The Path of the Martial Arts BOSS

As Xuanzhen began his seclusion, a covert villa outside Divine Capital saw the silent entry of a female crown, who never emerged again.

On the villa's pavilion, Qingyu's former body appeared, silently gazing into the distance with eyes that sought to pierce through space, observing the movements of the Sect Leader of Zhenwu Sect.

"Let's see how far you can go, Xuan Chen."

Inside the villa, there was also a "Xuanzhen" in seclusion, a facade and a testing ground.

Qingyu wanted to see how far those watching Xuanzhen would go. Would they find their way to the villa to attack, or discover the true location of Xuanzhen?

If it was the former, it meant the ones watching Xuanzhen hadn't investigated deeply enough; if the latter, Qingyu might need to be more cautious of the Shadow King.

The first suspect in Qingyu's mind regarding this level of secrecy was Shadow Pavilion. If so, the Shadow King might have to be truly listed as an enemy.

.........

In a civilian house within Divine Capital, three corpses lay on the ground, their faces contorted, appearing to have died after intense torture.

Not far from the bodies, a man in his thirties dressed like an ordinary citizen knelt on the ground, his head grasped by a somewhat emaciated large hand.

Zhang Xuanji's Divine Sense swept through the man's brain, digging out all his memories.

Unfortunately, these Shadow Pavilion spies had undergone special soul-searching resistance training and had mental restrictions planted in their minds. Despite Zhang Xuanji's formidable strength, he was somewhat helpless against these restrictions.

In the end, he scraped together only bits of information.

But even these scraps made him smile.

"After soul-searching over twenty people, I've finally located Tan Wuyan."

Zhang Xuanji turned to the silent young man with blood-red hair and said, "Your master mentioned wanting to deal with Tan Wuyan himself. Is it time to inform him?"

Tan Wuyan was not weak and had dealings with the Blood Demon Sect. Who knew if there were high-level Blood Demon Sect experts with him? Although Zhang Xuanji considered himself exceptional, he thought it wiser to involve Qingyu for safety.

With a warrior from the Divinity Realm present, what would it matter if there were experts from the Blood Demon Sect? They would all perish.

However, Blood Bat No.1 had a different opinion, "The Mirror Master is arranging plans; rashly disturbing him would surely reflect poorly on us as subordinates.

First confirm whether Tan Wuyan is indeed at the location you found, and then decide how to kill him."

Zhang Xuanji pondered and agreed that hastily summoning Qingyu was indeed reckless. If the information in the spy's brain was deliberately left by Tan Wuyan to mislead them, that would be offending Qingyu.

Having Qingyu take action only to come up empty-handed would be embarrassing for both parties.

Yet, sending Zhang Xuanji to investigate also seemed a bit much for him. He had often ambushed people in his early years, but those were all crude tactics, hardly comparable to Shadow Pavilion's.

If he wasn't careful and disturbed the target, the efforts of the past few days would be wasted.

Blood Bat No.1 clearly saw Zhang Xuanji's dilemma and said, "In terms of stealth, even Blood Robe Building is no match for Shadow Pavilion, given our shallow foundations. That's why I've found someone more professional."

He stepped out of the civilian house, looking toward the ordinary man who had arrived at some unknown time, "The assassins of Doomed Hall indeed live up to their reputation."

If it hadn't been for Blood Bat No.1's appointment with this man to come here a quarter of an hour earlier today, he wouldn't have known someone had arrived outside.

"Doomed Hall's Jue Si," the ordinary man gave a brief introduction.

'Jue Si...' A hint of surprise flashed through Blood Bat No.1's mind.

Initially, the Mirror Master had instructed Blood Robe Building to pay attention to the well-being of the three True Pill Realm experts who had destroyed Vajra Temple.

Gongshan Xiao from Purgatory Peak had his head twisted off in Ling Province by Ban Xiang, scattered to the winds.

Duan Yuanming of the Demon Sword Dao burned his essence blood and, using a Forbidden Technique of the Demon Sword Dao for a final blaze of glory, also died at the hands of Ban Xiang from Vajra Temple.

Only Jue Si had not been found. Even with Ban Xiang's extensive search for Jue Si and the Hidden Mirror Man throughout the world, their whereabouts remained elusive.

'The Mirror Master's guess was right; Doomed Hall indeed possesses secret techniques to hide their tracks,' Blood Bat No.1 thought to himself.

Such techniques, which even Xinyuan couldn't trace, justified Doomed Hall's many years of active presence in worldly society.

Assassins operate in the shadows; once exposed, all their enemies would come knocking. Though assassins are but tools, who has ever seen the avenger let go of the tool that is the assassin?

Even if it was just a tool, the avenger would melt down the knife to accompany the deceased.

So it's said, without some skills, Doomed Hall would've been destroyed many years ago. There are not many masters of Heavenly Mechanism in the world, but neither are they few; every era has a few such individuals.

Doomed Hall's secret techniques might not be as thorough as Qingyu's Nihility Magic Mirror, which indeed hides the Heavenly Mechanism itself; but the versatility of these secret techniques far surpasses that of the Nihility Magic Mirror.

After all, there is only one Nihility Magic Mirror, but secret techniques can be cultivated by anyone.

Collecting his thoughts, Blood Bat No.1 said, "The portrait has already been given to you before, within Shuxi Prefecture. No problems in tracking the person in the portrait, right?"

"Of course no problem," Jue Si smiled and said, "Being hired to find someone for the price of an assassination, such work is most welcome to us."

"Then it's in your hands."

Jue Si nodded lightly, then stepped around the corner outside the civilian house and his trace vanished.

.........

In a dark secret chamber, the Array Plate rotated slightly, but the figure that appeared was not the person in black luxury garb from last time, instead a scholar-like, refined gentleman.

At that moment, the refined gentleman respectfully said to the shadow in the secret chamber, "My lord, I have found that Xuanzhen is very likely in a villa outside Divine Capital. What are your orders now?"

"How could you discover Xuanzhen's whereabouts in such a short time and not doubt its authenticity?" the shadow rebuked.

"But my lord," the scholar said, "our spies found that Qingyu has stayed at that villa for many days. If Xuanzhen is not in seclusion there, wouldn't that mean there's no protector?"

The person shrouded in shadow silently contemplated, weighing the truthfulness of this information.

After a few moments, as if he had realized something, a chilling smile emerged on his lips, "Keep a close watch on that villa. In three days, someone will assist you."

"Yes."

Dispersing the image with a wave of his hand, he said with a smile, "Qingyu, oh Qingyu, I don't care whether you're being deceitful or not, killing you will greatly decrease the threat posed by Xuanzhen. Be it you or Xuanzhen, there's no difference—you're both on my hit list."

"Those few favors should be put to good use soon."