With Wei Xing'er safely gone, no worries weighed on Jiang Chen's mind. Traveling light, he felt considerably more at ease.
He linger near the formation for a short while, then prepared to head back in for another exploration.
He had just started moving when his ear twitched. His spiritual sense stirred, and he slowed his steps. His figure came to a halt beneath a large tree as he stared ahead at both sides of his flanks.
He gave a light snort. "Come out!"
Jiang Chen's spiritual sense was extraordinarily powerful. He immediately detected that groups lay in ambush on the left and right ahead — two on each side, clearly positioned to intercept him.
Jiang Chen found it somewhat strange. When he had escorted Wei Xing'er out earlier, there had been no one in this area. After seeing her off, he hadn't wasted much time, yet four people had suddenly appeared here.
"Could they be targeting me specifically?" Jiang Chen was mildly surprised.
Though his heart held a trace of shock, his outward expression remained perfectly calm. His spiritual sense told him that these four ambushers possessed no small amount of strength. Any one of them had cultivation around the third level of the Imperial Realm.
Still, at Jiang Chen's current cultivation level, there was naturally nothing to fear.
"Hee hee hee hee…" An ear-splitting, eerie cackle suddenly rang out from the right. Then a figure in coarse hemp clothing burst from the undergrowth.
As the figure shot forth, a blinding flash accompanied it. Without warning, a powerful wave of crisis surged into his mind. Jiang Chen instinctively swayed to the side.
Swoosh!
A streak of golden light, like a beam of scorching sunlight lancing down from the heavens, shot past — a volley of golden needles.
Behind it came a hunched old woman dressed in threadbare hemp robes patched together a hundred times over. Her face was withered like sun-dried orange peel, thoroughly unsightly.
"Humph, boy — dodging Granny's golden needles, you've got some skill. What a pity you've come to a place you shouldn't have!"
This old woman was none other than one of the four wandering cultivators among the twelve protectors that the Master of Cuihua Pavilion had originally selected. Her name was Golden Needle Granny.
Jiang Chen had stood at the entrance of Cuihua Pavilion himself, watching the Master of Cuihua Pavilion receive those four wandering cultivators. Golden Needle Granny had been among them.
But she was supposed to be elsewhere — with the other protectors.
The Master of Cuihua Pavilion's diversionary ploy had sent a group of protectors escorting a decoy to a different location. Golden Needle Granny should have been in that escorting party.
How had she suddenly appeared here?
"Could they have rushed here after going there first? If so, what was the point of the diversion?"
Jiang Chen was thoroughly bewildered. This affair was growing more and more bizarre. Behind it all, there was clearly a vast conspiracy — a great hand manipulating everything.
And the one pulling the strings was the Master of Cuihua Pavilion.
Yet Jiang Chen now suspected that, given the Master of Cuihua Pavilion's abilities and calibre, he would not have been capable of laying out such an elaborate scheme entirely on his own.
"Could the Master of Cuihua Pavilion have an accomplice? Or perhaps the Master of Cuihua Pavilion is nothing more than a puppet?" A profoundly unsettling thought suddenly crossed Jiang Chen's mind.
At such moments, the advantage of cultivating the Heart of Rock became apparent. The more critical the situation, the calmer he grew.
"There are more of you, lurking about — are you too ashamed to show your faces?" Jiang Chen let out a cold laugh, his gaze piercing toward the remaining three hidden positions.
The other three — though Jiang Chen had never seen them before — could only be the three great wandering cultivators: Elder Kongyun, Silver Sand Guest, and the Young Master of Wonders.
"Don't get cocky, boy!"
A thunderous shout rang out, and another figure burst from the shadows. This man had distinctive silver eyebrows — it was none other than Silver Sand Guest.
To the left and right, two more figures shot out simultaneously. One had white hair flowing behind him — Elder Kongyun. The other was a handsome, strikingly poised young man — the Young Master of Wonders.
The four of them occupied four corners, forming a loose encirclement around Jiang Chen.
Jiang Chen's brow furrowed slightly as the Heavenly Eye Divine Pupil swept slowly across the four. His gaze was deep and penetrating, as though it might pierce straight through their spiritual defenses and lay bare their innermost hearts.
All four were Imperial Realm powerhouses. Facing Jiang Chen, they naturally refused to show weakness. When his gaze fell upon them, each met it with a cold smile of their own.
Indifference. Amusement. Disdain. Gravity.
Four distinct expressions, each one perfectly capturing its bearer's character.
Golden Needle Granny's gaze was indifferent. The Young Master of Wonders wore an amused look. Elder Kongyun was openly disdainful. And the only one with a serious expression was Silver Sand Guest.
Clearly, among these four, only Silver Sand Guest was treating Jiang Chen as a genuine threat. This likely had to do with his past.
Silver Sand Guest had lived through the life of a gang member and endured the agonizing experience of watching his organization destroyed. As a result, he was more cautious by nature than the rest.
Golden Needle Granny, on the other hand, had always been wild and unruly — an eccentric who marched to the beat of her own drum. Lone-wolf cultivators like her tended toward an aloof, detached temperament.