“Brother Ye, I’m afraid I don’t quite understand what you’re saying.” Gou Monan stood by the stone pillar, his sincere gaze showing hints of distress and confusion.
He and Ye Zichen had gotten along swimmingly ever since they met in the outer palace. They’d cooperated even more closely to solve the riddle of the paintings.
It was fair to say that both of their hard work had been needed to get this far.
It was because of their friendship that even after making it inside, Gou Monan chose to wait instead of seek his fortune. He wanted them to go further in together. Who would have thought that when he and Ye Zichen were reunited, Ye Zichen would say something like that?
Gou Monan didn’t know what had happened after he and Gu Luolin entered the secret passage. He didn’t know what Ye Zichen had experienced up there, or why he was suddenly treating him with such enmity!
“Yao Sovereign, at this point, there’s no longer any need to pretend, is there?” Gu Luolin wasn’t particularly heavy, but Ye Zichen only had one arm, so carrying her was rather inconvenient. He smiled at Gou Monan, then turned and leaned Gu Luolin against a pillar. Then, he placed layer after layer of the strongest barriers he could manage.
After taking extensive precautions, Ye Zichen turned back around and discovered that Gou Monan was still standing in place, that he hadn’t taken so much as half a step.
“I gave you the best possible opportunity just now, yet you didn’t go and seize it.”
“Brother Ye, you’d deeply misunderstood me.” Gou Monan shook his head, then smiled bitterly. “I understand.”
“Understand what?”
“It seems the thought of transcendent fortune has your eyes red with greed too, and you want to seize it all for yourself. I thought you were different from the others. To think… Yao Monarch? If I were really the Yao Monarch, why would I even come here? Even without transcending, the Thousand-Faced Yao Monarch’s position is incomparably lofty. The murderous fiend? Me? If I were the Thousand-Faced Yao Monarch, what need would I have to slaughter those people? Surely you don’t think any of them had treasures the Yao Monarch would find worth stealing?”
Gou Monan sighed and shook his head, his eyes filled with disappointment. “Brother Ye, I was really wrong about you.”
Finally, he grimaced and lowered his head. “Brother Ye, since you want all the treasure for yourself, then can I at least ask you to open the door to the secret passage for me? I’ll just leave. Really, Brother Ye. I’ve never been interested in this particular good fortune.”
This seemed like a sincere display of emotion, from the look in his eyes to the changes in his mood, to the flickers of heartrending pain in his expression.
But from beginning to end, Ye Zichen merely maintained an indifferent smile. No matter how Gou Monan tried to cover up the truth, Ye Zichen’s conviction never wavered in the slightest.
When Gou Monan requested to leave, Ye Zichen nodded in delight. “I’m surprised, Yao Monarch. And here I thought you’d say that, while you’d never considered laying your hands on transcendent fortune, considering my greed, you’d have to fight, even if you knew you weren’t my match.”
“I, Gou Monan, know my own limits. Brother Ye, while you aren’t yet a titled emperor, I’ve never underestimated your strength. So many great emperors are willing to subordinate themselves to you and work on your behalf, and moreover, you created the first new Divine Mountain in billions of years. Although I am an imperial king, I know that I am not necessarily your match.”
Gou Monan then said earnestly, “I’m just here because I wanted to become an imperial lord. I certainly don’t want to die here.”
“Well said!” Ye Zichen couldn’t help but applaud, a hint of a smile on his face. “Yao Monarch, if you want to leave, there’s no way I would try and stop you. Please!”
Ye Zichen directly stepped aside, clearing a path onto the staircase. He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes, and his gaze was profound as he pointed to the tunnel.
He gazed indifferently at Gou Monan. Even now, Gou Monan looked disappointed. He walked toward the tunnel without hesitation, and as he drew near, he made no attempt to call upon his spiritual power or the dao.
He really did seem like he was leaving in dejection, but just as he was about to pass by Ye Zichen…
The nails of Gou Monan’s left hand sharpened into claws. His dejection vanished, replaced with an eerie, bloodthirsty grin.
The claws struck without encountering any obstacles, then pierced right through Ye Zichen’s chest.
“Hm?” As Gou Monan ran Ye Zichen through, his expression soured. There was no trace of blood on his claws.
A body double!
The Ye Zichen before him wasn’t the real him at all!
“I already put everything out in the open. Yao Monarch, do you really think I’m so stupid as to just stand there and wait for you to kill me?” Another Ye Zichen appeared beside a stone pillar. He leaned into it and laughed at the Thousand-Faced Yao Monarch, who’d just revealed his true colors.
“Hah…” His first attack missed the mark, but Gou Monan didn’t seem bothered.
He smiled coldly, then strolled leisurely up to Gu Luolin. A long, thin finger tapped the barrier around her. “Brother Ye, you put a lot of work into this, but then, the Gu girl must be quite important to you. But placing her here was a bad move. Brother Ye, surely you don’t think barriers at this level can stop me?”
“There’s no way it’ll hold. I’m barely a ruler, while you’re practically an imperial sovereign.”
