"Then where is this rogue cultivator?" Xia Mu’s expression turned ugly, yet he didn’t really believe that Ceng Houyi would do something like this.
Rhodes sighed, "This story originated from a hotel. There was simply too many people in the hotel then, and everyone knew this story, but no one took note of who started spreading it."
At this point, Rhodes paused for a moment, "Young Master, I heard from Shaoyi that Rogue Cultivator 2705’s talent for cultivation is very poor. For a person without talent in Transcending Mortality Stage to actually defeat Shaoyi who’s Rank 1 on the Mortal Board, he must have a big secret about him. If Elder Ceng could sense his secret, it would be hard to know if such an incident might occur."
Gu Shaoyin suddenly came to a realisation. Thankfully he had left early, otherwise, he might have been silenced for good.
In his mind, Xia Mu began to believe Rhodes’s words, and upon observing this, Rhodes carried on, embellishing the story further, "Rogue Cultivator 2705’s contribution points have been this high, and he holds the top rank on the rankings, so why wouldn’t he show himself for such a high profile incident? I believe that this guy is afraid that his secret would get exposed. Hence, if it weren’t for Cen Shuyin, we wouldn’t have been able to locate him."
The hatred in Xia Mu’s heart grew. Ceng Houyi was a part of his Xia Clan, but he actually got some funny ideas after a treasure was presented before him which ultimately led to the killing of Rogue Cultivator 2705 while the treasure remained out of Xia Clan’s hands. Instead, the Xia Clan was exposed. This was simply unforgivable.
"Forget it, let’s prepare to climb the Heaven Seeking Staircase, then return to Zhen Mo Continent." The expression on Xia Mu’s face changed multiple times, and in the end he could only sigh.
Ceng Houyi was at a half step to Worldly Immortal King, and after he defected away, there was no one on Xia Mu’s side that could restrain him. Even though Defender Xu could kill Ceng Houyi in seconds, he was a Worldly Immortal King, and was not a retainer of the Xia Clan, so there was no way for Xia Mu to use him. If it were for official work, perhaps Defender Xu would take actions to help him. However, this was personal business, hence Defender Xu might not even bother with him. It was better that he didn’t go to try his luck.
As for Ceng Houyi being killed by others, he never thought this would be possible. How many people on the Lost Continent were there that would be capable of killing Ceng Houyi? If there were such experts, why wouldn’t they have emerged when the Hundred Sect Alliance was about to be destroyed?
At that moment, Mo Wuji was on the way towards Yu Lin Lei Clan. He believed that no matter how much trust Xia Mu had in Ceng Houyi, some doubts about Ceng Houyi’s disappearance would still exist, because there was no one on the Lost Continent that could be a match for him. The strength of the white moustached fisherman was something that even the Heaven Seeking Palace did not know about.
The only thing that puzzled Mo Wuji was that, with the strength that the white moustached fisherman possessed, could it be that he was really a Worldly Immortal King?
Wasn’t it very difficult to even enter the True God Stage in the Lost Continent? So how could there by Worldly Immortal Kings?
The Heaven Seeking Palace’s Heaven Seeking Staircase came to mind, and Mo Wuji thought that if something like that existed, why couldn’t there be a Worldly Immortal King? Maybe he had come from another place.
Luckily Cen Shuyin was brought away by this old moustached elder, as Mo Wuji hoped that the elder would be able to save her life. No matter what, once he finished building up Tian Ji Sect, he would go back to Heaven Seeking Palace to find out how Cen Shuyin was.
Yu Lin.
This was an area that was neither a state nor a prefecture. Even though Yu Lin was at the intersection of Xing Han Empire and Tian Shang Empire, it did not fall under the jurisdiction of either empire.
There was a large clan here: the Yu Lin Lei Clan.
The Lei Clan’s history was went even further back than some of the ancient clans around. Back in ancient times, the Lei Clan was one of the top clans which had a large number of True God Stage experts.
Only in the recent years did the Lei Clan begin to decline. Even so, the Lei Clan remained as the greatest Earth sect.
