Chapter 828: After Working So Hard

The crown prince’s side was furious when they saw that the barbarians were trying to steal away the Jade Moon Serpent.

“You bastard, we were the ones who killed the Jade Moon Serpent! Why should we give it to you?”

“If you have the skill, why don’t you hunt one yourself!?”

“We worked hard to kill it, yet you guys came over to steal the fruit of our efforts! Do you all have no sense of shame?”

…

Bi Linglong’s face darkened when she heard her subordinates’ curses. The Serpent’s tendons were supposed to serve as proof of its defeat; how could they possibly give them to anyone else?

Meng Pan exclaimed coldly, “These barbarians think they can do whatever they want! If they don’t listen, just kill them all.”

Zhao Xi’s fists clenched so tightly they cracked. “I was already pissed off that we had to fight a ninth ranked Jade Moon Serpent. I can just use these barbarians to vent my anger.”

Zu An arrived at Bi Linglong’s side and said, “Be careful. I feel like something’s not right.”

“What is it?” Bi Linglong asked. She didn’t dare ignore any of Zu An’s opinions now.

Zu An said with a frown, “I feel like these barbarians aren’t as simple as they seem.”

Bi Linglong also became quiet. So many of the academy’s students had come into the dungeon over the years, yet no one had ever discovered any barbarians before. Their appearance was indeed quite strange.

But she hadn’t felt too much suspicion at first, because the dungeon was quite big, so the academy hadn’t completely explored it. It wasn’t entirely impossible for barbarians to appear here.

After all, the human race didn’t know too much about dungeons. They only knew that these places that seemed to come out of nowhere were full of mysteries and dangers. They had no idea how they formed.

Suddenly, Liu Xian took a few steps forward to size up the barbarian leader. He suddenly laughed out loud and said, “Isn’t this King Qi Manor’s Guardian Wei? When did you become a barbarian?”

The others’ expressions changed when they heard those words. Bi Linglong suddenly looked toward the barbarians. This was actually someone from King Qi Manor?

King Qi Manor had many powerful cultivators under its network. They had five great guardians: Lu Xiao, Wei Pingyang, He Li, Mu Ping, as well as Han Fengqiu whom Zu An was familiar with.

Han Fengqiu was ranked fourth out of the five guardians. Even the worst of these nine individuals was at the mid stage of the ninth rank. Lu Xiao was even at the mid stage of the master rank!

The ‘Guardian Wei’ Liu Xian spoke of was probably Wei Pingyang, ranked number two. He was at the initial stage of the master rank!

Zu An was quite shocked. How had King Qi Manor sent one of their men in? Were the people from the crown prince’s faction who were watching the entrance of the dungeon blind?

The expression of the barbarian leader changed. “What guardian? I have no idea what you’re saying. This serpent corpse is ours! You’d all better scram!”

Liu Xian laughed out loud. “Who are you trying to fool? The two of us even made a trip to Heavenly Abode together back in the day. I let that Lady Xiang I wanted go with you out of respect for your cultivation, but look at you pretending you don’t know me now!”

Zu An was speechless. This fella might not be so great at anything else, but he really is a master at whoring.

Bi Linglong’s expression changed greatly as she exclaimed, “This is bad!”

The ‘barbarian leader’ threw away his previous crude accent and spoke normally. “I didn’t want to expose my identity before for fear of any of you getting away and telling the outside world. You would’ve had your prey mysteriously stolen by barbarians, resulting in the failure of the exam, but at least you would all live. We didn’t want to take the risk of silencing everyone, because isn’t it fine for all of us to be alive and well? But since a fool like you insisted on exposing me, there’s no other choice. All of you will die here!”

As soon as he finished speaking, more of his subordinates who were dressed similarly emerged from the woods. All of them had blades in their hands, their eyes flickering with light. They were clearly all high level cultivators.

Zhao Xi and Meng Pan glared angrily at Liu Xian. They really were going to die because of this idiot! However, they soon realized that King Qi’s side didn’t want to go all the way either, and their job was just to ruin their mission. They didn’t want to take the risk of incurring the wrath of the emperor.

