TFOD Chapter 116

Lan Xichen was pushed back several steps, staggering, not yet understanding what had happened in that split second. Lan Wangji, on the other hand, struck the back of the serene Guanyin statue in the temple. The statue trembled all over, flying toward the coffin. Nie Mingjue was still scrutinizing the corpse in his hand, whose head was already tilted. The heavy Guanyin statue came crashing down, smashing him back down again.

Wei Wuxian leaped up, stepping on the chest of the Guanyin statue. The coffin lid was already cracked, and he could only use this Guanyin statue as a temporary lid to seal the rampaging Nie Mingjue. Nie Mingjue slammed his palms against the underside of the statue, trying to get out. Wei Wuxian swayed along with the shocks, nearly being thrown off. After a few wobbles, he realized that he couldn’t draw a talisman, and said, “Lan Zhan, quick, quick, get up here with me. Adding one more person will add more weight. If he slams it a couple more times, this Guanyin statue is going to fall apart…”

Before he could finish speaking, suddenly, Wei Wuxian felt his body and vision tilt. Lan Wangji had grabbed one end of the coffin, lifting it up.

In other words, with just his left hand, he had lifted this heavy solid wood coffin, the two dead bodies inside, the Guanyin statue on top of the coffin, and Wei Wuxian on top of the statue off the ground.

Wei Wuxian was dumbfounded.

Even though he had known that Lan Wangji’s strength was astonishing, this was… too astonishing!

Lan Wangji, however, remained expressionless. He swung out a silver guqin string with his right hand. The string flew like a shuttle, wrapping around the coffin and the Guanyin statue dozens of times, binding them firmly together. Then came the second, third… Only after confirming that Nie Mingjue and Jin Guangyao were tightly sealed did he abruptly release his left hand. One end of the coffin crashed to the ground with a loud bang. Wei Wuxian also tilted along with it. Lan Wangji went forward and caught him, placing him steadily on the ground. The same hand that had just lifted a thousand pounds, when holding Wei Wuxian, was incredibly gentle.

Lan Xichen stared blankly at the coffin that was bound by seven guqin strings, still in a daze. Nie Huaisang reached out and waved his hand in front of him, shuddering and saying, “…Xichen-ge, are you alright?”

Lan Xichen said, “Huaisang, just now, was he really trying to sneak attack me from behind?”

Nie Huaisang said, “I think I saw it…”

Hearing him hesitate, Lan Xichen said, “Think about it more carefully.”

Nie Huaisang said, “You ask me like that, and I’m not sure anymore… it really just seemed like it…”

Lan Xichen said, “Don’t say ‘seemed like it’! Did it happen or not?”

Nie Huaisang said, awkwardly, “…I don’t know, I really don’t know!”

When Nie Huaisang was pressed, he would only repeat this sentence. Lan Xichen buried his forehead in his hands, looking like he had a splitting headache and didn’t want to speak anymore.

Suddenly, Wei Wuxian said, “Brother Huaisang.”

Nie Huaisang said, “Ah?”

Wei Wuxian said, “How did Su She stab you just now?”

Nie Huaisang said, “He was carrying Third Brother… carrying Sect Leader Jin, and running away. I blocked his way, so he…”

Wei Wuxian said, “Is that so? I remember it seemed like the position you were standing in, wasn’t in their escape path.”

Nie Huaisang said, “It’s not like I deliberately bumped into him to get stabbed, right?”

Wei Wuxian smiled, and said, “I didn’t say that.”

Nie Huaisang said, “Then what are you trying to say, Brother Wei?”

Wei Wuxian said, “I just suddenly connected some things.”

Nie Huaisang said, “What things?”

Wei Wuxian said, “Jin Guangyao said that someone sent him a letter, threatening to reveal all the things he had done to the world in seven days. Let’s assume he wasn’t lying, and telling the truth. Then, this person is simply doing something redundant.”

He said, “If you want to expose someone’s crimes, why don’t you expose them directly? Why would you go to the trouble of informing the person, ‘I have your proof of your crimes’?”

Nie Huaisang said, “Third Brother… Sect Leader Jin said that the person wanted him to kill himself as an apology, right?”

Wei Wuxian said, “Wake up, use your brain, Jin Guangyao would never choose to kill himself as an apology. What’s the point of doing that? It looks like it has no meaning. However, someone who can dig up Jin Guangyao’s old secrets, would they really make a pointless move? This kind of redundancy must have a purpose. It must be to promote some incident, to create something.”

Lan Xichen said blankly, “Create? Create what?”

Lan Wangji said deeply, “Jin Guangyao’s murderous intent.”

If it was the usual Zewu-Jun, he would naturally be able to see this. But he probably doesn’t have the mental energy to think about that right now.

Wei Wuxian said, “Correct. It was precisely this letter that created Jin Guangyao’s murderous intent to an unprecedented height. Wasn’t it said he would await his death in seven days? Then he’ll make the first move, eliminate the main force of the cultivation clans in the Burial Mounds within seven days, to see who dies first.”

Lan Xichen said, “Are you saying, this is the goal the sender of the letter wanted to achieve? Just to urge him to make a move?”

Wei Wuxian said, “That’s what I think.”

Lan Xichen shook his head, saying, “…Then what exactly is this sender trying to do? Is it to expose Jin Guangyao, or to massacre the cultivation world?”

Wei Wuxian said, “It’s very simple. See what happened after the siege failed. When everyone gathered at Lotus Pier, in the most agitated moment, we welcomed Sisi and Bicao — I don’t think the arrival of these two witnesses was a coincidence. Therefore, everything stacked up together, and suddenly exploded.”

