Chapter 1408: A Family Secret

Even then, Lü Wushuang had been forced to disguise herself before intervening. It would have been inappropriate to act openly. She had promised the other Sacred Venerables that she would no longer go looking for Yuan Gang.

Having been forced into action left her no choice. She had originally thought Yuan Gang would flee and had planned to help him secretly while he escaped, then seize an opportunity to abduct him without anyone being the wiser.

"Didn't expect it was me, did you?" A faint trace of mockery touched Lü Wushuang's lips. "Didn't expect you'd fall into my hands again either, did you?"

Shhk! Yuan Gang pulled the saber free. "A little unexpected."

Lü Wushuang said, "You still want to fight me? Don't you know your own limits? You're no match for me, and you can't escape. You'd be better off not humiliating yourself."

That was what she said, but in truth she was somewhat surprised herself. When she had carried Yuan Gang away, he had struggled and resisted, and she could feel that the brute's strength seemed to have increased considerably since the last time he had fallen into her hands.

Yuan Gang asked, "What exactly do you want?"

Lü Wushuang said, "Look at all that hostility on your face. I did save your life, at least. Can't you show even the slightest gratitude?"

Yuan Gang replied, "Do you need it?"

Lü Wushuang's gaze dropped again to his severed arm. "That's why I find this so strange. I've looked into your history. Your connection with the Huyan family amounted to little more than some dealings when you were undercover in the Qi capital. At most, they once spared your life. Oh, right, they also gave you a saber. Other than that, there doesn't seem to have been any deeper relationship between you. Yet you were willing to go alone and risk your life trying to save them. Is there something else I don't know?"

"No. What you know is already clear enough."

"That little connection was worth risking your life for? Worth maiming yourself over?"

"Did you come looking for me just to argue about this? If there's nothing else, I'm leaving."

"This is how you repay the person who saved your life?"

"I think you have something else in mind."

Lü Wushuang looked away from his face and gazed into the distance. "Then let me put it another way. I saved your life. If I ask nothing from you now and simply let you go, then if I need something from you in the future, will you repay me the way you repaid the Huyan family?"

"Fine. I'll repay you another day. Farewell." Yuan Gang turned and started away.

"Wait!" Lü Wushuang called after him.

Yuan Gang stopped and looked back. "What else do you want?"

Lü Wushuang gave a slight smile. "That answer came so readily that it makes me uneasy. Forget repaying me another day. Better to settle the debt right now."

Yuan Gang slowly turned around, then glanced toward the boundless desert. His voice sank. "The Scorpion Emperor."

Lü Wushuang inclined her head. "There. So you're not actually stupid. I really don't understand you. You're clearly not a fool, yet you insist on doing those idiotic things that throw your life away. Since you've already guessed, I don't need to teach you what to do, do I?"

"What if I refuse?"

"You don't have a choice! This time, no one can save you. At the very least, no one can prove you're in my hands. For every day you refuse, I'll imprison you for another day, until the day you're finally willing to agree. If you want to spend the rest of your life somewhere that never sees daylight, I can grant you that wish."

"If I agree, will I still have a way to live?"

"I promise to guarantee your safety. If you don't believe me, there's nothing I can do about that. You may as well gamble on it."

Yuan Gang looked back toward the desert. Then he said decisively, "Fine. I agree."

Lü Wushuang froze. Suspicion gradually appeared on her face. She found it hard to believe he would agree so readily. She still remembered the last time she had tortured him until he could neither live nor die, yet even then he had refused to give in. For him to agree so quickly now made suspicion inevitable. "That was too easy. It doesn't feel like you. You're not planning to play some trick on me, are you?"

Yuan Gang looked straight at her. "If I say I agree, then I agree. But I have a condition."

"Oh?" Hearing that there was a condition actually reassured Lü Wushuang somewhat. His easy agreement had made her uneasy. "Let's hear it first."

"I can help you, but you have to help me with something too. Help me kill Gu Yuanda."

Lü Wushuang laughed. Now this made sense. A man he had been willing to die trying to kill; this was at least reasonable. She nodded. "No problem. In my eyes, crushing Gu Yuanda to death is no different from crushing an ant. And I can promise you this: so long as you're obedient, I won't kill you. At most, I'll simply make sure you never meet outsiders again."

"So long as you help me kill Gu Yuanda, I don't care whether you kill me afterward. But words alone prove nothing. How am I supposed to know you'll kill Gu Yuanda once this is over? Trading Gu Yuanda's life for a solemn oath from you isn't too much to ask, is it?"

He was not stupid. He knew that if he agreed too easily, she would not believe him. That was why he had seized on Gu Yuanda as a pretext.

Lü Wushuang raised one hand. "I swear to Heaven: so long as you do what you promised me, I will kill Gu Yuanda in repayment. If I break this oath, may Heaven strike me down and Earth destroy me!"

Yuan Gang held her gaze for a moment, then turned away, dragging the saber behind him as he faced the distant desert. "From my experience, the Scorpion Emperor probably won't be near the edge of the desert. If you want to save time and effort, we'd better go closer to the center."

That was not a lie. Yuan Gang truly did have experience summoning the Scorpion Emperor now. Trying to call it near the desert's edge really would take far longer.

Without another word, Lü Wushuang flashed to his side, caught him by the arm, and carried them both into the sky.

At her flying speed, the distance was nothing much. Roughly an hour later, they landed. Lü Wushuang released him. "There's no need to go too close to the center. We'd be easier to discover there. This should be about right, shouldn't it?"