But now that they had been exposed by Liu Xian, they had no choice but to silence everyone here. Otherwise, with so many eyes watching, they wouldn’t be able to cover this up. The emperor would have a proper reason to go after King Qi then.

After all, Guardian Wei was at the master rank! Furthermore, his subordinates didn’t look weak either. The group couldn’t defeat these people even if they were at their prime, let alone right now after they had just fought against the Jade Moon Serpent and were severely wounded.

Bi Linglong was comparatively more composed. She did her best to calm herself down. She raised her head proudly toward the enemy leader and asked, “How did you all enter the dungeon? There’s no way the emperor or my father would have let you all in.”

That was also what everyone present was confused about. Zu An remembered the Gu clan brothers’ ‘curse’ before they died. Back then, they had just thought that was just their resentment before death, but it seemed as if King Qi really did have more cards to play after all. But the key was, how had these people gotten in? This didn’t make any sense!

Guardian Wei laughed and said, “Indeed, with all of you guarding the entrance, there would be no way for us to get in. But just because we couldn’t have entered at this time doesn’t mean we couldn’t have entered at any other time!”

Bi Linglong was shocked and blurted out, “Then three years ago, you…”

“Correct!” Wei Pingyang stroked his beard. “Three years ago when the academy dungeon opened, King Qi found a way to bring us in. That time didn’t involve the crown prince’s great exam, so the examination wasn’t as strict. Do you know how we spent these years? We only had beasts to keep us company day after day, and we almost went mad. Fortunately, you guys finally arrived, ha ha ha!”

Zu An was stupefied. King Qi really was a deeply scheming man; he had actually planned for this three years ago! King Qi Manor had looked like it was at a disadvantage, but perhaps they had looked weak on purpose precisely for the emperor to agree to this great exam! What a crafty old bastard!

When Zu An realized that this was the type of person he had offended, a chill ran down his back. It was probably only because most of King Qi’s attention was on the emperor and crown prince that he hadn’t gone after Zu An yet. Once this test was over, things would become really troublesome once King Qi really decided to target him.

Zu An couldn’t help but look down on the emperor. Was having the title of ‘world’s number one’ behind him really all that? The emperor was completely being toyed with in the palm of King Qi’s hand.

Judging from King Qi’s schemes, he was clearly someone who planned things far in advance. Who knew just how many traps he had lying in wait? Comparatively speaking, the emperor was vastly inferior. Ever since they had entered the dungeon, their group had been led around by the nose the entire time.

If not for me, the Gu clan brothers and Shi Tong alone would’ve already been enough to wipe out the entire group.

Wait… The emperor didn’t do absolutely nothing. I guess he sent a golden token envoy like me inside to protect the crown prince and princess.

Originally, his cultivation would already have been enough to settle this situation. But the emperor hadn’t expected King Qi to have planned this far ahead either, to have actually arranged for these experts to come in three years ago.

Bi Linglong said in a clear voice, “Wei Pingyang, you have quite the nerve. Do you think his majesty won’t be able to find out what happened just because you killed our people here? All things will inevitably leave behind a trail.”

The others felt admiration. No wonder she was the crown princess chosen by his majesty! The natural presence she possessed was definitely not something a normal girl could compare to.

Whether it was when they had faced the ninth ranked Jade Moon Serpent or now, when she was facing a master rank expert, she had always remained the calmest and bravest out of all of them, silently granting everyone courage.

Wei Pingyang laughed and said, “Crown princess, there’s no need for you to scare me. Why would King Qi not know about this? All those here with me are warriors who were recorded to have died in battle over the years. They’re people who shouldn’t exist anymore. How will his majesty find out then?”

Bi Linglong frowned. King Qi really was thorough! Who knew how many years of preparation this kind of thing had taken? She looked at him coldly. “They might not exist in the records anymore, but what about you? There’s no way you can just be ‘missing’ or dead, right?”

Wei Pingyang’s smile faded. “That’s not something you need to worry about. Once I kill all of you, naturally, no one will know about my existence anymore.”

] Pika’s ThoughtsThe beginning of this chapter is recapping previous events in more detail, which is why it seems to repeat the end of the previous chapter.