Chapter 41: A Test That Shows No Kinship

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Zhou Wangchuan’s brow knitted into a tight knot after hearing the name Bai Yao report, but it quickly relaxed again.

The name was utterly unfamiliar to him.

Especially in the Xu Kingdom, which was built on commerce, royal spies were scattered across every mortal corner, and even the Ji Di was not lacking in intelligence gatherers.

Yet the name Bai Ling had almost never surfaced within the Xu Kingdom.

But soon, the outstanding combat prowess of the young woman named Bai Ling, along with his earlier speculations about her origins, immediately smoothed his brow.

“Miss Bai Ling, we would like to hire you to help transport an… item.”

A smile reasserted itself on Zhou Wangchuan’s face, and his gaze had shifted from scrutiny to appreciation.

“Once the item reaches Tianye City, your compensation will not be lacking.”

“And regardless of your origins or what grave deeds you may have done, you will receive a new identity in Tianye City.”

“Of course, you won’t be the only one hired.”

He had already concluded that someone with such extraordinary skills, who had to sneak into the Xu Kingdom aboard his Zhou family’s merchant ship, would surely value the conditions he was offering.

Most importantly, the aura radiating from the young woman screamed of a ruthless Mo Dao practitioner through and through.

And the Xuan Kingdom, the Xu Kingdom’s most imminent enemy, offered no soil whatsoever for Mo Dao or Xie Xiu to take root.

So no matter where she came from, she most likely wasn’t a spy from the Xuan Kingdom.

That was enough.

“Tempting offer, but allow me to think it over first, how about it?”

“After all, I know nothing about this commission.”

Bai Yao flashed a charming smile.

Though her features were such that a single smile should have toppled cities, in Zhou Wangchuan’s eyes, it carried a somewhat ruthless, indifferent air.

But he didn’t dwell on it.

After exchanging a glance with Chief Escort Lin, he tossed a small jade token toward Bai Yao, inscribed with the ancient character “Ji.”

“Ji? The Xu Kingdom’s royal surname?”

Taking the token, Bai Yao’s gaze sharpened slightly.

She truly hadn’t expected that Zhou Wangchuan, who appeared to be nothing more than a scion of a merchant family, would hand over a jade token carved with the Xu Kingdom’s royal surname as a pledge.

‘Interesting. It both hints at who stands behind him and serves as a test of me.’

‘This Zhou Wangchuan does have some brains after all.’

Seeing Bai Yao accept the token with not a flicker of emotion on her face, Zhou Wangchuan spoke calmly and unhurriedly:

“When you’ve made your decision, miss, know that the roads of the Xu Kingdom are not easy to walk.”

“Tomorrow, present this at the Chenfeng Escort Agency.”

“If you pass the trial, Tianye City will have a place for you.”

With that, Zhou Wangchuan turned and left without looking back, Chief Escort Lin following alongside him.

Bai Yao pinched the warm, smooth jade token, her fingertips tracing the character “Ji” twice.

She paid no mind whatsoever to Zhou Wangchuan’s veiled threat.

That kind of threat only worked on naive young cultivators who had yet to see the world.

But then she froze for a moment, snapping back to reality, and couldn’t help but complain inwardly:

‘Wait a second… I think I am exactly that naive young cultivator who hasn’t seen the world.’

She shook her head in self-deprecation and simply tucked the token into her waist.

She understood perfectly well what Zhou Wangchuan’s true intention was.

He was merely showing off the Xu Kingdom’s reach to bolster confidence in the people he recruited, making them feel the commission’s backer was the Ji royal clan and full of promise.

But Bai Yao wasn’t in a hurry to accept.

Not because she feared this might be a meticulously crafted scapegoat scheme where she’d be used up and discarded…

She looked down at her Storage Pouch, which clinked with only about five hundred low-grade Spirit Crystals.

With that little money, buying enough resources at auction to cultivate herself to the late Hundred Refinements Realm was clearly impossible.

‘To become a Grandmaster of the Hundred Refinements at the pinnacle of the human path… five hundred Spirit Crystals won’t even make a splash, let alone becoming a Thousand-Peak Transcendent Mortal, a Human Immortal.’

Bai Yao sighed.

More than gaining a respectable identity in Tianye City, what she needed now were Spirit Crystals and resources.

She wandered aimlessly, turned a street corner, and looked up to see a sign emblazoned with several gilded characters: “Zhou’s Heavenly Treasures Pawnshop.”

Bai Yao halted mid-step, the corner of her mouth curling upward.

‘Since Zhou Wangchuan wants to test me, why can’t I test the Zhou family right back?’

With a swagger that acknowledged no kin, she strode straight inside.

The shop’s interior was quite imposing.

