Seeing Gu Lingzhi get pulled away by Rong Yuan, Tianfeng Jin automatically followed along, giving Ding Rou a slightly smug look.

However, when Tianfeng Jin turned to look at Rong Yuan, she felt like it was getting harder to read his intentions.

Rong Yuan’s initial behaviour had led them to believe that he had been seduced by Ding Rou. However, his behaviour during Su Nian’s attempt to assassinate Gu Lingzhi made it seem like he had never given up on Gu Lingzhi to begin with. Although he still hung out around Ding Rou and treated her adoringly, it seemed as if he was putting on an act. This was the reason why they were willing to let Gu Lingzhi continue being with Rong Yuan and did not try to convince her to leave him.

But if he did not feel that way towards Ding Rou, why didn’t he just make it clear? 

According to Ding Rou, Rong Yuan even had plans to marry her.

What confused them the most was Gu Lingzhi’s attitude. Whenever Ding Rou was around, she would pretend to be jealous and purposely go against her for no reason. However, to those that really knew her, they could tell that Gu Lingzhi was not truly jealous and she was not really neglected by Rong Yuan but seemed to be compromising. All in all, the situation between the two of them was extremely weird…

On Gu Lingzhi’s side, Rong Yuan had dashed and taken the most valuable item, the Earth-Level Spiritual Weapon, for himself. After she was sure that Ding Rou and her brother could not hear them, she lowered her voice, “Will you share the Spiritual Weapon with Ding Wei when you go out?”

Rong Yuan gave her a look that said ‘

are you kidding?’

.

“Why should I give away anything that I have already claimed?” His righteous look seemed as if he had forgotten what he said when he took the weapon.

Gu Lingzhi rolled her eyes and hissed, “Despicable.” However, she fully approved of his answer. Anything that would cause the two siblings to lose out made her feel good.

They were the ones who made use of her and Rong Yuan.

This side palace was not very big. Other than the living room, there were only two back palaces. One was a bedroom while the other looked to be a study room.

Both Gu Lingzhi and Rong Yuan reacted in the same manner. The minute they stepped into the room that was ten meters wide, they rushed to the bookshelf leaning against the wall.

It was a pity that although the bookshelf had a lot of books, they could all be bought in the Tianyuan Continent.

When they paused to think about it, why would the North Qiu Kingdom leave behind anything that was truly useful for them?

Rare books were different from spiritual treasures. No matter how precious the latter was, it could only be used once. On the contrary, rare books could be passed down generations and were useful even for fundamental techniques.

After confirming that there was nothing valuable on the bookshelf, both of them turned their attention to the other things in the room.

From the way the study room was decorated, the person that used to live here must have been a lady.

The study table had intricate flower engravings and on it sat a rabbit-shaped paper weight made of white jade. The owner of the room seemed to have left in a rush and on the table lay a painting and half a drawing. It was of the orchid tree that Gu Lingzhi had been plucking earlier. Numerous colourful flowers dotted a tree branch glittering splendidly. The rising sun peeked out from behind the clouds and shone on the orchids, making the entire painting seem lifelike.

“What a pity,” Gu Lingzhi sighed. If the painting had been finished, it would definitely be an extremely valuable treasure. Unfortunately, as it was only half-finished, it was merely scrap paper. If not, the North Qiu Kingdom would not have left this behind to make it look like no one had been here before.

At this moment, Tianfeng Jin and a few others who were faster, had also reached the study room. Seeing the books on the bookshelf, they similarly rushed forward.

A pity that after roughly browsing through, they returned the books to their original position as they look at Gu Lingzhi and Rong Yuan suspiciously.

“There are only those few books here. We haven’t taken anything,” Gu Lingzhi rushed to defend herself before they could accuse her.

“Hmph, who would believe you if you just say that you didn’t take it? It is obvious that someone has looked through this shelf. Who would put only a few useless books in the room? You all must have hidden them!” a bright-looking young man said.

Someone immediately accused loudly as well, “That’s right, you must have hidden them. The shelf is so big. There must have been quite a few valuable rare books. Are you all trying to take them all for yourselves?”

As the words left his mouth, the ten over people that entered the study room looked at them accusingly.

Yan Liang immediately stood up for Gu Lingzhi, “If Lingzhi says there wasn’t any, then there wasn’t any. Are all of you asking for a fight?”

The group from the Royal School, Yuan Zheng and Wei Hanzi stood in front of the Gu Lingzhi and Rong Yuan, in a position that signalled they were ready to fight.

Just as the energy in the room peaked, Rong Yuan who had been silently searching for treasures around the room spoke. Placing a metal lump that he had found on the small cabinet beside the table into his Storage Ring, he straightened up and looked happily at the group of people. In a mocking tone he said, “Even if we wanted everything for ourselves, what can you all do about it?”

He then emitted Martial Sage spiritual pressure, forcing the few people in front of him to fall to the ground with a

plonk 

as they could not resist his power

. 

