Chapter 1078 – Transforming the Devil into a Spirit
"I saw this person at Lord Xu Wuya's side before," Zhou Tingyu said. He had eventually decided to speak the truth after hesitating for a while. "He's one of Lord Xu Wuya's three most trusted lieutenants and has served at his side for many years. He's known as Zhang Wuxin, and we served in the same unit previously."
Zhang Wuxin?
The trusted lieutenant of Xu Wuya, the Dragon Human Race's War God?
Ye Qingyu's expression changed a little.
The answer given to him was beyond his original expectations.
Ye Qingyu recalled that in the memories that the Puppet Bloodworm had collected from Wei Wubing, Zhang Wuxin had taken part in the sneak attack against Ren Puyang. If he was one of Xu Wuya's men, did it mean that the War God of the Dragon Human Race was one of the masterminds behind Ren Puyang's assassination?
"From what you've just told me, this Zhang Wuxin should be with Xu Wuya now, right?" Ye Qingyu questioned Zhou Tingyu further.
Zhou Tingyu did not know why Ye Qingyu was so concerned about this, but continued to reply to him truthfully, "Not exactly. Lord Xu Wuya is fond of giving his men opportunities. As long as they are truly capable, he'll place them in important positions, regardless of their background or race. Take me for example. I was merely an ordinary citizen of the Dragon Human Race and a personal guard of his. His testimonial allowed me to take up the post of commander of the shock troops in Dragon Scale Province. Zhang Wuxin was a valiant officer in the Dragon Teeth Army and was well-liked by our lord. Four years ago, he had already taken control of a province himself, and now he's the highest ranking official in Snow Dragon Province."
"Oh? Snow Dragon Province?" Ye Qingyu replied and nodded slightly.
"Sir, you asked about Zhang Wuxin because…?" Zhou Tingyu asked a little curiously.
Ye Qingyu glanced at him and replied casually, "You'll understand why in the near future."
Zhou Tingyu did not dare to question him further.
"Now that all three regular armies of the Dragon Scale Province are under your control, it shouldn't be a problem for you to suppress the entire province, right?" Ye Qingyu asked.
Zhou Tingyu replied with a serious expression, "Now that you've helped me set the stage, my lord, what's left for me is only to clean things up. If I can't even manage that, I wouldn't have dared to ask you to intervene, my lord," Zhou Tingyu said, his tone revealing his solid self-confidence. He had been the commander of an army once, and he was a strong martial arts expert who began his career at the side of Xu Wuya, the God of War. He could not have gone through all of that without possessing some real skills.
Ye Qingyu nodded and replied, "Fine, I'll be leaving today. Take care of yourself and treat my people well. If I hear that you've been slaughtering them like Xu Xuesheng, I'll hunt you down and slay you, no matter if it's in heaven or hell. Even Xu Wuya himself can't protect you then. Is that clear?"
Zhou Tingyu replied hurriedly, "Rest assured, my lord. I'm willing to swear a martial vow to never kill any human, and that I'll be struck down by heavenly lightning and turned into ash if I do…" He then proceeded to vow solemnly.
Zhou Yuexin was standing in a corner, quietly listening to them speak.
The beautiful, kind, and soldierly maiden of the Dragon Human Race had been very curious about Ye Qingyu since she had met him.
Her lover was a warrior from the Human Race. As such, she had a good impression of Ye Qingyu and did not have a strange feeling of superiority when she was dealing with humans.
"May I know where will you heading next, my lord?" Zhou Yuexin asked as she blinked her large eyes.
"To the Snow Dragon Province to meet Zhang Wuxin," Ye Qingyu replied without any attempt to conceal his intentions. He paused for a while before continuing, "Perhaps, I may even meet up with Xu Wuya, the legend of the Dragon Human Army."
Zhou Yuexin's eyes lit up instantly after hearing him.
"You want to go to where the Dragon Teeth Army is situated? My lord… can you bring me along?" she asked, full of hope.
Her lover, who she had been thinking of every day and night, was in the Dragon Teeth Army.
They had already been separated for quite some time, and Zhou Yuexin was at the age where girls had their first awakening of love. Her heart ached with love, and girls her age would easily give unconditional love to their lovers. How could she not think about him? She wished that she could be with him every day, and she had been wanting to meet him for a long time, but dark times were suddenly upon everyone. Bandits and trouble were everywhere, and countless strongmen had risen. Furthermore, the situation in Hidden Dragon City was unstable and she could not bear to leave her father behind. Even if she did, the journey would be fraught with danger and difficult to complete. However, now that she heard Ye Qingyu wanted to head to the Dragon Teeth Army, she was instantly overjoyed. What obstacle could possibly trouble a peerless martial arts expert like him?
