The night grew ever deeper.
The Zhao Family estate was also brightly lit, but the atmosphere was nowhere near as tense as it was at the Wang Family.
After returning, Patriarch Zhao immediately gathered the lineage's upper ranks to discuss the details of the defenses at Sky Eagle Cliff.
Although the guards within the estate had also heightened their vigilance, their attention was focused more on the outside, guarding against that elusive Chen Family Remnant.
No one had imagined that the danger would come from within.
A figure dressed in Li Family guard attire was leisurely making his way through the courtyards of the Zhao Family estate, taking advantage of his identity.
It was Chen Chen, disguised.
The Li Family waist token at his belt was his finest pass. Though the Zhao Family guards he encountered along the way cast him suspicious looks, once they saw the token, they merely asked a few routine questions before ignoring him.
After all, the three families had only just formed an alliance. It was perfectly normal for them to send people to relay messages between one another.
Chen Chen's target was neither the Zhao Family's upper ranks nor their treasure vault.
What he was looking for was one of the Zhao Family's most important—and most vulnerable—lifelines.
—The pill room!
Among Qingyang City's three great families, the Wang Family dominated through martial strength, the Li Family was famed for commerce, while the Zhao Family owed its standing to an alchemist capable of refining first-grade pills!
Though this alchemist was merely a guest elder hired by the Zhao Family, over sixty percent of the Zhao Family's annual income depended on the pills he refined.
The pill room was therefore the Zhao Family's most critical asset.
Relying on his powerful Spiritual Power and the information he had "interrogated" from the Li Family guard's mind, Chen Chen quickly pinpointed the pill room's location.
It was an independent courtyard deep within the estate, heavily guarded.
Outside the courtyard stood four elite guards at the Fifth Level of Body Tempering. Inside were the first-grade alchemist and his two disciples at the Fourth Level of Body Tempering.
Forcing his way in would be no different from courting death.
Chen Chen did not approach. Instead, he circled around to the back of an artificial rockery behind the courtyard.
He took several items from his robes once more.
Powdered sulfur and saltpeter, along with several hollowed-out bamboo tubes filled with fire oil.
These were the little "toys" Uncle Fu had prepared in advance for him.
He mixed the sulfur and saltpeter, wrapped them in oiled paper to make several simple fire starters, then bound them together with the fire-oil bamboo tubes.
After finishing all this, he circulated the Nine Nether Soul Refining Art. His powerful Spiritual Power, like invisible hands, lifted those "gifts" over the courtyard wall without a sound and placed them precisely on the pill room's roof, window ledges, and near the woodshed where medicinal ingredients were stored.
He had calculated these locations in advance. They were blind spots most likely to catch fire and least likely to be noticed.
After setting everything up, he did not ignite them immediately.
He waited.
Waited for the perfect moment.
Meanwhile, outside the gates of the Zhao Family estate.
A burst of urgent shouting shattered the night's silence.
"Something terrible happened! Someone's dead!"
"It's a Li Family guard! He was killed and thrown at the street corner!"
A patrol of Zhao Family guards discovered the corpse Chen Chen had deliberately left behind and immediately raised the alarm.
Very soon, Patriarch Zhao, who had just finished the meeting, rushed out with a dark expression and a group of people.
When he saw the corpse and the horrifying saber wound on it—the mark of the Wang Family's Blood Fiend Saber Technique—his pupils suddenly contracted!
"Wang! Wei!"
Patriarch Zhao practically squeezed those two words through clenched teeth.
The Zhao Family elders behind him also changed color.
"Family Head! What does the Wang Family mean by this? We just formed an alliance with them, and they're already stabbing us in the back?"
"Hmph! I say they're killing a chicken to scare the monkeys! They killed one of our guards to warn us to behave and obediently listen to them!"
"They've gone too far! Do they really think our Zhao Family is some soft persimmon they can squeeze as they please?!"
The Zhao Family members erupted in outrage.
Just then, a squad of Li Family guards also rushed over after hearing the news.
When the Li Family guard commander saw the miserable state of his brother, he flew into a rage as well!
"Patriarch Zhao! What is the meaning of this? How did a man of my Li Family end up dead outside your Zhao Family gates?!"
