Chapter 3288 — All Fell Silent

Seeing that Lin Dongfang had indeed let them go, the others hurriedly and hastily departed from West Star Mountain Village, leaving only the Bloody Garment Patriarch, the Yellow Springs Patriarch, and the Grim Patriarch.

"I'm a bit thirsty. I'm going to get some water—you two want some as well?" Lin Dongfang casually walked over to that spirit spring, cupped his hands to scoop up a bowlful, and tipped it straight into his mouth.

"We'll pass..." The three Patriarchs had just been drinking wine and were not thirsty at all. Besides, water from some random mountain spring—was that even fit to drink? Though they were sure Lin Dongfang meant them no harm, an upset stomach would be no fun either.

Lin Dongfang did not press them. He casually finished his water and made ready to descend the mountain. "Let's go. We'll head back and keep drinking."

"Sure!" The three Patriarchs nodded eagerly in agreement...

The Black Horse Association's seclusion elder bore Qian Puguang's corpse away, took his leave of Mad Bull Patriarch, Dongfang Badao, and the rest, and departed in haste. By now he had no thought of revenge left in him; he rather regretted that the Black Horse Association had waded into these murky waters at all. Two top-tier experts at the peak of the late Heaven rank, at perfect consummation, had died, and in one stroke the Black Horse Association had fallen from a foremost ancient sect to a mid-tier one. But whose fault was that?

Earlier, it had been a botched mission—and when you took a mission, you had to accept that you might die. Not everyone could be the one doing the killing; you might well be the one killed! As for Qian Puguang, he had simply courted his own death. He had called out to him time and again, and still the man could not read the situation. Whose fault was that?

The seclusion elder had spent years in seclusion, but this time he had no choice but to come out and take charge of the Black Horse Association—at the very least, he would have to wait until a successor had been cultivated before he could return to seclusion.

As for Dongfang Badao, after the seclusion elder departed, he glanced at the assembled members of the Tomorrow Upon Tomorrow Cult and shook his head. Then he too left quickly. Though a thousand hatreds burned in his heart, he knew this was not the moment; he could not afford to fall out openly with Mad Bull Patriarch and the others.

"Fool!" Zhong Yongliang spat on the ground as he watched Dongfang Badao's receding back and cursed: "Such a golden chance to find himself a backer, and he doesn't even know how to seize it—truly blinded by hatred! I've been beaten to death once already, and I'm not carrying that much of a grudge!"

"Senior Martial Brother, a man like that isn't worth getting angry over. Like you said, he's courting death. If you don't court death, you won't die!" Mad Bull Patriarch nodded in wholehearted agreement. He felt that ever since his senior martial brother had been reborn, his words had become very trendy and very sensible.

"Master, Mad Bull Patriarch—so what do we do now?" Pure Yang Heavenly Venerable asked cautiously.

Though Pure Yang Heavenly Venerable was now a formidable expert at the peak of the late Heaven rank, at perfect consummation, before these two Patriarchs he remained meticulously careful and never presumed to overstep by even half a step.

"Let's go back to the sect," Zhong Yongliang said with a wave of his hand.

"Then... what about Wei Zhao?" Pure Yang Heavenly Venerable asked cautiously.

"We'll see. Let's wait and watch for now—see what the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect and Wei Zhao's hiring rules actually look like. If the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect means to interfere, then we really have no good options." Zhong Yongliang spoke with some headache.

"As Master says." Pure Yang Heavenly Venerable nodded. "Then we'll set it aside for now."

A vengeful assembly that had shaken the entire ancient plane had ended up fizzling out, tails high and heads low. All the parties involved kept their silence and said nothing of the outcome. But from the fact that the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect had emerged utterly unscathed, it was not hard to see that the members of the vengeful assembly had failed to achieve their intended goal.

As for what had actually happened and what the true result was, those involved kept their mouths shut tight, and outsiders had even less way of knowing. They could only guess—that the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect was no soft persimmon to be squeezed at will, that no one could make them change their ways.

And so, in the wake of it all, the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect's reputation soared across the ancient plane. At the very least, in the years to come, the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect had pulled far ahead of the Black Horse Association: when cultivators thought of hiring an assassin, the first name that came to mind was the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect, not the Black Horse Association!

Naturally, word had it that the Black Horse Association had also entered a period of recuperation. Apart from a few small jobs, they had stopped taking large ones altogether; any mission involving Earth rank or above was refused outright—even if the target was only an early Heaven rank, even one who had just set foot on the path!

That was enough to show how low the Black Horse Association had gone. Though people still did not know exactly what had happened, no wall in this world is truly airtight: the death of the Black Horse Association's chairman, Qian Puguang, had spread throughout the ancient plane.

How exactly he had died was unknown, but it was certainly connected to this vengeance scheme. And so people began to look at the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect with very different eyes. The Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect had actually slain Qian Puguang?

In no time at all, the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect's name was on everyone's lips! Yet even Feng Tianhu, another member of the vengeful assembly, did not know the crucial details of what had happened. No one dared tell him the truth; no one dared breathe a word about Lin Dongfang!

After hanging up on Dongfang Badao, Feng Tianhu's brows were tightly knit. He had already contacted the Tomorrow Upon Tomorrow Cult and the Black Horse Association before this, but neither had given him any answer—instead they had hung up on him rather coldly.

As for Dongfang Badao, though one could not call him cold, he had certainly been in no good temper. He refused to say a single word about what had happened then, only telling Feng Tianhu to lie low and give up any thought of making trouble for the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect.

"Fine, I won't. The nerve of them! It's not as if I have any grudge against the Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect anyway!" Feng Tianhu gave a cold snort. His main goal now was to rise to power; this Bloody Garment Yellow Springs Sect business, this Wei Zhao business—none of it had much to do with him.

So he shook his head and began studying his next plan against Feng Tianqi and Feng Shihua...

So many great events had unfolded in the world of cultivation, and far abroad, Wei Zhao too received a call from Ge Xian.

"Ge Xian, how are things? Any news from over there?" Wei Zhao picked up the call swiftly and asked.

"Leader, word is spreading all over the ancient plane right now that you don't have what it takes to instantly kill experts at the peak of the late Heaven rank or at perfect consummation, and that you're being hunted abroad by the Overseas Cultivators Association..." Ge Xian said urgently.

"Mm. And what else?" Ge Xian's news did not surprise Wei Zhao in the least. What Ge Xian reported, Wei Zhao had long since guessed; after all, once Cheng Yiyi had sent back this information, Wei Zhao had made his preparations. And besides, there was no way the Overseas Cultivators Association would keep anything secret on his behalf.