Someone asked curiously, "Master Hu, what kind of battle painting did you give him? Could you tell us?"
Hu Moyuan smiled. "You'll know once Fang Double-A returns."
Everyone began guessing. After all, Hu Moyuan only created one battle painting a year.
After bidding everyone farewell, Fang Yun loaded most of the paintings onto the ox-cart, then carried Hu Moyuan's battle painting himself as he headed toward the Literary Academy.
By now, many people at the Literary Academy knew him. All along the way, he kept nodding or cupping his hands in greeting to others.
Before Fang Yun even entered Ink Fragrance Lodge, he heard Li Yuncong and the others talking inside. Their tones differed from usual.
"I heard something happened at Winding River. That wasn't a Demon General at all, but a Demon Marshal. Apparently, one Provincial Graduate was nearly poisoned to death. Luckily, he had brought an antidote beforehand. To keep the poisonous fumes from reaching their hearts, two others had to amputate—one cut off his right arm, the other his left leg. Nearly everyone was wounded. It was especially tragic. I heard a fragment of a Great Scholar's Defiled Text appeared, though nobody knows which Half-Sage's famous work it had been before their Saint Enfeoffment. What a pity—it was defiled by Demon Sage blood."
The moment Fang Yun heard that it was a Great Scholar's Defiled Text from before a Half-Sage's Saint Enfeoffment, his interest was piqued.
A Great Scholar's writings, when placed in a room, could leave lingering echoes through the halls by day and blaze with light at night. All demons would retreat, for they possessed unimaginable power.
But the Demon Race was just as miraculous. The blood of powerful demons naturally had all sorts of effects. Once they used that blood to defile the famous