For a moment, the atmosphere before the Zhao Family gates was taut as drawn bows, tense to the extreme.
Patriarch Zhao had grievances he could not voice. He could not possibly say the Wang Family had done it; that would only make the Li Family think he was trying to sow discord.
And that was precisely the result Chen Chen wanted.
Once the seeds of suspicion were planted, they would take root and sprout wildly.
Just as everyone's attention was drawn to the disturbance at the gates.
Behind the rockery, killing intent flashed through Chen Chen's eyes.
He flicked his finger.
A tiny pebble sliced through the air and struck one of the fire-oil bamboo tubes he had placed atop the pill room woodshed with perfect accuracy.
Bang!
The bamboo tube shattered, spraying fire oil everywhere.
The sparks produced by the collision between the pebble and bamboo tube instantly ignited the fire starter soaked in fire oil!
Boom—!
A mass of blazing fire shot into the sky!
Like a giant python with eyes, the flames rapidly spread along the fuses Chen Chen had laid out in advance!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The fire-oil bamboo tubes exploded one after another!
The pill room, stocked with a vast amount of flammable medicinal ingredients, instantly turned into a sea of flames!
"The pill room is on fire! The pill room is on fire!"
A shrill scream came from deep within the estate.
The first-grade alchemist rushed out of his room with his robes in disarray. Seeing the raging inferno before him, he was completely dumbfounded.
"My herbs! My pill furnace!"
He let out a mournful howl and tried to charge into the flames without a care for his life.
"Teacher, it's dangerous!" His two disciples desperately held him back.
The estate guards finally came to their senses as well. Carrying buckets of water, they rushed toward the pill room in utter chaos.
The entire Zhao Family estate was thrown into complete disorder.
At the gates, Patriarch Zhao, who had been confronting the Li Family, heard the commotion behind him. His face turned deathly pale with a swish.
He whirled around. Seeing the flames soaring into the heavens, his vision went black, and he spat out a mouthful of blood.
"The... the pill room!"
That was the very root of his Zhao Family!
Meanwhile, Chen Chen had long since taken advantage of the chaos to remove the Li Family guard uniform, change back into his night clothes, leap over the Zhao Family walls like a nimble swallow, and vanish into the boundless night.
He did not return directly to Uncle Fu's courtyard.
Instead, he went to the back alley of a Wang Family business in the city—the Four Seas Money House.
He quietly placed a bundle of rare medicinal ingredients he had "casually" taken from the Zhao Family pill room, along with a money pouch bearing the Li Family insignia that he had taken from the Li Family guard, in the garbage pile by the money house's rear entrance.
Only after finishing all this did he completely conceal himself.
Tonight, he had given the three great families a grand "gift."
The Wang Family had killed a Li Family man.
The Li Family had stolen the Zhao Family's medicine.
And the Zhao Family's pill room had been burned clean by a mysterious blaze.
He had thoroughly muddied the waters.
He greatly looked forward to seeing what splendid drama the three families would perform after dawn.
As for him, he could sit atop the mountain and watch the tigers fight while calmly counting his gains.
[Name: Chen Chen] [Realm: Body Tempering Ninth Stage (Peak)] [Techniques: Asura God Transformation Art (First Layer), Nine Nether Soul Refining Art (Beginner)] [Martial Skill: Seven Shadows Step (Mastery)] [Cultivation Points: 300]
Killing Wang Hu and three guards had earned him another 300 Cultivation Points.
"System, can these 300 Cultivation Points allow me to break through to the Qi Condensation Realm?" Chen Chen asked inwardly.
[Breaking through to the Qi Condensation Realm requires drawing the Spiritual Energy of heaven and earth into the body and condensing a vortex of qi. This process cannot be completed directly with Cultivation Points, but Cultivation Points may be used to purchase pills or techniques that assist in the breakthrough, and can provide energy protection during the breakthrough, greatly increasing the success rate.] [Detected that the host possesses the pill 'Qi Condensation Pill.' Spend 500 Cultivation Points to activate 'Perfect Breakthrough' mode. Success rate: 100%. Foundation: flawless and immaculate.]
"Five hundred points..." Chen Chen frowned.
He was still short by two hundred points.
It seemed that before leaving Qingyang City, he would need to kill a few more people.
His gaze turned cold once more.
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