Five Immortal Sects

Chapter 41: Searching for the trace

Views:

Advisor Ji has now arrived outside Qingshanai City. He is galloping in the pitch-black night, and his face is even darker than the night.

He had just explored the secret passage in the Marshal's Mansion garden, but also found nothing. He then turned back and searched the Marshal's Mansion several times, and finally had to confirm the fact that Li Yan was not in the mansion.

After leaving the Marshal's Mansion, he jumped onto the city wall again, climbed up the ridge and then left the city.

Division Ji's target now is the garrison camp thirty miles away, which is very difficult to find. There are hundreds of thousands of troops there. If Hong Linying hides one person in it, even if he has spiritual awareness, it will take a long time.

After searching there for a while, if Li Yan is still not there, it will be even more difficult to find Li Yan's whereabouts after such a long time.

Thinking of this, he was already filled with rage, and there was a faint tendency for fire poison to flow through his body. He had no choice but to slip into the forest on the side, find a place, and sit cross-legged.

About half a cup of tea later, he stood up and disappeared into the darkness in a flash.

Time flies, and the Military Advisor Valley ushered in the second day after Li Yan's departure. Chen An and Li Yin did not sleep all night, and their eyes were bloodshot. They didn't know what fate would await them next, and they were extremely nervous.

Just like that, as they were feeling uneasy, time slowly passed until the second night. In just one day and one night, the two were already exhausted. How could they feel better if they couldn't eat or sleep

The other soldiers and women in the valley also noticed that something was wrong. After Lord Ji arrived yesterday, he quickly left the military advisor's residence alone with a gloomy face. What was even more strange was that the young master did not come back with Chen An and Li Yin yesterday.

After the two men came back, they stayed in the barracks with gloomy faces, without eating or drinking. The rest of the people didn't know why, and even the soldiers who usually liked to joke with them spoke in much lower voices.

As a result, the entire Military Advisor's Mansion seemed very depressing, as if a dark cloud was looming over the city.

The sun slowly rose in this oppressive situation... at the top of the valley... and towards the west mountain.

The moonlight slowly rose again, and then moved westward little by little.

"Chen An, Li Yin, come in!"

Suddenly a voice sounded in the valley, extremely gloomy.

It was already midnight. Master Ji, dressed in a black robe, appeared on the field like a ghost in the night, and then walked straight into the valley.

Upon hearing this voice, both the soldiers on duty outside and the people in the house were shocked and felt a chill rising from their backs.

Chen An and Li Yin were trembling and ran out in a daze.

When the two of them arrived in the valley, they saw a figure standing in front of Li Yan's room. They hurriedly approached and took a closer look in the moonlight. It was Advisor Ji who was standing with his hands behind his back.

But his appearance at this moment shocked the two of them. In just this short day and night, Advisor Ji's face turned purple and black, his expression was haggard, and his face looked much older. Only his eyes were glowing with blood red light.

Since arriving at the garrison camp thirty miles away last night, Division III has been using all his skills, using his eyes and spiritual sense, his body movements and spiritual power, to fly around the camp...

But the search was not completed until dawn. If it were daytime, he would be discovered even with his agility.

But he didn't have time to wait any longer, so he made up his mind and released some of his spiritual power that suppressed the poison, increasing the range of his spiritual sense and speeding up his body movements.

With this skill, his entire body was just like a breeze passing by in front of others, and it would be impossible to detect him even in the daytime.

A few hours later, he appeared behind a tent. At this time, his face looked ugly, his appearance was ferocious, and he was in a trance. The fire poison had begun to flow in his body.

Under such circumstances, his mind had become somewhat out of control, and he wanted to find Li Yan at all costs. After pausing for a moment, Master Ji increased his spiritual power a little more and began to search everywhere.

By the time night came, he had searched seven or eight out of ten areas of the camp. Due to using too much spiritual energy, the flow of fire poison in his body accelerated again, and he became a little insane.

Looking at the unsearched area, the black energy on Strategist Ji's face turned purple, and part of his hair turned gray-black, and he spoke unconsciously.

"Do you think you can hide? Even if you dig three feet deep, you can't escape."

Finally, it was not until midnight of the next day that he had searched the entire camp, but still found nothing.

Division Master Ji's face was distorted, his teeth were gnashing, and his sharp white teeth were chattering. On his purple-black face, his eyes were glowing blood red, like a man-eating evil ghost in the dark night.

