Dragon Fish and Dragon Lake

"Teacher, how about I come back to ask you some questions later?" Li Ke looked at geography teacher Luan Fengfeng.

He sensed something was off in the office, so he decided it was best not to get involved.

The geography teacher looked at Li Ke with a kind smile and said, "Well, you can go back to the main room first."

Li Ke turned and went out, but he was cautious and did not leave immediately.

But then they saw the 14-year-old boy hiding under the window outside the door, squatting down and eavesdropping.

Inside the room, the four instructors who had been sitting in the corner immediately got up and stretched after Li Ke left.

The geography instructor asked, puzzled, "What's going on with you all? Why are you all sitting over there... And why is that new combat instructor Qing Chen, sitting in your seat, Old Zhou?"

Old Zhou, Zhou Xingwen, is a math instructor.

At this moment, Zhou Xingwen stood up and said, "Didn't we agree yesterday to give him a hard time? So after he arrived, we didn't prepare a desk for him, wanting to see how he would react. But I don't know where Li Changqing found this monster. He was quiet for a few tens of minutes, flipped through all the textbooks in the Li Clan Academy, and then started attacking us."

Zhou Xingwen continued, "First, we brought out our best high school exam questions, and he managed to score 145 points in every subject. Then he turned around and gave us questions, and neither Lao Liu nor I could answer a single one of them."

Lao Liu, Liu Junkui, is a physics teacher.

Geography teacher Luan Fengfeng was stunned. He took the problem, one of the most difficult in the history of the IMO Math Competition, from Zhou Xingwen's hand and looked at it for a long time but still couldn't understand it.

Although they teach different courses, they are all highly educated individuals who have obtained a Master of Education degree from Qinghe University, so solving a high school math problem should be a piece of cake for them.

But now, I can't even understand the questions.

Li Ke, who was crouching outside the window, was filled with shock, like an undercurrent churning beneath the surface of the sea.

To be honest, he really didn't expect Qing Chen to have managed to do so much in just one day.

First, they subdued the servants, and then they took control of the teachers' offices, leaving the teachers without even a desk to sit on.

Arrogant!

Young Li Ke finally witnessed what true arrogance was!

No wonder he felt Qing Chen's aura suppressing the entire teaching office when he entered!

Thinking of this, Li Ke secretly slipped back to the main room. How could he not share such a joyous occasion with his other brothers and sisters?

At this moment, Qing Chen was walking on the path leading away from Zhixin Courtyard.

The Banshan Manor is lush and green; walking through it feels like being in a forest maze.

Simply put, Qing Chen got lost.

With his excellent memory, he has rarely gotten lost in his life.

However, he was transported from the back mountain by Li Changqing in a hovercar, so he had never walked the road in front of Zhixin Courtyard.

Qing Chen used the position of the sun to determine east, west, south, and north, and headed in the general direction of Feiyun Courtyard.

However, after walking for an hour, he still hadn't seen a trace of Feiyun Courtyard.

Along the way, Qing Chen encountered more than ten hidden agents in the Banshan Manor. Fortunately, Li Changqing had given him the electronic access control in advance, otherwise he might already be buried under some garden.

As he turned off a side path, a wide, open lake suddenly appeared before him, its surface shimmering in the sunlight.

Unexpectedly, such a huge artificial lake is hidden in this Banshan Manor.

Looking around, you can see schools of fish swimming in the water.

A wooden bridge extends from the lakeside into the lake, where an old man, draped in a thick fur cloak, sits quietly on a small stool fishing.

There was no one by the lake, and the lake water was as smooth as a mirror.

This is a very evocative scene: an old man in a straw hat and raincoat, fishing alone on Jiang Xue.

It would have been more atmospheric if the old man hadn't been holding high-tech equipment.

Qing Chen clearly saw that the old man was holding an LCD screen, which displayed the underwater conditions and even showed whether there were fish biting the bait.

However, what intrigued Qing Chen was that the fish in the waters of the wilderness had become incredibly ferocious.

But the fish in this lake seem to be normal.

It must have something unique about it.

He turned and left. The sight of an old man fishing alone in such a place meant that he must be an extraordinary figure from the Li family.

But just as Qing Chen turned around, the old man spoke up, "Come quick, help me pull the fish up! Hurry!"

