I Am Your Natural Enemy

Chapter 569: Chapter 226: Awareness, Offending Too Many People (5k)

When Wen Yan heard this, he more or less understood part of what Cai Heizi was up to.

The fewer the restrictions, oftentimes, the more invisible restrictions there actually are.

Wen Yan didn’t know if there was anyone here who actually wanted to make trouble.

If he were the one looking to stir things up, his first reaction right now would be: should I leave, or not?

Only three people can get the reward.

Or maybe, only one.

Cai Heizi only said any one item would fulfill the requirement; he never said a single person couldn’t take all three things, and he sure didn’t say you couldn’t snatch them from others.

Plus, this place is already locked down. Who knows what sort of methods were used on the exits and entrances—the rules for coming and going have all changed.

Cai Heizi’s way of totally ignoring convention and acting so brazenly probably left everyone a little stunned.

If you want the benefits, you have to stick your neck out; if you don’t want to stand out, then you get nothing.

No matter what you do, during this whole process, Cai Qidong can observe a lot.

Wen Yan glanced around. Most of the people here were young—some looked only seventeen or eighteen, while the oldest looked at most forty.

And the ones who looked forty, like Qin Kun, were clearly just here to watch the show.

After a brief silence, people began quietly slipping out of the shabby hall, heading off elsewhere.

After all, this was just the entrance to this domain, at best.

People slowly drifted off in all directions, some already grouping up in twos and threes as they left.

When everyone finally dispersed, only Wen Yan, Qin Kun, a martial artist, and a Taoist were left in the original spot.

Aside from Cai Qidong, Wen Yan hadn’t seen any other Scorching Sun Department staffers again.

Thinking back, when he first arrived, there’d been a few, but after Cai Qidong came out and gave his little speech, the contestants left, and those staff members vanished too.

Wen Yan actually couldn’t remember where those staffers went, or even how they disappeared.

He glanced at the others; seeing that no one else seemed to react, he kept quiet too.

”Junior Brother Wen, let me introduce you to the others.”

Qin Kun led him over, giving a cupped-fist salute to the martial artist and the Taoist.

”This is my junior from Fuyu—his name’s Wen Yan.”

”Wen Yan from Virtue City, I’ve heard of you.” The martial artist speaking looked over forty, wasn’t tall, and was lean, but his spirit was strong—his eyes sharp, his spine relaxed yet straight.

”This is Luo Liang from Chan City, Master Luo. His skill in the Martial Path is deep, and the Luo Family’s Martial Arts Hall is famous—many of their disciples work in the Scorching Sun Department.”

Wen Yan cupped his hands politely.

”A pleasure, a pleasure.”

”Don’t listen to your senior sing my praises,” Luo Liang laughed, self-deprecating. ”My skills are average. Most of my students end up acting in TV dramas—not many are actually any good. Just one or two, really.”

Everyone chuckled and exchanged pleasantries, and Qin Kun then introduced Wen Yan to the Taoist.

The Taoist was dressed simply, just a plain indigo Taoist robe, and wore thick glasses—the edges of the lenses alone had to be at least a thousand degrees nearsighted, for sure...

”This here is Daoist Master He Yunzi from Mount Luofu, a real expert from the Inner Pill Sect.”

”Greetings, Daoist Master.” Wen Yan respectfully greeted him as well.

Luofu is a famous mountain in Nanwu County, known for its Inner Pill Sect experts, though it’s not counted among the Three Mountains and Five Ridges, since Luofu doesn’t meet the criteria to independently impart talismans.

Wen Yan had heard before that Luofu is a bit like Mount Zhongnan; there’s actually more than one Taoist temple there.

The difference is, over at Mount Luofu, all the temples are pretty much the same—and all belong to the Inner Pill Sect.

But at Mount Zhongnan, lots of Taoists go there for secluded cultivation, with plenty of small temples too. But the one and only to truly represent Zhongnan is the Quanzhen Major Sect, so people usually just refer to it as Zhongnan for short.

Wen Yan was very polite to the two, since by rights, he counted as their junior.

Plus, Wen Yan had heard that Luo Family’s Martial Arts Hall and the various temples on Mount Luofu really did have plenty of disciples working in the Nanwu County Scorching Sun Department—even if none were true standouts yet, those people made up the main force among the field agents.

Normally, when running into ghosts or demons—not the really wild cases—the most common types of incidents were always handled by these people. They were really the most overworked field hands.

The stuff Wen Yan encountered was trouble stacked on trouble, but in terms of sheer numbers, he probably only saw a fraction of what these guys did all year.

After a round of small talk, the two excused themselves to ”go take a look around” and left.

Qin Kun picked a direction too—he was just here to supervise, in case things got out of hand and needed someone to step in and, ideally, keep anybody from dying.

Three people, three directions—just right.

In the end, only Wen Yan was left. He grabbed a chair and sat next to Cai Qidong.

”Minister, what kind of game are you playing here? You don’t seem worried at all. Are you not even a bit scared you’ll wind up trapped here for good? Or worried that messing around like this could actually get someone killed?”

Cai Qidong took a sip of cold tea from his thermos, eyeing Wen Yan like he’d spotted some rare kind of fool.

”I thought you, at least, weren’t naïve like all the other melon peels. Didn’t expect you’d ask something like that, too.

Since when is struggle ever bloodless?