Chapter 3051 — Little Shu's Secret, Part Three

"They've got the Hidden Yu family behind them. The reason I poisoned you was actually on the orders of the Hidden Yu family as well." Since Shen Yushu had started talking, she simply came clean and laid out the whole truth.

"The Hidden Yu family?" Wei Zhao frowned. "That family—if it weren't for the fact that... a friend of mine is among them, I'd wipe them out as easily as I'd kill a dog. They're nothing but hidden now; there's nothing left to fear from them. Why didn't you tell me this sooner?"

Wei Zhao was speaking the truth. Back then, the Hidden Yu family had been a colossus to him, but now he could bring the Hidden Zhao family to ruin with a flick of his fingers—and the Hidden Yu family was no different.

Yu Tianxing, Yu Yi, neither of them was any match for Wei Zhao. If Wei Zhao wanted the Yu family destroyed, it would take no more than the blink of an eye.

"My parents... are being controlled by the Hidden Yu family. Or rather, it isn't they who are controlling them. Behind them stands an extremely formidable ancient sect. Which one exactly, I don't know, but my feeling is, it's probably not Fire Burn Mountain!" Shen Yushu said. "Because Fire Burn Mountain and the Hidden Yu family don't seem to have much of a connection."

"The Hidden Yu family is holding your parents?" Wei Zhao felt the affair was growing stranger by the minute. "So have you ever seen your parents? Or do you simply believe whatever they tell you?"

"No..." Shen Yushu shook her head. "They won't show me pictures of my parents. Maybe they're afraid something would go wrong. But they did bring me a vial of blood and had me secretly run a DNA test. I took my brother's blood and had it tested too. The results showed that the blood they gave me matched my own kin—but it didn't match my brother's..."

"So you're saying this is real?" Wei Zhao was suddenly taken aback. Blood can't lie; either it is or it isn't. Even a cultivator like Wei Zhao couldn't change something like that.

"Yes, so I had no choice. At first they only forced me to do one thing—they didn't make me kill you. Killing you was a later assignment, but that was probably the Hidden Yu family's own idea, nothing to do with the sect behind them." Little Shu was no fool. "Later, when you grew strong, Arrow-Brand Bro, they gave up on that plan."

"The Hidden Yu family... what role do they really play in all this?" A sudden realization struck Wei Zhao. Yu Tianxing seemed a shrewd man—otherwise he couldn't have raised the Yu family to the height of the foremost hidden clan. He wasn't stubbornly blind like that old Zhao fellow; the way he'd canceled the order to assassinate Wei Zhao showed as much. When a thing was no longer feasible, he abandoned it—a wise man yields to the times.

But now that he himself had such a good relationship with Yu Bing, and shared an old romance with Yu Ning, any head of a hidden clan would have made winning him over their first thought. Yet the Hidden Yu family had done no such thing.

That indirectly confirmed it: behind the Hidden Yu family stood another patron, an exceedingly powerful one—perhaps even more powerful than Wei Zhao. So the Hidden Yu family could not choose him.

That being so, Little Shu's story made sense. But who exactly was the ancient sect behind the Hidden Yu family? Wei Zhao thought it over for a long while but could find no lead. Fire Burn Mountain and the Loess Plateau Sect were out of the question—their young masters were his junior brothers now. Dark Night Palace was naturally impossible too; they had once moved against him, whereas Yu Yi had offered him help. Ice Palace and Snow Valley were unlikely as well. As for the Profound Elixir Sect, they backed the Hidden You family, so they couldn't also be the Hidden Yu family's patron.

Could it be one of the Five Luminaries Sect or the Tomorrow Upon Tomorrow Sect? At that thought, Wei Zhao's expression darkened. Those two were the mightiest among the ancient sects—beings that had transcended the ancient order itself.

But all this was merely his own guesswork. And if it really was the Five Luminaries Sect or the Tomorrow Upon Tomorrow Sect, then he'd do better to feign ignorance. Otherwise, if he went to the Yu family to stand up for Shen Yushu, those two sects might just finish off her parents on the spot.

"They're most likely just messengers!" Shen Yushu said. "Arrow-Brand Bro, let me tell you a secret—actually... Little Shu is an Inheritor too..."

"What?!" Wei Zhao was struck pale with shock. Shen Yushu's words were truly too startling. Shen Yushu—an Inheritor?!

"It must be so. Actually, I figured it out myself," Shen Yushu said. "The Hidden Yu family told me I must remain a virgin because I have a betrothal. As long as I go through the marriage as they instruct and then do one thing, they'll let my parents go."

"Oh? You guessed you're an Inheritor from the matter of remaining a virgin?" Wei Zhao asked.

"Yes. That's how it was with Xiaoxiao. Later I got to thinking—maybe the betrothal is just a pretext, and the thing they truly want me to do is receive the inheritance. And my body often heats up for no reason..." Shen Yushu said. "I told you before, it's fire poison. The Yu family periodically gives me suppressant medicine. If I don't take it, my whole body burns and I'll eventually be burned to death—about the same as Xiaoxiao's symptoms..."

Wei Zhao nodded. He remembered that Shen Yushu had indeed once been burning all over; later she took some kind of medicine and recovered. She'd said it came from outside. He hadn't paid it much mind then, but now it seemed Little Shu and Xiaoxiao really were remarkably alike.

"Fire Burn Mountain is the birthplace of the fire element. If you went there, you might well receive the fire-element inheritance!" Wei Zhao said. "So... you were afraid Fire Burn Cloud would discover the secret that you're an Inheritor. It wasn't really about the betrothal at all, was it?"

"Yes. I don't want to go... but I have no way to avoid it either... all I can do is put it off a day at a time..." Shen Yushu said faintly.

"Little Shu, these years must have been hard on you!" Wei Zhao looked at her with some sympathy. What sort of girl was this? Threatened, her own life in another's hands, her parents' lives in another's hands—and yet, to cover the grief in her heart, she forced herself to smile, grinning every day, when in truth it was all a disguise.

She seemed like a girl who loved to make mischief, but in truth she understood everything—she was no fool at all.

"I'm used to it..." Shen Yushu smiled. "Brother Wei Zhao, please don't tell Sister Yaoyao. I don't want her to worry—she's the sort who takes things to heart. I'm afraid if she knew, she'd be unhappy all the time."

"What did you call me?" Wei Zhao was momentarily stunned, then nodded. (To be continued)