Chapter 616: Empress: This time, I will take action
"Card slot?"
On the steps outside Taiqing Palace, Xu Zhenguan was stunned for a moment, turned his head and stared at him with confusion in his eyes.
There happened to be a car driving in the distance, and the headlights shone on the empress's face for a moment, like lightning illuminating the night.
Seeing her confused look, Zhao Duan already got the answer.
The empress didn't know what a card slot was, so naturally she had never opened it.
"Boom boom..." His heart began to beat faster. Zhao Duan pursed his lips and stared down at the machine in his hand.
On the side of the phone, the traces of the card slot are clearly visible.
If there really are clues in this phone, where are they hidden?
He turned on the phone screen again and glanced at the signal icon in the upper right corner - full.
This means that this is a machine with a mobile phone card...
Is there a clue left in the phone card? Unlocking the card isn't the only way to read it.
Perhaps due to the influence of fixed thinking, he had never thought in this direction.
"Wait for me here!"
Zhao Duan stood up suddenly, said something, and ran towards the 24-hour convenience store outside the alley.
Xu Zhenguan was stunned and sat on the steps with his knees hugged, waiting.
After a while, Zhao Duan ran back again, with a metal...pin in his hand!
Then, Zhao Duan sat on the steps, and with the help of the light from the street lamp, he used a card pin to insert the card into the deep card slot of the empress's mobile phone.
Use a little force!
The card slot popped out silently, and then, under the empress's curious gaze, Zhao Duan carefully took out the phone card from the phone body.
Swallowed.
Zhao Duan did the same thing again, pushed open the card slot of his mobile phone, threw out a secondary card, and replaced it with the empress's card.
After reinstalling it, the operator's network access information will pop up on the screen.
Zhao Duan was delighted and quickly opened the phone book, and then... his pupils contracted slightly.
There was only a single phone number stored in Zhenbao's card.
There really is a clue!
Zhao Duan's breathing tightened, he glanced at the empress, and dialed the number with his fingers.
“Drip—drip—drip—”
In the alley, the sound of the phone was clearly heard by the king and his ministers, and after a moment, the call was connected.
A woman's voice came from the microphone: "Hello?"
Xu Zhenguan suddenly grabbed Zhao Duan's wrist and excitedly mouthed:
"The temple keeper, that temple keeper!"
The voice on the other end of the phone was actually the female priest from Taiqing Palace!
Zhao Duan suppressed his excitement and said in a deep voice: "Hello, I am..."
“Pah.”
The call was hung up.
The king and his ministers were both bewildered.
Just when Zhao Duan was about to call back, a text message popped up on his phone. He clicked it and found that the content of the message was a residential address.
At the end, there was a sentence: "The key is under the carpet at the door."
"this……"
Zhao Duan's eyes lit up:
"Our guess was correct. The female temple priest is the guide in the Human World. This address is the clue she gave us."
Xu Zhenguan also stood up excitedly: "Then what are we waiting for?"
After such a long exploration, they finally made some progress. How could they be willing to waste more time?
Zhao Duan immediately took a taxi and ran out of the alley with the empress to wait.
While waiting for the bus, Zhao Duan continued to fiddle with his phone, but he was not calling the female temple priest again.
Instead, he started logging into WeChat and TikTok… He called himself, got his phone number, and then used the verification code to log in without any problems…
"So, you knew there was this thing in your phone?" Xu Zhenguan turned his head to watch him operate it.
"Well, almost every one of them has one." Zhao Duan answered subconsciously.
Xu Zhenguan said quietly, "Then what about the password you made me search for so long?"
Zhao Duan: "..."
After several attempts, he confirmed that this SIM card was a brand new number and had not been registered with any major apps. He gave up, turned around, and said seriously, "Let's change the subject, okay?"
Empress: “…”
…
The SMS address is located in Binjiang Community.
Not long after, the two got out of the online taxi and saw an old residential complex in front of them.
Therefore, the two of them easily entered the community through the small door that was left open at night.
It took some effort to find the corresponding apartment building.
"cough!"
Zhao Duan woke up the sensor light and took the empress up the stairs.
In the old corridor, water and heating pipes are exposed, and the dirty walls are filled with lock-opening advertisements.
There was a bad smell in the air.
The two of them climbed to the sixth floor in one breath. Zhao Duan bent down and lifted the outdoor carpet under the security door. Sure enough, he found a key in a pit on the ground.
"It's hidden so obviously, aren't you afraid that someone will pick it up..." Zhao Duan complained.
Without stopping his hands, he unscrewed the old-fashioned security door covered with advertisements with a "click", and the room was filled with darkness.
He felt his way to the entrance light and turned it on.
The soft light spread out, illuminating this old building of about 50 square meters.
At a glance, the pattern is clear.
The two looked at each other and carefully opened the doors one by one.
