"You... want... how... to collaborate!"
The woman across from him asked in stammering Mien language, her face watchful as she stared at the blonde-haired, blue-eyed Zhong Shenxiu.
’Very smart, and quite humble... to have learned the local language so quickly, no wonder she managed to infiltrate Kaleston...’
Zhong Shenxiu nodded inwardly, his smile unchanged, "First... I can help you escape pursuit. I must say, lady, although you are very cautious, you do not understand the abilities of transcendents. You think you have eluded them, but in the realm of mystic studies, you have still left too many traces. They will soon catch up, implicating me along the way."
As he spoke, he pulled a strand of hair from the head of the female practitioner opposite him.
’He... how did he move his hand? I had no defense...’
The pupils of the female practitioner shrank.
"Transcendents of the ’Spirit Child’ lineage are all very adept at divination, and that is the case even when they are of a low rank. They are numerous enough to be assigned to every search team and can soon divine this location from the traces you left... So, to infiltrate for a long period, one needs some counter-divination skills."
Zhong Shenxiu smiled as he shook the strand of hair in his hand.
A somewhat ethereal figure of a lady emerged, identical to the female practitioner, resembling a spiritual body, passing through the carriage and drifting away in another direction.
Ordinary people along the road couldn’t see her figure at all.
"Now... I have covered your traces with my abilities. As long as you are careful, there’s no need to worry about divination before exposing yourself again."
Zhong Shenxiu smiled while sighing inwardly.
Divination exists in the East as well, but it requires high cultivation.
Sima Shu’s mastery of Innate Eight Trigrams Divine Power at the Divine Power Realm is already considered a natural gift in divination, yet here in the West, he would rank fourth!
But here, practitioners of the first-rank ’Spirit Child’ profession can master divination after some study!
Although the visions are blurry and easily misleading, with so many diviners working together, some trace would surely be caught!
This isn’t about a gap or superiority; it’s simply a matter of different systems emphasizing different things.
Transcendents from both the East and the West become more comprehensive and powerful as they advance to higher ranks.
Perhaps this female practitioner was able to infiltrate successfully because her cultivation was not high and she posed a small threat, meaning the diviners who took action were not particularly formidable.
But as she continues to escape, she will trigger more and more powerful diviners, and in the end, she will inevitably be captured.
After all, the previous Primordial Pill Team was caught because they were too powerful and posed a severe threat, which alerted a very capable diviner who prophesied their route.
Then, they blundered into a trap without a bit of temper to spare.
The female practitioner did not speak.
But after the phantom figure left, she indeed let out a long sigh of relief, her heart that had been tightly strung relaxed slightly, as if the heavy clouds that had loomed over her dispersed.
Recalling the past fearful journey, the dreadful situations when she was discovered, the bloody battles...
The exhaustion accumulated over the past days almost made her want to break down in tears.
But the female practitioner still maintained her composure strongly, "Are you a heretic?"
Even though her time infiltrating had been short, she understood the kingdom’s attitude toward those who did not believe in the Door’s Lord.
Probably not much better than her own status, both considered vermin.
Operating on the principle that the enemy of my enemy is my friend, she felt she could trust this person for the time being but couldn’t omit the necessary vigilance.
"Beautiful lady, you haven’t told me your name yet?"
Zhong Shenxiu asked very calmly.
The female practitioner held a Dharma Seal and solemnly replied, "Flowing Water Sword Sect, Zhu Qingliu!"
’To have persisted until now, luck, experience, and Dao Heart are indispensable... There’s a hidden Sword Qi, it seems she is a Sword Cultivator, and a natural born sword kind at that...’
Zhong Shenxiu praised to himself and said with a smile, "Lady Zhu, to move around here, you’ll need a Westernized face and a Western name."
"Of course, all this can be discussed later. I will provide you with a safe place to stay and stable food supplies, so you may first find a place to hide."
After all, as a spy, one must certainly gather intelligence, and even assassinate political figures if necessary.
...
Fielo was a Transcendent, skilled in divination, and part of the fifth agency directly under the control of the Imperial Family, responsible for maintaining order in Kaleston.
Today, he had received a dangerous mission.
A dangerous eastern cultivator had infiltrated the Royal Capital, and even brutally murdered his comrades.
This made him swear to root out those rats from the gutters!
"Over here... my divination tells me that the enemy has fled toward the Wojin River; they might be trying to swim across to escape."
Fielo, dressed in a black bodysuit, felt very reassured together with his teammates from the fourth sequence.
They quickly crossed through the flea nest, chasing after the enemy to the edge of a long river filled with garbage and stench.
"Typical of rats, even thinking of burrowing through such a foul-smelling river..."
A Transcendent team leader dressed in armor, clearly belonging to the warrior chain, sneered, "Which direction?"
"This way!"
Following the revelation of his spiritual intuition, Fielo crossed over a building and saw a woman with black hair and eyes, sporting an oriental demeanor.
She stood emotionless on the edge of the river.
Suddenly, her figure gradually became an illusion, vanishing without a trace.
"This is wrong... She’s fake, someone is misleading me."
Fielo exclaimed in surprise.
"Who is it? Which Transcendent is helping these outsiders from the east?"
The team leader roared angrily, chasing to where the illusion had disappeared, hoping to find other clues.
Immediately after, with his keen observation, he spotted a strand of hair.
Without a second thought, the team leader picked up the hair, "Quick... divine it!"
Fielo stepped forward and suddenly looked at the team leader’s palm with horror, "Captain... your hand..."
He saw a smear of darkness continuously seeping in from the edge of the strand, even corroding the captain’s iron gauntlet.
"My armor... why hasn’t it protected me?"
The captain muttered, as the flesh on his body suddenly melted away, leaving only scattered pieces of his armor falling to the ground.
"No!"
One female member couldn’t withstand the shock of the scene, suddenly clawing at her own face in frenzy, tearing away strips of flesh.
"This is the impact... all a curse! It’s spreading... we’ve all... been cursed."
Regret surged in Fielo’s heart as consecutive victories made him lose a cautious mind, forgetting the first lesson of mystical studies—be careful in all things!
"Quick... inform the fifth agency to send reinforcements, it’s the highly contaminated kind... we need the assistance of a legend, no, a demigod!"
Fielo found his voice had turned very strange. He looked at his hands and saw his skin began to melt like candle wax, a bitter smile appeared on his face.
Death came like a mountain collapsing or a tsunami striking; minutes later, not a single Transcendent was left alive in the area.
A few minutes later, an invisible doorway opened, and an old man in a complex and splendid robe appeared, looking at the scene with confusion and puzzlement.
As the master of spirits, everything that happened here should not have escaped his watch.
But now, the local Spiritual Bodies seemed to have all been poisoned to death, and his divinatory instincts received not the slightest bit of information.
The next moment, a fierce light enveloped the area completely.
A low voice echoed in the surroundings, "A probe? Or... a warning?