The creature puckered its snout and took a sharp inhale. Several wisps of pale white vapor were drawn up from the fragments and inhaled into its nostrils.
In an instant, the fragments vanished, leaving nothing behind.
The grotesque head let out a long, luxurious "Aaah." It looked like a starving beggar who had just gorged himself after seven days and nights of famine, or someone plunging into a hot spring in the dead of winter. How could a mere word like "pleasure" do it justice?
Anyone who didn't know better would have thought it was getting high on something. He Lingchuan eyed it sideways. "Does it feel that good?"
The grotesque head sniffled twice, savoring the lingering sensation. "In the past, this bit of power would've been divvied up among over a hundred faces. How could that compare to having it all to myself? Besides..."
"Besides what?"
"This idol reeks of smoke and scorching. What happened to it?"
He Lingchuan told it how he had rescued the idol from the fire.
"I knew something felt off just now! So Cheng Yu tried to burn my idol!" The grotesque head was furious, snarling malevolently, "Fine! Excellent! He broke the vow of his own accord, so he can't blame me for being ruthless!"
He Lingchuan paused, then brightened with joy. "You don't have to honor your contract with him anymore?"
"The contract is void," the grotesque head chortled. "He dared to burn my idol, which makes him my enemy. Now I can move against him!"
He Lingchuan rubbed his nose.
The true Hundred Faces Nightmare had been swallowed by that massive red shadow. Cheng Yu had probably thought the idol was useless and casually tossed it into the flames instead of taking it with him.
Who would have guessed an avatar of the nightmare had survived behind here?
Thus, his casual act of burning the idol had broken the pact originally made with the nightmare.
Talk about rotten luck.
Or perhaps he had been so overwhelmed by shock that he had lost his head in the moment.
"Now that you've had your fun, isn't it time to get to work? Otherwise, that vow of yours..."
"Right, right!" the grotesque head agreed readily, only to hesitate and stammer, "B-but there's one thing I must remind you..."
He Lingchuan stared at it without taking the bait, a bad feeling rising in his chest.
Unnerved by his gaze, the grotesque head gave a sheepish chuckle. "I can try to track him, but Cheng Yu might not be asleep. If he isn't dreaming, I can't find him."
"You can only find him when he's asleep?"
"That's right," the head sighed. "I'm a nightmare, after all. If he isn't dreaming, I can't get near him."
He Lingchuan said flatly, "Why didn't you mention that earlier?"
The wretch had played tricks on him, tricking him out of the idol's power first before revealing its limitation.
He had never dealt with nightmares before, so he had suffered from his lack of experience.
Feeling the sudden surge of killing intent radiating from him, the grotesque head hastily added, "B-but you don't need to fret! All mortals need sleep!"
"Cultivators often regulate their breathing in place of sleep." He Lingchuan was no exception.
"For short spells, sure, but whether demon or human, everyone needs long sleep eventually," the grotesque head argued. "So many demon kings in Beijia spend vast stretches in deep slumber—take the Jeweled Tree King, for instance. Besides, Cheng Yu suffered a magical backlash and severe injuries. He desperately needs deep sleep to nurse his vitality."
Its conclusion:
"He won't last long."
He Lingchuan looked at it. "You certainly have faith in your own trade."
Yet the grotesque head wasn't wrong. Mortals, in the end, had to sleep.
***
In the quiet night, the Tianluo Star flared violently once more in the eastern sky.
Lingxu City. The Heavenly Palace.
Red light once again flickered upon the altar.
This disturbance of the Tianluo Star lasted only a moment—a mere pair of quick flashes—yet its brilliance far surpassed the previous occurrence, successfully catching the attention of the lamp keepers.
Ever since the Tianluo Star's last stir, the Zhaixing Tower had assigned extra guards to watch the altar.
These two anomalies were naturally treated as a matter of utmost urgency and reported upward through the night.
Thus, the Demon Emperor arrived in person before long:
"Where there is a first, there will be a second. I expected as much."
"Your Imperial Majesty is wise." The Duyun Emissary summoned a miniature sand table, where mountains, rivers, valleys, and terrain were laid out in vivid detail. "This time, the location of the Dafang Pot has shifted."
It lay north of Zhitian Township and south of Xiangshan.
"The six northern counties of Chiyan Kingdom?" the Demon Emperor remarked amusedly. "Did that thing grow legs and run off on its own?"
"Narrowing it down to six counties is good news," the Chief Duyun Emissary analyzed. "The fluctuations produced by the Dafang Pot just now were very intense, allowing our monitoring to be far more precise."
"It wasn't like this in the past, was it?"
"In the past, the Dafang Pot's fluctuations pointed to very clear locations, precise down to a single city or locality, making it easy for us to pinpoint," the Chief Duyun Emissary said in a low voice. "This time, it is shrouded in a veil of illusion, elusive and indeterminate, which makes the task vastly more difficult."
Hardly had he spoken when a dozen or so words suddenly appeared upon the Celestial Book:
*An unknown cause and effect unfurls, not in this realm, not in the Divine Realm.*
"An unknown karmic thread tied to the Dafang Pot is unfolding?" The Demon Emperor pondered. "If it is neither in the mortal world nor in the Divine Realm, where else could it be?"
Cause and effect: only with a cause could there be an effect, just as only a pebble tossed into water could stir spreading ripples.
If you could find neither the water nor the pebble, how could you see the ripples?
Clearly, the omniscient gods took grave interest in this unknown causality, prompting them to task Lingxu City with uncovering the truth.
Were they feeling uneasy and...
threatened?
"Gods dread the cause; mortals dread the effect." The Demon Emperor gave a low snort. "Has Bai Ziqi made any new progress?"
