“It’s dead, it’s dead!” Lin Qingxue yelled excitedly from shore as she tugged at Lin Qingchen’s hand, “Brother Zhuo’s amazing—he actually shot it dead!”

“Where’s Sister Ruoyan?” After a momentary burst of excitement, Lin Qingchen then turned to look anxiously at the surface of the lake. After she had fallen back into the water, she hadn’t surfaced.

“Where’s Sister Ruoyan? Where is she?” After her sister’s reminder, Lin Qingxue also began to survey the surface of the lake anxiously.

“Qingxue, take care of these for me!” Meanwhile, Zhuo Yifeng tossed the bow in his hands and quiver on his back to shore. As Lin Qingxue caught the items, she saw Zhuo Yifeng suck in a deep breath as he dove into the lake.

After quite a while, Zhuo Yifeng was still unable to find any trace of Yun Ruoyan. The air in his chest had all but been used up, and he had no other choice but to resurface.

“Brother Zhuo, were you able to find Sister Ruoyan?” the Lin sisters asked as one.

Zhuo Yifeng shook his head, diving back into the water once more. After a few fruitless attempts, he ended up consuming quite a large amount of stamina for nothing. 

Neither Lin Qingchen nor Lin Qingxue were particularly good swimmers, or they would have dived into the lake in search of her themselves. However, Zhuo Yifeng’s repeated failures implied that she was deep within the lake, in a region which Zhuo Yifeng was unable to reach.

“Brother Zhuo, I think you should stop,” Lin Qingchen advised, after mulling things over for a long moment. “I suspect Sister Ruoyan’s retrieving the beast core from the eight-legged evil spirit right now.”

After the beast had been shot dead by Zhuo Yifeng, they hadn’t had time to retrieve the beast core before its carcass sank back into the lake. The only reason that Yun Ruoyan could have for vanishing was undoubtedly to retrieve the core.

“Have you guys obtained a high-rank beast core?” Suddenly, a female voice emerged from behind the Lin sisters, giving them a big fright. They had been focusing fully on the surface of the lake, and hadn’t even noticed when people appeared from behind!

When Zhuo Yifeng saw strangers approach, he immediately stepped ashore and walked to the Lin sisters’ side. A team of seven or eight were gathered around them, led by a girl clad in red. She was the one who had just spoken.

When Lin Qingchen saw that girl, she recalled Yun Ruoyan vaguely referring to her as Rong Yueshan, the daughter of Rong Tianling. Rong Yuehong’s involvement with Yun Ruoyan and her eventual death had been a rather juicy piece of gossip in the capital. Although neither Lin sister had witnessed the event personally, they had heard about what had happened.

“Who would have thought that you guys would manage to kill a high-rank beast so quickly?” Rong Yueshan’s group encircled the three youths as she walked up to them. 

“Miss Rong,” Lin Qingchen began, “what makes you so certain that we’ve killed a high-rank beast?”

“Oh, don’t hide it!” one of the young masters in Rong Yuehong’s group shouted impolitely. “We all heard that beast’s death wail, or we wouldn’t have run over immediately. Quick, show us the core!”

The youth sounded as though he couldn’t wait to take it from them, causing Lin Qingchen, Lin Qingxue, and Zhuo Yifeng’s hearts to thump.

“What do you mean? Are you trying to steal the fruits of our labor?” Lin Qingxue questioned.

The youth sneered, his intention obvious. Rong Yueshan glanced at the three of them and asked curiously, “Where’s Yun Ruoyan? Why don’t I see her?”

None of the three spoke. Rong Yueshan turned back to Zhuo Yifeng. He was wet all over, and had just emerged from the lake. As a result, Rong Yueshan turned to the lake suspiciously. 

Could Yun Ruoyan still be underwater? 

That wail had clearly marked the death of a high-rank beast, but neither the beast’s carcass nor Yun Ruoyan were anywhere to be seen. The only unusual feature was the lake in front of them, so there could only be one possibility: Yun Ruoyan and the magical beast were both in the lake.

When Zhuo Yifeng and the Lin sisters saw Rong Yueshan turn to the lake, they couldn’t help reaching for the weapons on their body. Yun Ruoyan had to be weakened after fighting with the eight-legged evil spirit. After being underwater for so long, she would certainly be easy to take down as soon as she emerged.