"You?" Ye Qingyu took another look at her.
He was puzzled as to why he kept meeting people who asked to follow by his side ever since he entered the domain of the Dragon Human Race. Before, he had met Hao Jianren, and now, Zhou Yuexin was requesting the same thing.
"I believe that you must have come from a foreign domain, my lord. Regardless of what you hope to achieve by coming into the domain of the Dragon People, you look like it's your first time here. You're unfamiliar with this place, while I grew up here. I've been to all of the major provinces in this domain, and I can be your guide," Zhou Yuexin said, trying hard to convince Ye Qingyu.
Zhou Tingyu thought about something as he heard his daughter speak to Ye Qingyu. "My lord, my daughter is right. She traveled around everywhere in this domain when she was younger and is very familiar with the lay of the land here. If you need a guide, she'll be your best option; she's very knowledgeable."
Ye Qingyu thought about it and nodded, "Alright."
He was planning to look for Zhang Wuxin and the other nobles of the Dragon Human Race, and he knew that he would set off alarm bells by trying to force his way to them. Even if he managed to slay Zhang Wuxin, what if the others managed to hide themselves? After all, Zhang Wuxin could not have been the only murderer who schemed to assassinate Ren Puyang. Zhou Yuexin was familiar with the geography and happenings in the Dragon People Domain, and she was friendly toward humans. As such, she would definitely qualify as a guide.
As for Hao Jianren, there would be no need to bring him along.
"This is great," Zhou Yuexin said, overjoyed.
"I'll go prepare and come back shortly," the maiden said excitedly as she turned to leave and pack up.
Zhou Tingyu was standing beside them, and he seemed to have stopped himself from speaking a few times. Even until now, he did not know what Ye Qingyu's true identity was.
Human martial arts experts of such a level would definitely not remain unknown in the Vast Thousand Domains. He had tried to guess Ye Qingyu's true identity in private before to no avail. No one would have been able to connect such a gentle and noble looking young man to the legendary bloodthirsty Insane Devil Ye. Furthermore, there were many rumors about him in the domain of the Dragon Human Race, but most of them were not true. Many of them described Ye Qingyu as a giant with three heads and six arms…
That said, Zhou Tingyu did not dare to clarify his doubts.
The respect he had for Ye Qingyu was indeed extreme.
Zhou Yuexin returned very quickly after packing up her belongings. She had changed into a snowy white set of warrior's clothes and carried a sword on her back; her getup was exactly like that of a sword-carrying maid. She looked extremely cute and as elegant as icy snow. She hopped over to Ye Qingyu and said happily, "From today on, I'm your sword attendant, sir."
Ye Qingyu smiled.
Both of them left Hidden Dragon City.
One day later, in Snow Dragon City, the provincial capital of Snow Dragon Province—
Compared to the chaos and carnage in Hidden Dragon City, this place looked much more prosperous. People weaved in and out of the streets in an orderly fashion, and evidently, the majority of them were from the Dragon Human Race. There were also many people from different races, but humans were still at the bottom of society here. This was especially true during the past year, where there were rumors that Ye Qingyu, the insane devil of the Heaven Wasteland Domain, had killed the old emperor of the Dragon Human Race. As such, a hatred of humans pervaded the air of the entire Dragon People Domain.
The architecture of the Dragon People was similar to that of humans, but it was slightly wider and taller in comparison.
The streets were filled with people.
Countless gazes fell on Ye Qingyu and Zhou Yuexin.
"She's simply too beautiful. How could such an outstanding beauty be just a sword attendant?" lamented everyone who laid eyes on her. There was a saying about how filial piety would amplify a woman's beauty, and Zhou Yuexin's beauty was further accentuated by her unique white warrior's garb. She looked like a fairy who had descended from the heavens, and many Dragon People gazed at her in amazement.
Some of them frowned and observed, "How could such a shining pearl of our race be subservient to a human? She seems to be his maid, and that's a huge disgrace."
Many people had noticed that Ye Qingyu was walking in front of Zhou Yuexin, and that she was only carrying a sword and following behind him.
Evidently, it seemed that this weak-looking, young human male in white was the sword-carrying maiden's master, and it was completely unacceptable to them.