As the number of genius disciples in the Lei Clan grew, there was hope for it to return to the ranks of Heaven sects in the future.
In the area of Yu Lin, the Lei Clan was the law. Whatever the law dictated, everyone in Yu Lin would have to follow.
No one dared to fight against the Lei Clan, not even some Earth sects.
As a result, out of all clans, the Lei Clan’s cultivators were the strongest in battle strength in a particular cultivation level. This was due to their inherited lightning attribute spiritual roots, which meant that one would be a top notch expert if it appeared, with no equal in the same cultivation level.
The surname of the Lei Clan [1] had arose from their lightning attribute spiritual roots, and it was so until today.
Li Yi was a small town at the borders of Yu Lin district, and because the Yu Lin Lei Clan was so strong, this small town had always flourished. Other than Lei Clan disciples, almost no horse bandits and cultivators dared to make a ruckus here.
Changing his appearance into that of a regular middle aged rogue cultivator, Mo Wuji entered Li Yi Town. Inside, there seemed to be barely any indications of the alien cultivators’ invasion.
Mo Wuji walked into a hotel, and casually ordered a jug of wine in its first floor’s hall. He originally planned to ask the helpers around here for some information, but heard two men at one side discussing about Lei Hongji. But unfortunately, those two men changed their topic of conversation after a few sentences.
With that, Mo Wuji gave up asking the helpers for information, instead bringing his wine jug to the table of the two men, bowing respectfully, "My two friends, if you don’t mind, I’ll be paying for this round of wine."
The two of them were complete strangers to Mo Wuji, and upon hearing what he had said, they stared at him in surprise. Treating other people to wine was naturally okay, but there had to be a reason behind it right?
"Both of you need not think so much, because Lei Clan’s Senior Lei Hongji is my favourite genius. To think that Senior Lei Hongji had become a top notch lightning attribute cultivator as such a young age. There aren’t many that can match up to him in the Lost Continent. I believe that Senior Lei Hongji enrollment in the Great Evolution Sect allowed him to add on to the glory of the sect, instead of the other way around. That’s right, I heard both of you say that Senior Lei Hongji had passed the selection and is really going to the Zhen Mo Continent?" Mo Wuji made it as though as he was on the same frequency as them, speaking incessantly after sitting down. These two cultivators that were discussing about Lei Hongji were immediately stunned after hearing Mo Wuji’s words. In a place like Yu Lin, Lei Clan’s Lei Hongji had an unimaginably large number of fans.
The slightly fat cultivator clapped his hands together, "My friend, you’re spot on. Lei Hongji passed the three rounds and is one of the geniuses that can go to Zhen Mo Continent. I also heard from others that once the Worldly Immortal King from Zhen Mo Continent found out that Senior Lei had supreme lightning attribute spiritual roots, he was even praised for it. The Worldly Immortal King said that for this level of spiritual roots, even without the selection, he would qualify to go to Zhen Mo Continent."
"That’s great!" Mo Wuji clapped his hands together, just like the slightly fat cultivator, and exclaimed. But after that, he spoke in a low voice, "It’s a pity that I didn’t manage to go to Yan City Plaza, otherwise, I could see Senior Lei’s glory and gracefulness. I imagine it would have been very sexy [2]."
The two men did not know what sexy meant, but they could infer that it was a term of praise. The other fairer cultivator nodded his head in agreement, "My friend, you’re right, but there are many people going to Heaven Seeking Palace now, and Senior Lei went there as well. If you head to Heaven Seeking Palace, you might have the chance to see Senior Lei from a distance."
"Why are they going to Heaven Seeking Palace?" Mo Wuji was shocked, and quickly asked. He wanted to find out about the Lei Clan, but in the end he discovered that everyone was going to Heaven Seeking Palace. Could his sabotage have failed?
