Taibai Jinxing held his teacup and changed the subject. "Your tea certainly has something to it, Lord Chen. Still, Tongming Hall has had no shortage of paperwork these past few days, especially the loose ends brought back from the Tongtian River case. They've been quite a headache."
Chen Wei said nothing, waiting quietly for the High Immortal to continue.
The loose ends Taibai Jinxing spoke of were naturally the Golden-Winged Great Peng, Azure Lion, and White Elephant Spirit.
As for the Five Demon Sages?
They were merely rough-and-tumble demons with no backing. Their fate was already sealed.
"Spirit Mountain has moved quite quickly." Watching the Dragon Carp swimming in the pond, Taibai Jinxing said slowly, "Guanyin, Manjushri, and Samantabhadra have all sent word, one after another. Their meaning was clear enough: those three vile creatures went to the Tongtian River because Spirit Mountain failed to keep a tight leash on them. Now that the Heavenly Court has caught them, they accept punishment. But they hope we can simply go through the motions and charge them with the minor offense of lax discipline."
At that, Taibai Jinxing stopped.
He neither spoke nor looked at Chen Wei, merely picking up his empty teacup again and toying with it.
Chen Wei quickly went over the old Star Lord's words.
A High Immortal's scolding was nothing to fear; what was frightening was a High Immortal who stopped halfway through speaking to pick up his teacup.
Taibai Jinxing had drunk the tea, yes, but drinking it did not mean he had accepted Chen Wei. The Great Heavenly Venerable had made an exception to promote him to Inspector, and Yang Chan had come personally to recommend him.
Taibai Jinxing had shown them courtesy and smoothed things over, but his bottom line remained.
Connections alone would not