessly pestered his father to let him personally come to Fenglin Town and investigate. For one, he wanted to understand what exactly his sister had been thinking. Secondly, since his sister had made a promise to protect the bearer of the Jade Pendant, he wanted to make the trip himself to help Lu Qingluo resolve her troubles.

At 3:00 PM, the two finally arrived outside Fenglin Town.

Looking at the town from a distance, Lu Qingluo couldn’t help but think of her father and Li Yushan again. The two of them had been taken away by the Ascension Association, and she had no idea how they were faring now. And then there was Fang Xu. She wondered if the Wu Family Ancestor had made a move during the few days she had been gone, and if Fang Xu was even still alive.

"What is Miss Lu thinking about?" Yun Qing asked, glancing at the worry written across her face.

"N-Nothing. I’m just worried about Fang Xu. That Wu Family Ancestor is in the Third Realm of the Martial Master stage. If he attacks with reckless abandon..."

"Pfft!" Yun Qing scoffed dismissively. "The Third Realm of the Martial Master stage, you say?

"Miss Lu, take me to the Wu Family right now." Though his natural talent wasn’t as monstrous as his sister’s, he was still a cultivator in the Seventh Realm of the Martial Master stage. Wiping out a Martial Artist with decaying qi and blood who was only in the Third Realm would be entirely effortless.

"Go right now?" Lu Qingluo paused, slightly taken aback. "But..."

"No ’buts.’ Let’s get rid of this Wu Family quickly; I still need to go find my sister." Yun Qing patted his horse’s neck and rode straight ahead.