Chapter 3234 — No Way Out

"True enough, there really was someone else. I'm just puzzled—why did you suspect me?" Wei Zhao said as he walked over to Xu Shilan and Cheng Yiyi. Both women had been gravely injured, but Cheng Yiyi's wounds were the more serious of the two.

At that moment, Cheng Yiyi, breathing with difficulty, said to Xu Shilan in broken gasps, "Xiaohan... I'm sorry..."

"Yiyi... what are you saying that for? You saved me—how could you have wronged me?" Xu Shilan was utterly baffled.

But Wei Zhao cut their exchange short, reaching out and pressing his fingers to Cheng Yiyi's wrist. "If you want to live, don't talk," he said flatly.

"Ah?" Cheng Yiyi was taken aback. She had not expected Wei Zhao to come and save her first, rather than Xu Shilan! That Wei Zhao might not have seen through her identity was one thing, but to save her before Xu Shilan—that caught her somewhat off guard.

"Xiaohan's injuries aren't as severe as yours. You're dying." Paying no mind to what Cheng Yiyi was thinking, Wei Zhao directly circulated the third layer of the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art and began healing Cheng Yiyi. The wound on his own shoulder had not yet fully healed, but it did not hinder him, and so he set to work treating Cheng Yiyi first.

"Since I accepted this assignment and came to Songshan City, naturally I know that in Songshan City and Donghai City there is a man named Wei Zhao. This is his territory." The Black Horse Society's Grand Elder, wrapped in the Heaven-and-Earth Net, showed not the slightest awareness of being a prisoner; he acted as though, having been caught, Wei Zhao could do nothing to him, and merely went on, as if telling a story: "I made a point of studying this man. But what you just did is plainly inconsistent with what you have done on previous occasions!"

"Oh? How so?" Wei Zhao frowned slightly. He too had not expected the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder to be so agreeable, answering honestly the moment he was asked. It seemed the Grand Elder did not regard Wei Zhao as worth a second glance.

"It's really quite simple. I injured the people at your side—nearly beat them to death. If you were the Wei Zhao of legend, you would have flown into a towering rage for the sake of your women! If you truly had the strength to slay a peak late-stage Heaven-tier expert in an instant, then the moment you appeared you would have killed me outright, and you would not have wasted so many words on me." The Black Horse Society's Grand Elder was evidently a thoughtful and cautious man; in an instant he had reached his own judgment: "And there's more—you actually agreed to let me go, and the conditions you proposed were not especially excessive. That is another point of doubt! It does not fit your character of opening your mouth wide in exorbitant demands!"

Wei Zhao nodded. He had realized this himself earlier, but there had been no help for it. Xu Shilan's and Cheng Yiyi's lives had hung by a thread, and Wei Zhao had been unwilling to bandy words with the Grand Elder, lest complications arise.

But that was only one point of doubt, not the main one. The main one was that his own famously protective nature had, unexpectedly, been thoroughly understood by the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder—and that on entering the room he had not struck at once. That was the greatest flaw of all!

"So that's why you attacked me?" Wei Zhao nodded and asked, "You're that confident?"

"There is of course one more thing: when you were at the door just now, you had been circulating your mental cultivation formula the whole time. I could sense it. That also shows that the moment I entered the room, you appeared—yet you did not come in, and you did not intervene when I made my move; instead you only came in after I spoke. That shows one thing as well: you have misgivings about me!" the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder continued. "And after you came in, you still did not strike at once, but kept circulating your mental cultivation formula. That proves the same point. If you truly could slay a peak late-stage Heaven-tier expert in an instant, there would be no need for you to circulate your formula at such a tense moment—that is a show of weakness!"

"I see..." Wei Zhao smiled bitterly. This was yet another flaw no smaller than the last!

"So, to sum up, these three points of doubt convinced me that you are all show and no substance!" the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder said calmly. "That said, if I had no trump card, then even if I harbored suspicions, I would not have struck at you directly. I would have left this place and avoided complications. But I do have a trump card—that is the greatest reason I struck! The doubts were merely supplementary!"

Hearing the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder's words, Wei Zhao could not help drawing a sharp breath. This man was terrifyingly clever and cool-headed! If he were not eliminated, he would surely become a mortal threat in the days to come!

But how was he to be eliminated? In truth, from the very moment Wei Zhao had trapped the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder in the Heaven-and-Earth Net, he had been thinking about how to kill him! With Wei Zhao's strength, there was simply no beating him to death!

Even caught in the Heaven-and-Earth Net, the man was protected by his true qi. No matter how Wei Zhao struck, he could not kill him! And the man had said as much himself: the power of Wei Zhao's present techniques could inflict no harm on him!

This was what vexed Wei Zhao most—he had clearly captured the man, yet could do nothing to him! No doubt the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder knew this perfectly well, and that was why he was so unruffled, chatting calmly with Wei Zhao!

"This so-called trump card of yours—you mean what you just did, drawing away my true qi?" Wei Zhao asked.

"Yes." The Black Horse Society's Grand Elder did not conceal it, and nodded directly. "Aren't you going to run? What are you dawdling here for? Don't you know the Heaven-and-Earth Net has a time limit?"

"A time limit?" Wei Zhao was slightly startled. He had never heard the Spider Clan mention such a thing. As a rule, anyone caught in the Heaven-and-Earth Net could not free themselves from the inside; it always took someone on the outside to open it.

But a time limit—that he truly had not known. Still, on reflection, the thing was a one-use item after all, and everything has a lifespan. It could not bind the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder forever, could it?

"It seems you didn't know? This is a treasure produced by spirit beasts of the Spider Clan, is it not?" the Black Horse Society's Grand Elder said flatly. "I advise you to run while you can. Once this thing fails, your time of death will have come. Though you won't get far—unless you all hide yourselves away in the depths of the mountains and old forests, I will still be able to find you next time. You can't have an inexhaustible supply of these Heaven-and-Earth Nets, can you?"