With the blade pressed against him, Fan Sheng simply gave up struggling and sneered, "If you dare kill me, go right ahead and do it! But if you dare humiliate me, you won't even leave behind an intact corpse!"
Even trapped in captivity, he did not forget to threaten He Lingchuan.
Yet this threat happened to be quite effective.
The two large spiders caught in the net with him vanished with a snap.
So those spiders were merely conjured through divine abilities?
Why did they feel so completely made of flesh and blood?
At that moment, Jia Yu's shouts came from within the wall of lotuses: "My Lord! Lord Special Envoy!"
He Lingchuan turned to look. Another boat had surprisingly pulled up alongside, and Jia Yu was locked in a brawl with someone aboard it.
He Lingchuan leaped over and struck him with two thudding punches. The man was instantly subdued, tumbling headfirst onto the boat.
He Lingchuan instructed Jia Yu to tie the man to several lotus stalks before holding out his hand. "The Overlord Lotus."
"Oh, oh, here you go!" Jia Yu came to his senses as if waking from a dream.
What had just happened?
It seemed Lord Fan had suddenly surfaced from the water to attack the Lord Envoy, the Lord Envoy vanished, and immediately after, several large spiders crawled out of the lotus wall to fight a fierce battle against Lord Fan, while a gigantic metal puppet emerged from the water and caught Lord Fan all in one net...
Now the Lord Envoy had reappeared and was even sitting on the puppet's shoulder. That meant the Lord Envoy had won, right?
In that case, he himself was out of danger.
Jia Yu's heart instantly settled, and he let the gold-armored bronze automaton scoop him up and place him onto its shoulder.
Standing high gave a far view.
"W-what do we do now?" He was still cradling that Overlord Lotus. "Ah, Lord Envoy, you're wounded!"
He Lingchuan was covered in cuts and bruises, and the clothing around his left waist in particular was stained bright red, exceptionally stark.
"It's fine. I'll tend to it myself." He Lingchuan took the Overlord Lotus and stowed it away, then said to Fan Sheng, "As an esteemed vice commander of the Tongxin Guard, why aren't you guarding the south gate of Lingxu City instead of running all the way out here to obstruct my investigation?"
Fan Sheng's eyebrows shot up in fury. "Who told you to hurt my third brother!"
If glares could kill, He Lingchuan would have died a hundred times over already.
He had ambushed He Lingchuan far more cautiously and meticulously this time than before, yet who could have guessed that through the entire fight, he had never even exchanged blows with the man in person!
Captured without their weapons even clashing once?
His origin power was clearly more abundant, his advantage far greater.
Nets, spiders, hidden needles, broken boats—what kind of garbage tricks had that opponent pulled out! That He fellow hadn't fought him properly and honorably even once!
Fan Sheng felt so choked with rage that he was on the verge of suffering internal injuries.
"Let's be reasonable here. You were the one who helped Zhongsun Mou try to harm me first," He Lingchuan said as he sat upon the gold-armored bronze automaton's shoulder, taking out medicine to dress his wound.
The fellow's strikes were truly no joke. Even though He Lingchuan had raised his guard to the utmost and employed the method of Sacrificing the Plum to Preserve the Peach in the nick of time, he had still been an instant too slow and was wounded around the waist by the gangqi on the axe.
Against such an offensive, the soul-snatching mirror's full-body protection had proved insufficient.
The laceration was half the depth of a pinky finger; thankfully, his kidney hadn't been nicked.
As the disinfecting medicinal liquid washed over it, He Lingchuan's face paled, and he hissed in pain.
"The Lingxu City courier case was assigned by the Emperor to Chiyan, and then entrusted personally to me by the Crown Prince of Chiyan. In obstructing my duties, you are ultimately sabotaging Lingxu City. When the Ruler of Chiyan submits an account of the rights and wrongs of this affair later, how will you defend yourself?"
Fan Sheng said coldly, "Don't try to intimidate me with grand labels."
