Chapter 17
In the dark of night, a shadow is moving stealthily while tracking the movement of the people in the area. Its eyes are glued on a person sitting inside a carriage as that person emits a strong aura. Although in normal cases this aura would not be visible outside. But the shadows have a special thing on its eyes that lets it peak on any living creature within its specified distance.
Then the shadow picks a place near a large tree with a deep wide crevice and set up a simple formation, after some time the tree crevice suddenly was covered and form a complete and healthy tree trunk. Although this is the most basic of illusion formation it is quite effective in this forest. Then another formation was also set up which sudden completely hide the presence of the shadow.
The darkness of the night ensues its silence as if nothing had happened and the tranquility of the surroundings made everything seems perfect.
In a luxurious looking tent a woman is sitting weakly on a chair while her head is on the table, she held her stomach as if in pain, while her shoulder is quivering. A pretty looking girl with a sinister grin on her face is slowly approaching her with an exquisite dagger in her hand. Beside the young pretty looking girl also stood a handsome young man with an anxious look in his eyes as he tries to pacify the girl's feelings with some sweet words.
But then all of a sudden the girl lifted the dagger in her hand and plunge it towards the young woman's head on the table. As the young man discovered this he wanted to rush and stop it, but all of a sudden his expression changed and he grimaced in pain then fell on the ground.
When Jing Lei fell, Lyn Lei actually noticed it, but she is really intending to kill Cherry Lao that she didn't stop but directly stab the dagger.
But then all of a sudden the dagger was stopped inches away from reaching Cherry Lao's head by a thin layer of light, and no matter how hard she exerted her effort is was not enough to penetrate the protective layer.
"Tsk, Tsk. Truly sinister… We helped your caravan and this is how you pay your savior, instead of gratitude you pay them with malice and hatred. How deplorable for a noble cultivator to act this way." The voice of Cherry Lao suddenly was heard.
Judging from her tone she seems to be not in pain at all. It was like there is a hint of being entertained from the way she says those words. Then she lifted her head up and a beautiful smile is plastered in her face. This made Lyn Lei unable to react and was stunned.
"Sigh… I am not as sinister as you, so I won't hold this to heart. It would be below me to step on an ant like you. I pray that our paths won't cross again, because if it does and you still hold a grudge against me, I won't be magnanimous and spare your lowly life." Cherry Lao said nonchalantly as she stood up and calmly walked out of the tent as if nothing had happened.
Lyn Lei felt her knees has suddenly become soft as the aura of the woman was truly scary. She is only at the primary stages of spirit refining realm, after being directly assaulted by a very strong aura of a gold core realm, she felt like her consciousness would fade at any moment.
When Cherry Lao's figure and aura disappear, Lyn Lei suddenly regained her composure. Then she remembers her brother on the ground writhing in pain. The animosity she had, suddenly vanished as she shows signs of concern for her big brother.
"Big brother! What happened to you? Why are you like this? Anybody! Help!" Lyn Lei shouted in panic as she kneeled beside her brother.
She slowly caressed her brother's hair and her tears flow non-stop. Then she started to mumble some jumbled and unintelligible words, as her eyes became unfocused.
When the servants from outside enter the tent, they saw that their young miss has a pale face and murmuring some words, as she held their young master in her arms lovingly caressing his hair. They can see that their young master was in pain. The elder who is hiding and waiting to ambush Cherry Lao was also called and suddenly rushed towards the tent. He then checked the pulse of Jing Lei and heave a sigh of relief.
"The young master is fine, he is just weak because of the meridian blocking powder. Luckily we brought the antidote… Here let him drink this." The elder said as he handed a small bottle of liquid to a servant.
After some time, Jing Lei was able to recover from the pain and began to breathe normally. This made Lyn Lei relaxed and began to recover from her anxiety.
"Young miss, what happened? I was waiting in the special room for the servants to call me. I didn't expect to see this." The elder asked.
Although the elder was a bit disappointed with what had happened, he could not say it out loud. He knows that the plan of the young miss was a little rushed and has a lot of holes. Which shows her to still be inexperienced of the ways of the world. So he just shook his head and went out to scan the surroundings. He would just try to find the woman and bring her to be punished.
Meanwhile…
Cherry Lao was dashing from tree to tree, scanning her surroundings and trying to find Shin Jiao. When she walks out of the tent, to her surprise, she actually didn't find him in that area. So she decided to head back towards the forest as that was their plan.
"Hello! It seems that you can't find me?"
A voice from behind suddenly interrupted her search, then a smile appears in her face.
"You really are crafty. I can't believe your hasty plan would have that result. I hope that they would learn their lesson from this." Said Cherry Lao as she stopped and turns around.
Seeing that Shin Jiao was able to chase after her, Cherry Lao had a surprised look in her face.
"Shin, your ability? Is it back?" Cherry Lao said with an excited expression.
"No, I still can't use my strength and abilities so far. But I have an artifact that could boost my speed." Shin Jiao answered.
Upon hearing his reply she felt a little disappointed but still was amazed at his luck in finding such an artifact. Then she looks around and found out that they are already too far from the campground.
"Shin, what's your next plan?" she asked unconsciously.
"Follow me, we have to hide first." Shin Jiao answered as he already knows that there would be trouble.
