Chapter 3697 — A Bizarre Background
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 2
"Leader Wei Zhao, I'm not telling you all this to win your sympathy—I'm telling you the reason I must live."
Li Zhengming's expression returned to calm, and he paused before continuing: "If you let me live today, I will serve you from now on, go through fire and water for you without a second thought, and I can even act as your mole, watching every move Meng Jueming and his lot make. This is the greatest stake I can think of. If you still won't trust me, Leader Wei Zhao, then I have nothing more to say."
"A mole for me?" Wei Zhao raised an eyebrow, stroking his chin. "That is worth considering."
By his own reckoning, even though he now stood at the peak of the early Foundation Establishment stage, for some time to come he would still need to lie low in the Welcoming Pavilion, quietly cultivating to build up his strength—and his greatest trouble in the Welcoming Pavilion at present was Meng Jueming and his crew.
True, with his current strength, Meng Jueming's lot could hardly do anything to him openly. But if they set about plotting dirty tricks in private, that would still be a nuisance for Wei Zhao, more or less.
If, however, he could plant a mole among them, everything would be different. Any so-called dirty trick, once uncovered in advance, was bound to lose much of its effect—and handled well, it might even backfire, letting him turn a profit from it.
Li Zhengming's proposal had struck precisely the itch Wei Zhao could not scratch.
Looking over Meng Jueming's crew, a diehard like Meng Zhou was plainly beyond bribery or control, while the other newcomers stood too far on the periphery and often could not hope to fathom Meng Jueming's plans. By contrast, Li Zhengming was a more fitting mole than anyone could ask for.
Seeing Wei Zhao waver, Li Zhengming was overjoyed and pressed his advantage. "A spear in the open is easy to dodge; an arrow in the dark is hard to guard against. Your strength is great, Leader Wei Zhao, and openly you need fear no challenge from any one of them—but what if Meng Jueming strikes at you from the shadows? After all, as the steward senior brother, he holds far more information than you or I. If you cannot see it coming, you may dodge it once or twice, but sooner or later there will come a moment of carelessness, won't there?"
Wei Zhao shot him a glance. "That much is true enough. But why should I believe you? Since you can betray Meng Jueming, you could just as easily turn around and betray me, couldn't you?"
Li Zhengming had anticipated this misgiving. At once he drew a jade tablet from his bosom and handed it to Wei Zhao. "This is my identity tablet from Qiushui Manor. My identity details are carved into it, and apart from the late jade-carving master of Qiushui Manor, no one in this world can counterfeit it. This is the greatest secret I carry—the moment this tablet is exposed, I am certain to die without even a grave to be buried in."
Wei Zhao took the tablet and examined it closely. The material itself was fine spirit jade, carved into the likeness of a manor; more wondrous still, inside the jade were carved several dozen tiny characters, so minute as to be nearly imperceptible—a set of birth characters, headed by Li Zhengming's original name, Qiu Jiming.
Such craftsmanship was truly uncanny. Li Zhengming's claim that no one in this world could counterfeit it was indeed no lie.