"Oh no, I was found out so quickly."

When Qin Jianfu took a candle from the southeast corner and returned, Gui couldn't help but say inwardly.

However, what made it feel even more depressed was the movement of the disfigured old scholar lowering his head and carefully sniffing the candle.

It turned out that they had been prepared for this.

The sword spirit frowned.

It is extremely difficult to tamper with the candle, put some aphrodisiac incense or poison in it to make an experienced old monster in the Jindan realm fall into the trap.

So... Zhao Rong's possible back-up plan is not in this white candle?

The candles are just ordinary candles, not his turning point?

Just like the blood circle drawn on the ground, was it just a trick of playing the empty city and making Qin Jianfu suspicious and distracted?

In the lake of his heart, the purple-robed sword spirit was confused and anxious.

At this moment, it turned its head and looked at the tranquil heart lake beside it, and most of it was still filled with that calm and dazzling color.

In addition, there are some colors of fear, terror, sadness, regret, etc. in the 'water of the heart lake', but they are suppressed by the calm 'lake water' and account for a small proportion.

Suddenly, Gui discovered something was wrong.

At the edge of the heart lake, some lake waters with colors that symbolize wandering consciousness and tiredness and dormancy are being restrained by the calm and composed lake waters at the edge of the heart lake...

Was he daydreaming, or trying to close his eyes and fall asleep? Was he no longer able to bear the injury?

Gui couldn't help but look at the calm one-armed scholar outside, and immediately held back from speaking.

It suppressed itself, concentrating all its attention on staring at the situation outside the outer brow chakra...

"Light a candle for yourself so early in the morning. Do you want to die so badly?"

Inside the main hall, the disfigured old scholar stepped into the blood circle and spoke softly as he slowly approached the one-armed scholar sitting in the coffin.

At this time, the old man was only seven steps away from the latter, and there was a blood-red pattern of a hexagram on the ground between them.

The bloody hexagram surrounded the one-armed scholar and the dragon coffin.

While speaking, Qin Jianfu casually threw one half of the candle that was broken in half over his shoulder.

He held the gray pipe in one hand and lightly twisted the remaining half of the candle with flame with two fingers. He took two steps forward and approached the edge of the last hexagram on the ground.

Zhao Rong tried hard to raise his drooping eyelids, raised his hand, and wiped his blood-stained face vigorously.

He continued to look calmly at the old man who was twisting the candle with two fingers and shook his head.

"It's for that little bastard of yours."

The disfigured old scholar looked calm. He did not seem angry even though his beloved son and his entire family were scolded.

keep going.

Keep moving.

Three steps away from the blood-red hexagram.

Three steps away from him, inside the hexagram, the one-armed scholar touched his face again, lowered his eyes, and spoke softly.

"Speaking of which, being so close to the golden elixir, was that little beast like you at the time, a person who was burned and neither human nor ghost, with no human-like part on his body?"

Qin Jianfu had a calm expression, did not speak, and continued walking.

"Actually, this little beast didn't look like a human being before, so... disfigurement can be considered plastic surgery." Zhao Rong raised his eyelids and looked at Qin Jianfu's old face, which was full of tumors and even his eyebrows were burned off.

He nodded again, "Well, then you don't have to worry about people saying that you don't look like your father, the Prime Minister of Wei. Now you and I are cut from the same cloth, right?"

The one-armed scholar on the dragon coffin chuckled and said jokingly.

The disfigured old scholar stopped.

The toes were only half a step away from the blood-red hexagram on the ground.

The one-armed scholar didn't seem to notice anything unusual and waved his hand modestly at the old man, "You're welcome."

Qin Jianfu's expression remained unchanged, as if everything was normal.

He lowered his head and looked at the last half step under his feet.

Look up.

His field of vision touched a dark red line of blood, which was a strange pattern that Qin Jianfu had never seen before.

It is like two triangles, one upright and one inverted, covering in opposite directions. It is simple and clear, but... the more you look at it, the more mysterious it becomes.

There are six corners. The upper and lower corners seem to correspond to heaven and earth, yin and yang, and the other four corners...

The old man's gaze focused and he continued to move slowly upwards, and the huge dragon coffin came into view.

The blood-red hexagram surrounding it seemed to represent some kind of protection or seal...

Qin Jianfu moved his gaze away from the leaky dragon coffin, looked left and right at the ancient and magnificent hall around him, then returned his gaze and continued to move upwards, finally settling on the face of the one-armed Confucian scholar.

He sat quietly in the dragon coffin.

His eyelids drooped and his dirty face was calm.

The palm below was slowly tapping the scabbard on the knee.

The old scholar held the candle in his hand, stopped outside the blood-red hexagram, and left the last half step behind.

Not moving forward.

"Why are you... so eager to anger this old man?"

The old disfigured scholar stared at the one-armed scholar's lowered eyes and asked calmly.

"Oh, I forgot."

The one-armed scholar paused as he tapped the scabbard, slightly realizing something.

"Sorry, I forgot that he seems to be dead. This little beast is not as capable as his father. He doesn't have the golden elixir to protect his body and can run away, so he should have been burned to ashes, right?"

Qin Jianfu looked at Zhao Rong, hunched over and motionless.

The half candle that was originally twisted lightly between the two fingers of his right hand now only had a small piece of cotton wick and a candle flame. The ground below was covered with paraffin powder that had been scattered all over the ground since someone had known about it.

The one-armed scholar turned a blind eye to all this.

He tapped the scabbard rhythmically with his index finger, leaned back slightly, sat crookedly on the dragon coffin, and looked down at the disfigured old scholar condescendingly.

"As a father, were you just trying to get away and left your son behind?"

