Within the secret chamber, the light of the Gathering Primeval Gu flickered dimly, madly dragging in the Primeval Energy all around.
One crystalline, translucent Primeval Stone after another dimmed rapidly under this greedy draw, ultimately turning into greyish white powder that scattered rustling beside Lin Mu like snowflakes.
And outside this tightly sealed stone door, time would not stop on account of Lin Mu's seclusion.
...
In the far rear of Black Blood Stockade, within an exceedingly quiet underground ice chamber.
The cold air was biting; white mist coiled about.
Lin Wan'er lay quietly settled within a specially crafted, massive ice coffin.
This ice coffin was not meant to freeze her utterly solid, but rather to use exceedingly subtle cold air to slow the decay and change of her body, and, together with several upper rank healing Gu worms, to barely sustain the gossamer thin flicker of vitality within her.
She still had breath.
Her heart still beat at an exceedingly slow rhythm.
That pale yet still delicate countenance was even not much different from before she had fallen unconscious.
But those eyes, which had always shone with gentleness and timidity, never opened again.
Lin Feng simply sat quietly beside the ice coffin, saying not a word, silently watching her.
The Lin Feng of old had been accustomed to placing everything in this world upon a scale, weighing it with an absolutely rational gaze.
Primeval Stones could be exchanged for supreme grade Gu worms.
Gu worms could be exchanged for formidable strength.
And the lives of subordinates could be exchanged for dazzling renown.
Even the emotions between people, those seemingly loyal followings — in his view, they too were nothing more than another kind of interest exchange, merely packaged more covertly, more respectably.
But on that very night, for the first time, he truly and clearly discovered— that in this world, there truly were people who would do something that took no account whatsoever of gain or loss, that even ran counter to instinct.
When the gauntlet woman's feet had mercilessly trampled and ground down upon Lin Wan'er, though she was already trembling violently all over from the pain, biting her lips until they bled, even so, she had still clenched her teeth stubbornly, forcibly swallowing all the agony back down into her belly, refusing to let out a single scream.
Because she knew.
Lin Feng was right beside her, and was already gravely wounded.
She feared that if she let out even the slightest, faintest scream, it would distract the Young Master and thus plunge him into an inescapable, doomed situation.
The Lin Feng of the past might only have taken this as loyalty that was his by right.
But now.
Every time this scene resurfaced in his mind, his heart — which had originally been ground cold and hard as iron by power and calculation — would feel as though fiercely gripped by an invisible great hand, sending waves of stabbing pain so sharp he could not breathe.
And it was precisely after that night's baptism of life and death, that Lin Feng, for the first time, truly understood one truth.
In this world, there was at least that one person whom he, Lin Feng, could not, no matter what, place upon the scale of interests to be weighed.
And the reason he had later, during the interrogation, been willing to so firmly cover for Lin Mu's exceedingly obvious flaws and trump cards before the Patriarch and his father — it was not merely because of the interest entanglement long since carved deep into the bones of both sides.
It was even more because, on that night, Lin Mu had once said one sentence to him, exceedingly calmly:
"Wan'er's condition — I have a way."
This sentence — was it a lie Lin Mu had thrown out to preserve his own life, or did he truly grasp some heaven defying Demonic Path method?
Lin Feng no longer cared.
For Lin Feng — after all of Black Blood Stockade's top healing Gu Masters had shaken their heads over Lin Wan'er's condition, sentencing her to "beyond cure" — this one sentence of Lin Mu's was already enough.
It was like the one and only straw in the eyes of a drowning man.
So now, the relationship between Lin Feng and Lin Mu had also undergone a fundamental change.
For Lin Wan'er's sake, at least before he found a way to truly heal her, or exposed that lie, Lin Feng would absolutely never permit anyone to lightly touch so much as a single hair on Lin Mu's body!
Lin Feng slowly extended his right hand — not yet fully recovered, still wrapped in bandages — and, across the biting, ice cold coffin lid, exceedingly gently let it come to rest above Lin Wan'er's face.
After a long while, within the dim ice chamber echoed a barely audible, hoarse murmur:
"Wait for me."
...
The White Bone Alliance, the command post.
Though Li Mang's heart had long since turned boundlessly fervent — even nearly to the point of madness — over those five words, "Black Bone King Inheritance," before all outsiders and subordinate patriarchs he still maintained that same cold, sinister, steady, unfathomable manner of a warlord as in days past.
As for the desperate plan to secretly drive out the wild beasts and manufacture the beast tide, apart from the few core Gu Masters truly involved in carrying it out, no one knew the whole picture.