Qing Chen was stunned for a moment, and when he turned around, he found that a fish had already taken the bait in front of the old man. The old man was so weak that he could barely hold onto the fishing rod.

The old man turned to look at him. "I'm talking to you, what are you standing there for?"

"Oh," Qing Chen walked to the old man's side, grabbed the fishing line, and pulled hard, pulling the struggling big fish out of the water.

"It's good to be young, you have so much strength," the old man said, sitting motionless on the stool beside him, and asked with a smile, "Whose son are you? I've never seen you before."

Qing Chen thought for a moment and said, "I am a new instructor invited by Li Changqing to Zhixin Courtyard, not a member of the Li family."

"Oh?" The old man was taken aback. "I knew it. Even the Old Li family doesn't have such good genes to produce such a handsome boy like you."

Qing Chen was also taken aback. Judging from the other person's tone, he was a little unsure if the other person was from the Li family. "Aren't you from the Li family? Why do you talk about the Li family like that?"

The old man chuckled and said, "I've worked for the Old Li family my whole life, what's wrong with saying a few words about them?"

Qing Chen frowned. He glanced at a corner of the eaves in the distance, and below the eaves hung Forbidden Item, the ACE-020 Heartless Bronze Bell, with a red rope.

"What? Afraid that if I speak ill of the Li family, that copper bell will ring?" The old man laughed. "That thing is fake!"

"Huh?" Qing Chen was confused. "Are all those copper bells hanging in the Banshan Manor fake? That can't be!"

"Why not?" the old man shook his head and said, "Things in this world are a mix of truth and falsehood, reality and illusion. Even the blood ties between brothers can be fake, let alone a Forbidden Item."

"I don't believe it," Qing Chen shook his head.

"Hey, you don't even believe me?" The old man glared at him. "Let me tell you, there's only one pair of the real Heartless Bronze Bell, so only the two hanging on the east side of Baopu Tower are genuine. After the Li family received the Heartless Bronze Bell from the knight, the Head of the Li Clan complained that it wasn't enough, saying that his Banshan Manor was so big, how could two Heartless Bronze Bell be enough? And that's how he got into a dispute with the knight."

Qing Chen was puzzled. What was so perplexing about the Head of the Li Clan? Someone had given him Forbidden Item, yet he still felt it wasn't enough...

Oh, he put himself in her shoes and realized that no one would ever complain about having too many Forbidden Items.

The old man continued, "The knight said that there were only two Heartless Bronze Bell, take it or leave it. However, the other party couldn't persuade the Head of the Li Clan in the end, so he came up with an idea: since the outside world doesn't know how many Heartless Bronze Bell there are, you make a few hundred more, and we knights will also say that we have a few hundred. That way, at least we can guard against villains."

Qing Chen was speechless; this was indeed something knights would do.

He was walking through the Banshan Manor when he worried that he might have accidentally done something that would cause all the Heartless Bronze Bell in the manor to ring.

It turned out to be all fake!

But when the old man told these secrets, it was as if he was there when Li received the Heartless Bronze Bell. So who is the old man?

"Who are you, and how do you know such secrets? And why are you telling me such confidential matters?" Qing Chen asked calmly as he removed the large, plump fish from the hook. "Do you have some ulterior motive?"

The old man raised his eyebrows. "What bad intentions could a simple old man like me, who fishes honestly, possibly have?"

"Alright," Qing Chen said calmly, "I've caught the fish for you, I'll leave now. I'll pretend I didn't hear anything you said to me."

"Oh, you just want to listen to the story and then leave without a trace?" The old man chuckled. "Don't you want to know why the knight gave the Head of the Li Clan the Heartless Bronze Bell?"

Qing Chen thought for a moment, "Because the contemporary knight leader Li Shutong is a member of the Li family? That's not a big secret, I know that even if you don't tell me."

"Nonsense!" the old man said. "When Li Shutong became a knight, this Heartless Bronze Bell had already been hanging here for over twenty years!"

"Oh?" Qing Chen became interested.

"The Li family has been on good terms with knights for generations because the Li family's ancestor was also a knight named Li Yingyun," the old man said, his interest piqued by Qing Chen's curiosity.

Li Yingyun, this is the name Qing Chen saw on the Green Mountain Cliff.

