Gao Yuan thought about it and realised that was true. The mission assigned to them had a protective nature. If Ning Chaoyi suddenly wanted to make a move on the target, the others might indeed not casually cooperate. So he said, “Then you directly relay it to your ‘boss’, let her carry it out.”
Ning Chaoyi nodded, readily agreeing, “Fine, I will go and handle it now.”
He turned to leave, but Gao Yuan remembered that Qiao Qie’er had ignored his signal, and he had doubts in his heart. He immediately called out to stop him, “Tell her, I will wait here for her reply.”
“Fine.” Ning Chaoyi nodded in agreement. When a gap appeared in the people coming and going outside moving things, he quickly leaped out.
However, he did not go directly to find Qiao Qie’er. Instead, he hid in a mountain hollow along the way, and successively waited for the Thief Mandarin Duck couple and Lu Xingyun to arrive.
Honestly speaking, having a woman of Lu Xingyun’s type do heavy lifting of such large objects really felt very mismatched. Fortunately, Lu Xingyun herself did not show any discomfort. Since everyone had decided on the matter, she just accompanied them and silently did the work.
Once Lu Xingyun arrived, Nie Pinlan said to Ning Chaoyi, “The people are here, speak, what is it?”
Ning Chaoyi tilted his head to indicate the direction of the Golden Ruins entrance and exit, “Those people outside followed us in. They just met with me and assigned another task.”
Nie Pinlan gritted her teeth and said, “More tasks? Shouldn’t they be telling us to wrap up?”
Ning Chaoyi: “Wrap up? When it truly comes time to wrap up, I am afraid it will be time to collect our lives. I never expected that the secret they were scheming about was actually the legendary Golden Ruins. After entering, once I knew this place was the Golden Ruins, I could not feel excited at all. My back went straight cold. At that time, my heart was filled with waves of coldness. I felt those people never intended to give us a way out from the very beginning.
Do you think after they succeed, they will still leave us alive? People who can use such methods will not let this secret leak out. The soft spots they have us by, not only will they not let go, they should also silence us. I do not know what soft spots they have on you, but I will make my meaning clear first. I am no longer counting on them to honour their promises. I want to rebel! What about you?”
Nie Pinlan’s face showed a look of dejection again.
Lu Xingyun was wooden. There was no need to say much more. Basically, after entering the Golden Ruins, everyone had sensed something.
Nie Pinlan suddenly slowly turned to face her husband, gazing at Zhu Wanzhen in the darkness. She gently gave a sentence, “I have done my best!”
Zhu Wanzhen silently nodded.
Nie Pinlan: “You make the decision.”
Ning Chaoyi did not know what riddle the two were playing, and urged, “We cannot hide here for too long, lest we arouse suspicion. Quickly tell me what you mean.”
The taciturn Zhu Wanzhen finally spoke, his voice low and resonant, “Mr Ning, what do you want to do?”
Ning Chaoyi: “With no way out left or right, how can we sit and wait for death? Even more so, we cannot allow ourselves to be manipulated at will. We must fight back, we must strive for ourselves.”
Zhu Wanzhen: “Their background should not be simple. To be able to gather us together in such a short time, their power should be very great. We are not their match.”
Ning Chaoyi: “Outside we are not their match, but here, they may not be. Otherwise, having already found the Golden Ruins, there would be no need to be so sneaky about it. They could completely adopt forcible occupation methods. Since they dare not, that means their strength here is limited.” He lifted his chin toward the valley direction, “There is still a master of Shangxuan over there, and a father of Gaoxuan strength. He is also more familiar with the situation of the Golden Ruins. We should join forces with that side. At the very least, we should strive to find out exactly who those dog thieves are. No matter what the final result of our efforts is, even if we die, we must bite back!”
Zhu Wanzhen: “Mr Ning, what do you want to do?”
Ning Chaoyi: “I do not know why, and I do not know if it is killing the donkey after the millstone is removed, but in any case, that side wants to kill Lin Erqing…” He explained the orders Gao Yuan had given him to the few people.
The crowd pondered, roughly understanding his meaning. Now was indeed a great opportunity to gain the trust of that side and cooperate with them.
Zhu Wanzhen: “Do as Mr Ning says.”
Ning Chaoyi looked at Lu Xingyun again.
Lu Xingyun said with difficulty, “My son’s entire family is in their hands. Is there really no other way?”
She still had a son. Regarding this, the others were not surprised at all.
Zhu Wanzhen said calmly, “Mr Ning is right. Your son’s family basically has no way out. The only way is to find out who they are. Perhaps there is still a possibility of rescue. You mother and daughter must not hinder us!”
Lu Xingyun sadly stroked the small white flower at her temple, and said softly, “Fine.”
Once opinions were unified, the few people quickly darted out. Along the way, they successively encountered the three martial brothers who were moving gold back and forth.
The three had just been a little surprised, because when coming and going, they had suddenly noticed the others were missing.
Now upon meeting, they found the few people sneaking around in a group, and they were even calling for them to pause their work together.
Nan Zhu muttered with some dissatisfaction, “I say, where are we going, what are we doing? We need to seize the time to earn money. How much silver do we lose by making one less trip?”
Ning Chaoyi: “We will talk after seeing that father and son pair.”
“What is going on?” Nan Zhu muttered, and also gestured toward Yu Qing.
Yu Qing did not speak, silently observing the few people. He faintly felt something was wrong.
Wu Hei and his father, who had been resting at the mountain cliff earlier, later moved farther away because it was too noisy. They also hid behind a mountain hollow. The child was already asleep beside him, covered with something.
The group found them.