"The truth of the case is about to come to light. Zhongsun Mou is colluding with the mastermind behind the scenes, and none of them will escape the law." Only then did He Lingchuan unhurriedly apply medicine to his wound. "Must you insist on jumping into the dye vat at this very moment? Or could it be that the Tongxin Guard has long been in cahoots with the mastermind, and you came here specifically to silence witnesses?"
Fan Sheng's expression darkened angrily. "What nonsense are you spewing! I know nothing of any mastermind!"
"Then what did you come to Baishaqu for?"
With the entire Tongxin Guard implicated, Fan Sheng grew anxious. "I was on duty in Qingding City and visiting family along the way when I received an urgent message from Zhongsun Mou. He claimed that relying on your five hundred soldiers, you abducted an important prisoner belonging to Lingxu City and treated him, the Inspector, as if he were nothing. He begged for my aid, so I came."
"Does the Tongxin Guard enjoy doing good deeds so much?" He Lingchuan remarked with mock curiosity. "Then if I tell you to go back, will you?"
Choked with irritation at his retort, Fan Sheng said, "My elder brother owed the Zhongsun family a major favor, which the Zhongsun family constantly boasts about and uses to hold over us. That's why I wanted to repay it."
"Aren't you afraid of causing even bigger trouble for Grand Commander Fan?"
Fan Sheng was struck speechless.
In Baishaqu's Lotus Harvesting event, people were injured in the scramble every year, so he had merely seized the opportunity. How much weight could a mere special envoy of the Crown Prince of Chiyan hold? He had figured beating him half to death to teach him a lesson would suffice.
Even if he crippled the fellow, how much trouble could it really cause?
He Lingchuan suddenly stood up from the gold-armored bronze automaton and shaded his eyes with a hand, looking toward Chaohu Pagoda:
"Oh? It's getting rather noisy over there."
The mirror grumbled against his chest, audible only to He Lingchuan: "Pretend. Keep pretending!"
Fan Sheng could naturally hear the commotion at Chaohu Pagoda as well. But hard-pressed to protect himself, how could he spare any thought for it?
A breeze blew from across the water, and Jia Yu heard the sounds too. "It seems... seems like I hear screaming. I don't know what happened."
He Lingchuan's face turned stern. "Not good. We need to head back quickly."
Having finished dressing his wound, he moved gently a couple of times before kindly reminding Fan Sheng, "Lord Fan, hold your breath. Take a deep breath first. Come on, like me—"
He mimed taking a deep breath while Fan Sheng glared at him coldly.
He Lingchuan patted the gold-armored bronze automaton, which immediately tied the net's cord into a slipknot and flipped it upside down into the water!
Forced face-down, Fan Sheng bobbed in the water along with the massive net.
Spared from death, but not from suffering.
The gold-armored bronze automaton turned and strode toward the lake shore several dozen yards away.
The boat was gone, but this mode of transport was fast as well.
Once ashore, the gold-armored bronze automaton strode along the lake bank toward Chaohu Pagoda, moving faster than a galloping horse.
Had it been anyone else ambushing him like this, He Lingchuan would never have been soft-hearted. But with Fan Sheng... if he truly killed him, it would likely play right into Cen Boqing's hands and make him a faction of formidable enemies.
Moreover, his subsequent actions required keeping an eyewitness to testify.
Fan Sheng was a vice commander of Lingxu City's Tongxin Guard, holding an important post, backed by a grand commander whose martial prowess and influence were off the charts.
For the sake of his subsequent mission and his own safety, unless He Lingchuan fled Beijia forever and never set foot in Lingxu City again, it was unwise to finish Fan Sheng off on the spot.
Fan Sheng could use the pretext of the Lotus Harvesting competition to try to kill him, but he could not use the same excuse to slaughter Fan Sheng.
He hadn't even personally killed Zhongsun Mou; Fan Sheng, whose status was above Zhongsun Mou's, was naturally even more off-limits.
