After the gauntlet woman tremblingly uttered that name, "Lin Mu," the atmosphere within the secret chamber instantly fell into a bizarre stillness.
Li Mang said nothing for a long while.
Only, upon that withered face of his, his expression kept shifting, and he murmured under his breath, as though chewing over these two syllables again and again.
"Lin Mu…"
"Rank 2 peak stage combat strength…"
"So young…"
First came confusion.
Then came incredulous shock.
Finally, all the fragments of emotion interwove and collided frantically upon his face, forcibly piecing together a kind of near-contorted ecstasy and madness!
"That's it, that's it…"
"It all adds up, it all adds up!"
Li Mang's hoarse murmuring slowly reverberated within the dim secret chamber.
Within those eyes of his, like will-o'-the-wisps, the light of greed had already burned to the utmost.
Prior to this, he had indeed sensed that the Black Bone King Inheritance had once been activated within the range of Black Blood Stockade.
But just who the person holding the token was, he had all along known nothing of.
This had cast Li Mang into deep apprehension.
What he feared most was that the inheritance had already fallen into the hands of the Rank 4 powerhouse Lin Cang.
But now.
This name the gauntlet woman had brought back suddenly cleaved apart the layers of fog obscuring Li Mang's eyes!
"A youth of tender years, once utterly inconspicuous, a peripheral collateral member who couldn't even squeeze into Black Blood Stockade's core circle — and yet, within the span of a few short months, he could suddenly erupt with terrifying combat strength approaching Rank 3!"
"And even cut down the masked man head-on!"
"If he is not some peerless prodigy the likes of which appears once in a thousand years, then there remains only one possibility…"
Li Mang abruptly rose to his feet.
Out of excessive excitement, that withered body of his was even trembling faintly.
In this world, where was there any genius that arose for no reason at all?
"He is the one who obtained the 'Heart' inheritance of the Black Bone King!"
"It's him! It's absolutely him!"
"Only by obtaining the foundational legacy and vast resources left behind by a Rank 5 great power could an insignificant ant soar into the sky in such a short span of time!"
Once this judgment took shape, the apprehension originally in Li Mang's heart was instantly pierced clean through by that greed capable of incinerating all things!
"Hahaha!"
"It's not Lin Cang! It's actually not Lin Cang!"
Li Mang threw back his head and laughed wildly, a hard-to-conceal frenzy in his laughter.
"The heavens themselves are aiding me!"
Originally, according to Li Mang's plan, under the deterrence of a Rank 4 powerhouse like Lin Cang, he had intended to temporarily avoid the edge, contract his defensive line across the board, and patiently wait for Black Blood Stockade to continuously wear itself down from within before making his next move.
But now.
He could no longer wait at all.
A young Gu Master who had obtained a Rank 5 inheritance — his rate of growth was simply impossible to estimate.
If he dragged things out any further, once this brat named Lin Mu had fully digested the inheritance, or once Lin Cang caught wind of the signs and seized the inheritance for himself…
then he, Li Mang, would forever lose this chance to defy the heavens and reforge his fate!
"I can wait no longer!"
Li Mang abruptly slammed the scepter in his hand against the ground, a mad, ferocious light flashing in the depths of his eyes.
"Relay my command!"
"Initiate the plan ahead of schedule!"
"Notify those hidden hands lurking in the deep mountains — have those three Rank 3 Enslavement Path Gu Masters, along with the Earth Path Gu Master, begin operations at once!"
"Use Earth Path methods to alter the land veins and the dwelling grounds of the beast herds, then coordinate with the Enslavement Path Gu Masters to forcibly drive them out!"
"In the coming stretch of time, I want to artificially manufacture one disaster after another, throwing every wild demonic beast within a radius of several hundred li into utter riot and panic!"
This was Li Mang's third venomous scheme—
Driving the wolves to devour the tiger!
In the Southern Border, this kind of disaster had a name that made all who heard it pale.
A Beast Tide!
By continuously altering the demonic beasts' habitats, food, and migration directions, then employing Enslavement Path Gu Masters to control the key beast herds among them, one could trigger a chaos that spread layer upon layer.
Ultimately, it would drive tens of thousands of wild beasts to storm Black Blood Stockade's defensive line en masse!
By the time Black Blood Stockade was run ragged within the meat-grinder of the beast tide, its combat strength and foundation exhausted to the last, he would then lead the core elites of the White Bone Alliance, well-rested and waiting at ease, to reap the fisherman's profit.
He could borrow the beast tide's hand to seize the symbiotic Gu worms upon the beast kings' bodies.
And he could also take the opportunity to annex Black Blood Stockade's surviving forces and resources.
Truly, killing two birds with one stone!
Venomous to the utmost.
Greed had already utterly blinded the eyes of this Demonic Path hero.
He could hold back no longer!
...
On the other side.
At Black Blood Stockade, likewise a secret chamber located underground.
The atmosphere was cold and oppressive, the air as though congealed into something corporeal.
At this moment, there were only four people within the secret chamber.
The Rank 4 Patriarch Lin Cang sat upon the main seat, his face sunken like water.
