That was the deadly judicial office, after all. Anyone it set its sights on would lose a layer of skin even if they survived. Dozens of Immortal Spirit Beads—there was no shortage of places to earn them with a little hard work. Why risk your neck here?
As soon as everyone had withdrawn, the maids were driven out as well. The empty hall was left with nothing but wreckage strewn across the floor and Xuan Zi'an and Chen Antong.
At some point, a bank of dark clouds had drifted over and covered the sun. The light and shadows in front of the hall instantly dimmed, turning patchy, like a jumble of mountains kicked to the ground.
After sitting in silence for who knew how long, Xuan Zi'an suddenly asked, "What do you think Mu Kuang meant by that?"
Chen Antong said, "Whatever it was, he wasn't trying to make trouble for us. Otherwise, there'd have been no need for him to reveal the person he'd planted there on the spot. He could've waited until those people accepted the Immortal Spirit Beads and the matter was settled. Then, even with a hundred mouths between us, we wouldn't have been able to explain ourselves. But wait—wasn't he always at odds with Xu? Back when Xu was fined, he made a huge public show of condemning him, and the two of them were on terrible terms. So why did he show up at this critical moment and help Xu?"
Xuan Zi'an shook his head hard, the fat on his face jiggling wildly. His expression was bitter as he stared ahead and said, "Tell me, who did we offend to deserve this? We were sitting at home, and disaster fell from the sky. Everything was fine, everything was fine—and then we had the misfortune