"Humans are low-class peasants in the domain of the Dragon People. This human brat doesn't have any yuan qi surrounding him and is merely trash that doesn't know any martial arts. What right does he have to own a sword attendant that is a peerless maiden of the Dragon People? What position is he in to do that? When did our kind allow such a piece of human trash to climb on top of our heads?"
"No matter who or what he is, we can't possibly swallow this."
"That's right. I'm deadly certain that he's forcing this otherworldly dragon maiden to serve him."
"I want to take action and save her."
A few young warriors of the Dragon Human Race felt their emotions stir as they watched the two strangers, and felt that this was their chance to save a damsel in distress. They rubbed their palms in excitement and tried to achieve their goals.
However, just as they were about to strike, their vision blurred and both the human and dragon maiden in white disappeared.
What just happened?
Could we have just seen ghosts?
The young martial artists rubbed their eyes in disbelief. There was a considerable number of them, and it was not possible that all of them had been hallucinating at the same time.
At the same time, at the end of the street—
"Sir, those people were simply too rude. Why don't I teach those impudent fellows a lesson?" Zhou Yuexin asked. She was brimming with anger and evidently displeased with the rudeness that her own people had displayed.
Ye Qingyu smiled. "Let's attend to the more important matters at hand."
He did not want to cause any unwanted trouble, and the current situation in the domain of the Dragon People had caused the relationship between the Dragon People and humans to be very tense. It could not be resolved by genocide, and it had to be dealt with slowly in the future. Now, he had to find Zhang Wuxin first to uncover the truth behind Ren Puyang's assassination. First, it was Wei Wubing, and now Zhang Wuxin. Even though they were people of different status, the roles they played were rather similar. It gave Ye Qingyu a vague feeling that Ren Puyang's death was not as simple as it seemed.
Thirty minutes later—
Both of them appeared before the gates of the lord of the city.
It was the residence of Zhang Wuxin, the ruler of Snow Dragon Province.
"I'll go announce our arrival," said Zhou Yuexin.
Ye Qingyu shook his head and unleashed his divine sense for a brief moment. "No need for that, we'll head directly in."
There was a brief flash of light and they disappeared from the gates of the mansion without drawing anyone's attention.
Inside a secret chamber—
A burly youth of the Dragon Human Race was training hard in isolation.
Immense primal draconic energy circled around his body, and it seemed as though red snowflakes were floating in the air. He was practicing the supreme technique of the Ice Division of his people—the [True Vitality of the Snow Dragon]. His mastery of the technique was already at the Sage level, and he was a martial expert who had few peers in the Saint realm.
This youth of the Dragon People was Zhang Wuxin.
After he arrived in Snow Dragon City to report for duty, he had spent a large amount of money to hire countless numbers of craftsmen from the Dragon Human Race to build the secret chamber. It was meant for him to train in privacy, and it was the place in the entire Snow Dragon Province with the heaviest security presence. Many arrays with different functions were set up within it, and they could be used to accomplish different tasks.
He gradually cooled down after channeling his qi for thirty-six cycles.
"The [True Vitality of the Snow Dragon] is indeed one of the supreme techniques of our kind. It's really profound, and if I can completely master it, perhaps I can transform into a divine spirit and remove all of the demon qi in me. Even peak-level Great Saints will not be able to detect my true identity then, even if I'm not wearing the [Demon Suppressing Talisman]. During that time…"
He broke into a smile gradually and opened his eyes.
What he saw caused the hairs on his back to stand on end. He was extremely shocked and channeled his power instinctively. Powerful primal draconic energy was unleashed, and he leaped backward in a flash, thereby creating some distance between himself and the intruders. He stared at them as if he had just seen ghosts and began speaking in a voice hoarse from shock and anger, "Who are… you two? How did you enter?"
He was extremely surprised to see two strangers appear in his secret chamber without any warning.
One of them was a human youth in white robes. He looked as brittle and exquisite as jade.
The other was a beautiful maiden of the Dragon Human Race, and she was carrying a sword on her back.
How could this be?
He was extremely certain about the tight security of this secret chamber, so how did these two people enter?
Zhang Wuxin could vaguely sense that something was not quite right.
"You transformed from a demon into a spirit? So that's why… Seems like I didn't guess wrong; both Wei Wubing and you are of the same kind," the human in white, Ye Qingyu, said. He took a good measure of Zhang Wuxin before continuing, "How many accomplices do you have hidden within the Vast Thousand Domains?"
