Chapter 4644 — Two Tasks
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 2
"Hold me," Han Jingyi murmured, a faint blush rising to her cheeks.
Wei Zhao smiled and drew her into his arms. The two pressed close together, thick as lacquer, and for a long while they did not part.
"Hey, why are those two so prim? A lone man and a lone woman—shouldn't they be like dry kindling and a roaring flame? How can one hug and have done with it?" Ning Xuefei, princess of West Island though she was, lay flat against the crack of the research chamber's door with no regard for dignity at all, her face steeped in disappointment. She had been certain Wei Zhao and Han Jingyi would take their intimacy further; she had even dragged Shangguan Lan'er into crouching at the door with her all this time, and yet beyond clinging to each other the pair had done nothing whatsoever. Two blocks of wood, both of them.
"Feifei, you're terrible—you actually want to watch things unfit for the young! I can't stand you!" Shangguan Lan'er said with a look of scorn.
"Oh, is that so? Well, if Lan'er is so high-minded, could you maybe not shove me? Shoving so hard just to steal my spot..." Ning Xuefei glanced at Shangguan Lan'er, who was draped over her head, and pursed her lips, speechless.
The two girls had clean forgotten that Wei Zhao was a peak expert of the early Nascent Soul stage, his spiritual sense far outstripping others of his level. With the two of them peeking so brazenly through the door crack, even a fool would have noticed—let alone Wei Zhao.
The West Island Envoys' Residence was not far from the Island Master's Palace, a place set aside expressly for the lodging of envoys from every quarter. Xu Lingchong and Kang Jingming had only just settled in. For convenience in carrying out their mission, the two had deliberately requested to be placed in the same room, so that they might confer and act at any hour.
Xu Lingchong sat drinking tea, while Kang Jingming naturally stood to one side pouring it for him. Just then a faint red shadow slipped in through the window and landed squarely on the table before them. Both men's eyelids twitched—it was a blood bat.
Blood bats were the spirit beasts reserved for their internal communications. Bound beneath this one, which had appeared so suddenly, was a coded secret order—a message from the mysterious man himself!
Xu Lingchong and Kang Jingming exchanged a glance. Receiving such coded orders back on North Island had been nothing strange, but now, far away on West Island, to receive one here too—that was somewhat baffling. More to the point, they had only just settled in, and the coded message had arrived at once. Such precision in timing was truly staggering.
The two men looked at the blood bat on the table, exchanged another glance, and wore thoughtful expressions. But this was no time for speculation; Xu Lingchong reached out and took up the message. After reading the contents of the mission, his expression turned rather odd.
"What is it, Young Master Xu?" Kang Jingming asked, discreetly withdrawing to one side. At his level he was not permitted to read such high-grade coded orders—the Center's rules made the consequences of overstepping unthinkable, and he had not the nerve for it.
"See for yourself." Xu Lingchong tossed the message carelessly to Kang Jingming. The mysterious man had not required secrecy, and since the mission called for the two of them to carry it out together, there was no need for concealment.
Kang Jingming caught it hurriedly and read it over carefully. After a long while he looked up at Xu Lingchong and said weakly, "Young Master Xu, I don't understand it..."
"Ah—I forgot about that." Xu Lingchong smacked his forehead. Only then did he recall that the coded orders required special training to read; an ordinary person could never make sense of them, and Kang Jingming's rank was not high enough to have learned the Center's cipher.
Kang Jingming gave a sheepish laugh and could only hand the message back to Xu Lingchong, waiting to hear the rest.