Chapter 3984 — A Dilemma of Retreat and Advance
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 2
At an occasion so crowded with the illustrious and the mighty, most people instinctively reined in their aura, lest some great personage take offense at a careless moment and land them in needless trouble. Yet this young powerhouse, the most highly touted of his generation in the Three-Tiered Pavilion, showed not the slightest inclination to do any such thing—he went his own way, utterly indifferent to those around him.
Even so, not a single person around him took offense, and some even went out of their way to nod in greeting—among them no few figures of elder rank within the Three-Tiered Pavilion.
Wei Zhao could not help but feel a chill of alarm. To single-handedly flout custom, and to have everyone around take it as a matter of course, without so much as a whisper of gossip—the sheer depth of power that must lie behind such a thing was easy to imagine. This Gongyang Jun was truly no ordinary figure.
Everywhere Gongyang Jun passed, the crowd fell back and cleared a path; not one among them had the nerve to bar his way—until it came to Wei Zhao's turn.
Even without looking back, Wei Zhao could sense with perfect clarity that overbearing, piercingly cold aura directly behind him, mere inches away—a single step from his back.
In an instant, every eye in the hall was fixed on Wei Zhao.
"Who's that fellow? Never seen him before—could he be some nephew the elders recently brought in?" someone in the crowd whispered.
To be eligible for the Shangguan young miss's birthday banquet, one must surely have formidable backing. That they would speculate this way was only natural.
"Ha, whoever's young master he is, blocking the way in front of Hall Master Gongyang—I've only got one thing to say to him: ignorance breeds fearlessness!"
"Right. The fellow probably doesn't even know who Hall Master Gongyang is, has no idea about these taboos. Pity, really!"
"'Wherever I pass, no one may bar my path'—those were Lord Gongyang's own words, and even the high elders of the council deliberately accommodate him. This fool's picked the wrong day to be so tactless; he's in for it now."
The onlookers around them traded gloating remarks, every face wearing the expression of someone settling in to enjoy a good show.
With his keen senses, Wei Zhao caught every word of those discussions despite their deliberately lowered voices. In a place like this, offending a formidable figure like Gongyang Jun over such a trivial, inexplicable matter was indeed less than wise.
Yet just as Wei Zhao was about to step aside like everyone else, Xu Lingchong spoke up first: "Well, well! If it isn't the strongest newcomer in the history of the Azure Cloud Pavilion. Wei Zhao, your condescending to attend the birthday banquet is truly an honor for me and my junior sister Lan'er. Come, come—right this way, please!"
The moment the words left his mouth, a stir ran through the hall, and even Gongyang Jun, behind Wei Zhao, came to a halt.
"The strongest newcomer in the history of the Azure Cloud Pavilion—isn't that the Divine Physician and Sage Alchemist Zhang Lifeng? Since when did that title fall to some nobody named Wei Zhao?"
"True enough. But I hear this Wei Zhao, like Master Zhang Lifeng, comes from the mundane world. Word is he's been throwing his weight around at the Welcome Pavilion, making quite a name for himself."
"Rubbish. He's nothing but some grass-roots newcomer with a bit of piddling, unimpressive strength. What the hell's he so cocky about? Thinks stepping in a few piles of dog shit makes him the next Master Zhang? One such man in tens of thousands of years—and you think the likes of him could be it?"
Just that single remark from Xu Lingchong set the crowd buzzing, and in an instant Wei Zhao was hoisted onto the pyre—not merely made the target of every eye, but left with no way forward and no way back.
What a vicious little scheme this was! Wei Zhao gave Xu Lingchong a long, deep look. The intent behind those sudden words was plain as day.