"No, no... where are you?"

At this time, he was in a state of confusion, and the fire poison had gradually spread to the meridians throughout his body. After wandering quickly in the military camp for a while, he ran wildly unconsciously, just muttering to himself.

He walked like this for an unknown amount of time before his mind gradually calmed down. He stopped and gasped for breath!

After calming down a little, he looked around and realized that he had subconsciously returned to the outside of the Military Advisor's Mansion.

"You two should tell me everything you said and did with Li Yan in the past few months. It should be detailed and clear. Do you understand?"

In the dark night, Advisor Ji, dressed in a black robe, stood in the moonlight like a ghost, looking coldly at the two people kneeling on the ground.

Chen An and Li Yin were trembling continuously under the gaze as cold as a poisonous snake, and they felt as if they were still in the severe winter. Chen An explained everything one by one, and even Li Yin, who was usually taciturn, added a few words from time to time.

An hour later.

"Is that all?"

Division Master Ji spoke coldly.

Chen An and Li Yin lay on the ground, without answering, still racking their brains to think hard.

After a long while, the two of them secretly looked at each other and got the answer from each other's eyes. In an hour, they had said everything they could say.

"Yes, sir! That's all, there's really nothing else."

Chen An answered cautiously, and Li Yin nodded in agreement.

After an hour of narration, the two of them had begun to calm down. After all, they had experienced life and death many times on the battlefield, and at this point, they just resigned themselves to their fate.

After hearing this, Division Master Ji just stood there quietly without saying a word.

Below, Chen An and the other two were kneeling quietly on the ground, like people waiting to die.

Under the moonlight, only the chirping of early summer insects occasionally rang out among the flowers and plants all over the valley, making people feel extremely depressed... At some point, Chen An and Li Yin felt the pressure on their bodies relieved. When they looked up, Advisor Ji had disappeared from their sight, and then they heard a voice coming from Li Yan's house.

Advisor Ji came to Li Yan's room. In the past hour, he listened and pondered every word the two said. His mind had returned to its usual calmness. In the end, he came to several conclusions and doubts:

First, from their descriptions, he could infer that Li Yan should have known his true intentions, but how did he know his intentions? He had always behaved perfectly, which puzzled him.

Second, Li Yan had intentionally or unintentionally started to increase the number of contacts with Liu Chengyong two months ago, so Liu Chengyong should be the contact person arranged by Hong Linying. Li Yan's escape today was most likely caused by Liu Chengyong's manipulation in the military camp, using a sleight of hand to block Chen An and Li Yin's sight;

Third, several fellow villagers who were close to Li Yan were also suspicious and might have participated in helping Li Yan escape. So the wine shop and the Ironware Pavilion might also be Li Yan's hiding place.

Although the soldiers guarding the city said that Li Yan had left the city, with Hong Linying's means, it would not be difficult to make a few soldiers lie

Fourth, if the soldiers at the city gate can lie, then the soldiers on duty in the barracks can also lie. Will Li Yan still be hiding in the barracks

Fifth, if the soldiers above were possibly lying, then could we imagine that, apart from the wine shop and the ironware pavilion, Hong Linying could have found any private residence in the city to hide Li Yan, rather than in the Marshal's Mansion.

Sixth, Li Yan's recent purchase of a large number of farm tools and clothes, what does that have to do with his escape? He couldn't figure it out for a while.

Seventh, is Li Yan’s recent planting of a large number of these flowers and plants related to his escape

Eighth, if Li Yan is not in any of the above places, then where could he go? Hometown? Or find a secluded place, waiting for me to slowly lose confidence and give up looking for him.

Nine, how could Li Yan imitate his own handwriting and forge a message

Tenth, have Chen An and Li Yin also been bribed by Li Yan? In fact, have they both been helping Li Yan all along

He deduced all the above factors one by one and slowly formed conclusions.

The reason he entered Li Yan's house was to confirm the last two points first. He believed that Li Yan would not do it perfectly, and any means would have certain clues to be found.

What he needs to do now is to get results from these conclusions one by one, and then he can gradually find out where Li Yan is.

After entering the house, although there was no light in the house, with the monk's eyesight, with the help of a little light in the darkness it would be almost the same as daytime. It was only when looking far away that it would have some effect at a farther distance.