He said to Qing Chen as if he were watching a melon, "You don't know this, do you? Li Yingyun himself didn't have a talent for business, but his son was a business prodigy. Back then, the Northwest hadn't been blocked by the Forbidden Zone, and this Li family prodigy built up the Li family's business little by little by traveling through the Northwest and the Central Plains. So, the Li family has a connection with knights."

Qing Chen suddenly felt that the old man had been telling him so much today, and it seemed that he was only now getting to the point: the old man was telling him, intentionally or unintentionally, that the Li family and the knight had a very good relationship.

This made Qing Chen wary; did the other party perhaps know his identity?

But who exactly is this old man?

"I'm leaving. You can continue fishing," Qing Chen said, turning and walking away.

But the old man grabbed his arm. "This Dragon Fish is for you. You can braise it tonight. It's delicious."

Qing Chen asked in surprise, "You caught it yourself, why don't you eat it?"

"The most enjoyable part of fishing is the moment the fish bites the hook, not the process of eating it. Here, take it," the old man chuckled. "By the way, if you want to hear more gossip, come find me here in the afternoons. I know a lot of secrets, enough for a young person to benefit from for a lifetime."

Qing Chen glanced at the monitor in the other person's hand and thought to himself, "What the hell is so fun about this high-tech fishing?"

He hesitated for a moment, but finally accepted the Dragon Fish from the other person. "Thank you, see you again sometime."

On the way back, he kept thinking about the other person's identity.

First, there are two clues. One is that the old man knows many of Li's secrets, even about the Heartless Bronze Bell.

Secondly, the old man did not speak of Li with much respect.

At first, Qing Chen thought the other party was the head of the Li family, but then he thought about it and realized that the Head of the Li Clan had been critically ill multiple times. It shouldn't be him.

So, the other party might be the elder or younger brother of the Head of the Li Clan? Because he failed to seize the position of family head, he was imprisoned in the Banshan Manor.

Then, because he harbored resentment towards the Li family, he told outsiders an important secret. Perhaps he wanted to use his words to dispel the rumors about the Heartless Bronze Bell make the outside world less afraid of this Forbidden Item.

I can't figure it out.

However, he had only walked two kilometers when he was stopped.

The spies who had stopped him emerged from the woods and spoke into their communication headset, "Team leader, we've discovered unidentified individuals stealing Dragon Fish. Requesting backup."

Qing Chen: "???"

He looked back at the lake and thought to himself, "This is such a rip-off!"

Could that old man be deliberately trying to scam me? He must know that I'd run into trouble for carrying the Dragon Fish around, which is why he insisted on giving it to me.

Old man, you're in big trouble.

Looking at the dark muzzle of the other party's gun, Qing Chen wisely raised his hands. "Hello, I am Qing Chen, the new instructor of Zhixin Courtyard. This Dragon Fish was a gift from someone else, not something I stole myself."

The hidden stakeout didn't approach rashly; while waiting for backup, he asked, "Who sent it?"

"I don't know the name," Qing Chen sighed, "But I'm not lying."

But then they saw the undercover agent take an unknown device, point it at Qing Chen, and press it. Immediately afterwards, the electronic access control on Qing Chen's phone transmitted his identity information to the device.

The undercover agent breathed a sigh of relief; at least the identity of the new instructor at the Zhixin Courtyard was genuine.

Qing Chen said earnestly, "I know Li Changqing. Could you please ask her to come over? She can help me explain."

At a time like this, it would be foolish to rebel against the entire security system of the Banshan Manor. If you have connections, quickly reveal them; don't create unnecessary conflicts.

Before long, more than ten security guards surrounded them and escorted Qing Chen to the Garrison Department's small building.

Seeing that he was cooperating, the other party did not make things difficult for him and waited for Li Changqing to come and handle the matter.

Some people in the Garrison Department even recognized him. "Qing Chen? You're the Qing Chen who knocked over a group of servants this morning?"

"It's me," Qing Chen sighed, still holding the Dragon Fish in his hand.

The security personnel at the Garrison Department asked curiously, "Did someone really give you this Dragon Fish as a gift?"

"Yes," Qing Chen explained, "An old man was fishing by the lake. I was passing by when he caught one and gave it to me. Now I suspect someone is taking advantage of my unfamiliarity with the rules to frame me! There are surveillance cameras everywhere in the Banshan Manor; take a look at the footage!"

