After the fight on Lingyan Island ended, Wei Tu didn't linger at the Qixue Zhao Clan. He took the chance to say goodbye and left with Fu Dalu, heading back toward Liao Prefecture together.
"Master Fang, this was all my fault," Fu Dalu apologized along the way. "I just wanted to help that old Zhao fellow vent a little. I didn't mean to extort that guy surnamed Jiao…"
He assumed that he'd ruined Wei Tu's visit to his old acquaintances and that Wei Tu had been forced to cut his trip short.
"Young Master Fu, there's no need to mind it. I was the one who asked you to help in the first place. As for extortion, that's nonsense. That Jiao fellow just didn't understand how Liao Prefecture cultivators make friends."
"No hard feelings between brothers, right?"
Wei Tu pinched the bridge of his nose and gave a reply that went against his true feelings.
"Exactly! That's it!" Fu Dalu slapped his thigh, suddenly enlightened. A few months ago, hadn't he tried to extort Wei Tu too? And look where they were now—good friends.
At the end of the day, it was just because Jiao Zihua was too weak and had let himself get robbed. That's why it had turned messy.
"It's that Jiao guy's fault!"
"Too weak."
Fu Dalu muttered to himself, convincing himself it wasn't his fault and easing the guilt of having provoked a Golden Core enemy for the Fu Clan.
…
Two months later.
Wei Tu and Fu Dalu returned to Immortal Peach City.
There were still two and a half years left until Wei Tu's agreed visit to Mingwang Sect with Sun Chixin. He planned to stay in Immortal Peach City in the meantime.
Things were different now.
After the trip to Shengya Mountain, Fu Dalu's attitude toward Wei Tu had completely shifted—from veiled threats to open respect.
Wei Tu no longer had to worry about the Fu siblings trying to backstab him after he made pills for them.
On top of that, their pill refinement commission was a great way for Wei Tu to quietly make money and build up his own resources.
After all, the Fu siblings couldn't be watching the furnace all day long or checking every batch for its exact yield. As long as the pills Wei Tu produced met the average market standard, they wouldn't grow suspicious.
Still, for his own safety, once back in Immortal Peach City, Wei Tu made two requests to Fu Dalu.
First, the pill refining site had to be outside of the Fu Clan's core territory.
Second, unless absolutely necessary, no one from the Fu Clan was allowed to disturb him. Even the Fu siblings had to meet him in private.
The first request made the Fu siblings a little uncomfortable. They felt like Wei Tu was being too guarded.
But after thinking it over, Fu Dalu generously agreed.
He figured Wei Tu was probably still shaken up from what happened with Jiao Zihua—his own fault for being so greedy and running his mouth.
The second request was met with full agreement from the siblings. They didn't push back at all.
After all, this whole "pill refinement laundering" scheme was supposed to stay secret. The fewer people who knew, the better.
They simply assumed Wei Tu preferred peace and quiet, like most alchemists did.
Nine out of ten alchemists liked quiet, secluded places. It was rare to find one who enjoyed noisy crowds.
With that, Wei Tu used the opportunity to assume a new disguise—a pill master named Cui Wang.
It wasn't just for fun. He did it to avoid any future blowback from the mess Fu Dalu had stirred up with Jiao Zihua. He didn't want to get caught in the crossfire.
…
Once everything was arranged for Wei Tu, Fu Dalu turned his attention to tying up loose ends with the "Jiao Zihua situation."
He used a special connection to reach out to his boss, Ji Zhang, and asked him to investigate Jiao Zihua's background.
On Lingyan Island, Fu Dalu had only known the man's surname was Jiao. He didn't know anything else.
After the fact, he tried to ask Zhao Jiangwu and the other Zhao elders… but they had all clammed up, either too afraid or genuinely in the dark. No one told him who Jiao Zihua really was.
"Young master of the Tianyi Jiao Clan, Jiao Zihua?"
Half a year later, a letter arrived from Ji Zhang.
Fu Dalu opened it and finally found out who he had messed with.
As he reviewed Jiao Zihua's background, one name stood out—Zhao Qingluo.
"Twenty-six years ago, Zhao Zhujun's affair was exposed, and the two families decided to substitute Zhao Qingluo as the marriage candidate to the Tianyi Jiao Clan…"
Fu Dalu raised an eyebrow, pondering the report.
But the more he read, the less he felt like anything was off.
Sure, he had gone to Shengya Mountain with Wei Tu, and yes, the person Wei Tu had been looking for was indeed Zhao Qingluo. But so what?
Could that mean Wei Tu had set him up?
From beginning to end, Wei Tu had just asked him to step in and help. He never told him to extort anyone. It was his own loud mouth and greedy hands that had blown things up and caused all the trouble.
"Wei Tu was handling business, went to Shengya Mountain to find Zhao Qingluo, and then accepted a request from her to go to Lingyan Island…"
After thinking it through, Fu Dalu came to what he believed was a reasonable conclusion.
As for Jiao Zihua…
Fu Dalu figured Wei Tu probably didn't even know the guy.
After all, Wei Tu was a foreign cultivator, and his arrival in the Xiao Kingdom could be traced. There was no reason to believe he would've met Jiao Zihua, the young master of the Tianyi Jiao Clan, before Fu Dalu had.
