Chapter 3414 — A Clue

"Then you came here for... cough, cough..." As he spoke, Meng Gaohai spat out several more mouthfuls of fresh blood. Though Wei Zhao had held back in his strikes, this early Heaven-rank expert was simply too feeble for his rank; even as he spoke, he was already fading fast.

Seeing Meng Gaohai in such a state, the others in the dormitory were aghast—the close-cropped man especially. He was beginning to regret having put on airs with Wei Zhao earlier.

"You're dying. I'll give you a choice: work for me, and I'll heal you. Or stay here and wait for death." Wei Zhao glanced at Meng Gaohai and spoke flatly.

"I... if you can really heal me, I'll submit, of course..." Meng Gaohai knew how grave his injuries were. He was on the verge of death—what choice did he have left? True, he could not leave this poison-refining base and spent every day refining poison, but who would want to die? Especially as the leader here, with people to wait on him—his life was comfortable, and all the more reason he did not want to die.

Now, even if he had to submit to Wei Zhao, he would still be second only to one and above ten thousand—a figure of no small consequence. So he agreed without the slightest hesitation.

"Good." Wei Zhao nodded, then glanced at the close-cropped man from before. "You come here too. Your leader has already yielded—surely you don't mean to defy me to the bitter end and wait to die?"

"No, no, absolutely not! Leader 9527, we'll all follow your orders from now on..." The close-cropped man's injuries were not especially severe, but he was still in a bad way. He scrambled over at once and swore his loyalty to Wei Zhao.

Meng Gaohai did not mind in the least. He himself had submitted—what right did he have to expect his underling's loyalty?

"Then I'll save your lives." With that, Wei Zhao circulated the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art and began repairing Meng Gaohai's and the close-cropped man's injuries, one on each side.

Though Wei Zhao had said he could heal them, neither Meng Gaohai nor the close-cropped man quite believed it. Their injuries were severe, after all—even the Lesser Restoration Pill was useless; only the Greater Restoration Pill would do. And if Wei Zhao had possessed a Greater Restoration Pill, it could never have escaped confiscation when he entered.

So they had only meant to humor him. What they never expected was that Wei Zhao would not feed them pills at all, but heal them with true qi! It was simply astonishing.

As they felt their injuries mending bit by bit, their admiration and awe for Wei Zhao rose from the bottom of their hearts.

Such is the world of cultivation: the strong are revered. If someone is only a little stronger, you may hate them in your heart and scheme to surpass them. But if they are so much stronger that it surpasses imagination, there is nothing left to hate—you can never hope to overtake them anyway, so you might as well submit obediently.

Their injuries were soon healed. Wei Zhao looked them over and said, "You're fully recovered now. You could also choose to feign submission and then secretly inform on me—tell the people of the poison-refining base that I was merely hiding my strength."

"We wouldn't dare..." Meng Gaohai shook his head hurriedly. "I, Meng Gaohai, am neither a faithless villain nor a brainless fool! Leader 9527, since you're strong enough to wound me gravely with a single move, dealing with the few guards of this poison-refining base will be child's play—and when that time comes, you'd surely settle accounts with me as well. I'd have to be out of my mind to do such a thing!"

"It seems you see things quite clearly?" Meng Gaohai's answer took Wei Zhao somewhat by surprise. His greatest worry had been that these men would shirk their work and inform on him, ruining his plan.

Not that he feared the people of this poison-refining base—they could never hold him—but his purpose in coming here was to find the Pangolin, so it was better to keep a low profile.

On reflection, though, Meng Gaohai was plainly terrified. Since he was so sensible, Wei Zhao said no more.

"Indeed, Leader 9527, you must have come here for some purpose, surely? If there's anything you need, just tell me, your humble servant. Modesty aside, I do carry some weight around here." Meng Gaohai said hastily.

What he feared most was being of no use to Wei Zhao—for if he truly was of no use, what would stop Wei Zhao from finishing him off?

"Good. Do you know where those first-batch bio-humans are housed?" Wei Zhao asked.

"The first batch of bio-humans? Oh, you mean those walking corpses, Leader. They're not here—they're in another dormitory building," Meng Gaohai said.

"So we have no contact with them at all?" Wei Zhao could not help frowning at this.

"That's not quite it!" Seeing Wei Zhao frown, Meng Gaohai said at once, "Our daily work areas are still quite close to theirs!"

"Close? Could we go over there?" Wei Zhao asked, a note of hope in his voice.

"That we can't." Meng Gaohai shook his head. "Our work areas aren't connected, but I am sometimes able to go over."

"Oh? How so?" Wei Zhao asked.

"Aren't I the leader here? Some of the bio-humans are quite formidable, with exceptional strength. Because the original reagent wasn't especially refined, these bio-humans can go berserk if the hypnosis isn't done well. I'm called in to help suppress them, and in return they grant me certain privileges here." Meng Gaohai explained, "If there's anything you need, Leader, I'll find a chance to do it!"

"Oh, in that case, take a look at this photo." As he spoke, Wei Zhao pulled a phone out of the jade pendant's space—as though drawing it from his robes—and Meng Gaohai's jaw dropped.

Wei Zhao had actually brought a phone in here? Weren't they all confiscated? His own had been taken long ago.

Still, in his eyes Wei Zhao had already been ranked among the extraordinary; that he should be a cut above the rest was only natural! With that thought, Meng Gaohai hurriedly studied the photo in Wei Zhao's hand.

Looking at the photo, Meng Gaohai could not help falling into reminiscence...

After a moment, Meng Gaohai said, "This person—I think I've seen him before. He went berserk once, and I was the one sent to suppress him!"

"Oh? You're certain?" Wei Zhao's breathing suddenly quickened. He turned to Meng Gaohai and said urgently, "Look again, carefully!"

"No mistake, it's this man!" Meng Gaohai nodded. "I don't recall his name, but I remember he was a Yellow-rank expert. After the injection, though, he could reach Mystic-rank or even Earth-rank when he went berserk. That day the two Heaven-rank guards happened to be away, so for fear he'd hurt someone, I was sent to suppress him!"

"And was he well?" Wei Zhao asked quickly.

"He was fine before. After that I stopped paying attention. But if you're looking for him, Leader, I'll make inquiries for you tomorrow!" Meng Gaohai said. (To be continued...)