Zi Mo hurriedly led Yang Kai and Shui Ling out of the jungle, racing toward the wastelands as though afraid her master might change his mind.
Half a day later, her pace finally slowed. She panted softly, a helpless look on her face as she turned to Yang Kai and Shui Ling. "You two... sigh..."
"Your master is quite an interesting character," Yang Kai chuckled.
"Master isn't someone who can't tell right from wrong. He's grateful that you stepped in and killed those people — that's why he let you go."
"Grateful?" Yang Kai shook his head. "I didn't get that impression. Him letting us go was a calculated move."
"What calculation?" Zi Mo asked, surprised.
Yang Kai smiled faintly and drew a line across the back of his hand with his finger. A wound appeared instantly, and blood welled out. With quick hands, Yang Kai pinched something small out of the gash.
"A tracking insect?" Zi Mo's face changed drastically. She stared blankly at Yang Kai, then suddenly understood. "Master planted it on you?"
"What do you think?" Yang Kai replied with a teasing expression.
Zi Mo flushed with embarrassment. The only person capable of stealthily planting a tracking insect on Yang Kai was her master — and this one was clearly a high-grade specimen, unmistakably his handiwork.
"Don't worry about it. Your master did this for two reasons. First, he genuinely doesn't want to kill us — after all, we avenged your Insect Mastery branch, and I saved your life. Second, he needed to leave some evidence behind to pacify the Hall Master of Senluo Hall." Yang Kai analyzed the situation as if he had seen straight through her master's thoughts, all while casually slipping the tracking insect back into the wound.
"You..." Zi Mo was stunned. "Why did you put it back?"
"If I killed it, how would your master explain things to the Hall Master of Senluo Hall?" Yang Kai smiled. "If I'm not mistaken, this insect can pinpoint my location?"
"That's right. Tracking insects come in male-female pairs. The one planted on you is the female. The male can be used to locate you." Zi Mo nodded lightly.
"Then the male insect should be in the Hall Master of Senluo Hall's hands by now."
In just a few sentences, Yang Kai had laid bare the entire situation. Zi Mo looked at him with undisguised admiration.
"You're not afraid?" Zi Mo fixed her gaze on him.
Yang Kai shook his head. "If he dares to come, I'll make sure he never goes back."
"That's incredibly arrogant."
"Never mind that. What exactly is going on with your Senluo Hall?" Yang Kai finally couldn't hold back his curiosity.
Earlier, he'd played dumb and kept quiet because he didn't want to get involved in trouble. Now that he was already entangled, there was no reason not to understand the situation.
Zi Mo took a soft breath. "Senluo Hall is the only superpower in Tianlang, but it contains five major branches. Our Insect Mastery branch is one of them — and the weakest at that. Every ten years, each of the five branches puts forward one candidate to compete for the position of next Hall Master. The current Hall Master is Xing Zong — the father of that Xing Bao fellow you just saw. He's a capable man, but his lust for power is excessive. With his term nearing its end, he resorted to various schemes to win over and coerce the other four branches into supporting him. My master refused to compromise and wanted to follow the ancestral rules. But he was suppressed and marginalized by Xing Zong. Starting a year ago, our Insect Mastery branch was pushed out of Senluo Hall entirely, forced to live in that stretch of forest."
Yang Kai nodded slightly, gaining a clearer picture of the situation within Senluo Hall.
The Insect Mastery branch had only about a hundred members. Despite having a Transcendent-realm expert among them, they couldn't withstand the Hall Master's pressure and were compelled to leave the sect.
"Even though we've temporarily left Senluo Hall and distanced ourselves from the eye of the storm, we still have no peace. That Xing Bao shows up every few days, bringing people to cause trouble and pressure us into submitting to his father. But Master has never wavered."
"No wonder you said what you did when I first arrived," Yang Kai said, understanding now.
Zi Mo smiled faintly. "I didn't know it was you. I figured you'd died somewhere over these years."
She paused, then sighed. "That's how things stand."
Yang Kai fell silent, offering little reaction. If Zi Mo were a warrior of the Han Dynasty, he could have invited her to Zhongdu. But she was from Tianlang, so he couldn't very well make that suggestion — even if she were willing, her master certainly wouldn't be.
Judging by his refusal to compromise with Xing Zong, the old man was clearly the stubborn type. People like that generally had no desire to leave their homeland and forsake the land that had raised them.
Yang Kai had no wish to meddle in another sect's affairs. But if someone came after him, he wouldn't show mercy.
At the same time, in the jungle thirty li from Senluo Hall...
A stern-faced man who appeared to be only in his forties or fifties suddenly flew over the area, hovering in the air above.
His gaze trembled as he looked down at the spread of minced flesh and blood below. His aura grew erratic, and violent True Yuan erupted from him as he roared: "Liu Yun, get out here!"
"Hall Master, Liu Yun has been waiting for some time." Zi Mo's master materialized from the shadows, greeting him calmly.
"Who killed Xing Bao?" Xing Zong bellowed, his aura fluctuating wildly — clearly on the verge of eruption. He glared at Liu Yun with murderous intent, his expression promising violence if the answer displeased him.
"Two warriors from the Han Dynasty."
"Han Dynasty warriors?" Xing Zong seethed. "What would Han Dynasty warriors be doing here? Did you conspire with someone to harm my son?"
"Hall Master, you jest. If I had wanted to act, Xing Bao would have died countless times over by now. It was only out of respect for you that I tolerated his insolence all this time." Liu Yun snorted coldly, showing not the slightest fear of Xing Zong.
Xing Zong's fury subsided marginally, though he was far from satisfied. He demanded: "What exactly happened?"
Liu Yun recounted the earlier events in brief, then added: "I didn't expect those two to kill him on the spot. By the time I tried to intervene, it was already too late."
"Where are they now?" Xing Zong pressed. "Have you captured them for me to deal with?"