After speaking, Chang Sheng immediately controlled the puppets in the room, making them flee quickly.
Moving with extreme agility, they leaped out of the doors and windows, hiding themselves in various corners—such as thick patches of weeds or beneath piles of withered leaves—as fast as they could.
Then, they lay there completely motionless.
At this moment, he desperately hoped that Feng Xingyun wouldn't notice his puppets. Even if the man did, it would be best if he just treated them as trash like before.
He absolutely could not let suspicion fall on his own head.
Seeing this, Liu Da didn't waste a single second either. He spun around, pushed open the back window with both hands, and quickly scrambled out.
Use the front door?
That was absolutely out of the question.
His only way out was to scale the wall.
However, even though he pushed his speed to its absolute limit, he was still a step too late.
Just as he was scaling the wall, Feng Xingyun stepped into the courtyard.
The doors and windows of Zuo Lin'an's room were wide open!
The moment Feng Xingyun entered the courtyard, his gaze swept unobstructed through the open doors and windows, catching Liu Da right in the middle of climbing over the wall.
Feng Xingyun paused for a fraction of a second, then frowned slightly as a hint of anger surfaced on his face.
“What a bold little thief!”
He took a step forward, and his entire body shot forth like an arrow from a bow. In an instant, he crossed the courtyard, vaulted through the open back window, and flew outside.
Even though Liu Da had already cleared the perimeter wall, he still couldn't escape.
Before his feet could even touch the ground, someone grabbed his wrist, leaving him dangling in midair.
Feng Xingyun stood atop the wall, hoisting him up with a single hand.
Panic flooded Liu Da. The NPC's grip felt like an iron vice; no matter how hard he struggled, he couldn't budge an inch.
“Hey, wait!”
“This is a misunderstanding!”
“It's all a misunderstanding! I was just taking a stroll, I didn't mean to do anything.”
Feng Xingyun's voice was cold.
“If you really didn't mean to do anything, then why were you running?”
“Furthermore... how could a normal guest wander aimlessly around their host's home and even trespass into someone else's room?”
“Even if you took a wrong turn at first, you should have known the moment you pushed the door open that this room was occupied.”
He sneered.
“I never expected that when the young master was kind enough to host you, you would actually do something like this.”
Liu Da was about to explain further, but in the next instant, an agonizing pain shot through his wrist.
“Ahhh!!!”
With a few faint, sickening cracks, the bones in his wrist were crushed raw.
He could clearly feel his bones shattering into tiny fragments.
With a cold expression, Feng Xingyun dragged Liu Da out of the courtyard and headed toward the adjacent one.
“Wait!”
Liu Da sensed the danger.
“I can explain! Listen to me—”
Before Liu Da could finish, Feng Xingyun struck him on the head with his palm.
His eyes rolled back, and he instantly blacked out.
Feng Xingyun brought him to his own courtyard, which was located right next to Zuo Lin'an's, only a short distance away.
Of course, he didn't put Liu Da in his own room.
Instead, he found a small shed nearby, broke the man's arms and legs, and tossed him inside.
Then, he casually shut the door and stood quietly outside, watching through the gap.
Peering through the crack in the door, he observed the unconscious Liu Da lying inside.
To his surprise, the twisted angles of the broken limbs began to realign at a visible rate. Within a few short seconds, they were completely restored.
After another minute or so, Liu Da slowly regained consciousness.
Feng Xingyun found himself growing slightly intrigued.
Although he had already heard about this man's talent from Zuo Lin'an, seeing it with his own eyes was a different matter entirely.
After all... no one knew the power of that palm strike better than he did.
Though it hadn't been a lethal blow, he had still used a specialized internal technique.
That strike had been aimed directly at Liu Da's head.
He was a hundred percent certain that his true qi had damaged the man's brain.
Logically, there was an extremely high probability the man would have ended up in a vegetative state. Even if he did wake up, it should have taken several days, and he would likely have been left mentally impaired.
Yet right now, he looked perfectly healthy and energetic, as if nothing had happened at all.
It was truly remarkable.
In reality, however, Liu Da was nowhere near as relaxed as he appeared to Feng Xingyun.
He cast a glance at his talent interface.
【Time until Delayed Injury takes effect: 21 days, 3 hours, 1 minute, 24 seconds!】
Those few quick strikes from Feng Xingyun had actually slashed more than one day and seven hours off his timer!
To put that in perspective, when the specter had pierced his neck earlier...
Even that single fatal wound had only deducted about a day and a half.
What did this mean?
It meant the damage Feng Xingyun had just dealt was equivalent to a lethal attack!
Sitting on the ground, Liu Da's heart hammered wildly against his ribs, lingering fear gripping his chest.
“No, I have to get out of here right now.”
He pulled out his phone to check the time. It was already 6:27 PM.
There was a little over half an hour left until 7:00 PM.
He had to find an NPC within the next thirty minutes. Only by staying with an NPC could he avoid the next specter attack on the hour.
Originally, he could have chosen Feng Xingyun.
But now...
The only other NPC he could think of was Yao Wenli.
“I have to find him. I just hope he doesn't know what happened here yet.”
Then again, how could he be this unlucky?
He had barely opened the door and entered before being caught red-handed by an NPC, without even finding a single useful clue. What shocked him even more was that the NPC turned out to be an peerless master.
Still...
What was up with Chang Sheng?
Why did he take so long to notice something was wrong?
Could it have been on purpose?
But then again, Chang Sheng's own puppets hadn't had time to escape either, only managing to hide in various corners in a rush.
If the NPC searched carefully, those puppets would be easily discovered.
Wait.
That wasn't right either. Even if Chang Sheng's puppets were discovered, he would only lose a few of them. To him, they were just consumables that took a little time to craft.
Was he trying to set me up?
In truth, Chang Sheng was somewhat innocent. He had only just realized that he had to personally retrieve specter items, and his attention had slipped away from Feng Xingyun for a brief moment.
It was a pure accident.
But Liu Da had no way of knowing this, and even if Chang Sheng explained, he wouldn't believe it.
Squeezing his fully healed limbs, he slowly got to his feet and began inspecting the room.
“This place...”
He noticed that the room had clearly been swept; it looked quite clean.
“Leave through the front door?”
No!
Who knew if he would run right into Feng Xingyun if he went through the front.
Liu Da still wanted to slip out quietly through the back window.
He planned to find Chang Sheng and demand an explanation first, though he didn't know if the man was still in the guest courtyard.
Besides, Chang Sheng should have quite a few puppets at his disposal.
He wondered if he might run into one of those hidden puppets nearby. If so, it could help him track Feng Xingyun's movements, making his escape much easier.
He could only hope his suspicions were wrong and that Chang Sheng hadn't decided to turn on him just yet.
With these thoughts in mind, his hands moved quickly as he slowly pushed open the back window.
Right at that moment, the sound of a door opening echoed from behind him.
He instinctively spun around, only to see the door being pushed open. Who else could it be but Feng Xingyun?
Rate on N.U.