The bathroom, kitchen, side bedroom... are all very clean, and it looks like no one has lived here for a long time.
The moment they opened the bedroom door and turned on the light, they were both stunned.
In the master bedroom, the items were also neatly arranged, as if they had been carefully cleaned before the owner left.
But the wall of the bedroom was covered with black, dog-scratching words written with a brush.
That is the writing of the Yu State!
"An authentic copy of Emperor Taizu!" Xu Zhenguan exclaimed excitedly, "This is Emperor Taizu's handwriting!"
Ah... Such ugly calligraphy is Old Xu's? Zhao Duan opened his mouth, then thought of the stick figure-style painting on the mural and fell silent.
The pink and white walls were almost covered with dense calligraphy.
When the two of them saw the content of the text clearly, their hearts were shocked again.
"This is the general outline of the royal practice..."
"This is...ah, is this the secret technique you mentioned, the one Xu Jianwen used to use his bloodline to restrain Martial God heirs outside the royal family?"
Xu Zhenguan pointed at a spell on the wall and said in astonishment.
Zhao Duan glanced at him and said solemnly, "It's possible."
He shifted his gaze and caught a glimpse of a square topographic map on the wall. Because the painting was abstract, he carefully identified it and exclaimed in surprise, "Is this a topographic map of the imperial palace? No, it's a secret passage. This is a map of the imperial palace's secret passage..."
He quickly recognized that there was a secret passage extending out from the location of the Yuanzu Temple.
It was the secret passage that he had found to sneak into the palace.
Under the Yuanzu Temple, the two small words "Dragon Soul" were written in bold and emphasis next to it.
"Old Xu... Bah, Emperor Taizu actually marked the location where the Dragon Soul is hidden here?"
Zhao Duan was really surprised.
The shocked empress ignored his disrespectful words and murmured:
"All the royal secrets are recorded here, and they are probably top secrets known only to the emperor. No... there are more known than what all previous emperors knew. Otherwise, after six hundred years, the dragon soul would have been taken away by the previous emperor."
Emperor Taizu actually hid all of these in this old house in "The World".
Only those who meet the stringent conditions can come here and receive the complete royal inheritance.
"Ah. This is..." Xu Zhenguan walked to the wall and bumped into the table. He lowered his head and was surprised to find a book on the table.
She opened it... She was shocked: "This is Taizu's practice notes!"
It should be noted that the royal family had never heard that Emperor Taizu had left any notes on spiritual practice.
The empress picked it up with trembling hands, opened it and read, her beautiful eyes shining with wonder. This notebook recorded too many key points of cultivation in the "Heavenly Man" realm.
After just flipping through a few pages, she felt as if she had been enlightened.
Priceless treasure.
This is truly a priceless treasure.
Xu Zhenguan continued to flip through the pages, but suddenly his fingers paused and his eyes lit up slightly when he saw the words on the paper.
At this moment, Zhao Duan was attracted by a mental method on the other wall:
"Dragon Control Technique..."
His eyes gleamed with brilliance. This was actually a spell that taught how to control the dragon soul and use it for one's own benefit.
Well, Yulong is a serious Yu...
The huge surprise almost knocked the king and his minister unconscious. Putting aside other things, the value of these few secret techniques alone is inestimable.
As long as time passes, the Empress's cultivation will improve rapidly.
And Zhao Duan has a better chance to control the dragon soul and truly unleash the power of this half-god that Lao Xu has accumulated through his lifelong cultivation.
Without any hesitation.
The two held their breath and began to recite frantically.
I’m afraid these words will disappear soon.
The room was silent for a while. When he finished reciting, Xu Zhenguan just breathed a sigh of relief, but then he felt his body flickering and knew that his stay this time was up.
"Let's talk outside," she said.
…
A moment later.
The fourth floor of the Imperial Palace Restaurant.
Beside the stone wall, the empress suddenly opened her eyes and saw Zhao Duan also floating out from the mural.
The two looked at each other and saw the heat and shock in each other's hearts.
"What you saw tonight must be kept secret." This was Xu Zhenguan's first sentence.
Zhao Duan nodded, indicating that he would keep his mouth shut, and then said his second sentence: "Our chances of winning have increased."
Yes.
The inheritance left by Old Xu will definitely greatly affect the combat effectiveness of the two. With this new influencing factor, many subsequent plans can be changed.
The two of them were overwhelmed with emotions and could hardly contain their excitement.
"Maybe, after a short rest, we can go in again and look for more clues." Xu Zhenguan was eager to try.
The calm and graceful female emperor had not been as excited as a young girl for a long time.
Zhao Duan nodded:
"Yes. But I don't think there's much hope. The female temple priest is clearly avoiding us and is only willing to give us this. Perhaps we need to meet some more conditions before we can obtain subsequent clues and secrets."
