In the morning, at Fujia Bay, Songhai.
Fu Qingyang, who was in the middle of a video conference, saw the phone screen beside his desk light up. The caller ID displayed: Little Zhang.
He frowned and immediately paused the rather important meeting. "Adjourned for half an hour!"
Exiting the online conference room, Fu Qingyang answered the call, opening with a sarcastic barb: "I thought you had had so much fun abroad that you lost all contact!"
After Yuanshi Tianzun returned to the Spirit Realm, Zhang Yuanqing had changed his phone number. Naturally, Fu Qingyang had updated his contact name as well. A moniker like "Little Zhang" was the easiest to overlook.
"Boss, I've run into trouble," Zhang Yuanqing said.
Hearing this, Fu Qingyang gave another scoff. "Figures. You wouldn't call me unless you ran into trouble. After all, when you're free, you're always busy video-calling Guan Ya."
*What kind of talk is that? Call Fu Qingyang in trouble, call Guan Ya at peace? Actually, not just Guan Ya, but also the Palace Mistress and Xiao Yuan.* Zhang Yuanqing silently grumbled, pretending not to hear his boss's scoff, and said, "I sent you an encrypted email."
Fu Qingyang pulled out his chair and sat down, opened his laptop, logged into his mailbox, and downloaded the attachment.
After entering the password, he clicked open the document to review its contents while listening to Zhang Yuanqing's explanation:
"Here's what happened. The President learned from Pluto that the backer behind the Bounty Hunter Guild is the Free Covenant. He wants me to infiltrate the enemy ranks and root out the Free Covenant members lurking within the orthodox organizations.
"The Hunter Guild assigned me a mission..."
He babbled through the causes and consequences of the whole affair.
"When two armies clash, espionage comes first! An intelligence war takes precedence even over the physical battlefield. Still, your mission is a central piece of the President's grand scheme—you shouldn't have told me," Fu Qingyang commented.
Zhang Yuanqing replied immediately, "Boss, don't treat me like an outsider. In this world, I wouldn't even trust my own mother, but you're someone I can trust without reservation."
"Save those sugarcoated bullets for Guan Ya. There's no need to fire them at me."
*Firing at Guan Ya doesn't take sugarcoated bullets; it takes ancestral chromosomes...* Zhang Yuanqing said loudly, "My trust in you is higher than in Guan Ya! Uh, just don't tell Guan Ya that."
"I'm not that bored." Fu Qingyang dropped the subject and said, "I've finished reading the files. Since you called me, it means Stargazing divination cannot pinpoint the location of the other bronze pieces. Right now, you can only bet that the Pope gave the entire disk to Huo Zhengkui; otherwise, you won't be able to find the bronze pieces."
"Yeah, exactly!" Zhang Yuanqing chimed in mindlessly. In front of Fu Qingyang, he could afford to stop thinking.
"So, Huo Zhengkui divided the relic into four pieces. One was passed down through his family, and the other three were hidden away."
"Where would he have hidden them?"
"To answer that, you have to consider why Huo Zhengkui made that bronze piece an ancestral heirloom." Fu Qingyang's thoughts were lucid, and he spoke with calm eloquence. "Even after obtaining one of the bronze pieces, you still cannot divine its location, which means the bronze piece cannot be divined or deduced. In that case, if he truly wanted to conceal its existence forever, the best way would have been to sink it into the ocean."
*Makes sense...* Zhang Yuanqing nodded and followed that line of thought. "Yet Huo Zhengkui passed it down to his illegitimate son, which means..."
Fu Qingyang gave an affirmative grunt and said, "It means he wanted someone to obtain the Pope's relic, but he didn't know whom to entrust it to. After the fall of the Holy See, the orthodox organizations became untrustworthy, and evil classes were even more out of the question. Thus, he had no choice but to pass it to his illegitimate son.
"Do you remember what the founder of the Anti-Black-and-White Alliance said when Jia Feizhang received the relic in his memories?"
Zhang Yuanqing said in a deep voice, "'Do not give it to foreign devils; do not give it to good-for-nothings; do not give it to wicked people.'"
"Correct. That instruction is the best proof," Fu Qingyang said. "Since Huo Zhengkui wanted someone to find it, he definitely left behind clues. The biographical data you got from Heaven's Punishment is too cluttered. Investigating each lead one by one would take far too long."
