Chapter 4390 — Most Familiar Indeed

Seeing that Wei Zhao still looked half unconvinced, he hastily raised his hand and swore, "It's true, all true—I swear it on heaven above, I really don't know anything more. Sure, those Xuan Ascension experts look the other way around me, but they've never once talked to me either, and I don't dare ask any questions. One wrong question, and someone's liable to wind up dead..."

"All right. Next." Wei Zhao did not press Sun Hengbiao any further, and turned straight to the others nearby, asking them one by one why they had been seized, how long they had been locked up here.

The crowd found it a little odd that Wei Zhao should do such a thing, but with Sun Hengbiao's fate lying there before them, none of them would have dared provoke such a savage character with ten times the courage—and after all, it was only two questions, harmless enough, not like Sun Hengbiao's habit of snatching treasures at the slightest excuse. So they were only too glad to play along.

Going through them one by one, each person gave a different reason: one had quarreled with the Zhongshu Merchants' Guild's people while making a purchase, another had drunk too much and gone to make trouble at the Guild, another had fallen behind on the spirit jade he owed the Guild...

A thousand strange tales—anything imaginable or not, every sort of muddled and preposterous excuse, some so absurd they made a man laugh and cry at once. Yet one thing every one of them had in common: all of it had to do with the Zhongshu Merchants' Guild.

After making the rounds, it was at last Lu Bianren's turn. Wei Zhao had deliberately gone through them one by one like this; beyond wanting to learn as much as he could of the situation, the one he most wished to question was in fact Lu Bianren—yet unwilling to reveal his own identity, he could not single the man out by name, and so had to use this method to cover his tracks.

The two stood face to face at close quarters, and the longer Lu Bianren looked at Wei Zhao, the more familiar he seemed, a sense of having met before—though this coarse brute's face he had surely never seen. It was only Wei Zhao's bearing, the air about him, that struck him as somewhat familiar, and somewhat strange.

Strange, in that Wei Zhao's bearing was wholly at odds with his brute's appearance. An ordinary man, without looking closely, would not notice, but felt up close like this, the incongruity fairly grated on the senses.

In his days at the Welcome New Pavilion, Lu Bianren's power had been hollowed out, leaving him little to do, and so he had spent his time poring over all manner of ancient texts—with a particular knack for the study of physiognomy.

The face, they say, springs from the heart. Wei Zhao's brute's face and his bearing were a total mismatch; to one skilled in physiognomy like Lu Bianren, it was a flat contradiction of common sense—not the least bit scientific!

Yet strange or not, Lu Bianren still did not know that this fiend was Wei Zhao, and like the others he showed him every respect, not daring to be remiss.

"I had gone to the Zhongshu Merchants' Guild to gather information. For what reason, or in what way I offended them, I've no idea—I was seized out of the blue and locked up here ever since, and to this day I've yet to make sense of it." Lu Bianren smiled bitterly.

At this the others looked doubtful. Whatever the cause, great or small, they had all been seized for having offended the Zhongshu Merchants' Guild, and surely Lu Bianren was no different—who ever heard of being locked up merely for asking questions?

This account was neither full nor true; something was surely being held back—that was everyone's first thought. Yet every word Lu Bianren spoke was the truth; such was the fact of it, and to this very moment he remained utterly bewildered, wholly at a loss.

Wei Zhao was somewhat taken aback as well, though he did not think Lu Bianren was lying—Lu Bianren had always gone about things openly and honorably, by the straight and square path; he was not the sort to concoct a lie over a matter like this.

"What information had you gone to gather?" Wei Zhao pressed on, betraying nothing.

"That... might I not say?" Lu Bianren said, somewhat awkwardly.

The others broke into an uproar at once, and Sun Hengbiao wore the look of a man beholding a corpse. This fiend before them had beaten a vicious fellow like himself half to death without a second thought—and you, a mere Golden Core cultivator, dare put on airs before him?

It was only a harmless question, after all—no one was going to carve the flesh off your bones. Was it worth provoking such a savage brute over a trifle like this?

Even if there truly was something unspeakable in it, couldn't you just cobble together some lie and smooth it over? Why be so blunt—was this not asking for death?

But such was Lu Bianren's way: what could be said, he said; what he did not wish to say, he said so outright. To spin a lie was easy enough, but to do so would be to cease to be Lu Bianren.

Lu Bianren had no particular ties with anyone in this dungeon, and the crowd all gloated, waiting for Wei Zhao the fiend to fly into a rage, waiting for the spectacle—yet Wei Zhao's reaction was wholly beyond their expectations.

"Very well. Let it go for now." Wei Zhao nodded faintly, his expression bland, and turned straight to the next man.

Such a placid response left the crowd half wondering whether their eyes had deceived them—Sun Hengbiao especially, who nearly cursed aloud on the spot. When it had been his turn, this fiend's hand had been savage and ruthless enough; there had been no such willingness to talk things over!

Even Lu Bianren himself felt a touch surprised. He had braced himself for the other's fury—who would have thought it would be brushed aside so lightly, settled with a single offhand sentence? With anyone else, the man before him would most likely have kicked him sprawling...

Lu Bianren could not help but wonder: could this jarring sense of familiarity really be no illusion? Had he truly dealt with this man before?

Everyone exchanged glances, not daring to make a sound, able only to swallow a bellyful of questions and watch as Wei Zhao went on questioning one after another.

At last, when everyone in the dungeon had been asked in turn, Wei Zhao betrayed nothing, found himself a spot, and sat down cross-legged—and as chance would have it, right beside Lu Bianren.

At this, even the bewildered crowd began to catch a whiff of something. This fiend, more brutal even than Sun Hengbiao, was plainly treating Lu Bianren differently!

In this dungeon, Lu Bianren had always kept quiet and said little, never once overstepping, and in the eyes of the crowd had always been the sort to be pushed around—but now, from here on, they would have to weigh their dealings with him a little more carefully.

Lu Bianren was easy to bully, true enough—but if that brought down the displeasure of the fiend beside him, then a man might weep and find no grave to cry at.

And so, not only was the crowd startled and suspicious, but even Lu Bianren himself muttered inwardly: had he or had he not dealt with this man before? The face was unfamiliar, but the air about him was indeed quite familiar.

Yet no matter how Lu Bianren and the others might guess and wonder, Wei Zhao would not open his mouth, silently turning over in his mind the most pressing matter at hand: how to get out of here.