Chapter 8: The Trap

Pei Ling dropped to his knees without the slightest hesitation, and only then did Pei Xuan finally let out a breath of relief.

At that moment, a voice came from the quiet cultivation chamber, cold and laced with a trace of irritation. "What is it?"

"Answering Fairy Li," Pei Xuan said hurriedly. "We know the fairy is here in secluded cultivation, and we would not dare disturb you lightly. But my nephew Pei Ling has just returned from Yuanlao Mountain. He says he found traces of Wu Tingxi, and fearing we might alarm the snake, he did not send a family signal. We originally thought Friend Zheng was in the estate..."

"Wu Tingxi?" Before he could finish, the chamber door suddenly opened without a sound, and a figure shot out in an instant. She wore a black dress and dark shoes, with a veiled hat covering her head. Black gauze hung from the brim all around, matching the skirt and falling straight down over her chest, leaving her face completely hidden.

The moment she appeared, Pei Xuan lowered his eyes at once, fixing his gaze on his nose and his nose on his heart, not daring the slightest disrespect.

Pei Ling was a step slower. In that fleeting glimpse, he could only tell that the woman had a graceful figure, especially a waist so slim it seemed he could almost encircle it with one hand. Yet the aura around her was extremely sharp, like a famed sword just drawn from its scabbard, its edge pressing down with suffocating force.

Fairy Li extended a hand in a beckoning motion. Along with the crisp ring of wind chimes, both Pei family uncle and nephew felt their minds go hazy. By the time they came to themselves, the skull-shaped wind chime was already hanging at her waist, and her veiled hat had tilted slightly. Fairy Li turned her head and asked, "Where is he?"

Pei Xuan looked at Pei Ling. Pei Ling steadied himself, tightened his grip on the pill in his hand, and said in a low voice, "Answering the fairy, Wu Tingxi is already dead."

"What?" Pei Xuan was shocked.

Fairy Li did not seem to care. "Where is the cultivation method?"

"Outside the city," Pei Ling said. He felt that the fairy's presence was far beyond Zheng Jingshan's. At the very least, when he had seen Zheng Jingshan in the main hall of the Pei estate, the other man had been lofty enough, but he had not given him any particularly special feeling.

But now, even through the veil, he could feel Fairy Li's gaze like lightning. When it swept over him, it was as if some utterly terrifying thing had locked onto him, and the hair on the back of his neck stood on end.

He swallowed hard and forced himself to stay calm. "By chance, I encountered Wu Tingxi in a cave. At the time he was already critically injured and on the verge of death. After a desperate fight, I killed him. I originally intended to take all his belongings and return to report, but I was worried they might be lost on the way, so I hid everything outside the city."

Fairy Li gave no clear response. "What do you want?"

Pei Xuan stood behind her. The moment Pei Ling admitted to killing Wu Tingxi, he was already drenched in sweat. Hearing this now, however, he quietly relaxed a little and kept signaling with his eyes for Pei Ling to speak on behalf of the family.

But Pei Ling had risked his life to come back for himself. How could he possibly care about that?

He ignored Pei Xuan and said solemnly, "I beg the fairy to save my life!"

"Save your life?" Fairy Li looked him over, then said casually, "Wu Tingxi's Five Poison Finger is indeed not something your cultivation level can withstand."

She casually tossed over a jade bottle. "There are three antidote pills inside. Take them all and sit in meditation for a moment."

"As for the Beauty-Bone Rakshasa Diagram..." the fairy said coolly, "once I retrieve the jade slip and confirm it is correct, I will naturally speak to Zheng Jingshan, that waste, on your behalf!"

Pei Ling caught the jade bottle, and before she even finished speaking he tipped the pills into his mouth in one go. Feeling the poison that had already spread to his left shoulder truly begin to stall, his heart finally settled. He hurriedly said, "Thank you, Fairy Li! The jade slip is beneath a small hill outside the city. There is a marker there: three locust trees forming a triangular pattern."

After saying that, his hand hidden in his sleeve clenched tightly around the pill. He held his breath and focused all his attention.