Yuan Gang said nothing. Under her watchful gaze, he climbed a sand dune, turned toward the limitless desert, and suddenly let out a series of deep, guttural "hoh, hoh" calls.

Lü Wushuang flashed to his side and looked out over the desert. Her bright eyes flickered with anticipation.

What she did not know was that Yuan Gang would never have agreed to her demand in the past. The first time Lü Wushuang wanted the Scorpion Emperor, he had been afraid she intended to kill it.

But things were different now.

He knew Lü Wushuang wanted the Scorpion Emperor because she intended to enter the Fifth Domain.

And Yuan Gang had already been there. He knew what lay inside. This time, once he entered, he was prepared never to return.

In other words, once he took Lü Wushuang inside, he had no intention of bringing her back out.

Whether he was Lü Wushuang's match did not matter. Lü Wushuang might very well kill him, and he had never expected her to spare him afterward. He did not trust people like these, people who had brought calamity upon the world.

So he had already prepared himself to sacrifice his own life, trap Lü Wushuang in the Fifth Domain, and remove one of Master Dao's troubles for good.

Master Dao had already dealt with Mu Lianze and Zhangsun Mi. If Yuan Gang could help him deal with Lü Wushuang as well, Master Dao's burden should become considerably lighter.

That was the real reason he had agreed so readily to Lü Wushuang's demand.

He was prepared to die for it.

Lü Wushuang witnessed the strange spectacle with her own eyes. At Yuan Gang's summons, a group of sand scorpions emerged from beneath the ground, their tails trembling violently like rattlesnakes.

In less than half an hour, one patch of the desert surface exploded upward. A colossal creature crawled out.

The mountain-like Scorpion Emperor pressed forward until it stopped in front of the two of them. It was hideous and terrifying, yet when its foul breath blasted over Lü Wushuang, excitement shone in her eyes.

Yuan Gang looked back at her. "I've summoned the Scorpion Emperor for you. Can I go now?"

Lü Wushuang suddenly reached out and seized Yuan Gang. Together they leapt onto the Scorpion Emperor's back. Only after releasing him did she say, "This isn't over. Since you can control it, keep going. Make it take us somewhere."

As expected. Yuan Gang felt a slight stir in his heart, but his face remained expressionless. "Where?"

Lü Wushuang's bright eyes swept their surroundings. "Apart from the Sacred Realm, the Tiandu Secret Realm, and the Butterfly Dream Illusory Realm, Shang Song actually opened a passage to another world. It is buried beneath this desert, and the Scorpion Emperor just happens to be able to find that passage."

Yuan Gang pretended not to know. "There's another world?"

"That's right." Lü Wushuang looked at him. "No one knows what secret Shang Song and his wife hid there. If I can obtain it, and truly become unrivaled beneath Heaven, why would I care whether you leaked some secret? I guarantee I'll set you free. Don't you want to see what another unknown world is like?"

Of course Yuan Gang did not. It was not as though he had never been there. He had entered long ago and had already made his way through that entire world.

Seeing that he said nothing, Lü Wushuang urged him, "Stop dawdling. The Scorpion Emperor is enormous and far too conspicuous. Hurry!"

Yuan Gang turned to face the Scorpion Emperor's head and gave several more deep "hoh, hoh" calls.

The Scorpion Emperor's massive body began to move. After a burst of wild running, it suddenly plunged headfirst beneath the ground and rapidly bored down under the desert.

In the darkness, a ceaseless rustling surrounded them. A luminous pearl appeared between Lü Wushuang's fingers, illuminating the space she held open around them with spiritual power.

No one knew how long the Scorpion Emperor had been burrowing when Yuan Gang's wounded body began to tire. He slowly sat down.

Lü Wushuang glanced at him a couple of times before suddenly asking in a casual tone, "I heard you once went so far as to risk your life for a married woman. Feng Guan'er, was it? Is she very beautiful?"

Yuan Gang said, "Are Sacred Venerables this bored too?"

"There's nothing else to do. No outsiders are here, so there's no harm in chatting."

"Since there's no harm, then let me ask you something. How do you know there's a passage to another world? If this weren't a secret known only to you, I imagine you wouldn't be the only person trying to force me to find the Scorpion Emperor."

Lü Wushuang did not conceal it from him. Perhaps she believed Yuan Gang was already under her control. "You could call it a secret of my family."

"Your family?" Yuan Gang looked up at her in surprise.

"My grandmother was actually one of the maidservants of Shang Song's wife, Li Ge. She once overheard a conversation between Shang Song and Li Ge by accident. Unexpected, isn't it?"

Yuan Gang gave a slight nod. "So that's how it was. Yes, that is unexpected."

...

High above the Boundless Desert, a flying mount swept back and forth. Niu Youdao and Yun Ji stood on its back, constantly scanning the terrain in every direction.

But after searching from the air for a long time, they still found no trace of what they were looking for.

"If Lü Wushuang really came here, she's probably arrived by now. She may already have forced Monkey to take her to the Fifth Domain," Yun Ji finally sighed. What she really meant was that searching aimlessly like this was not going to solve anything.

Niu Youdao said, "Monkey would never agree. Even if she killed him, he wouldn't yield. If he did agree, there would only be one possibility: he has no intention of bringing Lü Wushuang back out. He'll trap her inside and leave her there to die!"

Yun Ji was startled. "Then how could Lü Wushuang possibly spare him?"

A trace of sorrow actually appeared in Niu Youdao's eyes. "You think Monkey wouldn't dare? You think that bastard, who doesn't give a damn about his own life, would be afraid? Has he done so few stupid things like this?"

[End of Chapter 1408]