Chapter 74: The Three Treasures
The wicked witch of the Mo family from Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture was unbelievably cooperative, “Well, that matter was actually unrelated to me. My elder sister had brought along some men to create a disturbance on Mount Emei. She did not have any purpose to it and was just secretly murdering people to try to stir up some trouble. That domestic servant of hers, the yellow-shirt person who had turned into a puddle of water, had picked that mountain slope and killed everyone who had passed by during that time. Only after that, she had found out that those were actually the disciples of the Wen family.”
Bang, a dull noise was heard suddenly.
The three-inch nail had taken a step forward abruptly and raised his leg to stomp on the head of the young married woman’s corpse until it was flattened. He then stared straight into the eyes of the wicked witch savagely, “A coincidence? All her victims were just coincidentally disciples of the Wen family?”
The wicked witch nodded her head innocently with great effort, “Yes, what a coincidence isn’t it? After that, elder sister heard that the Great Mercy Temple had almost turned hostile on the group of rogue cultivators because of the Wen family. Only then she had understood that she should not have provoked the disciples of the Wen Bucao. So when she had passed by the Nine Peaks Mountain, she killed a group of priests trying to secretly sneak up the mountain and considered that as her favor to make up for her mistake in the past.”
As she spoke, the wicked witch rolled her eyes again and said to Wen Leyang delightfully, “If you were to ask, I once did the Wen Bucao’s disciples a favor too! A few months ago, I had brought along some people to the Nine Peaks Mountain. I coincidentally bumped into someone who was deliberately creating trouble for the Wen Bucao’s disciples. I was the one who had helped all of you to kill those troublemakers without any hesitation!”
Before their departure, Wen Leyang had heard Fourth Elder Wen discussing this matter with Wen Buzuo. Back then, when the Return-to-Before fruits were ripening, it had attracted a group of people proficient in the art of cultivation to steal the fruits. The Death Trademark suffered some losses yet these enemies had been killed by the Qing Miao clan’s witchcraft. The Qing Miao clansmen only stayed for one round before they left.
Wen Leyang’s tone of speaking was so brief that it was frightening, “What were you doing at the Nine Peaks Mountain then?”
The wicked witch pursed her lips as her expression turned piteous once more, “There’s a long story to this matter! We were the pathetic ones running away from those who were trying to confiscate our property and exterminate our families. We dwelled in seclusion in this mortal world but we still keep in touch with each other. About six years ago, a few main families reunited and started sending information our way and reminded us to never miss out on any anomalies that would appear between the heavens and the world. They sought our help to look out for three objects. We had been running everywhere for the past few years and we will still rush to anywhere immediately as long as it was showing signs of any anomalies.”
The wicked witch articulated her speech clearly as if she was too lazy to be forced by Wen Leyang to tell the truth bit by bit. She had revealed the entire story in a straightforward manner.
There organized societies in the immortals’ realm also resembled the triads and mafia in organized crime. Their operation was never silent and in the recent hundreds of years, they were finally ‘recognized by the manifestation of God’s will’, and were granted the status as the cultivators of the righteous path led by the Five Blessings Sect. On the other hand, most of the cultivators of the evil path were razed to its foundations. They had no choice but to fade into the mortal world and to live in seclusion while secretly cultivating. They were regarded by the people of the righteous cultivation path as the World Sect. After hundreds of years of recuperating and building up their strengths, no one knew what they would have turned into by now.
Those of the World Sect were not a bunch of divided beings, they too had their spiritual leader who led the pack and they would wage a guerrilla warfare every once in a while, but they were always fighting in a small crowd that did not amount to anything. But about six years ago, the four great forces with the most profound power within the World Sect simultaneously spread the same information regarding the arrival of three treasures crucial to the destiny of all cultivators and reminded everyone to pay attention to the anomalies that appeared near them. Even if it was just a small anomaly one should not let go of it.
The Mo family from Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture was only a mediocre-level sect before being destroyed by the One Word Palace. When their sect was annihilated they were even less imposing so they could only join the World Sect as a pawn.
The Return-to-Before fruits were considered as an immortal herb. When it was ripened a few months ago, a blast of immortal radiance was revealed and the wicked witch had brought along her men. They had rushed over to the radiance but they did not know what to look for over there. By sheer chance, they met those who were trying to steal the fruits from the Death Trademark. Those so-called disciples were from the Mountain Sect so the wicked witch had eliminated them with ease.
When the wicked witch’s elder sister had brought along her domestic servant to the ancient cave of Mount Emei, her purpose was rather similar. The actual strength of the Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture had its limits and the older sister had been there to fight against the real master cultivators of the Mountain Sect. She tried to create some havoc by killing a few of them randomly and considered her mission accomplished. However, when the yellow-shirt person with a profound cultivation of the Mountain Coffin Devilry spell was lying in ambush on that nameless mountain slope, coincidentally at the same direction came those disciples of the Wen Bucao in search for their family’s information.
The wicked witch finally finished her story and heaved a relieved sigh. Her gaze was charming and seductive as she stared at Wen Leyang with a smile.
Wen Leyang suddenly felt that he was in the awkward position of not knowing whether to laugh or to cry. He had cultivated the method left behind by Wen Lazi and owed his success to the Return-to-Before fruit. Therefore, the wicked witch had unknowingly become his savior. The wicked witch’s failure in wresting the Qing Miao clansmen’s witchcraft power was also due to her conveniently helping the Wen Bucao’s disciples back then by killing the people who were trying to steal the Return-to-Before fruits.
