"Brother Qi...?"
Miss Mo's teeth chattered as she looked at Qi Ruoyun, her gaze filled with confusion and terror.
Qi Ruoyun blinked, smiled faintly, and patted Miss Mo's arm reassuringly. "Don't worry, Miss Mo. You've treated me so well. I won't let anyone hurt you."
"Eh?"
Qi Ruoyun's expression was far too natural. For a moment, Miss Mo could not tell whether he was telling the truth or lying. Her mind was muddled, yet she actually calmed down and instinctively said to Dongyang Zi, "Old Daoist Priest, could you have mistaken him for someone else? Brother Qi is only a failed scholar, not some Divine Lord."
"Whether the old daoist has mistaken him, why not ask him yourself?"
A calm female voice sounded beside her ear. Miss Mo turned around and saw a woman at her side, dressed in a crimson-gold palace gown embroidered with phoenix patterns. She was tall and graceful, with a cool, noble bearing.
Before Miss Mo could ask anything, Qi Ruoyun beside her could no longer keep his composure.
"Si Lingxi? Why are you in Great Jing?"
The next instant, Miss Mo felt herself wrapped in a soft aura. Then everything before her eyes turned blue-black, and she could no longer make out anything clearly.
Then came the sudden sounds of rushing water—whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—and roaring wind and fire—hu, hu, hu. She grew somewhat dizzy and disoriented. When she opened her eyes again, she found herself still in her own little courtyard, though she seemed to have shifted sideways by three feet.
Outside the courtyard gate, not far behind Dongyang Zi, Lu Zheng and Yuan Lin stood shoulder to shoulder. Two great figures with a thousand years of Dao Comprehension apiece could not intervene at all in a battle of this level.
Yuan Lin knew