The calm before the storm

A single slap had nearly torn the future-renowned Shrek Seven Devils apart.

If he had not seen that Tang San had a bit of a brain and seemed to have realized something...

He would certainly have kept fanning the flames.

"Forget it. I'll save them to play with slowly later. Where's the fun in playing them to death all at once?"

"Wouldn't you agree, Xiao Hei?"

Mo Lin glanced at the black ball lying beside him, a smile on his face.

"Awoo."

The black ball raised its head, a humanlike gleam flashing in its jewel-like eyes.

Its little furry head swayed, then nodded vigorously.

At the sight, Mo Lin laughed twice, looking to be in a very good mood.

"Speaking of which, Lingling should be coming here in a few days. Do you think she'll like you looking like this?"

Heaven Dou City was not far from Suotuo City, and transportation these days was still limited to horse-drawn carriages.

The fancier ones were merely pulled by tamed Soul Beasts, and were not much faster.

He had to get everything ready before she arrived, and the little black ball before him-more precisely, the shrunken Dark Demon Evil God Tiger-was the surprise he had prepared for her.

Girls liked furry things, after all. The Dark Demon Evil God Tiger's fur felt quite nice, and it was soft to hold, too. He had tested that personally.

But would Ye Lingling like this pitch-black thing that looked like a lump of coal?

Mo Lin put a question mark beside that in his mind.

He wondered whether he should use the Monkey Talisman's power to give it a new look.

The Monkey Talisman could change an object's very form. The burly man who had stirred up trouble earlier had been his disguise, created with the Monkey Talisman.

As for leaving without anyone being the wiser, he had used the Snake Talisman's power.

Forget Tang San-even Qian Daoliu would not have been able to sense him.

"Hmm? You smell a little. That won't do. We can't have you stinking someone out later."

Without waiting for the Dark Demon Evil God Tiger to resist, Mo Lin grabbed the soft fur at the back of its neck, ready to scrub it clean and give it a new look while he was at it.

But he seemed to have overestimated his skills a little. The finished result was too horrible to look at.

Fortunately, the Horse Talisman had a restorative effect. Otherwise, the Dark Demon Evil God Tiger might have become the first bare-bottomed tiger.

While Mo Lin was tormenting the Dark Demon Evil God Tiger, Tang San and the others sat gathered elsewhere, discussing what had happened in the street earlier.

"Zhuqing, you misunderstood Boss Dai. He was protecting Xiao Wu, not deliberately picking a fight."

Tang San first helped wash the dirty water off Dai Mubai's name. The pair's relationship was already poor; without a clear explanation, it might well be ruined outright.

"You don't need to explain anything to me. His affairs have nothing to do with me."

Clearly, Zhu Zhuqing did not appreciate the gesture. Whether that incident had been Dai Mubai's fault no longer mattered to her.

There had been something very wrong with the way Dai Mubai had looked at her earlier. It had been naked contempt.

Clearly, he had not taken her seriously at all, yet she had risked her life fleeing the Star Luo Empire to find him.

Especially after everything she had seen and heard since arriving here, she finally understood just how foolish her actions had been.

"San, why are you explaining anything to her? I wasn't in the wrong to begin with."

Dai Mubai was very irritated now. He did not understand what she had to be so haughty about. Sure enough, he should never have been too nice to her.

"Boss Dai, calm down. I know this wasn't your fault, but didn't you notice something very wrong about the whole thing?"

With things like this, trying to reconcile them would be useless. He could only take another path.

"Wrong? What was wrong?"

Clearly, Dai Mubai was still immersed in his own emotions and had not thought about anything else.

If there was anything else, it was how to pin Zhu Zhuqing to a bed and ravage her mercilessly.

"That man was clearly coming after us. I'm not quite sure what his goal was yet, but I'm certain this wasn't a coincidence."

Those words shocked everyone present.

"San, don't scare me. I've been here for so many years, and I haven't made any enemies."

Ma Hongjun, who had been happily gnawing on a chicken leg beside them, shrank back timidly.

"Could it be someone from the Suotuo Great Spirit Arena?"

After hearing Tang San out, Oscar rubbed his chin and thought of a possibility.

After all, he had not been there at the time. By the time he arrived, everything was already over.

Besides, in all his years hanging around Shrek, he had never encountered anything like this before.

It was unlikely to be an old grudge, and the only recent change had been the Suotuo Great Spirit Arena.

They had been making quite a splash at the Suotuo Great Spirit Arena lately and had gained a modest reputation.

Even though they wore disguises, if someone truly wanted to target them, discovering their real identities was not impossible.

Combined with what Tang San had said earlier, it seemed quite likely.

"That's possible, but I keep feeling things aren't that simple."

For some reason, Tang San kept having an ominous premonition, as though something very bad was about to happen.

"Do you need this young lady's help?"

Ning Rongrong, who had remained silent beside them, suddenly spoke up.

Intelligence gathering was one of their Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect's strengths.

"Is that really necessary? It was just a slap. It's not that big a deal."

"Fatty, what's that supposed to mean? Easy for you to say when it wasn't your face getting slapped, huh?"

Dai Mubai slammed the table and rose, his mismatched, sinister eyes glaring at Ma Hongjun.

Soul Power surged around him as his hands gradually turned into tiger claws. His blade-sharp nails pierced the wooden tabletop, leaving clear marks.

"Boss Dai, calm down! That's not what I meant."

Seeing Dai Mubai activate his Martial Soul outright scared Ma Hongjun half to death, and he hurried to explain.

"I just feel there's no need to make such a big fuss. We can just ask the dean."

Flender was a Soul Saint, after all. Though he was usually rather greedy and stingy, he fiercely protected his own.

Dai Mubai was still a Shrek student, after all. Was slapping him in the street not the same as slapping Flender himself?

Given his temperament, he would certainly settle the score.

"Can't you get everything out in one go? Otherwise, I'll beat you to death next time."

Only after hearing Ma Hongjun's explanation did Dai Mubai's expression ease slightly.

"All right, all right, Boss Dai, calm down. You know what Fatty's mouth is like. As the saying goes, a dog's mouth can't spit out ivory. Can you really expect words of gold and jade from a barnyard chicken's beak?"

Seeing that things had more or less settled down, Oscar seized the moment to smooth things over.

But while putting one down to flatter the other made Dai Mubai feel better, it left Ma Hongjun displeased.

"Oscar, who are you calling a barnyard chicken? I'm a phoenix! A phoenix, understand?"

"Haha, a phoenix? Aren't you just a fire-breathing barnyard chicken? An especially fat one, at that."

Never one to mind making a spectacle bigger, Ning Rongrong jumped straight in to join the teasing.

Zhu Zhuqing did not want to speak at all and coldly watched everything unfolding.

As for Xiao Wu, she huddled beside Tang San, her gaze wandering as though she were pondering something.

Watching this scene, Tang San also felt utterly drained, so he simply stopped bothering.

In the end, they took the matter to Flender and let him handle it.

But after investigating for several days, he still found absolutely nothing, so the matter ultimately came to nothing.

Of course, that was only how things ended on their side. Mo Lin had no intention of stopping there.

A few days later, a carriage from Heaven Dou City entered Suotuo City.

Mo Lin sat at the edge of a tall building's eaves not far away, smiling faintly as he watched Ye Lingling step out of the carriage.

"She's here? Looks like it's time to begin the next stage of the plan."

As he spoke, Mo Lin glanced at Xiao Hei beside him and pointed toward Ye Lingling.

"Go on, Xiao Hei. Time for you to get to work."