Whether it was the Mountain Sect or the World Sect, none of this had anything to do with the Wen family. If it wasn’t for the fact that dozens of the Wen family disciples had died tragically, Wen Leyang would still be training while chewing on a carrot in the Red Leaves Forest right now. As he listened to the wicked witch’s story, the entire situation’s connection to the Wen family was purely out of coincidence as well.
The old monk Ji Fei asked with a frown, “What are those three objects?” As he was speaking, he took a sip of tea absent-mindedly.
The wicked witch peered at him from the corners of her eyes, the smile on her face turned exotic and eccentric, “The objects that we are looking for are…a dog, a piece of round flat cake, and half a gong.”
Pfft.
The old monk’s mouthful of tea was not wasted for it was all blown out onto the three-inch nail Wen Bushuo’s entire body. He coughed as he spoke in rage, “Hey, wicked witch! Is ‘self-amusing’ your family’s elder!”
The wicked witch shook her head in puzzlement, “The Mo family of Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture was defeated, even within the World Sect, no one had a high regard for us. They will never tell us what the true purpose of the broken gong, the big flat cake, and the dog was as well as what kind of treasures they were. It’s a pity that I had failed on the verge of success this time for if I were to acquire this group of Qing Miao clansmen’s witchcraft power, let’s see who would dare to despise my family anymore.”
As she spoke, the wicked witch stared at Wen Leyang with hidden bitterness, “You have ruined my important event…” Before she could finish her sentence, Wen Leyang suddenly yelled as he jumped up and pounced on her.
When Wen Leyang was battling desperately with the young married woman, he had gone through all sorts of hardships. The Faulty Punch which had been refined with the living and dead poison in his body had turned him into a bronze-skinned and iron-boned person. It was correct that it had turned Wen Leyang into an iron hammer but the problem was that the young married woman was not a nail, she was also a hammer. Even though Wen Leyang managed to kill the enemy with poison, all his vital organs had suffered extremely severe internal injuries. He needed some time to recuperate if he were to make a full recovery.
Due to his severe injuries, the opening and closing speed of the pores on his entire body was also much slower than before. His senses alerted him just as something began to throw itself up from underneath the ground as fast as lightning. Before he had the time to contemplate he shouted and surged towards the wicked witch.
He did not expect his body to be thoroughly out of sync with his thoughts. The situation was almost similar to a lip-syncing error in a movie where the dubbing of the sound did not match up to the person’s lip movement.
The dubbing had already spoken: Pin down the wicked witch.
The lip movement had only just stood up with his buttocks only ten centimeters away from the chair.
The monster flashed past and rapidly moved out from the boundaries of Wen Leyang’s sensation, causing the entire Miao stockade village to shake ferociously! The bamboo house where Wen Leyang had been in was pulverized in a loud crash while the few of them were akin to bottle gourds rolling on the ground as they tumbled out of the house in a mess.
In the midst of it all, the wicked witch’s bell-like laughter sounded as she finished the last part of her speech slowly, “I will never forgive you.”
A giant frog the size of a small hill with a soil-colored body which was encrusted with countless thin strands of gold narrowed its eyes as it appeared before everyone impressively!
On top of the giant frog’s head sat a middle-aged lad who was thin and bony. He was naked with two rows of protruding ribs and the color of his skin was almost fused with the giant frog’s. If one was not attentive one would not able to distinguish that there was a man on the frog. The middle-aged lad was lugging the wicked witch in his flexed elbow.
Ji Fei sat on the ground with utterly no effort to stand up as he stared at the giant frog in bewilderment and spoke with a trembling voice, “Sitting…toad?”
The lad on top of the frog peered at the old monk, his skin and bones face squeezed out an odd smile, “Almost the same I suppose!”
The wicked witch leaned her body into the thin man’s embrace and spoke with a goosebumps-inducing fondness, “Brother-in-law, they killed my sister and you must avenge her!”
The ‘brother-in-law’s’ eyes brightened as he scratched his ears and cheeks in elation, “Really?”
The gigantic sitting toad made a muffled croak as it spat out a yellowish object from its mouth. The object fell onto the ground with a crisp clanking sound.
Wen Leyang abruptly broke out in a rage so fierce that his eyes were splitting apart, his entire body was in agony as if his bones and muscles had been shattered. He was like an injured wild wolf as howled and pounced towards the sitting toad!
A small bronze pan had rolled around a few times underneath the giant frog’s feet before it finally stopped spinning.
It was Ah Dan’s treasured hat.
Meanwhile, the vigorous and firm ringing of a bell ring burst through the dawn under the foothill. A small, shimmering inverted bell transformed into a large bell as it swayed in the sky as the fat monk Shui Jing ran in great strides burning with a frenzy of rage. He tore off the string of Buddhist prayer beads on his neck and tossed it towards the sky ferociously then pointed at the giant frog and roared madly, “You sorcerer, the Buddha will defy death to fight you for injuring the little girl!”
Ji Fei, who had only just stood up, heard the fat monk’s raging roar and his legs gave way as he fell back onto the ground once again. His face was ashen as he muttered, “It’s over, this time the old monk will get a master teacher!”
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