Ning Chaoyi sat down, so Nie Pinlan and the others also followed and sat down.
Wu Hei looked at them in puzzlement. These people were not carrying gold. What did they mean by coming here to idle?
The three martial brothers were the last to sit down. After sitting down, Yu Qing asked, “What is the meaning of this?”
Ning Chaoyi stared at him, bringing up the old question again, “What exactly are you three people?”
Yu Qing found it strange, “We each make our fortune, take our money and go our separate ways, live our own lives. With so much gold, we have no need to covet anything. Is it important who we are?”
Since that was the case, Ning Chaoyi did not answer the question directly. He directly threw out a sentence, “The woman called Wang Shaojun by your side has a problem. She is a spy planted by others beside you.”
Nan Zhu and Mu Aotie instantly had confused faces, feeling baffled.
Wu Hei was somewhat surprised, looking left and right.
Under the moonlight, Yu Qing’s face was already twisted, instantly feeling like he was about to explode. He said coldly, “Mr Ning, I show you respect but that does not mean I fear you. If you have some words that are impolite to me, that is one thing. But my woman is not for others to speak of disrespectfully!”
He believed he was not stupid. Whether Qiao Qie’er liked him or not, he felt he could sense it.
Ning Chaoyi: “You do not even want to hear an explanation?”
Yu Qing gritted his teeth, “There is no need for outsiders to plant any spy beside me, so I do not need to listen to any explanation from you!”
Indeed, as he himself said, he did not think there was any need for outsiders to plant Qiao Qie’er beside him when he met her.
In other words, he internally rejected and absolutely refused to accept this accusation. He rejected it without any reason, and absolutely would not face it.
Ning Chaoyi slowly said, “Some things that happened to me, presumably you have more or less heard of them. It is just that rumours are rumours after all, and some places are mistaken. My master’s entire family was killed by me, and my wife was also killed by my master. But he did not rape her. My wife took the initiative.
Speaking of which, you probably would not believe it. That cheap woman only wanted some external things, to satisfy some of her vanity. She squandered all of my master’s family assets. My master truly could not afford to give anymore. Facing her endless demands, he finally developed murderous intent.
Actually, I still have a son. He was still young then. I did not know how to explain all this to him when he grew up, so I gave him to a childless couple to be their son. I did not want the previous generation’s affairs to affect him, nor did I want him to harbour resentment toward anyone. I only wanted him to live out his life in peace. The matter was done very secretly. Especially after so many years, I thought no one knew. But who knew that some nights ago, someone suddenly found me.
My son fell into their hands. They used this to threaten me to help them with some matters, and overnight sent me to the vicinity of Rift Valley Estate. These people’s energy is very great. They had flying cavalry carry me flying directly above the airspace of Yin Nation, not afraid of being discovered at all. Clearly, even if something happened, they had the confidence to suppress the matter.
The task I needed to do was very simple. It was aimed at you three, especially you, Lin Erqing. They wanted me to find that halberd on the Rift Valley Estate clan emblem, saying you could unravel the secret on the halberd. Their goal was this secret. So they also told me to secretly protect you, and secretly cooperate. As for how to secretly cooperate, they pointed out Wang Shaojun to us, telling us to follow Wang Shaojun’s assignments.”
After he finished speaking, he looked at Lu Xingyun, “What about you?”
The muscles on Yu Qing’s face were twitching. He was clearly about to fly into a rage, plainly not accepting this.
Nan Zhu, who had a grave expression beside him, suddenly reached out and grabbed Yu Qing’s wrist tightly, “Old Fifteen, let them finish speaking, it won’t be too late!”
Mu Aotie also reached out and pressed down on Yu Qing’s shoulder. They saw Yu Qing’s breathing was heavy and rapid.
Lu Xingyun’s expression had fallen into a trance, “Similar to Mr Ning. Qingcheng also has a younger brother from a different father. He has already established his own family and career, very secretly. They not only took away my son’s entire family, but also threatened to let my son’s entire family know what I do, and to let the relatives and friends around my son know what I do. I did not dare to disobey. Our three generations of grandmother, mother, and daughter were forced by circumstances and had no choice but to come and serve. We were also sent to the vicinity of Rift Valley Estate overnight.”
Ning Chaoyi looked at the Thief Mandarin Duck again, “Your couple presumably is about the same, right?”
Nie Pinlan looked at Zhu Wanzhen, “He has a son and a daughter. I killed his former wife, but his children I knew I could not touch. Moreover, I took good care of them, arranged very secretly. I do not know how those people found out. His children are my children. Naturally, I cannot ignore them.”
Even though Wu Hei was rather detached from worldly affairs, he was still stunned listening. Killing someone’s mother, then treating that mother’s children as one’s own children, what kind of logic was this?
Ning Chaoyi: “Our three families were all arranged here by those people. Our goals are the same. When it is inconvenient to contact them, we all take orders from Wang Shaojun.”
Nan Zhu and Mu Aotie’s expressions were quite heavy. Only now did this reasonably explain why these three groups of people could come together. It was much more reliable than some claim that they heard the halberd at Rift Valley Estate had a secret and they could get rich.
Yu Qing struggled, but was held down again by his two martial brothers working together. He said between gasps, “This is impossible. We did not leak the secret of the Golden Ruins to any outsider. Even before the Golden Ruins opened, we did not leak half a word. How could someone scheme against me targeting the Golden Ruins?”
Ning Chaoyi: “How the secret was leaked, we do not know. If you want to know whether it is true, it is very simple. Those people have already followed us in. They just contacted me, wanting to kill you. They told me to relay the order to Wang Shaojun. She is the direct executor!”