Even some of the peripheral clan elders within the White Bone Alliance knew only that Li Mang had recently, suddenly, given the order to contract the battle lines, yet had no idea at all of the true reason behind it.
And within a secret chamber sealed on all sides, holding only the two of them, father and son, Li Mang sat upright upon his bone chair, his gaze dim, and once again brought up that name.
"Huang'er."
"This person, Lin Mu… do you still have any impression of him?"
Standing below, Li Huang first froze for a moment.
Lin Mu?
This name did indeed sound somewhat familiar, but were he to think it over carefully, it was also somewhat too inconspicuous.
He closed his eyes and began to search and recall carefully within his mind.
Very soon, a figure — always dressed in ordinary clothing, standing low key beside Lin Feng like a shadow — surfaced in Li Huang's mind.
In the Blood Forest. That struggle when they had encountered the "Empty Fort Stratagem" — he had been present.
The matter of the Green Snake. That encirclement of a Rank 2 Demonic cultivator and the poison mist assassination — he had been present.
Even including that raiding squad from the earlier intelligence, the one that had slain Tie Xiong.
His figure had been there too.
Li Huang abruptly opened his eyes, and a layer of cold sweat suddenly seeped out on his back: on all those past occasions when Lin Feng had broken through impasses in dire straits and turned the tide, this collateral branch youth named Lin Mu had seemingly… always been nearby!
Only, in the past, everyone's gaze had been drawn firmly, entirely, toward Lin Feng.
Li Huang's brows knit tighter and tighter, and he slowly opened his mouth to speak:
"Father."
"In the past, your child… did indeed scarcely take note of this person. I merely took him for a slightly cleverer attendant at Lin Feng's side."
"It is only now, with you reminding me thus, thinking back on it anew… that it seems every single time Lin Feng truly gained a benefit, or turned danger into safety, he was there."
Reaching this point, upon Li Huang's arrogant, unruly face, his expression too gradually underwent an exceedingly complicated change.
In the past, he had always regarded Lin Feng as the lifelong enemy of his life, believing that Lin Feng did indeed surpass himself in foundation and talent.
Whether in the speed of cultivation advancement, the laying out of stratagems, or the on the spot adaptability of counter kills, all had once made him feel no small pressure.
Even now, when he himself had only barely stepped into Rank 2, struggling bitterly, he had once, in the depths of night, secretly doubted whether he truly was inferior to that fellow Lin Feng.
But now.
If one took "Lin Mu" — that role which had originally been overlooked — and placed it back into those events of the past, deducing it all anew… then the flavor of many things changed utterly!
Li Huang hesitated for a moment, a trace of a tremor in his voice:
"Father."
"Do you mean… could it be that Lin Feng's rapid rise over these years, and that luck of his in turning calamity into fortune time after time, in fact… all had this person secretly stoking the flames behind the scenes?!"
Li Mang did not answer at once.
But those eyes of his, sunk deep in their sockets, grew brighter and brighter within the dim secret chamber.
The more extraordinary Lin Mu's performance, the more deeply Lin Mu had concealed himself in the past, the more perfectly he had disguised himself, the more firmly resolved that already sprouted, rooted conjecture in Li Mang's heart became!
An ordinary, lowly born collateral member — by what right did he possess the terrifying strength of Rank 2 peak stage in such a short span of time?
And by what right could he, in that lowly identity, withdraw from the stage time after time without a scratch?
If… he truly were the one who had obtained a ruined portion of the inheritance left behind by the Black Bone King?!
Li Mang himself was a beneficiary of the Black Bone King's "spine" inheritance.
So, in this world, no one understood more clearly than he: what the things left behind by a Rank 5 peak stage Demonic Path power truly meant!
High rank Gu worms enough to change the heavens and alter one's fate.
Vast, mountainous heaps of Primeval Stones.
Those heaven defying secret methods long since lost.
Even those profound, unfathomable killer move techniques that even he, Li Mang, had never come into contact with!
The greed in Li Mang's heart, like a raging fire doused with hot oil, blazed ever more fiercely.
The greater the secret upon Lin Mu's person, then, so long as he could capture Lin Mu alive before Lin Cang discovered it, the greater the benefit he could obtain, naturally!
Thinking of this, substantive flames were already all but about to erupt from Li Mang's eyes.
"Huang'er, you may withdraw first. Continue to keep a close watch on the movements of Black Blood Stockade's front."
"Yes, Father."