Between the two fingers of the disfigured old scholar who was pinching the candle, the candle flame was dancing silently, like a fire snake sticking out its tongue and licking his fingertips.

Qin Jianfu looked straight ahead, ignoring all this. The orange light from the flames burning his fingertips covered the right side of his face, as if he was wearing a dark yellow, rigid mask.

The old man looked at the young man calmly.

"Why? You finally realize that there will be a day when you can no longer protect him?"

Zhao Rong held up his eyelids which were about to droop, tilted his head and asked with a chuckle.

After he finished speaking, he turned sideways and spat the blood in his mouth onto the ground.

Is this a mouthful of blood on the tip of his tongue? Zhao Rong raised his hand that was holding the scabbard and wiped the corners of his mouth that couldn't be suppressed.

He is laughing.

Half a step away from the blood-red hexagram line, Qin Jianfu closed his eyes with trembling lips and raised his head slightly.

"You... want to irritate me so much..."

The old man murmured and took a deep breath.

The one-armed scholar covered his stomach and laughed heartily, "Hahaha, come here quickly, you old beast. You are so scared that you are suspicious even if you take half a step. You still want to kill me with such little talent?"

The disfigured old scholar raised his right foot, but under someone's encouraging and expectant gaze, his right foot slowly stopped in the air.

His feet were suspended above the edge of the blood-red hexagram.

It has been slow to fall into the hexagram.

The air in the hall was silent for a few breaths.

Then, the one-armed scholar seemed to have seen the biggest joke of the day.

“Hahaha cough cough cough…hahaha…”

He began to laugh wildly, and even started coughing violently. After the coughing, he continued to laugh, as if he would not stop laughing.

Zhao Rong's happy laughter echoed in the magnificent hall.

Qin Jianfu didn't look at him. He lowered his head quietly and stared at his right foot hanging in the air.

For no reason, the old man recalled the self-destructing golden elixir that his beloved son, who had just recovered, had curiously grabbed from under the quilt in the ward of the Qin Mansion in Liangjing of the Great Wei Dynasty.

This is the scheming work of the laughing scholar in front of me.

The two fingers that Qin Jianfu was holding the flame trembled, and the candle flame suddenly swayed violently.

In a certain lake in his heart, Gui took a deep breath again and stared intently at the stalemate outside the Ajna chakra.

Two Confucian scholars, one young and one old, are still playing a game.

At present, it sees this game as dangerous and unequal.

Zhao Rong only has one chance and he cannot lose. If he reveals even the slightest flaw and is caught by the suspicious Qin Jianfu, or if he makes up his mind to take a gamble, then this empty city plan will immediately become a fatal one.

Qin Jianfu's doubt and hesitation were only temporary after all. The old man was no fool and would always take other actions to test Zhao Rong.

So why would you keep playing the empty city stratagem? As long as you fail to scare the opponent away the first time, and instead let the hesitant wolf take the opportunity to surround and look at you, then sooner or later you will be exposed, allowing it to pounce on you with its gradually growing courage, tearing off the last layer of fragile veil.

In the face of the huge gap in numbers between the enemy and us, all strategies are actually futile, and the initiative is in the hands of the enemy...

In the eyes of the sword spirit, this is Zhao Rong’s current situation.

Seeing the old man outside who was lowering his head and becoming increasingly silent, and hearing the hearty laughter coming from someone outside, it couldn't help but turn its head and look into the latter's heart.

Even though he was laughing wildly, his mind was still calm and deep, and no one knew what he was thinking about.

Did Zhao Rong want to drag it out like this until Zhao Qian'er and the others brought in reinforcements? But... was it really okay to "tease" the old guy so much? Bluffing him was enough, but too much is as bad as too little. Did he forget this principle?

Gui frowned and muttered, his heart hanging in the air again, and hesitantly spoke to persuade Zhao Rong.

But at this moment, someone seemed to be deliberately confronting the sword spirit.

Zhao Rong leaned forward, pointed at Qin Jianfu, who was bowing his head in silence, with the end of his sword sheath, and said with a smile:

"A white-haired man, an old thief with a grey beard. As a Confucian, he only seeks food and clothing from the Wei Dynasty; as a minister, he indulges his evil son and causes harm to the people! As a father, he abandons his son in times of trouble; he lives in the world in vain, with the ability to cultivate the golden elixir, but has read the Confucian sages in vain..."

The one-armed scholar was solemn and upright, looking directly at the disfigured old man from Siqi Academy, with the tip of his sword sheath pointing directly at him:

"You old thief, you cowardly rat, you are lucky to be alive, instead of hiding your head, how dare you come before me and show off your power? How dare an old dog who has lost his home bark in front of me!"

“…”

The atmosphere in the hall suddenly became dead silent.

A thunderous scolding pointed directly at the deepest scar in an old man's heart, and even tore off the scab again.

Qin Jianfu lowered his head and stared at the swaying candle flame between the two fingers of his right hand.

His expression could not be seen clearly, only some mumbling sounds floated into the hall.

"A white-haired man... a gray beard... an old thief... a scholar... a minister... a father... reading the books of sages in vain... a bereaved family... an old dog..."

The air was still.

Qin Jianfu retracted his right foot that was about to step into the line, stopped half a step away, raised his head and asked.

"Anything else?"

The old man looked at the one-armed scholar.

Zhao Rong glanced at Qin Jianfu's retreating steps.

laughed.

He raised the back of his hand and wiped his blood-stained face vigorously, then raised his chin, revealing a row of dazzling white teeth.

He smiled brightly and was about to speak.

An old man twisted a candle with two fingers, lowered his head, and blew gently at the candle flame forward.

Then.

The one-armed scholar's face was 'lit up'.