The aura of Lingxu City was just that overbearing.
Whether people felt aggrieved or unwilling, they always had to maintain reverence.
...
Submerged in the water, Fan Sheng had been intentionally flipped face-down by the gold-armored bronze automaton just now.
Before entering the water, Fan Sheng had had no choice but to take a deep breath.
With his profound cultivation and enduring breath, holding his breath underwater for half an hour was child's play.
The problem, however, was that there were piranhas in the water!
Before leaving Chaohu Pagoda, Zhongsun Mou had given him a fish pouch only the size of a dried mandarin orange, but once tossed into the water, it expanded and released sixty to seventy piranhas.
During dry seasons, this kind of piranha could burrow into the mud to survive; even cracked, parched earth could not kill them. Only when the rains returned in abundance the following year would they revive upon touching water.
Empowered by Zhongsun Mou's origin power, these creatures ignored protective astral qi. Known as tigers of the water, they could strip a living person down to a skeleton in mere minutes.
Had He Lingchuan not been protected by the mirror shield, he would have been bitten full of holes earlier.
Fierce and bloodthirsty by nature, these piranhas had tasted blood and now craved living flesh. Fan Sheng was merely the owner of the pouch, not a jiaoren, and held no natural dominance over them. After swimming around and devouring every frog, bird, snail, and fish in the vicinity, they remained ravenous, and thus fixed their gaze upon Fan Sheng.
The warm reception He Lingchuan had previously enjoyed from them was soon intimately experienced by Fan Sheng.
These demonic things snapped their sharp teeth as they chomped on him, targeting skin unprotected by clothing or armor—such as his face, neck, and wrists.
They particularly relished gnawing on facial features. Fan Sheng hardly dared open his eyes; otherwise, his vision would be completely filled by several gaping maws lined with razor-sharp teeth.
How could soft eyeballs withstand such devastation?
Don't forget, these creatures could penetrate protective astral qi. Not only had He Lingchuan's protective astral qi failed to block them, Fan Sheng's couldn't either!
Although origin power could reduce the harm, reducing damage was not eliminating it. Three or four flashes of light flared across Fan Sheng's body as his protective magic artifacts activated.
How long could they hold out? Even he had no confidence.
Tilting the blade of his axe, Fan Sheng strove to hack and slice at the net, occasionally burbling out a few bubbles.
Channeling his true power, frost condensed wherever the axe blade passed.
The net was no exception.
However, the lake currents carried away part of the chilling frost; even though a thin layer of frost formed over the mesh, it didn't turn brittle or rigid, remaining utterly resilient. This proved awkward: an axe blade was better suited for chopping than slicing, while the refined iron dagger in his robes couldn't cut through it at all, like trying to saw through steel wire.
He exerted immense effort just to sever three or four knots.
Damn it, this net even had three layers inside and out!
He was still far from breaking free.
What kind of net was this to be so tough! Had he not been holding his breath, Fan Sheng would have cursed at the top of his lungs.
He didn't know that Zhu Erniang's cloud brocade robes were impervious to fire and water in the first place.
After He Lingchuan left, the roiled lake water gradually cleared. When Fan Sheng opened his eyes a few times, he saw new things appearing along the lakebed.
Something seemed to be growing rapidly, turning into dozens of long, snake-like tendrils that extended toward him.
Were those... lotus stems?
These astonishingly tall lotuses in the Lotus Palace were called King Lotuses. Their stems were as thick as goose eggs and remarkably tough; a dull woodcutter's cleaver wouldn't even dent them.
Now, these thick, elongated lotus stems reached toward him, wrapping around him coil by coil like pythons.
The most insidious stem made no move to throttle his neck; instead, it circled him with sinister intent, as if searching for a point of ingress to strike.
Only then did Fan Sheng remember that Baishaqu's Water Spirit was a lotus demon—and the creator of this very labyrinth.
Chapter 509