“I also believe the rest of you!” he said loudly. “You wouldn’t have come here for no reason at all. Please, allow me to tell you how I truly feel. Although I know how things ended up, I don't know why they happened. All of you say that you consumed soul medicine concocted by these two grandmasters, which was what led to the various incidents. Does anyone have one of those portions of soul medicine that I could examine?”
His words seemed to pacify the crowd for the moment. Then, a middle-aged cultivator snorted coldly and tossed out a portion of high-grade soul medicine.
Bai Xiaochun caught it in his hand and then peered down to examine it. After a moment passed, he frowned and looked up at Sima Tao and Sun Yifan.
“Fellow Daoists, the two of you definitely outrank me in terms of necromancy. Pray forgive my ignorance, but I really can’t see any signs of tampering.” With that, he handed the soul medicine over to Sima Tao.
Snorting coldly in his heart, Sima Tao took the soul medicine. He had heard earlier that the cause of the disaster was his own soul medicine, but hadn’t been able to get his hands on one of the offending portions.
After taking it, his eyes shone as he began to examine it closely. However, as the moments ticked by, his eyes widened, and his heart began to pound. He even performed an incantation gesture, drawing upon the power of his cultivation base to perform a very thorough investigation. After all of that, though, he was unable to identify any problem areas. Soon, beads of sweat began to pop out on his forehead.
Furthermore, he could tell that this soul medicine really was the work of his own hand. No matter how he looked at it, he couldn't find any traces of tampering. Slowly, he began to pant, and his heart began to quiver with a sensation of profound foreboding.
Sima Tao’s behavior was also getting Sun Yifan nervous. In the end, he grabbed the soul medicine and used his own methods to examine it. Soon, his face turned just as ashen as Sima Tao’s, and a look of incredulity could be seen in his eyes.
“Impossible!” Sun Yifan thought. “This soul medicine really was concocted by Sima Tao! But I don’t see anything wrong with it! There’s plenty of soul power inside, and it seems completely stable…. Don’t tell me that this is just an ordinary portion of soul medicine, and they’re intentionally using it to try to fool us?”
Having reached this point in his train of thought, Sun Yifan prepared to speak, and yet, was beaten to the punch by Bai Xiaochun.
“Fellow Daoists, I wasn’t able to find anything wrong with that portion of soul medicine, nor find any traces that it's counterfeit. In fact, I suspect that it is just an ordinary portion of medicine. I think we need to perform a test!”
As soon as the words left his mouth, Sun Yifan chimed in. “That’s right. This medicine is definitely not counterfeit!”
Sima Tao’s eyes glittered. He refused to believe that a portion of soul medicine that he had concocted could be tampered with without him being able to tell. The only person who could possibly do something like that would be an earthly necromancer. And yet, if an earthly necromancer really wanted to cause problems for him… he wouldn’t need to do it in such a complicated way. An earthly necromancer could have him expelled from Arch-Emperor City with a single word.
With such thoughts on his mind, he looked at the soul medicine again, and then pointed at one of his shop clerks, a young man he had brought with him from Nine Serenities City.
“You test it!”
The clerk hesitated for a short moment, then walked forward and took the soul medicine. After taking a deep breath, he sat down cross-legged and then began to absorb the soul power from the medicine through his palm.
With so many people watching him closely, there was no way he could pull a fast one in this situation. Everyone simply waited to see what would happen. Before long, the clerk opened his eyes, and the soul medicine was completely absorbed. As he rose to his feet, he seemed completely normal, leading Sima Tao to breathe a sigh of relief. Then he opened his mouth to speak when, all of a sudden, a loud phhhhhhrt erupted into the open, followed by a cloud of foul gas.
All of the soul cultivators present who had been affected earlier immediately erupted into howls of rage.
“So that soul medicine is defective! What were you just about to say, huh Sima Tao?!”
“Sun Yifan, you and he are both completely out of line!!”
“Impossible!” Sima Tao blurted, his face draining of blood as he staggered backward. “This is impossible! I checked it myself. There were no problems….” However, he was at a complete loss as to how to defend himself.
Sun Yifan was physically shaking, and knew that the game was up. He and Sima Tao had been thoroughly defeated: their soul medicine really was defective!!
Bai Xiaochun shook his head silently, seemingly at a loss for words. As for the other shop owners and clerks, they all began to sigh.
The shouting from the crowd began to grow more intense.
“Alright, Sima Tao and Sun Yifan. We have proof now. You’d better compensate us for all of this!”
“Give us our compensation, otherwise, we won’t let you go even if you call for help from the Arch-Emperor!!”
“Once this story gets out, everyone in the Wildlands is going to know that Sima Tao and Sun Yifan are knaves through and through!”
Sima Tao and Sun Yifan were so nervous they were sweating rivers, when, all of a sudden, a grim voice cut through the shouting of the crowd.
“I, Zhou Hong, will provide the compensation!”
Please go to
install our App to read the latest chapters for free
Chapter
737: Good People Go The Extra Mile
Along with the words came a beam of light, slicing through the air. It was none other than the heir apparent from Nine Serenities City, Zhou Hong. He wasn’t alone either. He was flanked by dozens of henchmen, as well as a group of several hundred cultivators wearing black armor.
The black-armored soul cultivators had expressionless faces, and completely ignored everyone present as they spread out in the area, performing incantation gestures as they set up a spell formation.
As soon as the spell formation was activated, a massive gravitational force appeared, which immediately sucked away all of the foul gas in the area.
The sight of the gas vanishing filled the other soul cultivators in the area with complete shock.
“The heir apparent of Nine Serenities City….”
“It’s Zhou Hong….”
The truth was that Zhou Hong was actually feeling very nervous. Even the smallest incident in Arch-Emperor City could have profound implications outside. He might be an heir apparent, but that didn’t mean he had the luxury of letting his guard down. After all, relations between the four heavenly kings weren’t very good at the moment.
At the moment, it didn’t matter whether or not Sima Tao and Sun Yifan were truly responsible for what was happening. The soul medicine had their mark on it, which meant that they couldn’t extricate themselves from the situation. Furthermore, neither could Zhou Hong. The truth was that Zhou Hong was even more worried than Bai Xiaochun was about things getting out of control.
After all, this was Arch-Emperor City!
In his anxiety, he had called in some favors to stop the city guards from getting involved. After all, once they did, it would be impossible to prevent reports from going up the chain of command.
That didn’t mean that a lack of a report would keep the matter hidden. However, once someone did report the matter, formal action would have to be taken.
After ensuring that the city guard would wait a bit before taking action, Zhou Hong quickly came over with members of his father’s own personal guard, who used a powerful spell formation to get rid of the foul gas.
It had been a lot of things to take care of in a short time, and he was feeling extremely frustrated about the matter. However, there was nothing he could do. As soon as he arrived on the scene, he called out, “It doesn’t matter how all of this happened. It was probably just a mistake. Don’t worry, everyone, I will provide compensation that will surely leave you feeling very pleased!”