The fair cultivator chuckled, "It seems like you really don’t know yet. The Zhen Mo Continent’s Star King Mountain’s special envoy has always revered Heaven Seeking Palace’s Heaven Seeking Staircase, so he went to climb it to see if he could get ranked first. At the same time, all the geniuses heading to Zhen Mo Continent also have to climb the Heaven Seeking Staircase once. From this they will determine everyone’s potential for growth. Since Senior Lei was in the top 100 for the competition, he naturally has to go to Heaven Seeking Palace too."
Hearing that it was about the Heaven Seeking Staircase allowed Mo Wuji to heave a sigh of relief, and he asked while slightly confused, "Then are all the Lei Clan experts going to Heaven Seeking Palace?"
The slightly fat cultivator shook his head, "It’s the complete opposite, all Lei Clan experts are not going."
"Why? Lei Hongji is the number one genius of Lei Clan after all, so why isn’t there anyone going. They seem to be making light of the situation." An angry expression appeared on Mo Wuji’s face as he spoke passionately.
The slightly fat cultivator simply laughed, "My friend, you’re a very emotional person, so let me tell you the truth. The third day of next month is Lei Clan’s ancestors’ memorial day. All Lei Clan disciples have to come back to burn incense and pray."
Hearing this, Mo Wuji was extremely elated. Even the heavens wanted to destroy the Lei Clan, as such a good opportunity had been delivered to his doorstep.
"Then is Lei Hongji coming back too?" Mo Wuji asked naively.
To that, the slightly fat cultivator responded, "He originally was coming back, but after the Zhen Mo Continent’s special envoy said that the 100 chosen disciples cannot leave their group, and once they do, it would be considered as backing out. Hence the Lei Clan’s Clan Head could only allow Lei Hongji to not return for the time being, and follow the Zhen Mo Continent group to climb the Heaven Seeking Staircase."
"I heard that the Lei Clan’s Clan Head is at Great Circle of Nihility God Stage. Not sure if that’s true or not." Mo Wuji randomly spouted.
"Haha, you’re wrong about this. I heard that the Lei Clan’s Clan Head is at Nihility God Stage Level 3. The real Great Circle of Nihility God Stage cultivator is the Lei Clan’s First Elder, Lei Guang." The slightly fat cultivator giggled, as he was satisfied that he could educate Mo Wuji.
"Haha...It seems like I’ve been focusing too much on Lei Hongji, so I didn’t take note of other things. Come, let’s drink." After speaking, Mo Wuji took the cup before him and downed all of its contents.
The other to men also resonated with Mo Wuji’s forthright attitude, and emptied their cups too.
Heaven Seeking Palace regained its past glory and liveliness, and the Heaven Seeking Staircase was more congested than ever. Many people had rushed over from Yan City Plaza just to watch the Lost Continent experts climb the Heaven Seeking Staircase. Moreover, everyone also heard that the Zhen Mo Continent’s special envoy was taking part in the climb too.
Hence for these few days, Heaven Seeking Palace was open to the public. Anyone could enter as they pleased, and go to the plaza in front of Heaven Seeking Staircase. Of course, they could only go to the Heaven Seeking Staircase’s plaza, and nowhere else.
The rankings in front of Heaven Seeking Staircase was covered with a piece of red cloth, waiting for the Zhen Mo Continent’s special envoy to officially declare the commencement of the climb.
Standing on the Heaven Seeking Staircase’s plaza, Xia Mu looked up at the Heaven Seeking Staircase whose top could not be seen. A sense of excitement and pride welled up inside him. He had to climb to the top of Heaven Seeking Staircase, and carve his name as the eternal Rank 1 on the Heaven Seeking Staircase rankings, which would make all the Lost Continent’s future geniuses think of him, Xia Mu, whenever they come here in the future.
"Take off the red cloth, unveil the Heaven Seeking Board." Xia Mu waved his hand. The setback from a few days ago had already been forgotten by him.
A strong gust of wind blew the red cloth away, and after the rankings was revealed, the crowd was shocked.
[1] We translated Lei as lightning.
[2] The raw for sexy is 拉风, which is sort of slang so the two men don’t know about it.