The life of a mob boss was bound to be extraordinarily colorful. The people he had befriended and the deeds he had done were too numerous; finding clues about the bronze pieces among them would require a lengthy investigation and verification.
"Therefore, based on the information in his dying words, we can take a gamble!" Fu Qingyang said.
"How do we gamble?" Zhang Yuanqing asked.
"I'm betting that he was a patriotic man!"
On the other end of the line, Zhang Yuanqing's eyes lit up as he recalled an entry in the biographical files, blurting out, "In 1955, he donated an overseas cultural relic that had been lost from China to the country!"
That cultural relic was named the Zhou Ji Phoenix Zun, a bronze vessel from the Shang and Zhou dynasties.
Fu Qingyang said, "During the era when Huo Zhengkui was active, the Spirit Realm walkers of the Second District were just rising. The five major organizations—predecessors to the Five Elements Alliance—had not yet become official bodies. Huo Zhengkui couldn't possibly entrust the bronze piece to them. Therefore, hiding it inside a cultural relic and donating it to the country was the safest method."
*Compared to a real Scout, my powers of insight are still far inferior...* Zhang Yuanqing said excitedly, "Makes sense!"
"Then that's all for today. I'll handle that cultural relic. I still have an important meeting. Also, send me the Merchant Guild President's phone number." Fu Qingyang hung up directly.
He leaned back in his chair, his gaze profound, lost in contemplation.
A dozen seconds later, his phone chimed with an incoming message.
Zhang Yuanqing had forwarded the President's private number.
Fu Qingyang promptly dialed the number. After a dozen seconds, the call connected, and a deep voice spoke:
"Who are you, and how did you get this number?"
Fu Qingyang sneered. "The spy you arranged sold it to me."
"..." Silence lingered on the other end for several seconds before the President sighed. "That ungrateful white-eyed wolf!"
Fu Qingyang said coldly, "You want him to infiltrate the Free Covenant to root out the corrupt elements within the orthodox organizations?"
"Is there a problem?"
"No problem. It's a brilliant move. The game between factions has never been just about fighting and killing." Fu Qingyang's tone deepened. "But it is too dangerous. I am not at ease."
"The piece has already been played. There is no turning back."
"Then give the piece more leverage and strength," Fu Qingyang said bluntly. "I want you, in the name of the Merchant Guild, to request aid from the Five Elements Alliance. Behind the conflict between the Merchant Guild and the Dionysus Club lies the clash between the two great factions. As an orthodox faction, it is the Five Elements Alliance's duty to aid an ally."
"Go on."
"I will send several teams to New York to assist you. I think the members of the Return of the Dead guild would be very suitable."
"No Dominators?"
"The aid is merely a cover. Yuanshi needs a team. Saints will suffice; Dominators would draw too much attention."
"Agreed!" the President consented.
Fu Qingyang hung up, picked up the landline phone, and informed the bunny girl downstairs:
"Prepare the plane. I need to make a trip to Capital City. Contact the Capital City Museum."
***
New York, the red brick building.
Zhang Yuanqing put down his phone, left his bedroom, and knocked on Annie's door.
"Good evening!" The blonde beauty wearing a silk nightgown opened the door with a radiant smile.
"Good evening." Zhang Yuanqing gave a slight nod, stepped into the bedroom, and sat down on the armchair by the bed. "Annie, have you ever heard of someone named Catherine? Desire class, Dominator level."
He described Catherine's appearance in detail.
"You think Catherine is an alias or disguise of a senior executive from the Desire class in the New York branch?" Annie shook her head slightly. "You would think that, but so would the association's top brass, and Heaven's Punishment as well. The Hunter Guild's high-ranking members who operate openly must have unimpeachable backgrounds; it's impossible for them to hold an official identity in an orthodox organization."
"Makes sense. Maybe I'm overthinking it. But looking at it from another angle, could this be a case of 'darkness beneath the lamp'?" Zhang Yuanqing theorized conspiratorially. "Catherine might not be a senior executive in the Association of the God of Beauty. What if her identity within the association is just a Transcendent or a Saint? Wouldn't that allow her to conceal herself perfectly? No one would suspect a low- or mid-level member of the Association of the God of Beauty of being the vice president of the Hunter Guild."