The sandalwood counter was polished to a gleaming shine, and a faint scent of agarwood drifted through the air, giving off an unmistakably upscale vibe.

The shopkeeper first noticed the strikingly beautiful features of the young woman entering and was stunned for a brief moment.

But immediately after, he sensed that ineffably sinister aura radiating from Bai Yao, and his originally impressed expression instantly fell.

“Shopkeeper, open for business?”

Bai Yao walked up to the counter and tapped her small, jade-like fingertips against the sandalwood surface.

“Miss… what would you like to pawn?”

The shopkeeper instinctively shrank back a little, though his face maintained a facade of calm.

Bai Yao didn’t waste words.

She reached into her Storage Pouch, pulled out a Demon Core the size of a pigeon egg, and slapped it onto the counter.

The Demon Core was perfectly round in color, with a faint luster flowing within, like a miniature star frozen in time, tinged with a pressure that sent chills down one’s spine.

The shopkeeper’s pupils contracted sharply, and his hand trembled.

That was… the Demon Core of a Nascent Formation great demon!

Even in the Ji Di, this was a rare treasure, and judging by its quality and luster, that demon beast was likely only half a step away from taking human form.

“This… where did you get this, miss?”

The shopkeeper’s voice turned raspy, and he swallowed hard.

“Mind your own business.”

Bai Yao tilted her head, her tone as unyielding as the expression on her face.

“Name your price.”

The shopkeeper swallowed his saliva, his gaze darting back and forth between the Demon Core and Bai Yao.

The young woman, though radiating a sinister aura, looked frail and delicate.

Her cultivation… early Hundred Refinements Realm, and with an unstable aura at that.

His mind began to race.

A Nascent Formation great demon was on the same level as a human Thousand-Peak Human Immortal.

There was no way a junior at the Hundred Refinements Realm could have killed one by their own skill, let alone received it as a gift from an elder.

Moreover, the effects of a Demon Core were not something a mortal at the Hundred Refinements Realm could handle, much less would someone gift such a treasure to a junior to pawn off?

That left only one possibility… she stole it.

She was a small cultivator with no backing, trying to fence stolen goods but with nowhere left to turn.

A glint of greed flashed through the shopkeeper’s eyes, but a smile was plastered back onto his face:

“One moment, miss.”

“This Demon Core is of extraordinary quality. Allow me to take a closer look.”

As he spoke, he lowered his head as if examining the Demon Core, but his right hand casually reached into the hidden compartment beneath the counter and tugged at a rope inside.

The motion was so subtle that even with Bai Yao’s keen senses, she would normally have had no chance of detecting it.

However, she was a once-in-a-millennium genius who cultivated Righteous Qi.

Even without the Skylark’s warning, she had sensed the moment the shopkeeper’s murderous intent leaked out.

She shook her head inwardly, a cold laugh echoing in her heart.

‘If the price was just a bit lower, I would have sold it and been done with it.’

‘I’ve got three of these things in my possession anyway.’

She thought this while keeping her expression perfectly still, merely tapping her fingertips lightly against the counter’s edge, producing a rhythmic clicking sound.

Within moments, the front door let out a low creak, then slammed shut with a bang.

The light inside dimmed abruptly as several sets of footsteps converged from all directions, the scraping of weapons being drawn filling the air one after another.

Bai Yao swept her gaze around.

Five people in total, all at the early Hundred Refinements Realm, releasing their auras without the slightest restraint as they sealed off the pawnshop’s main hall, leaving no gaps.

The shopkeeper tore off his false smile completely, taking the Demon Core in hand to toy with it like a prize already in his grasp.

He looked at Bai Yao with contempt in his eyes:

“Little thief, where you stole this Demon Core from, I couldn’t care less.”

“But since you’ve walked right into my hands, don’t expect to walk out alive.”

“Once you’re dead, no one will know which hands that great demon’s core you stole fell into.”

Bai Yao let out a resigned sigh, calmly scanned the five men, then looked at the shopkeeper and shook her head:

“I wonder if Zhou Wangchuan will be magnanimous enough not to hold it against you if you all die.”

“If he doesn’t, then maybe I can still work with him.”

With that said, before the shopkeeper could make sense of what Bai Yao meant, she had already drawn an ordinary Refined Iron Short Sword from her Storage Pouch.

The blade left its sheath with a crisp ring, jarringly sharp within the dim pawnshop.

The shopkeeper’s face changed in an instant.

He was just about to order the attack when he saw Bai Yao not move a single inch, yet the Refined Iron Short Sword in her hand had inexplicably vanished.

“No! A Hands-Free Sword?! How could a Mo Dao practitioner possess such…”

Reflected in the shopkeeper’s pupils was the Sword Light flying straight toward his brow.

He suddenly realized he might have provoked the wrong person.

But it was already too late.