The sound of footsteps drew nearer, crunching over the gravel outside the ruined temple, clear as knocks upon the heart. I stood beside the altar table, my fingertips lightly pressing down on that dark jade seal—Yan Jiuxiao's City Lord Token.
He did not move or speak. He merely stared at the token on the table, his expression darkening bit by bit.
"If you do not believe me," I said, my voice low yet sharp as a blade scraping across bluestone, "then inspect the back of the token."
He hesitated for a moment before reaching out and turning it over.
Firelight slanted in through the broken window, revealing an exceedingly fine dark pattern on its reverse—twisted like flames, its edges glimmering with an almost imperceptible scarlet sheen. It was a mark possessed only by the inner sect of the Blood Demon Sect, etched into the backs of objects with a special medicinal solution. It normally lay hidden without a trace, appearing only around midnight or near a Blood Sacrifice site.
His pupils suddenly contracted.
"This pattern... impossible." He spoke in a low voice. "It never leaves my person. How could someone have tampered with it?"
"So it was not tampered with." I answered flatly. "It simply never left your side—only the one holding it is no longer someone you trust."
He abruptly raised his head, his gaze shooting toward me like lightning.
I met his eyes without retreating an inch. "You investigated the anomalies in the Black Market, searching for remnants of Chaos Aura. But have you ever considered why, every time you mobilized troops, the other side could withdraw in advance? Why, when Ye Qingwan was targeted, were the guards replaced by faces you did not recognize?"
His Adam's apple bobbed.
"The commander of the guards transferred in three months ago was personally promoted by you," I continued. "Yet the flow of his internal meridians does not match the Northern Wasteland Martial Codex. He uses the poisonous tempering methods of the Southern Border. As for that adviser of yours, every night at the third quarter of the hour of the monkey, he goes to the rear courtyard of the City Defense Office to burn paper. He is not burning incense, but talisman ash stained with fresh blood—what is he feeding?"
Yan Jiuxiao's fingers trembled faintly as he clenched the token tight.
"What nonsense are you spouting!"
"I am not accusing you." My tone remained calm. "I am merely telling you that someone is borrowing your authority. And you are still kept in the dark."
He glared at me, veins throbbing at his temples. He seemed on the verge of exploding, yet forcibly suppressed it.
Just then, a muffled thud came from outside the door.
It sounded like someone had slammed into the courtyard wall.
Then a figure burst through the door, bringing with them a gust of cold wind and the stench of blood.
Ye Qingwan stood in the doorway, blood staining her shoulder. She held a medicinal pestle across her chest, her breathing rapid but steady. Her gaze swept across the room before landing on my face. She lowered her voice. "You are still wasting time here? They are coming for this place."
I did not move. "How many?"
"At least eight dead warriors. Two of their leaders had Blood Crystal fluctuations on them." She caught her breath. "I intercepted a messenger in West Alley just now. Before he died, he shouted, 'The token has appeared—kill the Token Holder at once!' They know whose hands the token is in."
Yan Jiuxiao suddenly turned to me. "You said they want this?"
"Not want." I slowly pushed the token back before him. "They have already decided it is in your hands. And by standing here now, you are telling everyone that you are the one who leaked the secrets."
His face turned livid. "You deliberately left the token behind?"
"I wanted you to see reality clearly," I said. "If you walk out now and claim to be innocent, will they believe you? Or do you think your Half-step Tribulation Crossing cultivation can stop the Blood Demon Sect's carefully arranged encirclement?"
He gritted his teeth, his knuckles cracking as he clenched his fists.
Ye Qingwan strode quickly to my side and asked in a low voice, "What exactly are you trying to do?"
"I want to stay alive." I looked at her. "And I want all of you to stay alive too."
She stared at me for a moment, then suddenly gave a cold laugh. "Then you had better stop playing these calculated, step-by-step games. Those people outside are not here to negotiate. They are here to silence us."
Before her words had faded, there came a faint sound from the distant wall.
Someone had leapt onto the roof.
The tiles trembled slightly, followed by a second sound, then a third—at least four people were lying in ambush above us.
Yan Jiuxiao's expression finally changed. He swiftly retreated into the shadows beside the door, his back against the earthen wall as Spiritual Power gathered in his hand.
