The actor was unwilling to come close, and the main gate to the Portable Abode could not remain open indefinitely. Li Banfeng shut the doors, raised his clock pendulum, and resumed his fight against the actor.
The actor had fine vocal chops, but his combat skills were only mediocre. Even though Li Banfeng had only a clock pendulum in hand, his swift strikes ensured he didn't fall behind in the slightest.
After three to five minutes of fighting, the actor had sustained several cuts, while Li Banfeng remained unharmed.
Seeing that he could gain no advantage, the actor vanished into thin air in the blink of an eye.
Li Banfeng barked, "Are you coming out or not? If you're not, I'm going to keep singing!"
The Sprawling Compound technique allowed him to channel his wife's abilities outside the manor, and her singing could entice wandering souls. Standing in the second courtyard, Li Banfeng resumed singing *Wu Family Slope*.
He belted out several passages at the top of his lungs. Peking opera was no ordinary singing; it truly put one's skill to the test. Li Banfeng sang until smoke practically billowed from his throat, yet the actor still did not show himself.
His wife's technique wasn't working?
That proved the actor's cultivation was by no means low.
High cultivation, yet clumsy in martial combat—what pathway was this actor on?
Never mind his pathway. Since he won't come out, I might as well leave.
He had originally hoped to shelter in this grand manor for the night and reassess at dawn, but given the current situation, staying here was out of the question.
Li Banfeng instructed Xiao Yeci, "Gather everyone. We're setting off immediately."
"Understood," Xiao Yeci replied, promptly bringing everyone to the front gate.
Li Banfeng shoved the gate with his hands; it wouldn't budge.
He kicked it; it wouldn't budge.
He had several people ram it together; it still wouldn't budge.
The gate had been sealed.
A sealed gate was no cause for panic—they could simply climb over the wall.
Xiao Yeci led the others to haul over water vats, wooden crates, and various odds and ends, piling them all against the base of the wall. Niu Guangda was the first to step forward, clambering from a crate onto a water vat. Just as he was about to scale the wall and his hands touched the top of the bricks, a wisp of dark smoke drifted up.
"Mother of mercy!" Niu Guangda wailed, tumbling from the water vat. The top of the wall was hotter than a branding iron.
Climbing over was impossible. Li Banfeng turned to the group and said, "I'll jump over first and find a way from the outside."
Though the brick wall was tall, to Li Banfeng it was hardly higher than a door threshold.
With a single bound, he cleared the wall by a foot, preparing to land on the other side.
Without warning, the brick wall shot up by ten feet. Li Banfeng slammed headfirst into it and slid down with trails of smoke rising from his clothes.
Getting scorched by the brick wall was no great torment; his wife had long since accustomed him to burning heat.
He stood up, staring at the brick wall for a moment, and thought about simply passing through it.
The fourth-tier technique of a journey cultivator, Unimpeded Passage—slipping through this wall didn't seem particularly difficult.
Yet if this wall could shoot higher, could it also grow thicker?
If he got trapped inside, wouldn't he end up fried like a potsticker?
After pondering for a good while, Li Banfeng suddenly let loose a stream of curses: "If you've got the guts, come out and fight me fair and square! What kind of hero uses dirty tricks to sicken people?"
"What do you mean by dirty tricks?" The actor's voice echoed through the night sky, singing smugly to the rapid tempo of xipi liushui, "Here lies a heavenly net and earthly snare, none shall escape even with wings to bear! Ahahaha—!"
Li Banfeng barked, "You trap us and won't let us leave—what exactly do you want?"
The actor continued in song, "Shameless wench, pissing in my courtyard! Even if your life is spared, a sound thrashing you cannot escape!"
Xiao Yeci turned to Lu Chunying and said, "Daughter, you brought this trouble upon us. Bear the consequences yourself. Kneel right here and let them give you a proper beating."
Lu Chunying froze.
"Mother, you want me to kneel here?"
Xiao Yeci said with a grim expression, "Daughter, don't feel wronged. Everyone's lives are hanging by a thread. You cannot escape this suffering today."
Lu Chunying asked in dismay, "Mother, what did I do wrong?"