Upon hearing this, Fairy Li did not even look at him again. With a sweep of her sleeve, and amid the crisp ring of wind chimes, she vanished in an instant.

"..." Pei Ling wiped away a cold sweat, still shaken. The pressure this Fairy Li gave him was far too great.

Although Wu Tingxi's final attitude had suggested that the pill in his hand was likely some kind of trump card, after facing Fairy Li in person, he had no confidence at all that it could threaten her.

Fortunately, although this fairy was cold and proud, she had no intention of crossing the river and burning the bridge.

That was the outcome he had hoped for most before coming back.

Now that he thought about it, it was the best possible result among all the bad ones.

"Pei Ling, what do you think you're doing?!" Seeing that Fairy Li had left, Pei Xuan also relaxed a little, then immediately darkened his face and barked, "A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity like this, and you don't think of the family at all, only yourself? Don't forget that it was the Pei family who raised and nurtured you all these years!"

Although Pei Ling had swallowed the antidote pills, the gaze from the surrounding void still clung to him like a maggot on bone, growing only more intense. How could he possibly have the mind to waste words with the family head?

He said, "Yes, nephew always remembers the Pei family's kindness, which is why I was afraid of dying young and being unable to continue serving the family in the future. Please rest assured, Family Head. When Fairy Li comes back and removes the Beauty-Bone Rakshasa Diagram for me, I will say a few good words for the family."

With that, he cupped his hands toward the family head, turned, and left.

When he hurried back to his own quarters, his face was already deathly pale and he was swaying on his feet. Forcing himself to hold on, he shut the door, and Pei Ling felt as if even his thoughts were growing sluggish.

"No!" He bit hard on the tip of his tongue, forcing himself to stay awake, and thought, "At this rate, I probably won't even last until Fairy Li brings back the cultivation jade slip."

For now, there was only one thing he could do, just as before: let the system cultivate for him!

The problem was, he no longer dared try the one-click auto-manage function for the Bone Tempering Art.

Who knew whether this time the system would control his body to steal from Zheng Jingshan or Fairy Li?

Both of them were going to return to the Biwu Courtyard later. If they caught him red-handed, having stolen from their rooms and still brazenly cultivating, the outcome would be easy to imagine.

"System, I want to cultivate!" In the midst of his anxiety, Pei Ling suddenly remembered that he was not limited to the Bone Tempering Art now.

He quickly called out in his mind, "Select the nameless cultivation method, then choose [Temporary Cultivation: Smart Duration] and [One-Click Auto-Manage]!"

"Ding dong!" The system sprang into operation. "The Smart Cultivation System is at your service! One-click auto-manage, intelligent upgrade! Starting auto-managed cultivation now. Friendly reminder: during cultivation, the host will lose control of the body, so please do not panic..."

The instant his body was taken over by the system, the gaze of the Beauty-Bone Rakshasa Diagram quickly faded.

Pei Ling secretly breathed a sigh of relief, then nervously watched the system's movements.

He saw the system arrange his body into a posture completely different from the Bone Tempering Art, while the spiritual power in his dantian began to circulate in an entirely new way.

As cultivation progressed, the medicinal power of the antidote pills he had taken earlier began to take effect. Pei Ling could clearly feel the poison in his left shoulder starting to recede, and sensation gradually returning...

At the same time, outside Luquan City, on the small hill beside the three locust trees Pei Ling had mentioned, Fairy Li successfully found the jade slip containing Wu Tingxi's cultivation method.

Along with the jade slip were a few miscellaneous items, but she did not even spare them a glance. "Although Luo Qiao is only at the lower grade of core formation, he has still been in the Nascent Core stage for many years. He would not easily misjudge something. Since this Secret Canon of the Six Desires could make him risk switching to another path of cultivation, it must have something remarkable about it."

After murmuring to herself, Fairy Li pressed the jade slip to her forehead with great anticipation.

But the moment the jade slip touched her skin, it suddenly burst forth with a streak of icy light.

Whoosh!

Fairy Li reacted swiftly and immediately tossed the jade slip away, but no matter how fast she was, the icy light still struck her sea of consciousness like lightning, hitting with irresistible force!