"But something still feels off..."
Fu Dalu frowned and tapped his bald head.
After a moment of thought, he got up and headed to the small courtyard where his younger sister Fu Linglong resided.
In both strength and intelligence, he wasn't a match for Fu Linglong, the Buddhist maiden of Jinglian Convent. What he couldn't figure out, maybe she could.
"Too little information. Hard to guess anything," Fu Linglong said succinctly after hearing the situation.
No matter how clever she was, she couldn't find the truth from just a few scraps of intel.
At the end of the day, even Fu Dalu admitted himself—it was his own doing that provoked Jiao Zihua, not anyone else's scheme.
"Little sister, doesn't Jinglian Convent have the Mind-Reading technique? You've got a pure Buddhist heart. Maybe you could use it to learn the truth from Wei Tu?" Fu Dalu suggested cautiously.
"Mind-Reading?" Fu Linglong shook her head. "That secret art is a Nascent Soul divine ability. Even though I was born a Buddhist maiden with an innate heart of dharma, it's still extremely hard to use."
"Extremely hard?"
Fu Dalu latched onto those words.
His sister wasn't saying she couldn't do it—just that she didn't want to spend the effort.
"Little sister, I'm guessing this Wei Tu might actually be that Yi Yun you've been looking for all this time." Fu Dalu's tone grew serious as he threw out a weak attempt at reverse psychology.
It was crude, but it worked.
Fu Linglong narrowed her almond-shaped eyes and curled her lips into a cold smile. "You're not wrong. There's a decent chance Wei Tu is pretending to be Yi Yun. Or maybe... Yi Yun is Wei Tu."
She didn't believe someone like Yi Yun could just vanish into thin air right under her nose in Immortal Peach City.
When Yi Yun arrived in Immortal Peach City, his first stop was the Ye Clan's medicine shop. And Wei Tu just so happened to be a third-rank pill master. The coincidence was a stretch, but when there were no other leads, it was worth investigating.
…
Fu Linglong didn't waste time.
That night, she put on a white bamboo hat and left the Fu residence alone, heading for the cave dwelling Wei Tu had rented in the outer city.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Following the secret code, Fu Linglong lightly tapped a jade plaque beside the cave with her knuckle.
"Miss Fu, please come in."
A faint voice came from inside as the stone door of the cave opened.
"Many thanks, Daoist brother."
Fu Linglong smiled softly and lifted her skirt as she stepped inside.
As soon as she entered, she caught a whiff of a strange pill fragrance that stirred the spirit. She wasn't surprised though—it was a pill master's cave. If there was no herbal or alchemical scent, that'd be the odd part.
Still, as a precaution, she followed habit and shut off her breath and mouth, just in case of trickery.
When she reached the outer chamber of the cave, Fu Linglong took a seat in the main hall.
Before long, Wei Tu emerged from deeper inside, dressed in a blue robe. He adjusted his sleeves and took a seat opposite her.
"Sorry to keep Miss Fu waiting," Wei Tu said apologetically. "Just now, I was in the middle of refining a batch of Blood Crane Pills. I lost track of time. Please don't take offense."
Blood Crane Pill?
Fu Linglong raised a brow slightly.
That was one of the more difficult mid-grade third-rank pills. Not easy to make. If Wei Tu dared attempt it, it meant that his skill in alchemy was quite high—even among third-rank pill masters.
"It's nothing. I just arrived myself," she replied sweetly, her voice clear and musical like jade beads falling on a tray.
"I wonder, did Daoist Fang succeed in refining the Blood Crane Pill just now? If so, would you allow me to take a look?" she asked, gently steering the conversation.
Her mastery of Mind-Reading wasn't complete. She couldn't read minds at a glance and had to rely on guiding the conversation to draw things out.
"Uh…"
Wei Tu hesitated.
The Blood Crane Pills weren't part of the commission from the Fu siblings. They were his personal batch.
"I see… I must've overstepped." Fu Linglong sighed softly. Her delicate face showed a hint of disappointment, as if slightly scolding Wei Tu for being cold.
But her sacred, serene aura as a Buddhist maiden kept the moment from feeling like flirtation. It felt more like compassion from heaven to the mundane world.
"Since Miss Fu wishes to see them, I suppose I'll show you." Wei Tu gave a wry smile. He flipped his hand and produced a mutton-fat jade bottle, sending it toward her with a gentle wave of spiritual energy.
And in that exact moment of spiritual transfer, Fu Linglong activated her Mind-Reading technique and secretly planted a divine mark on Wei Tu.
Then she gently probed, asking indirectly about "Yi Yun" and "Zhao Qingluo."
But the results left her disappointed.
Wei Tu had only heard the name "Yi Yun" after arriving in Immortal Peach City. He'd never met him.
However, when she asked about "Zhao Qingluo," she got an unexpected surprise.
"What? When you met Zhao Qingluo, a personal disciple of Shengya Mountain, you were thinking about me?"
Hearing that, Fu Linglong was overjoyed.
She might not have feelings for Wei Tu, but she enjoyed being admired by men—especially powerful ones.
Wei Tu might not count as truly powerful, but his alchemy skill could rival a late-stage Golden Core cultivator. That was more than enough for her to take pride in.