86: Chapter 86: Praying Sparrows Form a Game, Golden Cicadas Shed Their Shells

In the Outer City of Yunze Immortal City, within the shantytown for Loose Cultivators.

The pungent smell of swill mixed with the scorched odor of inferior Medicinal Pills in the narrow alleyway. On the flagstones flowing with sewage, two extremely stealthy shadows were darting rapidly.

Lu Yuan, an elite scout of the Blood Fiend Sect, was tightly tracking the aura of the burly Body Cultivator ahead.

"This savage really knows how to pick a spot, specifically drilling into this kind of quagmire where Spiritual Qi is chaotic and Divine Sense is easily interfered with." A cold, sharp glint flashed in Lu Yuan's eyes. Deacon Leng Wuhen had given the order: better to kill an innocent than to let one slip away.

Just as Lu Yuan prepared to summon his Magical Artifact to forcibly intercept and kill the burly Body Cultivator before a dead-end alley.

Clang!

An extremely faint sound of something breaking through the air struck from the side. Lu Yuan's figure came to a sudden halt as a dark blue poisonous needle, as thin as a cow's hair, grazed his nose tip and nailed into the wall, instantly corroding a small black spot onto the bluestone brick.

"A secret guard from Wandu Pavilion?"

Lu Yuan's gaze narrowed as he turned to look at a dilapidated rooftop ten zhang away. There, Feng Mo, a secret guard of Wandu Pavilion, was staring at him coldly, holding a second poisonous needle in his hand.

"This person is an honored guest of our Wandu Pavilion; the Blood Fiend Sect's hand stretches too far." Feng Mo's voice was hoarse. Steward Yan had ordered them to find out the background of this savage; they absolutely could not let the Blood Fiend Sect cut in and snatch the prize first.

"An honored guest? I think you mean a fat sheep. Let's see who has the skill!" Lu Yuan sneered, already gripping a blood-colored Talisman in his hand.

The lackeys of two major Sect forces, in this filthy alleyway, found themselves in a brief yet deadly standoff over the same prey.

However, merely three breaths later.

Lu Yuan and Feng Mo's expressions changed simultaneously.

"The aura... has disappeared?!"

The two could no longer bother with the standoff and rushed into the dead-end alley ahead almost at the same time.

The end of the alley was completely empty.

There was only a wide, coarse hemp garment hanging casually on a dead wooden stake. The clothing still retained a trace of intense blood-energy fluctuation that had been left there extremely deliberately.

The prey, within those three breaths where they were wary of each other, had vanished as if into thin air, completely escaping the trap.

"We've been played!" Lu Yuan's face turned livid, and he smashed the wooden stake to pieces with a palm strike.

Two streets away.

A middle-aged scholar wearing a grey Confucian robe, with a pale complexion and coughing softly from time to time, was mingling in the crowded flow of Loose Cultivators, walking unhurriedly towards the direction of the Inner City.

The mana fluctuations on his body were extremely stable, at Qi Refining Level 7. The unique, upright, and peaceful aura of the Wood-element Cultivation Technique, Longevity Art, disguised him as the most ordinary, down-and-out Spell Cultivator.

This person was none other than Gu Shen.

"Master, those two heat sources erupted into a brief conflict in the shantytown dead-end alley; currently, they have lost our tracking trajectory."

The Crab, which had been in a silent, standalone state, reported this in an extremely faint voice in Gu Shen's ear before going dormant again.

"Two biting dogs, just right for tripping each other up."

Gu Shen sneered in his heart. The moment he stepped into the dead-end alley, he had taken off his outer garment to leave behind the blood-energy, while simultaneously activating Thousand Faces to completely exchange the burly Body Cultivator's skin for that of this sickly scholar. Afterwards, he restrained his Physical Body's blood-energy, emitted Wood-element mana, and walked out from a side path openly and brazenly.

Having shaken off his tails, Gu Shen did not linger on the street. He walked straight into a noisy tavern called Zui Xian Ju and sat down in an inconspicuous spot in the corner of the main hall.

"Waiter, a pot of Green Leaf Spirit Tea."

Gu Shen tossed out a Low-Grade Spirit Stone.

"Coming right up! Please wait a moment, patron!" The waiter nimbly collected the Spirit Stone and served the hot tea.

Gu Shen picked up the teacup, seemingly resting his eyes, but in reality, his Qi Refining Level 7 Divine Sense spread out like a fine spiderweb, silently and without being noticed by other Cultivators, capturing the gossip of the various types of people in the tavern.

Opportunity never grows legs and runs to your door; one must peel back the layers in the chaotic flow of information.

Half an hour later.

A few Middle Stage Qi Refining Cultivators at the neighboring table, speaking in hushed tones, caught Gu Shen's attention.

"Have you heard? At the Blood River Dark Assembly in half a month, among the grand finale auction items, there is actually a scroll of an ancient Legacy!"

"Pfft, an ancient Legacy? Are there few pieces of junk these days that use the ancient banner? Where did it come from?"

"This time it's real! It's said to be from the remaining lineage of Qianji Pavilion, brought out by that destitute Puppeteer He Zichuan. He owes a huge usurious loan to the Black Water Gang in the Inner City and is truly at his wit's end; he has no choice but to take the Incomplete Manual of 'Soul-Pulling Threads' passed down by his ancestors to the Dark Assembly to mortgage and auction!"

"Puppeteer He Zichuan? That madman who lives in Willow Lane in the Outer City and spends all day tinkering with broken wooden Puppets?"

"That's him. I heard that the Incomplete Manual contains extremely profound thread-control secret techniques. It's a pity, though; once such a precious treasure appears in the world, even if Puppeteer He Zichuan pays off his debt, he won't be able to walk out of Yunze Immortal City alive for the rest of his life."

The discussion at the neighboring table gradually shifted to other gossip.

Gu Shen slowly opened his eyes, drained the slightly cool Spirit Tea in his cup, and a sharp glint flashed in his deep eyes.

"Puppeteer He Zichuan. The remaining lineage of Qianji Pavilion."

So, the seller of that Incomplete Manual of 'Soul-Pulling Threads' was not some mysterious, high-and-mighty great expert, but a down-and-out Loose Cultivator forced into a desperate situation.

"Since the owner of the goods is right here in the Outer City, why must I go to the auction table of the Blood River Dark Assembly and compete in financial resources against those old Foundation Establishment monsters and Sect forces?"

Gu Shen stood up and smoothed out his grey Confucian robe.

In the Cultivation World, any deal that can be settled in a dark alley should never be taken to an auction platform.

"Willow Lane in the Outer City."

Gu Shen silently recited this location in his heart. Like an ordinary, down-and-out scholar, he walked slowly out of the Zui Xian Ju tavern and merged into the dark, turbulent night of the Immortal City.