Xiao Yeci gritted her teeth. "Right or wrong doesn't matter today; just take your punishment. Daughter, don't blame me for being coldhearted..."
*Thwack!*
Li Banfeng brought the clock pendulum down across Xiao Yeci's face.
Everyone was stunned, never imagining Li Banfeng could be so vicious.
Clutching her face, Xiao Yeci stumbled back several paces and stared at Li Banfeng. "Benefactor, what are you doing? I'm the child's mother—am I not even allowed to discipline my own child?"
Brandishing the clock pendulum, Li Banfeng struck at her face again. "Shameless fraud! You're a man—how on earth could you be her mother?"
Xiao Yeci cried out, "How could I be a man? Benefactor, you're seeing things!"
"I'm seeing things? Then what about my ears? Could I have misheard as well?"
Li Banfeng had long noticed something off about Xiao Yeci's behavior, but because he saw no green glow on her and her appearance and voice were completely identical to the real Xiao Yeci, he hadn't dared to strike recklessly.
Once Xiao Yeci told Lu Chunying to kneel, Li Banfeng knew with absolute certainty that this "Xiao Yeci" was a fake. Following a flurry of slashes from the clock pendulum, "Xiao Yeci" dissolved into thin air.
Li Banfeng shouted, "I saw through your trick! Hand her back to me!"
The actor's voice rang out from the night sky once more. "Why should I give her back to you?"
Li Banfeng retorted, "You couldn't fool me, which means you lost. Refusing to admit defeat—what kind of hero does that make you?"
On the surface, this reasoning held no water. If the actor simply refused to concede, what could Li Banfeng do about it?
Even if the actor did admit defeat, he was under no obligation to return Xiao Yeci.
Yet hearing Li Banfeng's words, the actor felt torn.
*I am different from these vulgar folk.*
*They relieve themselves wherever they please—how could I be like them?*
*If I lose and refuse to admit it, becoming a laughingstock to people like this, my conscience simply won't bear it.*
Seizing upon his hesitation, Li Banfeng called out again, "Even if you won't hand her back, at least tell me where she is!"
The actor hesitated no longer and stated plainly, "She's lying in a wing room of my main courtyard. I haven't harmed her, nor have I laid a finger on her. If you have the guts, come fetch her yourself!"
"Mother!" Hearing this, Lu Chunying bolted toward the festooned gate, only to be yanked back by Li Banfeng.
"Don't cause trouble. Take everyone, find a room, and hide inside. Pair up two by two and keep watch over each other. If you spot anything wrong, tie them up immediately. If you can't beat them, run. If you can't run, grab whatever you can find and piss together in the room."
Lu Chunying asked in bewilderment, "What good will pissing do?"
It was enormously useful, but Li Banfeng didn't care to explain.
*If only Xiao Genzi were here!*
Li Banfeng strode into the second courtyard. This courtyard was a garden; though overgrown with wild weeds, traces of flowerbeds remained visible.
Aside from flowerbeds, there was a pond, a carved pavilion, and a row of chambers on both the left and right.
Directly ahead stood another festooned gate. By rights, this should be the way to the third courtyard, but Li Banfeng did not proceed toward it, because two ribbons of green flame coiled before the entrance.
A phantom blindfold?
This gate might not be real; it was likely an illusion cast by ghosts. If Li Banfeng pushed through, there was no telling what he might run into.
Just how many spirits haunted this manor? What level were they?
The only spirit Li Banfeng had truly clashed with was the actor, and even that actor's tier was hard to gauge.
To call his tier high, he couldn't fight well and dodged him at every turn.
To call his tier low, he could withstand his wife's singing and evade the detection of Golden Eyes Discerning the Minutest Detail. When he impersonated Xiao Yeci, Li Banfeng truly hadn't been able to see through it at first glance.
Did this actor possess techniques specifically meant to counter him?
These minor apparitions couldn't amount to much. Li Banfeng bellowed toward the festooned gate: "*Waa-ya-ya-ya!*"
The green light twisted, and the startled lesser ghosts scattered in panic. The original festooned gate vanished, and some ten-odd meters away, a new gate appeared.
