Before long, the patrol from Nine Ridges Mountain brought the boy back, only to earn a furious scolding from the elder in charge. "Do you have any idea what times we're living in? Have you stuffed yourselves so full you've got nothing better to do than make trouble for me?"
"Steward Zhao, dear Steward Zhao, just consider it a good deed and help this boy, won't you? Oh, right, lad, we still don't know your name."
The boy seemed frightened by the elder's ferocity. "I... my name is Er Niu..."
The elder's expression was cold. "Who knows whether this boy is an Outer Dao spy? You lot don't know how high the heavens are or how deep the earth is. You've never seen the transformations of Shape-Stealing Skin-Painting. Why haven't you sent him to the Examination Bureau yet?"
"Oh? Does that mean you've agreed?"
"Haha, Steward Zhao, you really do have a warm heart beneath that cold face. Hey, Er Niu, hurry up and thank Steward Zhao!"
Steward Zhao: "..."
The examination naturally found nothing wrong with the boy. He was merely a mortal youth from the underworld's markets.
The West River Gate on Nine Ridges Mountain was a small local sect, but it had a Core Formation Expert presiding over it. After the war between the Puppet Dao and spellcraft, it had received special support from the Immortal Alliance and grown several times over in a short period.
By now, the sect had long since merged with the other nearby powers, large and small, and introduced methods such as soul searching and suggestion, wielded by certain experts. These allowed them to secretly read mortals' minds and detect all manner of anomalies.
Unless the enemy could alter even divine souls and memories, no disguise, however ingenious, nor any Shape-Stealing Skin-Painting