Chapter 11610 — One Missing

The spectacle of the day was over, but everyone knew full well that the ripples it had set in motion were far from settling.

This was only the beginning.

Even the most stubborn of souls had to admit it now: the Inner Royal Court was truly about to see a change in the heavens.

Wei Zhao turned to the assembled stewards of the Nightfall Palace: "Bring my people back. If even one is missing, all of you will be buried with them."

"Yes, yes!"

Not one of them dared utter a word of protest; they scattered at once, frantic to begin the search.

Earlier, Cheng Shuang'er and the others had been swept away into Xiang Zikui's sleeve-universe. Xiang Zikui had then taken a beating from Li Qinghe and fled to the Nightfall Palace to nurse his wounds—naturally bringing the captives along with him.

Before long, Xu Anshan and the rest stood before Wei Zhao.

A year apart, and in circumstances such as these—their excitement could not have been greater.

"Not bad. You knew to come back."

The Queen rolled her eyes in fine style, then joined Dongfang Yan in planting a fist on Wei Zhao.

Wei Zhao doubled over, clutching his stomach: "So this is the welcome you give me?"

A smile flickered at the corners of the Queen's eyes, though her face stayed stern: "You're lucky we didn't give you an electric shock instead."

The group dissolved into roughhousing, all but Cheng Shuang'er, who, after paying her respects to Wei Zhao, stood quietly to one side, envy glimmering deep in her eyes.

She was one of Wei Zhao's people too—he had even entrusted her with the entire Institute of Rule Design, and his trust in her was beyond question.

Yet she understood clearly that she had not yet earned a place in Wei Zhao's inner circle. The Queen and the others could roughhouse with him, and he would coax and indulge them. She could not.

As she stood there envying them, Dongfang Yan suddenly flashed over, hoisted her onto a shoulder, and carried her to Wei Zhao.

Caught utterly off guard, Cheng Shuang'er went pale with alarm.

Dongfang Yan shoved her right up to Wei Zhao until their faces were nearly touching, and her gentle, pretty face flushed scarlet to the roots of her ears.

Dongfang Yan said carelessly: "Shuang'er took a lot of grief this time around. You owe her something in return."

Cheng Shuang'er waved her hands again and again: "No, no—Sister Yan is only joking."

But Wei Zhao nodded gravely: "I know everything that happened. You did well."

At that simple sentence, Cheng Shuang'er felt herself wrapped in a warm current, and all the pressure, grievance, and resentment of before melted away in an instant.

For that one sentence from Wei Zhao, she felt from the bottom of her heart that everything she had given was worth it.

"From now on, leave the Institute of Rule Design alone."

One sentence from Wei Zhao left her stunned, and then she heard him say: "From now on, you will be in charge of Nightfall Palace."

"Huh?"

Cheng Shuang'er was utterly dumbfounded.

Wei Zhao smiled without explaining, and merely said one thing: "Keep at it."

Cheng Shuang'er still had not recovered from the sheer volume of information, and nodded blankly: "Oh."

The former Rule Design Institute had already been a high-end platform that the vast majority of cultivators could never touch in their entire lives, yet in Wei Zhao's eyes it was nothing more than a newbie village for Cheng Shuang'er to practice in.

Now it was time to upgrade that newbie village a notch and switch to a more advanced platform.

As for Xu Anshan and the others standing nearby, they had not the slightest opinion on the matter.

Across the entire Inner Royal Court, Nightfall Palace could be said to be a top-tier power in a class of its own outside the seven great princely houses; even a clan like the Lü family of Liaojing Prefecture could not compare.

Such a massive piece of meat was enough to make anyone's eyes go red.

Within any faction, if there was even the slightest unevenness in the division of spoils, and people set upon one another like dogs over a bone, that could only be counted as routine procedure.

Handle it poorly, and it was not at all impossible for lethal hidden dangers to take root, or even for the whole thing to split apart in open infighting.

In fact, at this very moment, many factions—the seven great princely houses included—dared not cross swords with Wei Zhao openly, but behind closed doors they were all waiting to enjoy the show.

Unfortunately, they had all underestimated the ambitions of Xu Anshan and his people.

If they could truly be set at each other's throats over a single Nightfall Palace, these people would never have made it to Wei Zhao's side in the first place.

To put it bluntly, their sights were set on the stars and the sea; if Wei Zhao really did play the hands-off master and toss Nightfall Palace over to them, then every last one of these people would, in all likelihood, curse him out.

There was no help for it—such was the corporate culture of Wei Zhao's group.

At this moment, what everyone cared about more was Wei Baizhan.

Xu Anshan was the first to ask: "What exactly did you spend this past year doing with him?"

Yan Zhongyuan and the others all pricked up their ears.

What Wei Baizhan's original strength had been, no one knew better than they did.

Now that a year had passed, although their own strengths could be counted as having advanced by leaps and bounds, compared with Wei Baizhan they were crawling like snails—not remotely in the same league.

Originally, Wei Baizhan's strength had ranked only in the middle among them, but now he could easily take on all of them at once!

Anyone at all would feel their heart clawed at by a hundred talons.

Previously, Wei Zhao had once used the will of the world to send them a message, saying that he would be in seclusion for a year.

No one had taken it much to heart at the time, but had they known then how things would turn out, they would have battered down the gates to follow him into the Realm of Sin.

Still, that was only idle fancy.

During the year the new world had been merging with the Realm of Sin, the place had been in violent flux at every hour of every day; even Wei Zhao himself dared not enter or leave rashly, let alone bring others along.

Otherwise he would long since have taken them in with him.

After all, the windfall of a ten-thousandfold time flow was not something one chanced upon every day.

Wei Zhao put on a solemn face. "Old Xu, keep your nose out of society's business."

"Fuck."

For the first time in his life, the Born Emperor let slip a curse.

But after a few more jests, Wei Zhao let the cat out of the bag: "If you want to walk his road, you'll have to find another chance later. For now, though, I've set up a training camp for you inside, and found a dedicated instructor—very high grade."

Xu Anshan asked, "How high?"

"God tier. Is that high enough for you?"

At that one word, Xu Anshan and the rest all lit up at once.

A God-tier powerhouse for an instructor—the training camp's standing was instantly maxed out, and there was no way they could not be tempted.

Wei Baizhan, Li Qinghe, and the rest of the Ten Great Sinners, however, all wore strange expressions.

Naturally, they knew whom Wei Zhao meant.

Jiang Xiaoshang.

In their understanding, of course, Jiang Xiaoshang was Wei Zhao's God-tier ancestral elder.

That they possessed such formidable strength today was due in part, to be sure, to their own long grinding, and in part inseparable from Jiang Xiaoshang's personal drilling.

Only that devilish method of training—even knowing full well how great its benefits, the mere memory of it still made their scalps prickle in unison.

Back then it had been a mercy they were too green to know better and had not been frightened off at the door; looking back now, they could not even say how they had endured it.