If she were to encounter enemies underwater, it was very likely that she would succumb to them. If Rong Yueshan tried to send some of her group underwater in search of her, they would surely stop them at all costs.

When Rong Yueshan glanced back at their expressions, she became more confident of her conjecture. She stepped forward, and the pale-faced youth followed closely behind her.

“Yueshan,” he called out, his tone intimate.

As Rong Yueshan turned to look at the youth, he continued, “Are you suspecting that the treasure’s underwater? We have a few members who know a water-related cultivation technique, so why don’t we have them dive down and investigate?”

Rong Yueshan grinned as her gaze swept over Zhuo Yifeng and the Lin sisters once more. Although their cultivations were all relatively advanced, her side had the numerical superiority. She wasn’t scared of having a direct confrontation.

“Do you want me to have them dive into the lake?” the youth asked, clearly waiting for Rong Yueshan’s order.

Rong Yueshan was just about to reply in the affirmative when she suddenly noticed another group of people heading over.

“Where’s the eight-legged evil spirit?” Zhao Ming’s loud voice came from afar. He was followed behind by Zhao Xu, the Mo kingdom’s Miss Li, and a group of about seven or eight people, just as many as were in Rong Yueshan’s group.

Zhao Ming’s group consisted mostly of youths from the Chen kingdom, and they had all learned about the terrors of an eight-legged evil spirit from childhood. However, none of them had seen the body of such a beast for themselves. As soon as they heard its death wail, they all ran over curiously.

“What, are you all trying to share in the spoils too?” the pale-faced youth asked directly.

Zhao Ming hesitated momentarily as he glanced at the scene in front of him. There were two teams, one with three people, and the other with eight.

“That three-man party is likely the one that killed the beast,” Zhao Xu murmured softly from behind. Last night, she had seen Yun Ruoyan’s party before departing with Miss Li, so she was quite confident that Yun Ruoyan’s group had killed it. “However, they’re missing a member, and the beast’s carcass is nowhere to be seen.”

“That missing person and the beast’s carcass is likely still underwater,” Zhao Ming surmised.

The eight-legged evil spirit would never leave the water; even if it had been killed, no one would be able to bring its massive, waterlogged body on land. There was only one possibility: someone had dived into the lake to strip its carcass.

And since that person was nowhere to be found, didn’t that mean that everyone still had a chance to obtain the treasure? Zhao Ming had originally only wanted to have a look at the eight-legged evil spirit’s body, but now he had become more ambitious. Why would he leave a treasure uncontested right in front of him?

Without hesitation, he turned toward Zhao Xu. “May I borrow your water-breathing pearl?”

Zhao Xu hesitated for a moment before reacting. “You’re going underwater?”

Zhao Ming nodded. Pursing her lips, Zhao Xu handed over the translucent, pale yellow pearl necklace on her neck. Even in the Chen kingdom, such a pearl was a particularly precious object, one which could only be crafted with the beast core of an aquatic beast more than three centuries old by a ninth-rank blademaster.

The former requirement was hard enough to achieve, and the latter was even rarer. There were quite a few forgemasters on the Chenyuan continent, but only a rare few were sixth-rank or higher. Most such forgemasters were fifth-rank and below.

Zhao Ming thanked Zhao Xu sincerely, and her cheeks took on a faint red tinge. Although they had the same surname and were both from the Chen kingdom, they came from two different families entirely. Zhao Ming had seen the pearl on Zhao Xu’s neck by chance; she blushed because such a pearl could only be used if it was held in the mouth, and to have a perfect stranger suck on an object that had been in her mouth…

“This pearl will only allow you to breathe underwater for an hour,” Zhao Xu added.

Zhao Ming nodded and headed to the lake, where two members of Rong Yueshan’s party who were familiar with water-based cultivation techniques were also preparing to head underwater.

“Brother Zhuo, what do we do?” Lin Qingxue anxiously turned toward Zhuo Yifeng. 

Zhuo Yifeng was already holding his bow in his hand, and his other hand silently crept toward the quiver in Lin Qingxue’s grasp. The quiver was partitioned in two, half for regular arrows, and half for tiger-canine arrows. In order to make a proper showing of force and dissuade the other two parties from proceeding, Zhuo Yifeng had to use a tiger-canine arrow.

Just as he was cocking his bow, the pale-faced youth suddenly exclaimed, “What do you think you’re doing?”

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