Chapter 621 - 267: People from Tianshui
Chapter 621: Chapter 267: People from Tianshui
"This matter concerns a secret of your Celestial Prison Island. Are you sure you want to know?"
Li Cheng was baffled. ’A secret of my Celestial Prison Island? How could we, the people of the island, not know, while you, the Demon Evil God of the Eastern Domain, do?’
But he had already used up every ounce of courage he possessed to ask that question. At this moment, he didn’t dare to speak again.
Xia Weiyuan frowned slightly.
"Is it something bad?"
"That’s for you, a disciple of Celestial Prison Island, to judge for yourself. It makes no difference to me."
As Fang Shuwen spoke, he glanced at Liu Chuanzong again, unable to make up his mind.
’Celestial Prison Island has some influence in the East Sea. It wouldn’t be bad if I could make use of it... The problem is, I don’t know if the Trapped Dragon Order that old man gave me is actually useful.’
’What if they had an agreement beforehand that anyone who dared to use the Trapped Dragon Order was to be killed on sight?’
’That would put me in a rather passive position.’
Thinking of this, he sighed.
"Forget it. It’s too much trouble."
The others didn’t understand what he meant by that and were about to ask.
Then they saw him grab Liu Chuanzong by the neck. With a SNAP...
"He... he... he killed him!?"
Li Cheng was already terrified of him to the extreme. He stumbled backward again and again. If not for the vast ocean behind him, he might have jumped right in.
Xia Weiyuan gave Fang Shuwen a complicated look.
"You just killed him like that? Why did he kill all those people?"
Fang Shuwen searched Liu Chuanzong’s body but found nothing useful. He dragged the corpse to the side of the ship and, with a flick of his hand, tossed it into the sea.
Li Cheng stared blankly as his Elder sank into the water, speechless for a long moment.
Fang Shuwen said to Xia Weiyuan,
"That old man was his master. Liu Chuanzong was practicing his *Clouded Leopard Book*, which contains the ’Dragon Combat Chapter.’ It requires one to nurture the technique with battle, killing people to raise one’s Cultivation.
"That’s why the people on the previous boat died.
"It’s also how Gongyang Shang died.
"He was no saint... Hmm, you should go explain it to your junior brother."
Xia Weiyuan was taken aback.
"I didn’t think you’d be concerned about him."
"Hm?"
Fang Shuwen thought for a moment and said,
"I don’t like killing people."
"?"
Xia Weiyuan felt his words were some kind of joke, but when she really thought about it, a chill ran down her spine.
If Li Cheng came to resent Fang Shuwen over this and, feeling that as a member of Celestial Prison Island he needed to avenge his Elder, decided to foolishly pick a fight with Fang Shuwen, then Fang Shuwen would surely kill him.
Or, if he did something detrimental to Fang Shuwen because of this, the result would still be a one-way ticket to death.
When Fang Shuwen said he didn’t like killing people, he meant he didn’t *want* to kill Li Cheng. By asking her to explain, he was giving Li Cheng a chance.
Understanding this, she immediately went to Li Cheng’s side and explained what had happened.
Li Cheng was shocked and doubtful as he listened, but at least he was no longer in a daze.
As someone from Celestial Prison Island, he did possess some basic judgment.
So Li Cheng didn’t doubt Xia Weiyuan’s words, he was just a little lost. After she finished speaking, he asked in a low voice,
"Senior Sister Xia, what secret about our Celestial Prison Island do you think he knows?
"If even Elder Liu could do something like this, then the other Elders..."
Xia Weiyuan frowned.
"Don’t jump to conclusions without any proof."
Li Cheng nodded at her words but then sighed.
"If we make it back to the sect alive, how are we supposed to explain this?"
At the mention of that, Xia Weiyuan also felt a bit dazed.
She seemed calm about Elder Liu’s matter, but in truth, it had stirred great turmoil within her heart.
’If Liu Chuanzong, one of the twelve Elders of Celestial Prison Island, could do such a thing, what were the others like?’
’Was Celestial Prison Island really what she had always believed it to be?’
’If the other Elders were like Liu Chuanzong, did they know what he was doing?’
’With Liu Chuanzong dead, and with Li Cheng and I on Fang Shuwen’s ship, how will the other Elders view this? How will they treat the two of us?’
In the past, these thoughts would have never occurred to her... but now, they were popping into her head one after another.
Seeing the distressed look on her junior brother’s face, Xia Weiyuan sighed.
"We’ll worry about that later..."
Li Cheng was silent for a moment, then nodded.
He turned to glance in Fang Shuwen’s direction, but the deck was empty.
Only Zuo Xuan was still at the helm.
Fang Shuwen was already gone...
...
...
Fang Shuwen returned to his room.
He took out a brush, ink, paper, and an inkstone, and wrote down the *Clouded Leopard Book*.
After reading it over carefully a few times, he suddenly scoffed and casually marked several places with his brush.
The passages he marked were the kind that seemed fine at first glance, but if one were to cultivate according to the manual, they would inevitably cause one’s Inner Strength to clash.
Although the effect wouldn’t be large—during cultivation, one might only feel their True Qi stagnate for a moment before pushing through—
in reality, the hidden dangers the old man had left in this manual were far from limited to just these few spots.
Over time, it would likely cause immeasurable damage to one’s meridians.
’You old bastard. You really had a few tricks up your sleeve for me.’
Fang Shuwen sighed. These old veterans who had roamed the Jianghu for years were truly not so easily fooled.
If that old man hadn’t been in such a tearing hurry to teach him the *Clouded Leopard Book*, Fang Shuwen might have actually believed him...