MJWCATFPITWOC Chapter 13
by VolareFacing the inquiries from the crowd, Shen Yucheng went from initial apprehension to indifference.
“Shen Yucheng, do you know your crime?” The elder spoke first, questioning him.
Listening to the rumors and speculations of the disciples, Shen Yucheng felt a chill in his heart. They had already prejudged him as a criminal, giving him no opportunity to defend himself.
Cheng Mufei sat proudly beside the elder’s seat, with two guards standing by him, as if afraid that Shen Yucheng would suddenly attack and kill him instantly.
Shen Yucheng bowed respectfully and said, “This disciple does not know what crime I have committed. The elder’s sudden demand for me to confess has left me puzzled.”
The elders exchanged glances, not expecting him to be so quick-witted.
Shen Yucheng smiled inwardly. He had grown up in the harsh environment of the slums, and was long accustomed to treacherous situations. Otherwise, how could he have survived until today?
Cheng Mufei’s cheeks flushed red with anger. Shen Yucheng, who was usually silent and compliant, even when being beaten, dared to argue back.
“You’re talking nonsense! How could you not know!” Cheng Mufei roared.
The elder narrowed his eyes slightly, his gaze as cold as ice. “If that’s the case, let the evidence speak for itself.”
With a wave of his hand, a disciple placed a piece of cloth on the table for Shen Yucheng to see.
“This item contains remnants of your spiritual power and traces of Ti Ling Dan powder. This pill can greatly increase cultivation in a short period of time, even allowing one to cross realms.”
Another elder followed up, “We didn’t just listen to Cheng’s one-sided story. You happened to break through to the Golden Core stage during the competition that day.”
Shen Yucheng rolled his eyes inwardly. This was truly twisting the facts.
“Elder,” Shen Yucheng said in a deep voice, “this disciple has something to say.”
The elder gestured for him to continue.
“The cloth is indeed mine, but I have never used Ti Ling Dan,” Shen Yucheng said with a firm and forceful voice, looking around at everyone. “Firstly, as far as I know, Ti Ling Dan is a high-grade pill, worth a lot of money. The elders must know that this disciple comes from a menial background, where would I get the money to buy it? Secondly, if I really bought the pill, why wouldn’t I just take it directly, instead of grinding it into powder and sticking it to the cloth? Why go to such lengths?”
Cheng Mufei stammered, “Then, maybe you found someone wealthy to buy it for you, and the pill accidentally fell on the cloth, and the powder got stuck to it.”
The moment Cheng Mufei spoke, Shen Yucheng knew that he was behind this.
Shen Yucheng chuckled as if he had heard the biggest joke in the world, “If that’s the case, then please, Young Master Cheng, tell us who this wealthy person is.”
The other party didn’t expect to be questioned and was speechless, unable to utter a single word.
The elder frowned slightly, “Shen Yucheng, what exactly are you trying to say?”
“If this disciple had that kind of wealth and the inclination to do such idle things, I wouldn’t have participated in the Promotion Examination in the first place.” If Shen Yucheng had money, he wouldn’t have come to the Lingfeng Sect as a menial worker. He wouldn’t have gone through the Five Spiritual Roots merging. Even if it still happened, he would have had enough money to find a better place to learn cultivation, instead of walking down this dark wooden bridge.
“So you’re saying that someone is deliberately framing you?”
“Exactly,” Finally drawing everyone’s attention back, Shen Yucheng replied without hesitation. “On the day of the competition, I only used this cloth to wipe the water droplets off my face.”
At this moment, the door of the Hall of Proclamation and Offerings was suddenly pushed open, and Mo Yifeng entered with a disciple who looked flustered.
“Disciple Mo Yifeng, greets the elders.” He knelt and bowed in his red and gold robe.
The moment Mo Yifeng entered, Shen Yucheng exchanged a glance with him.
The elder told him to rise and asked what brought him here.