One of them was the same rank as Rong Yuan, a Martial Lord. He looked at Rong Yuan in disbelief.

He had known Rong Yuan was powerful, but did not expect him to be so powerful. Even at the same cultivation rank, he was completely powerless.

“You… are greedy to the point that you will not even share a bit with us… you will risk everyone’s fury!”

“If you’re not happy about it, we can have a duel.” The taunting look became more obvious as Rong Yuan’s lips twitched, “Haven’t you already determined that we benefited a lot from this area? If I don’t have the imaginary bookshelf that all of you claim, am I supposed to sit still whilst all of you attack me?”

“This…” The Martial Lord that was under the pressure of Rong Yuan’s power stiffened. Rong Yuan’s words had left him speechless.

It was only an assumption they were making that the two of them had gotten the rare books and had no concrete proof that the bookshelf had indeed contained valuable items. They had jumped to that conclusion as a consolation to themselves for coming up empty-handed. They just did think that Rong Yuan would be so strong and just exert his power on them as he was too lazy to explain.

“What kind of status does Rong Yuan have? Do you think he would lie to all of you over unimportant spiritual treasures?” Ding Rou’s voice suddenly interrupted. The indignance and anger in her eyes had changed into complete trust in Rong Yuan. “I believe Rong Yuan isn’t the kind of person to take everything for himself. If there was anything, he would have left some behind for others.”

Was Rong Yuan that kind of person? Of course not!

It was obvious that Ding Rou did not fully understand Rong Yuan. Rong Yuan had intended to keep the Earth-Level Spiritual Weapon for himself. Every treasure that he laid his eyes on, he did not fail to keep it.

Spiritual Weapons were not like Spirit Plants that could regrow. For these, if he did not take them all, others would take it anyway.

 If he saw treasures and did not take them, wouldn’t there be a problem with him?

But Rong Yuan could not admit to this here and could only follow along with Ding Rou, “Xiao Rou knows me the best. Am I the kind of person to not leave anything for others? Additionally…”

Rong Yuan’s eyebrows knitted together slightly as he did not laugh, “Which Martial Artist would be dumb enough to leave precious rare books on the study table?”

Everyone fell silent for a second after hearing what Rong Yuan said. Someone then laughed heartily. The familiar chuckle came from outside the room, “Haha, what this man says is right! Who would not keep their rare books in their Storage Ring so that they can access it at any time? Why would they place it in something like a bookshelf? Who would rummage through the bookshelf to find the book they need when they are training? It’s not like it’s a hidden shelf.”

The faces of the people that were initially accusing Rong Yuan and Gu Lingzhi became dull. Not only did they not obtain any treasures, they were also mocked by this person. The taunting voice sounded once again, “Well, I guess you guys don’t want to look for treasures. Then I shall quickly go and find some more spiritual treasures for myself.”

Hearing this, it was as if everyone suddenly realised where they were. They dropped their unhappiness and started to rummage through the room as if they were a bunch of bandits.

It was only then did Gu Lingzhi catch a glimpse of the red gown that Xin Yi was wearing. Xin Yi winked mischievously at Gu Lingzhi before turning to leave.

Gu Lingzhi smiled before preparing to continue looking. The half-completed painting on the table suddenly seemed to flash as if something had moved.

How could a painting move?

Gu Lingzhi taught she had seen wrongly as she turned back to examine.

This however, confirmed her suspicions that the painting had indeed moved.

“Lingzhi? What is the matter?” Seeing Gu Lingzhi pause, Rong Yuan asked curiously.

“The painting…” Just as Gu Lingzhi said these two words, she saw Ding Rou heading towards them and stopped talking. She grabbed the table with one hand as if she was tired, “Maybe we walked too fast earlier, I am a little tired. Let me just rest here for a bit.”

Rong Yuan did not believe that Gu Lingzhi was such a delicate person and as he saw Ding Rou heading towards them, he realised that it was something that she probably did not want Ding Rou to know. He added, “Okay, rest here then.”

“Eh? I didn’t think your physical strength would be so weak. You only walked a short distance and you are tired. How will you look for treasures like this? What a pity.” Ding Rou pretended to be concerned but in actual fact, she was mocking Gu Lingzhi.

How could a Peak Level Martial Practitioner be tired after walking for such a short while?

Gu Lingzhi was clearly fine before, but once Gu Lingzhi caught sight of her walking towards them, she started to pretend to be weak. Was she trying to win Rong Yuan’s affection by pretending to be pitiful? How disgusting!

As she thought this, Ding Rou completely forgot about how happy she had felt when she was acting weak previously. She even intentionally emphasised on “look for treasures”, to remind Rong Yuan that they were now outside and everyone was trying to gain as much treasures for themselves as possible. She could not help but think that Gu Lingzhi was an idiot to try to use such a method at a time like this to gain affection from Rong Yuan.

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