Ye Qingwan held her pestle before her, standing half a step behind and to my right. Though her breath had yet to settle, she showed no intention of retreating.
I remained where I was, my fingers quietly slipping into my sleeve to grasp a pale golden crystal. This was the wager I had won last night, and also the fuse for the final perception formation I had laid.
"What are you still waiting for?" Yan Jiuxiao barked. "Make your move!"
"For them to strike first." I replied coolly. "Whoever breaks the formation first exposes their position."
"You are insane!" He glared at me. "Do you think this is a contest at the Gambling House? This is a life-or-death game!"
"Precisely because it is a life-or-death game, we cannot act recklessly." I looked at him. "If you want to live, listen to me—do not circulate your power, do not make a sound, and do not try to break out. They want the token, not you. So long as you do not move, they will not be able to confirm the target."
He glared at me, fury churning in his eyes, but in the end, he did not move.
The room fell into deathly silence.
Only the wind passed through the broken beams and shattered pillars, stirring several scattered sheets of yellow paper on the ground.
Time seemed to freeze.
Suddenly, a fallen leaf was swept up by the wind, spiraling toward the altar table.
Just as it was about to touch the ground, my pupils shrank.
That leaf stopped in midair half an inch above the floor.
It was not that the wind had stopped. The air itself had congealed.
Some kind of restriction was taking shape.
"Careful!" I shouted. "They are setting up a trapping formation!"
As soon as the words left my mouth, dark red patterns surfaced across all four walls, spreading upward from the foundation, writhing and intertwining like living things. The roof tiles began shifting one by one, revealing desiccated corpses hanging beneath them—each dressed in the uniform of the City Defense Office, their faces twisted, scarlet Short Blades embedded in their chests.
Yan Jiuxiao's expression finally changed. "This is... the Blood Puppet Array?"
"Not only that." Ye Qingwan stared at the corpses. "Their souls have been nailed into the Formation Eyes."
I narrowed my eyes. These corpses were the Night Patrol Guards who had vanished in recent days. The Blood Demon Sect had not only killed them, but refined their loyal souls into the formation's foundation.
No wonder we had never been able to find any clues.
Because they had never left this city at all.
"What do we do now?" Yan Jiuxiao lowered his voice. "Force our way through?"
"We cannot break through." I said. "This formation uses loyalty as its lure and duty as its anchor. The more you draw upon the power of the City Lord's authority, the more fiercely it feeds. The moment you gathered Spiritual Power just now, you activated the first chain."
He lowered his head to look at his palm. Sure enough, a thread-thin red line was crawling upward along his meridians.
Ye Qingwan swiftly took out medicinal powder and sprinkled it in a circle around his wrist. "This will seal it temporarily, but it will not hold for long."
"They want to force us into turning on one another." I said coldly. "If one person circulates power, the entire formation activates. If two join forces, the backlash doubles. This design is not meant to kill—it is meant to torment."
"What is their objective?" she asked.
"To wait," I said. "Wait until we have exhausted our strength, wait until the token reveals itself, wait until the last person still standing personally hands it over."
Yan Jiuxiao sneered. "In their dreams."
"But they will get their chance." I looked outside the door. "Because the person outside has not entered yet."
"Who?"
"The one giving the orders." I said slowly. "Anyone capable of making dead warriors risk their lives to deliver messages cannot be some insignificant figure. He must be nearby, watching us struggle."
Ye Qingwan suddenly frowned. "Wait... earlier, you said that messenger shouted, 'The token has appeared'?"
"That is right."
"But the token had remained in your hands until you put it on the table just now." Her gaze sharpened. "Which means—the real token was never on City Lord Yan?"
I fell silent for a moment.
Then I gave a slight nod.
Yan Jiuxiao abruptly looked at me. "You knew all along?"
"From the moment I saw the sealing wax at the Black Market," I said. "Your City Defense Office changed the formula for its seal clay three years ago. The old clay cracks into a cross pattern when heated, while the new clay forms a spiderweb pattern. The sealing wax on the token at the trading point was the old kind, while the one on you—" I pointed at his waist, "—is new."
His entire body jolted.
"You were switched." I said. "You lost the real token days ago. And now, the three of us are standing at the center of a killing trap set for a false target."
Before you continue