“This disciple has come to prove Shen Yucheng’s innocence.” As soon as he finished speaking, everyone in the Hall of Proclamation and Offerings gasped, waiting to see how he would prove it. Then Mo Yifeng pulled the person behind him forward and said in a cold voice, “Tell the truth about what you just told me.”
Cheng Mufei, who was sitting next to the elder, turned paler and paler after seeing the person Mo Yifeng brought in. Clenching his fists tightly, he finally couldn’t sit still and shouted, “We’re talking about Shen Yucheng using forbidden medicine, what are you doing bringing in irrelevant people!”
The chief elder slammed his hand on the table, as if he had been holding back for a long time, and said in a low voice of anger, “Is the Hall of Proclamation and Offerings a place where you can run wild as you please!”
Just as Cheng Mufei was about to be smug, thinking that Mo Yifeng was about to be kicked out, the people beside him grabbed him and sent him outside. He was stunned, and began to yell. “What are you doing! Let me go! They’re the ones who should be kicked out!”
In the end, Cheng Mufei was deemed too noisy and disrupting the public trial, so he was made to stand outside the hall to listen to the proceedings.
This incident was enough for him to “brag” about for generations.
The person Mo Yifeng brought was the disciple who had splashed water on Shen Yucheng that day. He trembled as he said, “It was me, who splashed water on Young Master Shen. But! The water was given to me by Cheng Mufei, he told me to splash the water on Young Master Shen and rewarded me with spiritual stones!”
The disciple’s voice became lower and lower as he spoke, until it was as soft as a mosquito’s buzz.
Mo Yifeng took out a bucket of water and a porcelain bottle, with a few small black pills inside, “These were all found in Cheng Mufei’s room. This porcelain bottle was placed next to this bucket of water.”
The chief elder took the two items and examined them carefully, his expression changed. “This is not Ti Ling Dan.”
Hearing this, the Hall of Proclamation and Offerings was filled with sighs of surprise.
Shen Yucheng’s heart also tightened. When he was taken away by the disciples, he had discussed with Mo Yifeng, asking him to delay the time in the Hall of Proclamation and Offerings while Mo Yifeng went to Cheng Mufei’s residence to find evidence and find the disciple who had splashed the water that day. Fortunately, Cheng Mufei’s residence wasn’t far from the Hall of Proclamation and Offerings.
Now that they were saying that it wasn’t Ti Ling Dan inside, Shen Yucheng didn’t believe that Cheng Mufei was so planned, knowing to change the medicine to protect himself after framing him.
The chief elder took out a small black pill and crushed it into powder. “This is indeed not Ti Ling Dan, but a poison.”
As soon as he said this, even Shen Yucheng was stunned. He had unknowingly absorbed poison.
He’s fine after eating poison, could it be that he’s a chosen junkie?
“This poison is a unique formulation, used to paralyze large demon beasts. This old man has personally witnessed the power of this poison, it can instantly knock a demon beast to the ground, but when used on a person, it is instantly fatal – this medicine was created by the previous Cheng family head.” The chief elder frowned, deep in thought. “This unique medicine also comes from the Cheng family.”
The elders were shocked to hear this. They had only listened to Cheng Mufei’s words and mistakenly thought that Shen Yucheng had used Ti Ling Dan, but they didn’t know that it was actually the Cheng family’s unique poison.
Cheng Mufei couldn’t explain himself, even if he jumped into the Yellow River, he wouldn’t be able to clear his name.
Mo Yifeng suppressed his anger and walked to Shen Yucheng’s side, asking in a low voice, “Yucheng-ge, is your body really okay?” Although he was worried about Shen Yucheng’s physical discomfort, he was too embarrassed to say it.
Shen Yucheng recalled being splashed with water before the competition that day and did not notice anything unusual. He only felt sluggish when fighting the Red Sand Beast. Thinking about it now, it might have been because he was poisoned.