"There are no surveillance cameras at Longhu Lake. You're new here and don't know, but right across from Longhu Lake is the patriarch's Baopu Tower. Even we're not allowed to get close," the security guard paused for a moment, "There are real experts guarding that place. They don't need us from the Garrison Department. I wonder where that expert went today. Otherwise, you should be Qing Xing to have survived, let alone stolen fish."

"A true master? I haven't seen one," Qing Chen said, already suspicious. "Is this Dragon Fish very rare?"

"Of course, this Dragon Fish is the patriarch's most treasured possession. It's a precious species that a knight brought back from Forbidden Zone. Even if we catch it, we have to release it back into the wild," the Garrison Department officer explained.

Qing Chen lifted the Dragon Fish in his hand. "It? Caught in the Forbidden Zone? What's so special about it?"

"I've heard that Dragon Fish don't bite people on their own," the security guard said, "So they're naturally intelligent."

Qing Chen thought to himself, "How novel it is that fish don't bite people! Most fish in the Outer World don't bite people on their own!"

However, he then thought that if this Dragon Fish was indeed a descendant of a species that had reproduced in the Forbidden Zone, then it was quite unusual that it didn't bite.

Just then, a hovercar pulled up outside the Garrison Department. As soon as Li Changqing got out, he saw the Dragon Fish in Qing Chen's hand. "Why are you even catching Dragon Fish? I was wondering why you were brought to the Garrison Department."

The Garrison Department officer said, "Miss Changqing... as you know, stealing the Dragon Fish is no small matter. We dare not release him without authorization. Why don't you speak to your superiors? We can only let him leave if the Privy Council issues an order."

Just as he finished speaking, the phone in the Garrison Department rang; it was an internal call from the Privy Council.

The Garrison Department officer answered the phone, glancing instinctively at the caller ID: "Hello?"

"Release them," the person on the other end of the phone said simply, and then hung up.

"Who?" Li Changqing asked.

"The Privy Council," the Garrison Department asked curiously, "Miss Changqing, did you contact the Privy Council beforehand?"

Li Changqing didn't answer, but instead led Qing Chen away.

Sitting in the hovercar, Li Changqing suddenly asked solemnly, "I heard that an old man personally handed you the fish?"

"Yes," Qing Chen nodded, then suddenly said after a moment's thought, "They also told me that only two of the Heartless Bronze Bell in the Banshan Manor are real, and even who gave them to them. Do you know who that person is?"

Li Changqing glanced at Qing Chen thoughtfully. "What else did he say?"

"He also told me to come fishing with him when I had nothing to do. I would help him catch the fish, and he would tell me the secrets," Qing Chen said frankly.

"Then do as he says," Li Changqing said. "Since there are no classes at the school, you can go for a stroll around Longhu Lake whenever you have free time. No one should stop you."

Qing Chen fell into deep thought. Li Changqing seemed to have guessed something, but he didn't intend to tell him.

At this moment, only Li Changqing knew that she had not contacted the Privy Council before coming, and the Privy Council should not have known in advance that someone had stolen the Dragon Fish.

It should be noted that the Privy Council within the Li family is the most powerful central institution under the head of the family, and many administrative orders issued from there are beyond the authority of even Li Changqing.

Half of Li's intelligence agency is in Li Changqing's hands, and the other half is in this Privy Council.

Who could get the Privy Council to call the Garrison Department directly? Within the Li family, there are no more than three people with that kind of power.

"By the way, why did the old man give you the Dragon Fish?" Li Changqing asked curiously. "Did he tell you what it was for?"

"No," Qing Chen replied, "He just told me to braise it and eat it, saying it was delicious."

Li Changqing was taken aback for a moment, then laughed and cried at the same time, "Braise it?"

"That's right," Qing Chen thought of the ginkgo nuts given to him by those old guys in Forbidden Zone Forbidden Zone No. 002. He wondered if the Dragon Fish would have any magical effects after eating them.

A 5,000-word chapter, with another chapter at 11 PM tonight.

Thank you for finding fellow readers in this mountain of books to become new allies of this book. The boss is generous; the boss is like a grape that doesn't spit out the skin.