Precise Blueprints

"Mother is gravely ill!"

A shriek jolted Huo Yuhao awake from his light sleep.

He sprang up from the bed, his heart instantly clenching.

It was the voice of the young maid attending to his mother!

Without even getting properly dressed, Huo Yuhao dashed barefoot out the door and ran madly toward his mother's small courtyard.

Last night, he had still been using his Spirit Eyes to monitor Zhu Ruyi, calculating every step of the future.

Yet no matter how thoroughly he planned, he had not expected her to move so quickly!

Bang!

He shoved open his mother's door, and a heavy, bitter stench of medicine mixed with an ominous air of death rushed into his face.

On the bed, the woman who had once been gentle and beautiful now had a waxy yellow complexion, sunken cheeks, cracked purple lips, and breathing so faint it seemed it could cease at any moment.

This was not an illness. It was poisoning—and lethal poisoning at that!

"Mother!"

Huo Yuhao rushed to the bedside and dropped to his knees, his voice trembling.

The woman on the bed, who had already fallen unconscious, miraculously fluttered her eyelids at his cry and slowly opened them a sliver.

A startling radiance suddenly burst from her dull eyes, as though she were experiencing a final flash of life.

"Yuhao..." she said weakly. At the same time, she used every last bit of strength to pull one hand from beneath the blanket and tightly grasp Huo Yuhao's.

Her hand was icy cold, yet her grip was extraordinarily strong.

She quietly slipped something cold and hard into Huo Yuhao's palm.

It was a small key of an extremely peculiar design.

Then, in a breathy voice only the two of them could hear, she quickly gave him an address. "West side of the manor... beneath the third rockery... the seventh bluestone brick..."

Huo Yuhao's mind buzzed.

What was going on? This was completely beyond his expectations!

[Thought Palace, activate.]

A vast, frigid palace instantly formed within his sea of consciousness.

[Information recorded: Mother is near death, unusually lucid, entrusting a special key and a mysterious address within the manor.]

[Logical deduction: Her behavioral pattern is severely inconsistent with that of an ordinary maid. Hidden information analysis: The key and address point to an important secret. Conclusion: Mother is by no means an ordinary maid. Her true identity... holds another mystery!]

In the instant he was rapidly analyzing everything, his mother used the last of her strength to tug at his hand.

"Yuhao... listen..."

Her voice was as thin as a thread, yet every word struck like thunder.

"That woman, Zhu Ruyi... she is no ordinary person... her martial soul... possesses the ability to bewitch and control... never... never look directly into her eyes!"

What?!

Huo Yuhao's mind shook violently.

A bewitchment-and-control-type martial soul? Those were among the strangest and hardest martial souls to guard against!

No wonder! No wonder everyone in the entire duke's manor obeyed her every word!

His mother's warning continued, each word seeming to burn away her life.

"Your father... the White Tiger Duke... he... is not in the manor right now... in this manor... the one in charge... is Zhu Ruyi!"

This White Tiger Duke's Manor had long since rotted to the core, from top to bottom!

"Cough... cough, cough..." His mother coughed violently, and a streak of black blood spilled from the corner of her mouth.

She gripped Huo Yuhao tightly, using her final obsession to point him toward the road ahead.

"Go... go to the Sun Moon Empire... there are... soul tools... your future... is there..."

"Believe... believe in your own abilities..."

After speaking those final words, her arm suddenly fell limp, and the last light in her eyes went out completely.

"Mother—!"

Huo Yuhao let out a grief-stricken roar, suppressed to the limit.

The room fell deathly silent.

After a long while, he slowly rose and stiffly closed his mother's eyes.

He did not cry.

In a hellish situation like this, tears were the most useless thing of all.

He shut the door behind him, cutting off the panicked cries of the maids outside.

Calm down. He had to stay calm.

Huo Yuhao took a deep breath and activated his Spirit Eye Martial Soul once more.

This time, he precisely locked onto his mother lying on the bed.

Vision Penetration!

Skin, flesh, bones... everything peeled away layer by layer before his eyes.

At last, he "saw" it!

Between his mother's heart meridians and internal organs, clusters of strange black qi lingered like maggots clinging to bone.

That was no ordinary poison. It was a vile toxin mixed with soul power, specifically designed to destroy a soul master's foundation!

[Thought Palace activated once more.]

[Scanning target: residual toxins in corpse.]

[Energy signature analysis: complex structure; contains yin-cold attribute soul power and possesses continuous corrosive properties. Conclusion: this toxin was not naturally produced. It had to have been refined by a high-level soul master using their own soul power. Estimated refiner's level: at least Soul King rank.]

[Combining the records in Mother's manuscript... conducting temporal regression analysis...]

[Analysis result: based on the match between the toxin's level of erosion and the rate of bodily decline, the first poisoning occurred one hundred and eighty-three days ago. Chronic poisoning, sustained for nearly half a year!]

Half a year!

A full half year!

That venomous woman Zhu Ruyi had actually used this slow-boiling method to gnaw away at his mother's life bit by bit!

A towering killing intent nearly shattered his reason.

Huo Yuhao clenched his teeth hard and forced himself to calm down.

Now was not the time to lose his mind.

He carefully arranged his mother's body, then silently climbed out through the rear window.

Revenge required strength, but it also required resources.

What his mother had given him before her death was his last hope of turning things around!

Relying on the scouting ability of his Spirit Eye, he perfectly avoided every patrol route of the guards and, like a ghost, silently made his way to the western side of the estate.

This place was remote and desolate, overgrown with weeds.

The third rockery.

Huo Yuhao quickly found his target.

He crouched down and began examining the bluestone bricks at the base of the rockery.

One, two, three...

The seventh!

He placed his hand on it and felt around the stone according to the key's unusual structure from his memories.

Before long, he found a tiny groove that nearly blended into the cracks between the stones.

He inserted the key.

It fit perfectly!

"Click."

With a soft sound, the bluestone brick sank downward, revealing a pitch-black entrance.

Beneath the entrance was a hidden compartment that had been sealed away for a long time.

Inside the compartment lay a heavy iron box.

Huo Yuhao took out the box and immediately returned to his small room, locking the door behind him.

He steadied his pounding heart and opened the box.

There were no gold, silver, or jewels inside—only three things.

A thick stack of precisely drawn blueprints.

A heavy money pouch.

And a secret letter sealed with wax.

Huo Yuhao opened the pouch. It was filled with gleaming golden Soul Coins.

There were more than a hundred of them!

That sum was enough for an ordinary family to live comfortably for years.

Then, with trembling hands, he unfolded the blueprints.

From basic soul power ray emitters to complex linked amplification formations, there was even a design sketch for something called the "Single-Soldier Soul Guidance Propulsion Wing"!

These were all blueprints for soul tools! And soul tools far beyond the current level of the continent!

So his mother's final words had been true!

Finally, he opened the secret letter.

The contents of the letter were horrifying, detailing everything Zhu Ruyi had done since entering White Tiger Duke's Manor—how she had secretly cultivated her own forces, used her charm-type martial soul to control the servants, bribed officials, and even... colluded with forces from enemy nations!

The evidence was irrefutable, and the account was perfectly organized!

This was no letter. It was clearly a lethal blade that could send Zhu Ruyi—and even the entire White Tiger Duke's Manor—to the executioner's block!

His mother had never been a weak woman who meekly endured mistreatment.

She had been a top-tier undercover agent lurking in the heart of the enemy!

She had long since paved a broad path for his escape, survival, and even revenge!

Huo Yuhao carefully put away the stack of blueprints and secret letters, pressing them tightly against his chest.