After a pause, Wei Wuxian said, “What he wants is not just to make Jin Guangyao be disgraced, but to make Jin Guangyao become enemies with everyone. And one fatal blow – with no possibility of reversal.”

Nie Huaisang said, “It sounds like this person, has been planning this from a very long time ago.”

Wei Wuxian looked at him, and suddenly said, “By the way, wasn’t the body of Chifeng-Zun being stored by Sect Leader Nie?”

Nie Huaisang said, “It was originally being stored by me. But just tonight, I received news that my brother’s body was missing from Qinghe. Otherwise, why would I have hurried to Qinghe and then been caught by Su She on the way…”

Wei Wuxian asked again, “Sect Leader Nie, I heard you often went to the Gusu Lan Sect and Lanling Jin Sect, is that right?”

Nie Huaisang said, “Yes.”

Wei Wuxian said, “Then you really don’t recognize Mo Xuanyu?”

Nie Huaisang said, “Ah?”

Wei Wuxian said, “I remember the first time I met you after the body sacrifice, you seemed like you didn’t recognize me at all, and even asked Hanguang-Jun who I was. Mo Xuanyu had at least pestered Jin Guangyao back then. He even read the manuscripts that Jin Guangyao collected, and you often went to Sect Leader Jin to complain. Even if you weren’t familiar with Mo Xuanyu, did you really never see him even once?”

Nie Huaisang scratched his head, saying, “Brother Wei, Jinlin Tower is so big, it’s impossible for me to meet everyone. Even if I did meet them, it’s impossible to remember them all. And also…” He looked a little embarrassed and said, “You know Mo Xuanyu’s status, a little… everyone in Lanling Jin Sect tries to keep it hidden. It’s not strange that I haven’t seen him. It’s not even certain that Xichen-ge has seen him.”

Wei Wuxian said, “Oh, that’s indeed true. Zewu-Jun also does not know Mo Xuanyu.”

Nie Huaisang said, “Right! Also, I don’t understand, even if I had met Mo Xuanyu, why would I pretend that I don’t recognize him? Is there any need for that?”

Wei Wuxian smiled and said, “It’s nothing, I just felt it was strange, so I asked casually.”

But in his heart, he thought, “It is to test whether this ‘Mo Xuanyu’ was the real Mo Xuanyu or not.”

Where did a Mo Xuanyu, who everyone described as timid and cowardly, get the courage to commit suicide to offer his body?

Why was the left hand of Chifeng-Zun thrown out? Would it have been Jin Guangyao’s careless mistake?

And why did it appear in the Mo Family Manor, where he had just been reborn, and not somewhere else?

The corpse of Chifeng-Zun was buried by the Qinghe Nie Sect. Did Nie Huaisang, who had always respected his older brother, really not notice for so many years that the corpse was swapped?

Wei Wuxian was inclined to believe such a scenario.

Perhaps before Nie Mingjue died, Nie Huaisang was really ignorant about everything. But after Nie Mingjue died, he knew everything. Including the fact that Nie Mingjue’s corpse had been swapped, including the true face of the third brother he had trusted in the past.

He tried to find his older brother’s corpse, however, after spending several years and much effort, he only found a left hand.

He was stuck at this step, unable to get any further guidance. And this left hand was unusually fierce and difficult to subdue. Keeping it with him would only constantly attract bloodshed. Thus, he thought of a person, the person most skilled at dealing with this kind of thing and solving this kind of problem.

The Yiling Patriarch.

But the Yiling Patriarch was already torn into pieces, what should be done about that?

Therefore, he thought of another person, Mo Xuanyu who had been driven away from Jinlin Tower.

Perhaps in order to get some information from Mo Xuanyu, Nie Huaisang had spoken with him. He had learned from the depressed Mo Xuanyu that he had seen an ancient evil art recorded in a forbidden scroll of Jin Guangyao. He then encouraged Mo Xuanyu, who was being bullied by his family, to use the forbidden art of body sacrifice for revenge.

Who would they invite to possess the body?

Naturally, it would be the Yiling Patriarch.

Mo Xuanyu, who could no longer endure this life, finally activated the blood array, and Nie Huaisang took the opportunity to throw out that hot potato that he could no longer hold on to: the left hand of Chifeng-Zun.

Since then, the plan had successfully started. He no longer needed to go through the trouble of finding the rest of Nie Mingjue’s limbs, leaving all the dangerous and troublesome things to Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. He only needed to closely monitor their actions.

The time when Jin Ling, Lan Sizhui, Lan Jingyi and the other young disciples encountered the cat killing incident on their way, it was clear that someone had deliberately created an anomaly. Adding the non-existent “hunter” who gave them directions in the nearby villages, without a doubt, the purpose was to bring this group of naive young disciples into Yi City. Just think, if Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji had been careless and not been able to protect them completely, and anything had happened to these disciples in Yi City, the blame would have mostly been put on Jin Guangyao today.

In short, the more chips there are to convict Jin Guangyao, the better. The more mistakes and weaknesses he could induce from the cautious villain, the more miserably and thoroughly he would die in the end.

Lan Wangji used the tip of his Bichen sword to flip over the black box next to the coffin. He glanced at the spell carved on it, and said to Wei Wuxian, “Head.”

This box was originally supposed to hold Nie Mingjue’s head. After Jin Guangyao moved the head from Jinlin Tower, he most likely buried it here.

Wei Wuxian nodded to him, saying, “Sect Leader Nie, do you know what was originally in this coffin?”

Nie Huaisang said, “How would I know? But, judging from the way Third Brother… Ah no, Sect Leader Jin looked, it should be something very important to him.”