"You are quite strong," says the boy.
"Aren't you ashamed to call yourself a cultivator?" The girl with black hair asks.
Yang Zhai ignores him and looks at the man whose son had just thrown a stone at him.
When the man sees this, he hurriedly replies,
"No, you are mistaken, it was my son who threw a stone at him. He didn't do anything."
After the man said this, Yang Zhai turned around and gave three essence stones to the stall owner after taking what he was there for. Thereafter, he ignores and leaves.
"Stop!"
However, the girl with white hair came in front of Yang Zhai and stopped him.
"What do you want?"
Yang Zhai inquires.
She bows a little and answers,
"I am sorry for doubting you, we should have inquired about the situation first before doubting you."
Her hair was not tied and was left open, as a result, when she lowered her head a little, her hair also came forward slightly like a smooth wave.
Yang Zhai was silent for a moment before brushing past her, completely ignoring her.
Her two companions looked at this, feeling indignant and furious.
"How rude! Ha Eun apologized herself and that arrogant boy just completely ignored her," the boy is annoyed.
"He should have at least said something. Even if it was our mistake, Ha Eun did apologize."
The girl with black hair also felt indignant.
The girl with white hair, Ha Eun, raised her head and looked back at Yang Zhai's disappearing silhouette.
"I really want to beat that guy."
The boy was still angry.
"Min Jae, forget it. We were the ones who mistook him first," Ha Eun said, shaking her head.
"But still, you did apologize, he should have at least responded," the girl with black hair replies.
"Ji Woo, let it be, I feel like we will meet again. Anyway, let's go, Jun Yi must be waiting for us."
At night, the moon gazes down on the world, bathing it in a serene silence. Crickets and cicadas sing in harmony, as if offering their thanks to nature.
The boy from last night appears again. He is roaming the forest again, holding no fire. His eyes, seemingly being able to see through the night.
Owls look at the boy silently. It's as if they were gazing into the boy's eyes. A sense of familiarity radiated from his eyes toward them.
Unlike the owls, the boy's focus was not on them. He was wandering around without doing anything.
Just like last night, the boy returns back to his room after two hours and sleeps after examining his body.
The sun rose, bringing a new day.
Yang Zhai is wandering the village, looking around as if familiarizing himself with its terrain. While walking, he came to a stop and saw four people.
One was the one he saw the day before yesterday, and the three were those he met yesterday.
After looking at them for a while, he left.
Just like that, many days passed. A rumor began to spread throughout the village.
"Did you hear it?"
"About what?"
"There are rumors that at night, a phantom appears."
"I also heard about it, he seems to be looking for something. Many have seen him, but none met him."
"Many guards tried to look for this phantom, but none of them found him nor have even seen him."
"Some say that it's just a rumor made to scare the people."
"That's not true. I was hunting at night three days ago, and I saw him myself. But the next moment, he disappeared. Because of this, I haven't gone out to hunt for the past two days."
"Did you see his face?"
"No, who can see in the dark?"
"So, how can you say it's a male?"
"It's just an opinion that many drew after seeing the phantom's silhouette."
These rumors were spreading quickly throughout the village. These days, many were even scared to come out of their houses at night.
As for why they were considered just rumors even after many saw it? The reason was that after the rumors spread, many guards tried to look for the phantom to see if the rumors were true, but no guard ever saw any phantom.
Meanwhile,
"Did you hear the rumors?" Jun Yi asked.
In front of him are standing two girls and a boy.
"I did, my father said that the sect even dispatched three rank 4 elders to confirm if the rumors were true, but nobody ever saw this phantom." Ha Eun replies.
"Even I heard these rumors," Ji Woo answers.
"But, there was something strange that my father told me." Ha Eun says after thinking for a while.
"What?" Asks Jun Yi.
"He said that even though they couldn't find the phantom, they could smell a strange scent in the forest. Some places even had an intense odor."
"What scent?"
"Well, I don't even know about this. This was all said by my dad." Ha Eun shakes her shoulders with an awkward smile on her face.
"Anyway, this is the best opportunity we can get."
Jun Yi spoke with a serious expression.
"What do you mean?"
"Think about it, we want the sect to deploy a team to capture this Yang Zhai. But they aren't willing to. If we make them believe that a phantom really exists, they will have no choice but to dispatch a group into the surroundings for the sect's safety."
"Well… you are right about that. Even though the chances of Yang Zhai coming close to our sect's surroundings are slim, there is still a possibility. Who knows, he might even come to our sect."
"Yeah, that's what I have been telling those old fools as well, but all they care about is their authority and Elder Chi. Why don't they understand that they are three and Elder Chi won't be able to do anything." Jun Yi shouted annoyingly.
"Jun, mind your tongue, one of those old fools is my dad." Ha Eun was irritated by what Jun Yi just said.
"So what, I also included my dad and even theirs." Jun Yi countered right away.
"So, you should just include yours, don't include ours."
This time, Min Jae refuted.
"Stop it, you guys. What's your plan, Jun Yi?" Ji Woo inquired.
"Now that you asked about it, here is what I am thinking. So, what we will do is that all of us will go out at night and pretend to be phantoms. You three can also try to harm a few people during this to increase our chances of our plan succeeding."
"No, I won't harm any innocent person. As for your plan, I can go along with that, but I am not going to harm anyone unless I am provoked." Ha Eun strictly rejected Jun Yi's plan of harming innocent people.
"But… we have to do it. Otherwise, it will take us too long to succeed."
"Still, I am not going to harm anyone as long as I don't feel danger from the opposition."
'But…"
"No, no means no."
These two were arguing when Ji Woo interfered,
"Stop it, Jun Yi. You sound more like your dad now. We will do as you say except for harming innocent people. We can go hunt some beasts and scatter their blood to scare the sect though."
On the other hand,
Yang Zhai is looking silently at an archway. This archway has vines swirling around it. Moss can also be seen on it and there were four to five trees around it.
In front of it were standing two guards.
Behind it lay the Spirit Garden.
/!*****!*****!/