Great Li Martial God

Murong Xiaoya had absolutely no guard up against the little girl. She froze briefly in surprise, then looked down to see the cup falling toward the ground.

The cup, however, never reached the floor. At the midpoint of its fall, an invisible force wrapped around it, and it hung suspended in the air without moving.

”Don’t be naughty.”

The old man in hemp said gently to the little girl in pink. The cup that had been hanging still slowly floated up and came to rest on the table in front of Murong Xiaoya, and not a single drop of the wine inside had spilled.

The little girl in pink turned to look at the old man, who only gave a gentle shake of his head.

Murong Xiaoya’s brow furrowed slightly, and she glanced at the old man in hemp, then looked back at the cup on the table before her, a flicker of puzzlement crossing her face.

Before she had even had time to react, however, a hand suddenly reached in from the side, picked up the cup in front of her, and drained it in one go.

Murong Xiaoya turned to look, and saw Li Musheng give a thoroughly satisfied nod, then glance at her and say, ”Good wine. If Miss Murong doesn’t even want this, frankly speaking, that is being just a touch too picky.”

Hearing this, Murong Xiaoya’s eyelid twitched. She very much wanted to say that she had never said anything of the sort, but could not bring herself to say it aloud, and could only look away with a flushed face and let the matter drop.

At this point, the little girl in pink suddenly turned her head, saw that Li Musheng had grabbed Murong Xiaoya’s wine and drunk it himself, and her dark eyes rolled with a glitter of amusement. Then she broke into a happy, smiling expression and went back to gnawing at the roasted squab in her hand.Hu Rui’an had caught the moment when the old man in hemp made his move, and something about it struck him as slightly peculiar. Even so, he had other things on his mind at that moment and did not give it further thought.

Before long, the entire jar of Linglu wine had been finished off by those at the table. Wu Shang and Cheng Zhong were both lovers of good wine, and both felt more than a little reluctant to see it end.

But the Linglu wine was rare to begin with, unique to Zhanliu Manor, and unobtainable outside no matter how much money one had. They could only rein in the craving in their bellies and not allow themselves to dream of having more.

Li Musheng, though he had found the wine excellent, was not a man addicted to drink. Gone was gone. He simply smacked his lips with mild contentment and continued watching the little girl’s live eating show with idle amusement.

Faced with Li Musheng’s gaze, the little girl in pink pursed her lips, munching away at the roasted squab while muttering under her breath, ”Bad people get bad endings.”

Li Musheng gave a light laugh, entirely unbothered.

After everyone had eaten and drunk their fill, the duel on the platform in the middle of the lake was still going on without resolution.

Li Musheng overheard the martial world practitioners at the neighboring table discussing how several of the most promising contenders had yet to compete. Even so, he had no interest in staying any longer.

With the meal done and the sky growing dark, he returned to the courtyard the manor had arranged with Hu Rui’an and the others to rest.

Once darkness had fully settled in, Hu Rui’an gathered Wu Shang and the others in Li Musheng’s room and said, ”Your Highness, the powerfully built man standing beside Shen Liancheng today was an elder of Falling God Peak. Shen Liancheng clearly has deep ties to both Falling God Peak and the Sheng Province garrison.”

”With that in mind, I intend to conduct a covert search of Zhanliu Manor tonight and look into whatever may be hidden here, and whether it poses any threat to our Tianjin Guards’ plan to exterminate Falling God Peak.”

Hearing this, Wu Shang and Cheng Zhong naturally had no objection, and even expressed genuine admiration for Hu Rui’an’s foresight in deciding to come to Zhanliu Manor in the first place.

Whether the benefit of drinking the Linglu wine had factored into that feeling, only they themselves could know.

As for Hu Rui’an’s proposal, Li Musheng simply waved a hand and left him to decide for himself.

Even so, the glance he directed at Hu Rui’an was more than a little meaningful.

Li Musheng knew that Hu Rui’an’s real purpose in coming to Zhanliu Manor was something else entirely, and had absolutely nothing to do with the high-sounding reasons he had stated on the surface.

Or rather, the so-called investigation was only one of his purposes, and there was a more important one he was keeping concealed.

As far as Li Musheng was concerned, as long as Hu Rui’an was ready to set out when the time came, whatever else the man wanted to do was his own business and not worth worrying about.

Having obtained Li Musheng’s approval, Hu Rui’an arranged for Wu Shang and the others to remain behind and protect Li Musheng and Murong Xiaoya.

Then he set himself in motion, quietly leaped over the courtyard wall, and disappeared swiftly and silently into the night.

The night was overcast, and the moonlight was dim and hazy.

Roughly an hour passed, and Wu Shang and Cheng Zhong, standing guard in the courtyard, began to feel their eyelids growing heavy, perhaps due to the wine taking effect.

At first, the two of them managed to hold on by exerting themselves and circulating their True Qi to push back the drowsiness.

But very quickly, the pull of sleep became harder and harder to resist, and they began growing increasingly foggy-headed, with a dizzying, floating sensation.

In the end, neither of them could hold out any longer, and they shook their heads and muttered, ”That wine really hits hard. Brother Cao, keep watch for a while.”

With that, the two of them keeled over and fell fast asleep.

Cao Gaoshan, watching this, felt a faint sense that something was not right. He furrowed his brow, leaped up onto the rooftop of the courtyard building, and swept a gaze around the surrounding area through the darkness.

Even so, he noticed nothing out of the ordinary, and had no choice but to come back down into the courtyard.

He then crouched down beside the two of them to check on their condition.

But at that moment, Cao Gaoshan suddenly found that no matter how he called out to them, neither could be woken.

His expression changed sharply. Yet after carefully examining both of them, beyond catching a faint scent of wine on them, he could detect no other irregularity.

Knowing that the current situation was highly abnormal, Cao Gaoshan turned to go to the room in the courtyard to find Li Musheng.

But at that moment, he suddenly felt his own consciousness beginning to blur, and an overwhelming desire to sleep came over him with startling speed. Even as he sensed something was wrong and tried with everything he had to fight it off, it was utterly useless.

In the end, Cao Gaoshan’s eyes rolled back, and following in Wu Shang and Cheng Zhong’s footsteps, he collapsed stiff as a plank into the courtyard.

Before long, several figures stepped out of the darkness not far from the courtyard.

Five of them were dressed in dark night-traveling garb. At their head was a man with cold, sinister eyes whose hands were encased in silver wire gloves that gleamed with a chilling, crystalline light in the dim moonlight.

The remaining figure was none other than the Zhanliu Manor steward, who stood beside the sinister man with a bow and said, ”Hall Master Jing may rest easy. Whether they drank the wine or not, simply breathing in the wine’s aroma was enough to plant the ’Drunken Immortal’s Death’ toxin within their bodies.”

As he spoke, he pointed toward a slender, upright ”Moonlit Purple Orchid” growing in the courtyard, saying, ”Once they additionally breathe in the fragrance of this purple orchid, it gradually triggers the toxin that has taken root inside them. Any who fall under this poison will find it deepening with time, and even a Heaven-Human expert will be unable to resist it.”

Hearing this, the sinister man Jing Chengluo gave a slight nod and said, ”Well done. Anyone who moves against our Alliance Under Heaven, no matter how far they flee to the ends of the earth, will never escape from our grasp.”