This is a logical guess.
Xu Zhenguan calmed down from his excited state and accepted his judgment. The empress paced back and forth in the room, muttering:
"I never thought that these murals, which have been passed down for six hundred years, still contain so many secrets that the royal family has never discovered."
Having said that, she looked at Zhao Duan with gentle eyes.
It seems that these secrets were revealed only after the arrival of Zhao Duan, the "man in the painting".
He was like a key that opened a lock that had been sealed for six hundred years.
The Empress took a deep breath, temporarily suppressing her search for the secrets from six hundred years ago, and said:
"I will spend some time studying Taizu's notes. If I succeed, my combat power will be greatly improved. Then, I might have a chance of winning against Xuan Yin."
Zhao Duan said, "I have a hunch that with a little more time, I will be able to control the Dragon Soul. So, I have an idea."
"explain."
"Perhaps, we can take a bigger step."
Zhao Duan's eyes flashed with a sharp light:
"I'm at the front lines and learned that Prince Jing had previously traveled to Binhaidao, presumably to meet with Qingshan Wuxiankui and form an alliance with Prince Chen. His purpose for going now is obvious: he wants to take advantage of the winter, when spring has yet to arrive and the war is difficult to wage on a large scale, to escape briefly."
Xu Zhenguan stared at him: "So?"
Zhao Duan pursed his lips:
"So, a few days ago, I was thinking, should we just not wait for the spring for Prince Jing's return? Instead, we should just abandon the Huai River and Jiancheng, change our route and attack Binhai, and kill Prince Jing on Binhai Road!"
Kill Prince Jing!
This is a crazy idea, but it is not surprising when it comes from Zhao Duan, who once assassinated Xu Jingtang.
Xu Zhenguan's expression became serious and he reminded:
"Binhaidao is under the control of Prince Chen, and its situation is very different from Xu Jingtang's."
Zhao Duan nodded: "I know. Similarly, the old thief Xu Wen also knows.
That's why he had the courage to leave his old nest and head to Binhai Road, because he was sure that the imperial court had no advantage in Binhai, and it could even be said that it was at a disadvantage.
In Binhai, on the one hand, he had the natural ally of King Chen, who was also plotting rebellion, and on the other hand, he had the support of Qingshan...
Binhaidao, because of the Qingshan heritage, has always been a sacred place for martial arts, where countless martial artists gather. Qingshan's thousand-year-old disciples have already infiltrated the martial arts world...
Therefore, Xu Wen certainly didn't think I would dare to go over and kill him, but I chose to do the opposite."
Xu Zhenguan frowned, still worried:
"Since you know the dangers of Binhai Road, how could you have the confidence to kill him? Just relying on Princess Lu Yan'er?"
"Of course she's not the only one." Zhao Duan said calmly:
"Your Majesty, how is the energy level of the 'Tianyuan Cannon' built by Gongshu Tianyuan?"
"You want to use it?" Xu Zhenguan thought for a moment and said:
"I have already placed it in Houhu Lake, but the time is still short, so it is not yet ready. Well, the cannon may be stored during transportation, but even if there is enough time, this cannon alone is not enough."
Zhao Duan said seriously:
"Originally, I also felt that it was not enough, but now that I have the method to control the Dragon Soul, it is different. The formula states that once I control it, I can temporarily exert the strength of the Heavenly Man Realm."
Dragon Soul + Tianyuan Cannon + Princess Lu Yaner.
This combination definitely has a high chance of destroying Prince Jing, even if he has a trump card.
As for King Chen… King Chen had very few experts under his command, and the most powerful were his sailors, which was why he had “closed the country to the outside world” before and did not participate in the struggle for hegemony.
In the battle of high-level combat forces, it is difficult to get on the table at all.
With the blessing of Dragon Soul, even if some Qingshan masters are killed, it will not affect the overall situation.
Xu Zhenguan stared at him: "But the premise of all this is that Wu Xiankui will not take action himself."
Wu Xiankui.
That warrior who has no moral principles in the realm of heaven and man.
If Wu Xiankui shamelessly tears up the agreement between heaven and man again and chooses to take action, it will be a dead end.
Can the agreement between heaven and man really restrain Wu Xiankui?
Zhao Duan was silent for a moment and said:
"I can try to find Zhang Tianshi. He won't let Wu Xiankui tear up the Heaven and Man Agreement."
Xu Zhenguan shook his head:
"Although Zhang Tianshi is powerful, I cannot fully understand his thoughts. We cannot rely solely on him for such a major matter. Moreover, even if he is willing to go with you, will Xuanyin take action?"
Zhao Duan was silent.
"However, it is indeed worth a try to kill Xu Wen."
"So," Xu Zhenguan said shockingly, "this time, I will take action."
(End of this chapter)
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