This was the real festooned gate.
As Li Banfeng stepped toward the gate, Lu Chunying suddenly came running after him. "Benefactor, something terrible happened! That actor tied up Niu Guangda and the others, saying he's going to eat them to go with his wine!"
Li Banfeng looked at Lu Chunying and asked, "Where is your mother?"
Lu Chunying asked in confusion, "Isn't she in the main courtyard?"
"I'm asking where your biological mother is!"
"Isn't she my biological mother?"
"*Waa-ya-ya-ya!*" Li Banfeng roared. Lu Chunying shuddered from head to toe as a green aura flared over her body.
Li Banfeng raised his clock pendulum and struck again. After taking two blows, Lu Chunying vanished into nothingness.
The actor's voice drifted down from the night sky again. "How did you see through it?"
Li Banfeng said, "Come out and fight me first!"
"Tell me where I slipped up first!"
"Your acting is dreadful. You're so riddled with flaws I wouldn't even know where to begin."
"Villain, do not be arrogant! Let us match skills again in the main courtyard!"
The actor's tone was brimming with resentment. In truth, as far as impersonating Lu Chunying was concerned, the actor had left no flaws—he matched her both in form and spirit.
However, Xiao Yeci was not Lu Chunying's biological mother, a fact Li Banfeng knew well.
Passing through the third gate, he entered the third courtyard. Winding corridors crisscrossed the grounds, flanked on both sides by study chambers.
In the center of the courtyard, beneath a cooling pavilion, stood a slender man with piercing eyes and an eight-character mustache. Behind him knelt a retinue of attendants, awaiting his orders.
The Sage of Jianrengang?
The Sage looked at Li Banfeng and said, "Did you truly believe you could escape?"
Li Banfeng raised his clock pendulum and swung.
The Sage snapped furiously, "You'd even dare strike me?"
"Why wouldn't I!"
Li Banfeng slammed the pendulum straight into the Sage's forehead. With a cry of agony, the Sage vanished, and the crowd of attendants swarmed forward as one.
"This monk was just looking to slaughter scoundrels like you!" Brandishing the clock pendulum, Li Banfeng belted out a selection from *Wild Boar Forest*, channeling all of Lu Zhishen's burning fury as he tore into the throng of specters.
In terms of martial skill, these spirits were genuinely capable, some even slightly better than the actor.
In terms of lethality, they were far more ruthless than the actor, every one of them an expert killer aiming straight for vital points with every strike.
Yet they possessed little resistance against Li Banfeng's operatic verse. Overwhelmed by his resounding vocals, they found themselves unable to execute their techniques.
After several minutes of fighting, most of the spirits were dispersed by Li Banfeng. A few with higher cultivation continued to skirmish with him. Finding an opening, Li Banfeng unlatched the Portable Abode, and his wife's singing immediately drifted forth.
"Rose, rose, most lovely; rose, rose, most radiant..."
One of the spirits sneered, "Lewd and vulgar tripe!"
Li Banfeng shouted, "Wife, sing opera!"
"Ask who dyed the frosted woods crimson at dawn? Nothing but the parting lovers' endless tears..." His wife sang a passage from *The Western Wing*, and the destructive power of this piece was terrifying.
The spirits were drawn helplessly into the Portable Abode. By the time Li Banfeng slammed the main doors shut, it was too late for them to flee.
One of the spirits called out, "Were those lines just now sung by the Agile Cavalry General?"
The gramophone gave no answer, asking instead, "Who are you?"
The spirit replied, "I am Peng Chunyang of Prince Chun's Manor! Do you not remember me?"
The gramophone did not recall who Peng Chunyang was, but Hong Ying remembered. "Head Steward Peng, is that you?"
Hearing that voice, Peng Chunyang cried out, "General of Select Troops, is that you? How could you..."
Before he could finish, the gramophone inhaled deeply, swallowing every last spirit into her belly.
Hong Ying fumed, "Those were people from Prince Chun's Manor! How could you eat them?"
The gramophone gave a cold sneer. "What if I ate them? This is produce my man bought and brought home. I should eat it, I love eating it, and I'll devour it with utter delight!"
Chapter 252