"During the last stirring of the Tianluo Star, two distinct visions appeared over the ruins of Thousand Stars City on the Twilight Plains. Witnesses reported that they had never seen the second vision before—it depicted Thousand Stars City as it once was, untouched by war, with the entire city peaceful and quiet."
"A second vision?" The Demon Emperor paid close attention. "What was special about it?"
"A caravan walked into it and found nothing amiss. It was merely a sleeping city at night. The streets were deserted, save for occasional patrolling soldiers."
"It resonated with the Dafang Pot and caused the Tianluo Star to flare—how could there be nothing amiss?" The Demon Emperor's deep laughter echoed through the great hall, shaking the flames of the ever-burning lamps into another fit of trembling. "Is that all Bai Ziqi uncovered?"
"There is no further confirmed intelligence at this time."
"Order him to proceed to the new location," the Demon Emperor said, pacing back. "The more frequently the Dafang Pot stirs, the more clues there will be to find. By the way—"
The Demon Emperor paused abruptly. "Is it possible that this disturbance, like the one over a hundred years ago, is merely an illusion?"
"An illusion?" The Chief Duyun Emissary pondered for a moment before grasping his meaning. "Your Majesty means... the Dragon-Torture Pillar?"
"Yes." The Demon Emperor said coldly, "Back then, my royal father fell for Mitian's deceitful scheme and was run ragged."
That was not something the Chief Duyun Emissary dared to touch.
"Tell Bai Ziqi to stay alert. Furthermore, dispatch men immediately to the Panlong Desert in Yuan Kingdom. Inquire whether anything has happened there, and see if there is still a wild sand season this autumn."
***
The next morning, He Lingchuan opened his eyes and stretched lazily.
His abdomen still throbbed with a dull ache, but compared to the night before, it felt far better—so long as he didn't cough.
This was the result of swallowing a Hundred Virtues Pill (defective batch) before regulating his breathing. Small pills brewed from Emperor's Flowing Dew, even from a ruined furnace batch, still held tremendously potent life force, swiftly mending his internal injuries.
Only a trace of his injury remained; another two or three days of rest would heal it completely.
Just as he finished washing up, the door was thrown open.
The tiger bounded inside and called out, "The inn is surrounded! Someone's coming!"
He Lingchuan also heard a flurry of disordered footsteps below; at least a hundred men had arrived. When some guests gasped in alarm, a harsh voice barked, "Sit back down! Don't move!"
He Lingchuan stepped to the window and peered down. A dozen or so riders were rounding the corner, heading toward the inn.
Commoners, travelers, and even local bailiffs cleared out of their path.
Though there were only a dozen horsemen, they galloped with an arrogant, overbearing swagger.
The lead rider cut an imposing figure, handsome and flamboyantly bold.
He Lingchuan took a single glance and said, "Let's go."
He didn't intend to stay.
The tiger asked in surprise, "Where to?"
This special envoy hadn't flinched yesterday when confronting the Inspector or battling the Fan brothers, so why was he slipping away today at the sight of an aggressive stranger?
"To have breakfast and enjoy some morning tea, of course."
As he spoke, He Lingchuan was already slipping out the back window.
The men below hadn't completely surrounded the building yet, and with his footwork, slipping away was no challenge at all.
Left with no choice, the tiger had to follow closely behind.
To think that a dignified Household General of Baishan—a mighty warrior who had slain countless foes on sweeping battlefields—was now scaling walls and leaping across roofs, vaulting through windows and slipping down alleys alongside this special envoy. With barely an effort, it bounded onto the roof of the silk shop next door.
Man and tiger slunk forward furtively.
As He Lingchuan passed an attic window, he caught a glimpse of a young girl inside about to change clothes.
Just then, the tiger stepped on a roof tile with a sharp *clack*!
The attic's wooden shutter immediately creaked open. Startled, He Lingchuan ducked his head and rolled swiftly behind the ridge of the roof.
The girl poked her head out, looked left and right, and upon seeing nothing unusual, shut the window again.
He Lingchuan rapped the tiger on the head with his knuckles. "Be careful! Don't blow our cover."
With thick hide, tough flesh, and an iron skull, the tiger couldn't care less. It merely licked its lips and said, "They've dismounted."
"They," of course, referred to those ten-odd riders.
He Lingchuan peered out. The riders had halted outside the inn in grand display, drawing a large crowd of onlookers, yet the horsemen paid them no heed. Their leader strode into the inn with his hands clasped behind his back, the others following closely.
Before long, shadows flickered inside He Lingchuan's guest room. The leader stood by the window gazing outward, his expression sour.
Man and tiger were already tucked behind the ridge of the roof.
A high firewall blocked line of sight here; once they had vaulted over it, nothing they did could be seen from the room.
"Who's that cocky fellow acting like he owns the world?"
Jiao Yu answered honestly, "I don't recognize him."
He wasn't familiar with Baishaqu.
"From the way he looks down his nose at everyone, I'd bet he's from Lingxu City."
Jiao Yu asked, puzzled, "Why avoid him?"
"No need to meet him," He Lingchuan said with a smile. "He came charging in here obviously looking for trouble. Why waste time trading barbs with him? On such a fine morning, we've got important business to attend to."
Having come up empty-handed, that fellow was bound to feel miserable.
Jiao Yu looked at him with an odd expression.
"What?"
The tiger licked its lips. "Aren't you furious? Going after the special envoy of the Crown Prince time and time again—they're truly pressing their luck." If it had been the Crown Prince, he probably would have exploded with rage by now, wouldn't he?
"What good does being furious do?" He Lingchuan shrugged, entirely unfazed. "It's not as if I can just walk up to Zhongsun Mou and cut his head off with one slice."
Chapter 497