“If you knew that, why waste your time on something so superfluous? Do you think that, because of the Gu Family’s background, I wouldn’t dare touch the girl?”
“You’re welcome to try it.” Ye Zichen smiled, not the least bit concerned.
Gou Monan suddenly narrowed his eyes and looked at Gu Luolin. “That one’s a puppet too!”
“Wah, my dear nephew, he isn’t stupid!” Gu Luolin immediately popped out from behind the stone pillar next to Ye Zichen’s. Then, she dashed up to Ye Zichen’s side.
As soon as she appeared, the Gu Luolin within the barriers transformed into a straw doll.
Gou Monan suddenly fell silent. He looked at Ye Zichen and Gu Luolin, but he made no sudden attacks.
More than killing them, he was curious to hear just how he’d been exposed. “You’ve suspected me for quite some time, right?”
If Ye Zichen had only figured out that he was the Thousand-Faced Yao Monarch after clashing with Yuchi Kong and Huangfu Youming, the Gu Luolin he’d carried into the secret passage couldn’t possibly be a puppet.
He could say that with absolute confidence, as he’d been watching Ye Zichen constantly ever since he entered the palace.
He didn’t use spiritual power or his divine sense. Instead, he used his ruler’s domain.
Compared to other rulers, the Thousand-Faced Yao Monarch’s domain was a bit different.
Other people’s domains freed the user from the bounds of Laws while they were in its range. Conversely, the Thousand-Faced Yao Monarch’s domain was like a shadowy net that enveloped its surroundings completely.
When he first broke through and became a ruler, he’d once thought his domain weak and of little use.
But as his cultivation increased, he discovered that his domain was the superior type.
He could use it to kill people without a trace or alerting his targets in the slightest. That was why, to the Thousand-Faced Yao Monarch, his personal strength didn’t actually matter that much. So long as his domain was strong enough, he could kill anyone he wanted.
Ye Zichen had been under his domain’s surveillance this entire time, and he hadn’t used any auxiliary divine artifacts, nor had he given any such artifacts to Gu Luolin.
Thus, it was obvious that Ye Zichen had suspected him for quite some time already.
“I really have suspected you for quite some time.” Ye Zichen didn’t deny it. “To tell the truth, I did trust you for at least part of the journey. Your acting is just too good. Were you born in my era, your practical acting skills might very well have won you an Oscar.”
Gou Monan had no idea what an Oscar was, but then, he didn’t care.
There were just two things he wanted to know now…
“When did you start suspecting me?”
“From the moment you led me into the courtyard where the bloodthirsty fiend’s victim was,” said Ye Zichen.
“That early? Impossible!” Gou Monan shook his head. “We’d only just met then. Even if you were on guard against me, a stranger, you couldn’t possibly have realized it was me that quickly!”
“You’re right.” Ye Zichen nodded. He was naturally on guard against strangers, but accusing someone he’d just met of being the murderous fiend so quickly? That wasn’t a bit much, wasn’t it?
The initial source of Ye Zichen’s suspicion was the patch of trees outside the courtyard.
“Yao Monarch, do you remember the trees beyond the courtyard?”
“Trees?” The Yao monarch frowned. He naturally remembered them, but there shouldn’t have been anything noteworthy about them.
“It seems you remember!” laughed Ye Zichen. “If I’m not remembering wrong, when you first led me there, you said you’d witnessed the murder firsthand.”
“That’s right!”
“At the time, I surveyed the surroundings, and the only place a person could hide was that patch of forest. There was no other space large enough to obscure someone’s entire body.”
“So what?”
“But you also said that you left before the murderer. Tell me, how did you do it? How did you leave the forest and walk out without making any noise?” Ye Zichen laughed. “You might say you’re proficient in the Dao of Darkness and that you can make yourself invisible, but surely the murderer would have noticed had you called upon the Dao? But if you didn’t, wouldn’t the killer hear you? So that’s the first reason I suspected you!”
Gou Monan hadn’t expected such a detailed explanation, but listening to it, it seemed that his earlier story really didn’t quite make sense.
This was only the first reason. He was rather curious to hear Ye Zichen’s second reason.
“When you saw Dahai, you wept!
“That’s right. Brother Ye, are you saying my tears seemed fake?”
“No no no, they were very realistic.” Ye Zichen shook his head. “At least, I couldn’t tell they were fake. But what did you say then? You said that when you left, Dahai was still alive, that is, while you were away, while we were together, the murderous fiend struck again. But when I looked closely, I discovered that although the corpse had been ripped apart, based on how dry the blood was, Dahai had been dead for quite some time. At least, he’d been dead longer than you said he had.”
“I still don’t quite understand,” said Gou Monan.
“Then I’ll put it like this.” Ye Zichen put his arm on his shoulder and looked at Gou Monan. “Dahai’s eyes were wide with shock, but that was the shock of someone seeing a familiar face come at him with a knife. If I’m not mistaken, you killed the real Gou Monan, took on his appearance, then appeared before Dahai, and killed him wearing his friend’s face.”
“Well? Tell me, Yao Monarch, has this junior gotten it right?”