The Rank 3 peak stage Grand Clan Elder Lin Zhen sat to one side, his gaze like lightning.
Lin Feng, wrapped in thick bandages, his complexion still pale as paper, was leaning back upon a soft couch.
Evidently, he had insisted upon attending this secret meeting — nominally an "inquiry," yet in truth already bordering on an interrogation.
And Lin Mu sat upright directly opposite the three of them.
The four gazed at each other in wordless silence.
After a long, drawn-out dead silence, Lin Zhen was the first to break it.
This Grand Clan Elder, who had always been renowned for his iron-blooded ways, at this moment adopted a tone that was, against all precedent, rather gentle — even carrying a few traces of intimacy.
"Mu'er, this old man actually holds quite a deep impression of you."
"In earlier years, I even once had a chance meeting with your father. He was a decent man, a fellow who was dutiful and conscientious. Only, what a pity — he died young, and never got to see with his own eyes your accomplishments of today."
Faced with this sudden emotional play, Lin Mu was neither servile nor arrogant.
He rose to his feet and respectfully cupped his hands in a bow.
"The Grand Clan Elder praises me too highly."
"My late father often said in life that, having received the shelter of the clan, one ought naturally to bend one's back and spare no effort for Black Blood Stockade, giving one's all until death."
"This one was steeped in my father's influence from childhood, and has always regarded him as a model. I only hate that my own abilities are meager, unable to share more of the clan's burdens."
"Good."
"Well said — bend one's back and spare no effort."
Though these words carried a measure of courtesy, they also, with exceeding firmness, made clear Lin Mu's identity and standing—
He was a native-born clansman of Black Blood Stockade.
Hearing this, Lin Cang on the main seat softened his cold, hard countenance a shade or two.
He took up the thread of conversation, those eyes of his, hard as rock, still fixed unwaveringly upon Lin Mu.
"I have already learned the detailed course of events from Feng'er."
"That pair of male-and-female fiends who ambushed you were both notoriously infamous Rank 2 peak stage killers."
"Not only that, they were also assassins hired at high price by White Bone Stockade. Even Lin Ze of the Storage Hall died at the hands of this same batch of people."
Lin Cang paused briefly, his voice growing low and deep.
"The elders of the Storage Hall even once publicly posted a bounty of twenty thousand Primeval Stones for taking the heads off their shoulders."
"Now, by beheading that masked man, you can be counted as having avenged half the blood debt for Ze'er — and for our Black Blood Stockade."
Hearing the words "avenge," Lin Feng, seated to one side, stirred faintly in those eyes of his that had grown somewhat dim from weakness.
He raised his head and gave Lin Mu a deep, long look, seeming rather moved.
"The Patriarch overstates it. This one dares not lay claim to merit."
Lin Mu cupped his hands once more, his tone calm and humble.
"The situation at the time was critical; this subordinate was merely fighting desperately to preserve his own life."
"Failing to leave that she-devil behind along with him is already this subordinate's incompetence — how could I dare speak of any merit in taking revenge?"
Watching Lin Mu — neither arrogant nor rash, without the slightest fluster, and with a manner so exceedingly sincere — Lin Cang and Lin Zhen exchanged a tacit glance and gave an almost imperceptible nod.
The earlier groundwork and probing had, by this point, more or less run its course.
Lin Cang no longer beat around the bush, his tone abruptly turning cold.
"Lin Mu, I have already had people carefully investigate your background."
"You are indeed a native-born child of our Black Blood Stockade — trace back three generations, and your origins are quite clean as well."
"In the past, you were always a right-hand man at Feng'er's side. In the matters of the Blood Forest and the caravan, you did indeed render no small merit for the clan."
"Only, this time…"
Lin Cang's body leaned slightly forward.
Those sharp eyes seemed to want to cleave open Lin Mu's very soul.
"The strength you displayed in that ambush truly far exceeded our imagination."
"That masked man you beheaded — based on the intelligence we possess — his true combat strength was absolutely among the very topmost existences even within the Rank 2 peak stage."
"Even some clan elders who have only just stepped into Rank 3 would not dare claim they could take him down with a full ten-out-of-ten certainty."
"But you, in a head-on confrontation, forcibly severed his head!"
Lin Cang's gaze grew ever sharper, and he asked, enunciating word by word:
"In other words, your true cultivation — or rather, your true combat strength — is at the very least Rank 2 peak stage!"
"And yet you are so young, several years younger even than Feng'er."
"I have checked the records of that year's Aperture Opening Ceremony. Your aptitude was indeed B-grade aptitude, seventy-nine percent — what is called a pseudo-A-grade."
"But!"
Lin Cang abruptly slammed a palm down upon the table.
"Even a pseudo-A-grade is not enough to explain why you could, at such an age, reach Rank 2 peak stage!"
"And even possess the ability to cut down a top-tier powerhouse of the same rank head-on!"
As Lin Cang's words probed ever deeper, the atmosphere within the secret chamber grew ever colder, ever more murderous.
"I need an explanation."
"Lin Mu."