Chapter 4008 — Something Anomalous
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 2
Though he suspected Wei Zhao must have some deep and hidden background, he already knew Wei Zhao's public identity: a mere newcomer to the Azure Cloud Pavilion. For a place like the Far North Island, the most normal situation would be that he had never even heard of it.
And that was indeed the case. Though the Far North Island was a renowned money pit, it was exclusive territory for the great and powerful. Ordinary cultivators had no right to enter or leave, and those who even knew of its existence were exceedingly few. Even someone like Senior Brother Bitter, who had muddled along in the Triple Stack Pavilion for some years, knew nothing of it.
"The Far North Island—sounds decent enough. How do we get there?" Wei Zhao asked, raising an eyebrow.
Hong Zhong understood his meaning and shook his head. "There's no teleportation array, so the only way is a flying spirit beast. Even at top speed, the flight takes two hours, so we must set off at once."
As the two spoke, Hong Zhong had already made the preparations. A massive flying spirit beast stood waiting in the street. For this trip to the Far North Island auction, besides Hong Zhong and Wei Zhao, two staff members would accompany them, tasked with assisting Hong Zhong.
With a rushing whoosh, the giant flying spirit beast soared into the air and sped northward.
Standing on the beast's back, Wei Zhao could see that besides himself and Hong Zhong, a dozen or so other flying spirit beasts were also taking off from North Island, rising from all directions and heading the same way—toward the Far North Island.
Watching this, Wei Zhao suddenly noticed that Hong Zhong's expression had turned somewhat strange. Puzzled, he asked, "What is it? Is something wrong?"
It was an auction, after all. The Hong Clan Merchant Guild would send people, and so would the North Island Triple Stack Pavilion and the other merchant factions. There was nothing strange about that, surely?
"Nothing. It's just that these people seem to have gone to rather excessive lengths. In past years, the North Island auction never mobilized so many at once..." Hong Zhong stroked his chin thoughtfully.
Wei Zhao looked over at his words and saw that the other flying spirit beasts each carried a dozen or more people, while his own side had only four. By comparison, they seemed rather sparse.
By custom, the North Island auction was held once every half year—a frequency neither high nor low. The various factions of North Island would all send representatives, but few ever went to such lengths.
Normally, Hong Zhong bringing two assistants was enough to handle matters; more people would just be idle. After all, this wasn't a fight—it was ordinary auction business. There was no need for strength in numbers.
Yet it would have been one thing if only a single faction had mobilized so heavily. But now, looking around, nearly every other flying spirit beast was densely packed with a dozen or more people, some even more. This was simply too anomalous.
Hong Zhong shot a glance at the assistant steering their flying spirit beast, then had him slowly bring them alongside the nearest beast (Yesterday a reader on the public WeChat account 22 mentioned Xu Lingchong changing his cultivation method. This was mentioned earlier when we first came to Cloud Terrace Island: under the Heavenly Dao there is one cultivation method, and above the Heavenly Dao one may change to another method for cultivation. Xu Lingchong had never changed his before, so he can change once. This will be mentioned in future chapters.). (To be continued) R752