The moonlight tonight is as bright as water, and everything in the house is clearly visible to him.

Advisor Ji Jun stood in front of the table. There were an inkstone and a brush on the table near the window. After taking a look, he made a conclusion.

Li Yan was in a very anxious mood at that time. Although the inkstone and pen were put back to the non-writing position, the ink in the inkstone was still there and had not been cleaned off.

There were also ink stains on the pen, and some even dripped onto the table. Although there were only one or two drops, it showed how anxious Li Yan was at the time. He was probably afraid that something unexpected would happen outside of his plan, so he was careless in a hurry.

He picked up the pen with one hand and looked at it carefully for a while, but found nothing else.

He looked around again and found a pile of paper balls thrown on the ground in the corner. He put down his brush and quickly went to the corner.

He stretched out both hands, and with his left hand he had inserted the jade book that he had been holding onto the waistband outside his robe. He bent down and picked up a piece of paper from the pile, and unfolded it with both hands.

What was written on it were ordinary poems. He then picked up a few more and started to read them. Slowly... his expression began to become a little ugly.

These papers were the ones left by Li Yan's frequent graffiti some time ago. Since no one knew when Li Yan would start to write crazily, the woman who cleaned the house would occasionally have things that she didn't have time to clean up and take away.

As for the papers taken away during the cleaning, they were burned as firewood as Military Advisor Ji had instructed Chen An and Li Yin.

Advisor Ji had seen papers written by Li Yan before. They were shown to him by Chen An and Li Yin. He didn't think there was anything unusual at the time, but when he looked at them carefully today, he immediately discovered some problems.

Although these words are still scribbled and still so ugly and messy, as if venting the depression in the chest, but now looking carefully, some strokes of some characters are somewhat similar to mine.

If he hadn't been trying to find out what was wrong, he really wouldn't have discovered this situation.

After this discovery, an idea suddenly flashed through his mind, and he turned around to look at the bookshelf on the west wall of the house, where there were a dozen or so books.

With a flash of his body, he reached the bookshelf again and found a book inside. This book was exactly the one from which the poem in the paper ball he had just read came. He had often studied it before, so he knew it.

He quickly turned to that page, and after just one look, his expression changed.

Then, he found a few books one after another, opened them and read them. He couldn't help but sigh and muttered to himself.

"I really underestimated this kid. He is only fifteen or sixteen years old, but he has such intelligence."

When he opened the first one, he already knew that these were books he had read frequently before.

It's just that he read so many books that the bookshelves in his room could no longer accommodate them, so he only kept some of the books he often read, and placed the rest of the books on the bookshelves in these rooms.

He had a habit when reading. He liked to mark some good sentences and write a few notes and comments from time to time. Obviously, Li Yan also noticed this and included it in his plan.

At this time, Division Master Ji remembered that Li Yan had taken a few books from him before. He thought that one reason was to see more of his handwriting; the other was to confirm whether the handwriting on the books in his room was his.

He also remembered that he had only written something for Li Yan twice, one was "The Breath Guidance Technique" and the other was "The Black Night Curtain Green Skill".

However, it was obvious that Li Yan spent a longer time watching the skills the next time. At that time, he thought that as the skills were upgraded, Li Yan's comprehension would be slower, so it took longer.

Now it seems possible that Li Yan's main purpose was to see his own handwriting more, or to verify whether the handwriting in the book and on the paper were from the same person.

Looking back at the piles of papers in the corner, he also realized that in the handwriting that Li Yan practiced, it was often a certain basic stroke in a character that was truly imitating himself, and the others were just random writing to cover up.

When it came to actually using it, Li Yan slowly combined the basic strokes he had practiced to form his own message.

"It's really hard for him!"

Master Ji thought to himself that people have writing habits, and if one wants to write a certain word with specific strokes, that requires great concentration and patience.

At this point, he had already confirmed the last two points of his conclusion:

Li Yan secretly imitated the handwriting through the books he had annotated before. As a defect of practicing the method, he needed some external objects to calm the heat in his heart. He used this to cover up the fact that he was practicing imitation.

Another point is that Chen An and Li Yin were not bribed by Li Yan. This is easy to understand. If they were bribed, Li Yan would not have to go to such great lengths to secretly imitate his handwriting. Chen An and Li Yin would have just gone out with him.

Then next, he would have to confirm those other conclusions, maybe Li Yan’s whereabouts were among them!