"No need for flattery," Ji Mofan said.
"Alright." Li Jinchu could only shrug and smile. "My idea is very simple. It's copied from the way you disrupted the coronation ceremony."
"If we can throw the border town into chaos, we'll have a much better chance of escaping during the confusion than we do now."
The method is simple and crude, but also quite risky. No one can guarantee that they will have the same good luck as Ji Mo Fan.
The reason they were able to escape was because of the information gap between Ji Mo Fan and the Demon General.
They didn't understand why the Demon Lord would listen to this minor righteous cultivator so readily, which is why they were hesitant to act rashly, allowing Ji Mo Fan to exploit the situation.
But nowadays in this city, it's not so easy to find a suitable hostage to attract so much attention.
“Young Master Li, it’s easy for you to say, but where do we even begin to put it into practice?” Ning Weisheng, who had been standing to the side, stepped forward and asked, “We are not as free to move around as we were in the Demon Palace. The Demon Realm knows that this turmoil was started by the righteous path, and the voices against the righteous path are louder than ever before.”
Ning Weisheng's words were not unfounded. They had been fleeing all the way and occasionally encountered demonic cultivators who tried to intercept them.
Their attitudes were completely different from when they first entered the Demon Realm; they all looked like they had lost their parents. It was unclear what kind of bewitching potion the demon generals had given them.
"Demonic cultivation is an emotional practice. Regardless of the method of cultivation, being easily moved by emotions is an inevitable result of their techniques," Li Jinchu explained slowly, fanning himself with a folding fan.
"As long as you can find a way to stir their emotions, it's easy to control them."
Li Jinchu's words were quite arrogant.
Yet, it all felt perfectly natural. As the publicly acknowledged successor of the Li clan and the de facto leader of the younger generation of the Xiaoling Sect, the most powerful sect among the hundred immortal sects, Li Jinchu could be said to have started from a completely different point of view from others from birth.
What others might not understand about the demon realm and demonic cultivators, he might not.
What others consider a forbidden book might have been his bedtime reading during his youth.
"Then what brilliant idea does Young Master Li have?" Ji Mofan asked.
“I need a lure,” Li Jinchu said.
*
Ning Weisheng was still somewhat dazed when he stood with Miao Miao at the entrance of the City Lord's Mansion.
What's going on? How did he get pushed out?
When Li Jinchu made those remarks, he instinctively turned his gaze to his senior brother, whom he had always considered very reliable.
Unexpectedly, when they glanced over, their eyes met.
My heart skipped a beat for a moment.
But before he could pull his thoughts out of this chaotic emotion, he caught Ji Mofan's voice in his ears.
“Junior Brother Ning, you go.” he said.
Ning Weisheng's feverish brain cooled down instantly, and it took him a long time to finally understand what the Jimo dialect meant.
"Me? Senior Brother, can I do it?" He subconsciously doubted himself, and then looked back at the others behind him.
The safety of so many people is being placed on his shoulders?
What if we mess it up?
The demon realm is not like the cultivation realm; there is no one to support him. Once he makes a mistake, there is no room for recovery, and he will only make a complete mess of everything.
He wasn't even capable of becoming the chief disciple of the Yuncang Sword Sect...
Can I live up to my senior brother's trust now?
"Trying to hide behind someone else again, Junior Brother Ning?" Ji Mofan's voice pulled him back from his self-doubt.
“I call you junior brother, but you are far older and more experienced than me.”
"Your current state is truly a disgrace to your master, Elder Ji, who nurtured you."
Ning Weisheng felt as if he hadn't heard anything at all. Ji Mofan's words went in one ear and out the other, leaving only two words behind—
To let down.
He simply couldn't bear to hear Ji Mofan speak to him in that tone.
When those eyes looked at him, the disappointment within them almost crushed him.
"...No, I didn't intend to hide in the back." Ning Weisheng took a deep breath. "Senior Brother, Young Master Li, what do you suggest we do next?"
"Look at you, you're so scared you can only utter three words at a time." After a long silence, Li Jinchu finally spoke up, "Don't be so nervous, what I need you to do isn't anything big."
They were like a duet on a stage, one playing the white face and the other the red face, completely fooling Ning Weisheng and leaving him utterly bewildered.
The tension that Ji Mofan had stirred up gradually melted away as Li Jinchu spoke with a gentle smile.
As his thoughts returned from his memories, Ning Weisheng looked up and saw the little demonic cultivator in a straw raincoat walk to the front of the city lord's mansion and pick up the huge drumsticks placed at the entrance.
"Thump—!"
The echoes of the drumbeats had not yet faded in the air. The border town, which was already in a state of war, was extremely sensitive to any slight movement. The guards of the city lord's mansion immediately came out and opened the gate.
"Who is beating the drum here?" The guard looked around and finally his gaze fell on Miao Miao, who was running towards him excitedly.
"Brother, I want to report this!" Miao Miao said with a righteous and stern expression, pointing to Ning Weisheng behind him. "I saw a righteous cultivator sneaking over the city wall and found it very suspicious, so I tied him up and brought him here for the city lord to see!"
The guard looked Miao Miao up and down with a questioning gaze.
"How come I've never seen you in town before?" he asked. "Where do you live?"
“Brother, I’m not from this city. I live in the southern border region.” Miao Miao said, pointing in the direction of the southern border region. “The lockdown came too suddenly this time, so I didn’t go home.”
Although the guard frowned, he didn't press the matter further.
When the city was first sealed off, the situation was quite chaotic. The city lord instructed them to rather arrest the innocent than let the guilty go free. So, not only were there many people from other places stranded in the city, but a considerable portion of the population in the southern border region was also controlled by them.
Have a problem with that? Keep it to yourself.
Unless you can go to the city lord's mansion and beat up the city lord who made this decision, you can't take the top position yourself.
Everything else is out of the question.
"But your strength is clearly much lower than his, how can you capture him?" The guard's doubts remained undiminished.
Upon hearing this, Ning Weisheng couldn't help but look at Miao Miao over there.
He had been curious about this question, but unfortunately Li Jinchu was busy telling him other things and didn't have a chance to ask.
Miao Miao seemed to have no doubts about this and readily agreed.
He watched as Miao Miao, dressed in a straw raincoat, showed no sign of panic, and instead casually took out a small pottery jar from under his clothes.
“That’s easy, brother, it’s a Gu worm,” Miao Miao said.
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