Annie knitted her brows. "That has some merit, but it's only an unsubstantiated hypothesis."
"Make bold hypotheses, verify with caution!" Zhang Yuanqing said. "It doesn't matter if we guess wrong. To catch a spy, you have to suspect everyone. Annie, I have a mission for you."
"You want me to go to the New York branch?" Annie was a smart woman.
Zhang Yuanqing nodded. "I will continue to interact with Catherine to obtain more information and details about her. You stay at the New York branch and help me look for candidates. Lately, being my personal secretary has probably bored you out of your mind anyway."
Sure enough, Annie's fighting spirit was ignited. "I'll pack my bags right now!"
***
1:00 PM.
The curator of the Capital City Museum, dressed in a sharp suit and accompanied by two staff members, stood before the museum entrance, awaiting their distinguished guest.
At noon, he had received a call from the Director of the Capital City Cultural Bureau, notifying him that a VIP would be visiting the museum at one o'clock.
The director hadn't explicitly revealed the guest's identity, only instructing him to receive the guest with utmost care, satisfy every request, and never say the word "no."
The curator had been waiting under the hot autumn sun since twelve-thirty.
Soon, a polished black business van drove into the museum plaza. The driver, clad in a sharp suit and white gloves, hurriedly got out and bowed as he pulled open the car door.
Seeing the distinguished guest step down from the vehicle, the curator and the two female staff members behind him were dazzled.
The VIP wore a white suit. His features were sharply chiseled, breathtakingly handsome, and he carried an aura of aloof elegance—like a lotus blooming atop a snow-capped mountain, or a white magnolia clinging to a sheer cliff.
The curator rushed forward to welcome him. "Hello, I am the curator of the Capital City Museum, surname Xu."
The young nobleman in white nodded slightly, without expression or smile, and said, "I want to see the Zhou Ji Phoenix Zun."
*The Zhou Ji Phoenix Zun...* The curator froze for a moment, then hurriedly looked at the staff members behind him.
The female staff member on the left immediately said, "The Zhou Ji Phoenix Zun is in Exhibition Hall 3. I'll take you there."
Her eyes sparkled as she looked at Fu Qingyang. For an ordinary person, meeting a gentleman of such extraordinary elegance and looks was a blessing of a lifetime.
Led by the staff, Fu Qingyang arrived at Exhibition Hall 3 and saw the artifact.
Its shape was that of a magnificent phoenix bird covered in verdigris patina. The bird held its head high, resting on four legs, with its tail feathers drooping and curving slightly upward. It had bulging round eyes, a large curved beak, a hollow body, and a cylindrical wine container on its back.
It stood quietly on the display pedestal, protected beneath a tempered glass case.
The female staff member introduced it enthusiastically: "This is a bronze vessel from the Western Zhou dynasty, 56 centimeters long and 44.5 centimeters wide. In modern times, it was lost overseas, but in 1955, a Chinese compatriot purchased it for one hundred million federal dollars and donated it to the nation."
Fu Qingyang said coldly, "Take it out."
The female staff member blinked in surprise.
The curator was equally startled, but he quickly recovered and instructed, "Xiao Wu, have someone open the glass case."
"Ah, right away." The female staff member hurried off.
Shortly after, two male workers in uniforms arrived wearing white gloves and carefully lifted off the tempered glass case.
Fu Qingyang unhurriedly put on a pair of white gloves and lifted the bronze vessel with a single hand—an object that was quite heavy for an ordinary person.
He turned the phoenix zun over, his thick, sword-like eyebrows furrowing.
As a Scout, he knew precisely how heavy a bronze vessel ought to be. If a foreign object were hidden inside, he would detect it the moment he touched it.
Yet this bronze vessel felt completely normal. It was a precious, but otherwise ordinary, historical artifact.
*Was my deduction wrong?* Fu Qingyang held the bronze vessel in one hand, frowning in deep thought as information about Huo Zhengkui flashed rapidly through his mind.
Beside him, the curator and staff members held their breath, terrified, yet none dared speak, silently tensing to dive and catch the bronze vessel if it slipped.
Yet as the seconds ticked by, the distinguished guest's arm remained rock steady. Was this aristocratic young master actually endowed with Herculean strength?
Just then, a look of realization dawned on Fu Qingyang's face. He knew where the secret lay.
Chapter 671