The group also had a gold core realm expert, though that person is also at the primary stage, compared to Cherry Lao he's more experienced and judging from the Qi in his body it's purer than hers. If only he can open his ring, he could take out some weapons and the elder of the Lei's would not stand a chance. But since an unknown reason appear where he could not use natural energy, so the only sure way to escape this dilemma is to hide and wade out the situation first.
He grabbed Cherry Lao's hand and they both ran back towards a big tree.
The 2nd elder of the Lei's began his search in the vicinity but found none. When he found the tent where Shin Jiao was supposed to be held, he found the two servants lying on the ground unconscious. So he decided to quickly search for the two people, he can't believe that he would not find the two considering that one of them is a mortal and the other one is just a primary stage gold core like himself. So he tried to use an aura searching technique passed down from their family and search within 2 kilometers radius. Then he found traces which is the direction of where Cherry Lao went. But when he arrived at a place he was confused as he suddenly found that the traces have disappeared. It's like the person he is following just vanished into thin air from where that person was standing. So without a choice, he continued searching although he felt that it would be fruitless.
Meanwhile…
Cherry Lao is already cultivating inside a large crevice of a tree, while Shin Jiao is watching the surroundings outside. He already saw the person from the Lei clan, which seems to be an elder, judging from his aura. Shin Jiao is confident of the formations he had made, as long as that person is not in the nascent stage he could not find them even their auras.
Both of them rested there till morning the next day.
At the camp, Lyn Lei was throwing her tantrum and started smashing things she could grab while Jin Lei is trying his best to console her.
"Little sister, calm down. Although the 2nd elder didn't find them, they have nowhere else to go. Sooner or later they would still need to go to town. By then we could catch them, so you don't have to be angry okay?"
After hearing her big brother's explanation she calmed down a little but still threw some things. Then she grumpily sat on a wooden chair and frowned. Then as if an idea suddenly pops out of her mind she raised her head and smiled innocently.
"Big brother! I know I became bad all of a sudden. It's just that I was really angry that you got hurt. I won't let them go for hurting you, I would do all I can to get our revenge." She said acting cute while grabbing Jin Lei's hand and slowly swings it.
Both sibling shamelessly thought that they were wronged, but didn't think that they are the ones who planned to rob something that didn't belong to them. But this is a norm in this world, as most cultivators are almost always are shameless people who are trying to reach the Dao of immortality while forgetting a very important factor called karma.
When Lyn Lei went outside and saw the cultivators from the supply caravan, she approached them.
"Good day fellow Daoist! We had a conflict with two of your companions. It was the woman in the gold core realm and her companion the mortal man. Because they tried to poison my brother and tried to steal our treasure and we found out, they escaped. So, we are willing to offer 1,000 low-grade spirit stones for those who could help us find them. If you could bring them dead or alive an additional 1,000 low-grade spirit stones will be given." Lyn Lei said in a loud voice.
Almost everyone in the supply group caravan was shocked, but still, greed overcame some of them as they volunteer to go out immediately and search. Soon the only ones left in the supply group are mortal servants and the rest of the cultivators rushed towards the forest.
Shin Jiao and Cherry Lao decided to go around and avoided the main roads towards the town of Dis. Shin Jiao wanted for them to slowly travel to town and prepare for anything that might happen. Although Cherry Lao is a strong gold core cultivator, still there are other strong individuals in town. And it would be dangerous for them to cross paths with those without preparations. Shin Jiao decided to combine science and natural plants to make potent healing pills or serum that would rival pills made alchemist using spiritual energies. He didn't know if it would work but he has to try as he is still too weak to be of help to Cherry Lao. All he can do is not to be a burden to her and be able to keep himself alive in case of a fight.
So while traveling they would always stop as Shin Jiao would experiment on new plants and test its components. And from there he discovered a new medicine he named regrowth serum. With the help of Cherry Lao's spiritual control, he successfully refined the medicine to almost 90% potency. After discovering the medicine he decided to finally guide Cherry Lao with her martial arts skills. Which she felt skeptical as she is already confident in her own skills and doubted him. So she decided to have a bout of sparing session with him that day.
In a small clearing two people face against each other, a handsome young man in his twenties holding a short stick and a beautiful young woman looking a bit younger than the man, she held in her hand an exquisite soft sword.
"Shin, are you sure with this? I mean… you're underestimating my skills too much. I've been practicing my sword skills ever since I was young, how could you say that my skills have too many openings." said Cherry Lao with a hint of annoyance in her tone.
"I told you that I would polish your martial skills right? We are going to face each other without using your spiritual energy. This way your skills will become more refined and deadlier when you combined it with spiritual energy."
Cherry Lao sneered silently at Shin Jiao's confident words, still unable to accept that her skills are inferior to his. It is a bit of a hit in her pride as she is a cultivator and he is just a mere mortal. Then a glint of guile suddenly appears in her eyes as a plan suddenly pops up in her head. After analyzing her plan and how to execute it, she then quickly held the sword in her hand firmly and in a flash dashed towards Shin Jiao.
Although she is not using any spiritual energy her speed is already at least 2 times faster than a normal human. Then she suddenly extended her hand and strike directly stabbing towards Shin Jiao's shoulder. Since she already knows that he had the regrowth serum he will be fine.
When her sword was about to stab Shin Jiao's shoulder he just moves slightly and the sword strike misses in a hair's breadth which startled her as she actually saw his movements using her spiritual sense but was unable to change the direction of her sword. Then she can feel something is poking in her chest and saw a smile on Shin Jiao's face.
"You lost…" he said in a casual tone.