Chapter 344

Chapter 344: Can’t Compare, So I’m Done

Seeing his brother’s stunned look, Jiang Yu Wei cleared his throat and explained: “I was just curious about what the Defensive Jade Pendant does. Since it gives twelve lifesaving chances, using one to test it isn’t a big deal, right? Then I can relax.”

Speechless, Jiang Yu Chuan said: “I’ve already tested it, big brother, so don’t waste another chance.”

Puzzled, Jiang Yu Wei asked: “You tested it?”

Jiang Yu Chuan said: “Mm. When we wiped out the demonic cult before, they set a poison trap. A few of our men triggered it by accident. Everyone else collapsed, but I was fine.”

It wasn’t only him-two people standing right beside him were fine too. In other words, the Defensive Jade Pendant not only protects its owner; it also shields people nearby, within about one meter.

After hearing this, Jiang Yu Wei’s eyes lit up. His expression shifted again and again, making his usually serious face look oddly complicated.

Having never seen his solemn big brother show so many emotions, Jiang Yu Chuan asked, curious: “Big brother, what’s wrong?”

Jiang Yu Wei stayed quiet for a long time before saying: “Second brother, you’ve got a remarkable daughter.” He sighed: “Heaven’s favoritism is a magical thing. You can envy it, but you can’t copy it.”

From boyhood to youth and then to middle age, he had always measured himself against his second brother. If his brother had better talent in martial arts, he trained twice as hard. If his brother’s fame in the martial world was higher, he studied military strategy and worked hard to serve the martial world. Even in marriage, he competed in secret: his second brother married a heroine of the martial world, so he married a young lady from a great martial family. He even looked after Chen Ruo Lan because she loved Jiang Yu Chuan so deeply; that kindness carried a hidden sting of rivalry.

He had competed all his life and believed he had never truly lost to his brother. He never thought that in the very end, he would lose on the quality of their children. All his children together couldn’t match even a single strand of his little niece’s hair.

Jiang Yu Wei gave up.

People are strange. When you feel like you’re only a tiny step behind the person ahead, you want to chase them with everything you’ve got. But if the person ahead is first by a huge gap-like a cliff-then even if you’re second, you lose the urge to chase. At that point, normal standards don’t apply. The other person is basically a god. [A god. How can a person chase a god?] So, let it be.

Yu Zhi Yi had no idea about her eldest uncle’s odd thoughts. After leaving the ruins, she didn’t rush to find anyone. Instead, she picked a hidden corner and opened the book she had taken from Ji Guang Dai.

Formations, talismans, and alchemy pills aren’t good or bad by themselves; they’re good or bad depending on who uses them. So when the corner of her eye caught a flash of the Bird-Taming Talisman on the page, she decided to learn it.

Despite the word “bird” in its name, the Bird-Taming Talisman doesn’t control living birds; it controls paper cranes folded from talisman paper. Once folded, the paper crane takes on the form of a bird. It can be used to track, to watch, and it can even carry a bit of weight.

Yu Zhi Yi found it strange: if this talisman was so good, why hadn’t Ji Guang Dai used it to watch her? As for how she knew there were no such talismans around her, that was because she had already set a defensive formation on Mount Ming. If any foreign object entered, she would sense it at once. All this time, no one who looked like they were from the mystic sect had stepped onto Mount Ming, and there had been no ripples of spiritual energy-other than that one demonic cultivator. She had felt his intrusion, which is why she reacted the instant he attacked.

When she turned to the page on the Bird-Taming Talisman, she understood. It wasn’t that Ji Guang Dai didn’t want to use it-he couldn’t. Although it’s a low-level talismanic seal, it demands very high spiritual energy, because the paper crane runs on spiritual energy. Once the power cuts off, the talisman paper turns into an ordinary paper crane, nothing special besides the messy symbols drawn on it.

She hadn’t had time to test the strength of that previous demonic cultivator before the Heavenly Thunder Talisman blasted him to death. But Ji Guang Dai was just a total weakling at mid-stage Qi Refining; he simply didn’t have the power to control a Bird-Taming Talisman.

Luckily, all the talisman drawing she’d done lately counted as a kind of cultivation. Her cultivation base was now very close to mid-stage Foundation Establishment. The Bird-Taming Talismans she drew could fly with unlimited range as long as the cranes stayed within a hundred meters of her. Even if they flew beyond that, they could keep going for a full day and night. That much time was more than enough.

Yu Zhi Yi drew three Bird-Taming Talismans in one go. It wasn’t that she couldn’t draw more; it was that controlling too many flying cranes at once would strain even her. Three wasn’t too many or too few-it was just right.

With the cranes’ help, searching went much faster. In under two hours, she had checked everything within a dozen li around Juxian Manor. The three cranes had no thoughts of their own and could be dulled by certain formations, but they flew high. Even if they missed subtle signs, the images they fed back were clear enough that, with a bit of analysis, Yu Zhi Yi could spot clues.

Splitting her mind four ways was exhausting, but it paid off. By then, a lot of people had gathered near the killing array: Juxian Manor’s servants and villagers from the area. The Heavenly Thunder Talisman had made a noise so huge that folks within more than ten li had heard it.

The two Jiang brothers were already in hiding. Yu Zhi Yi didn’t startle the crowd. After meeting up with the brothers, she shared what she’d found.

“So if we keep everything here quiet, there won’t be danger,” Jiang Yu Wei said.

“Generally yes,” Yu Zhi Yi said after thinking it over: “But then we must keep it sealed tight.”

Once a person dies, it’s like a lamp going out. As long as they cleaned up the traces, there shouldn’t be problems. As for the demonic cultivator on the mountain, she had already burned him to ash with the Fire Command Talisman. With no living culprit and no body, no matter how powerful his backers were, they shouldn’t be able to trace anything back to Mount Ming.

“Let’s go back,” Jiang Yu Chuan said.

Still chewing on the question of that demonic cultivator’s backers, Yu Zhi Yi nodded and followed them back up the mountain. The moment she stepped into the yard, she smacked her forehead: “I knew I was forgetting something.”

She had meant to break the fortune-shifting array on the young manor lord of Juxian Manor. The guilty should bear the blame. Ji Guang Dai did all of this, and he and Chen Ruo Lan were the ones who benefited. Why should the young manor lord suffer in their place?

Even if Ji Guang Dai was dead, Chen Ruo Lan and her daughter were still alive. And this kind of thing isn’t wiped clean by death. Stealing someone else’s fate is a grave crime even in the underworld. If she didn’t set this cause and effect straight, Ji Guang Dai could slip past judgment. She refused to let a cruel man dodge Heaven’s clear justice.