Hearing this from outside the hall, Cheng Mufei’s hands and feet became even colder, “What poison, impossible, I don’t know, this is just Ti Ling Dan, not poison.”
The elder took a deep breath and turned his gaze to Shen Yucheng, “Shen Yucheng, your innocence has been seen, is your body really okay?”
Shen Yucheng had a faint guess in his heart. The reason why the poison was ineffective against him was because of his days in the slums. At that time, he had eaten moldy food as a regular meal for a while. Although he had diarrhea at first, his body gradually adapted to the mold.
Even so, he had developed a body that was immune to all poisons over time.
“This poison is severe, please go to Still Dan Hall and let the Immortal Doctor examine you,” the chief elder still said.
Shen Yucheng replied “Okay” and asked again, “What will happen to Cheng Mufei?”
“He framed others, attempted to attack a fellow disciple, and attempted murder, all three crimes are enough for him to be confined to the Punishment Cliff for life,” the chief elder said slowly.
Shen Yucheng nodded and left with Mo Yifeng, silently reciting in his heart that those who intended to harm him would receive their due punishment.
.
“Your body is fine.” The Immortal Doctor put down his hand and said in surprise, “How has your physical fitness improved so much in the past few months? Your cultivation has actually reached the Golden Core stage?”
Shen Yucheng moved his arm. Since his body was fine, that was good. He asked, “Does that mean my inner core can now accommodate more spiritual power?”
Mo Yifeng waited on the side, listening to their conversation without saying a word, his mind recalling Fu Lingxuan’s words. “Five Spiritual Roots merging, won’t survive.”
The Immortal Doctor took his pulse for him, “Theoretically, yes, but wait, how has the speed of your spiritual vein condensation accelerated?”
Shen Yucheng frowned, “What does that mean?”
“According to the condensation of your spiritual veins a few months ago, your inner core should be able to accommodate more spiritual power now, but now that the inner core has grown and the spiritual veins condense faster, there is actually no change. You still need to pay attention to the flow of spiritual power at all times, otherwise you will still explode and die.”
After working hard for a few months, he realized that everything was in vain, it would be a lie to say he wasn’t frustrated.
But Shen Yucheng had been at the bottom of the valley since he was a child, and he was no longer afraid. He quickly accepted this fact. The only urgent task now was to improve his cultivation and stabilize his spiritual power.
After saying goodbye to the Immortal Doctor, Shen Yucheng and Mo Yifeng returned to the valley. Shen Yucheng remembered that Mo Yifeng had also helped in the previous trial, so he said “Thank you” to him, but Mo Yifeng was absent-minded and went straight back to his room.
Shen Yucheng didn’t have time to think too much. After waking up, he now had time to check the changes in his body.
He found that his body was much lighter, as if he was born without a sense of heaviness, and felt that he could run from the bottom of the mountain to the top and back several times.
At this time, his cultivation should be at the early stage of the Golden Core, but he had just broken through not long ago, and his foundation was unstable, requiring a period of time to stabilize it. Otherwise, if he suffered a severe injury in this state, his cultivation might regress and his spiritual roots and inner core would be damaged at the same time.
He checked the condition of the giant beast again. He knew that it had successfully broken through during the last tribulation, and its cultivation was now at the middle stage of the Golden Core, which was the peak of the Golden Core for human cultivators. Its appearance had also changed greatly, making it look even more majestic.
He checked the giant beast’s body, and a piece of information suddenly flashed in his mind.
“After the ancient giant beast signed a contract, its first breakthrough transformed it into – Azure Scaled Lion.”
“Gold and Earth attributes, the Nascent Soul stage can become the master of the earth.”
“The following is omitted.”
Shen Yucheng looked at the information until it stopped here. Although he didn’t know what other information there was, he would eventually know in the future.
Thinking like this, there was a knock on the window again. It was a spiritual bird, with a piece of paper in its mouth, which read: “The reward for the champion of the Promotion Examination -”