The Elixir is for You, The Poison is for Me

#761 - Blood Mist

【Silently recite the website three times. Do you remember it? If you don't, I'll ask again in the next chapter. It would be best to share it on Facebook, oh.】

“You ask me, a cultivator, why I'm mixed up with Mr. Ji and his group of oddities? This is the reason,” the middle-aged Daoist said.

“In my opinion, the Directorate of Celestial Observations, the Court of Imperial Censors, the Ministry of Justice, the Imperial City Guard, and the like are not much different. You clearly possess power beyond the secular world, yet you choose to stand idly by. This, too, is a form of evil.”

“Mm.”

“You… you don't refute me?” The middle-aged Daoist was stunned.

“I admit that the Directorate of Celestial Observations' cold-bloodedness and ruthlessness, as you said, is a kind of evil, but compared to cultivators lording over ordinary people and deciding their life and death based solely on personal preference, I still prefer the current version of the Directorate of Celestial Observations.”

“What's wrong with cultivators eliminating evil and promoting good?” The middle-aged Daoist protested.

“There's certainly nothing wrong with eliminating evil and promoting good in itself. I myself quite enjoy acting chivalrously. Otherwise, why would I train my martial arts and cultivation? But if cultivators all see eliminating evil and promoting good as their duty, then there would be too many things to manage, things they could manage.

“From punishing petty thieves to dynastic changes… cultivators would be behind it all. If they discovered a wealthy household was rich and unkind, they'd confiscate their property. If they saw a prime minister was corrupt, they'd directly remove the prime minister. They could even feel that the emperor was unworthy of his position and immediately take action to replace him.

“Isn't that a good thing?” the middle-aged Daoist said. “If there were such a Directorate of Celestial Observations, those young masters wouldn't have dared to do that kind of thing to Xiao Ru that day.”

“Your idea is good, but unfortunately, cultivators are also human,” Lu Jing said. “Why do you have this illusion that a country governed by cultivators would be better than the imperial court?

“If officials don't do their jobs properly, the Court of Imperial Censors will make trouble for them. If the emperor acts perversely, there will naturally be heroes who rise up and kick him off that position. Only cultivators… have no natural enemies. Once they decide not to be human, it's easy for them to become uncontrollable.”

“You seem to have little confidence in your own people,” the middle-aged Daoist said, his eyes flickering.

“It's not that I have no confidence in my own people, I'm just stating an objective law,” Lu Jing said. “The senior cultivators who established the Directorate of Celestial Observations obviously understood this principle, so they consciously limited the Directorate of Celestial Observations' power, allowing cultivators to focus only on solving the troubles of strange objects.

“It is precisely because of this that the Directorate of Celestial Observations has been able to exist for thousands of years and has protected the human world for thousands of years.”

Lu Jing paused. “But these are not the main points. You have your reasons for hating the Directorate of Celestial Observations, and you have enough reason to save Mr. Ji, but since I've caught you, if you want to live, honestly gather your team and lead them out of the capital.”

“Do you think I'm stupid? If I gather everyone together, wouldn't that be giving the Directorate of Celestial Observations a chance to wipe us out in one fell swoop?” The middle-aged Daoist rolled his eyes, then added, “Wait, you just said a team… How do you know we split into several groups?”

“Because before coming to find you, I'd already dealt with two groups,” Lu Jing routinely scared the other party.

As expected, the middle-aged Daoist was bluffed. He widened his eyes, and just as he was about to say something, a cloud of blood suddenly rose in the sky to the west of the city.

“I was almost tricked by you.” The middle-aged Daoist was first happy when he saw the blood mist, but then he frowned. “Why so early?”

Lu Jing also concluded from the middle-aged Daoist's words that they had three teams this time.

“What is that blood mist?” Lu Jing asked the middle-aged Daoist.

However, the latter suddenly closed his mouth, and no matter how Lu Jing pressed him, he would not speak.

Lu Jing even used his flying sword to cut off one of his fingers. He was covered in sweat from the pain, but he still stubbornly remained silent.

Seeing this, Lu Jing didn't force him any further.

He first picked up Xie Lili from the ground, and then carried the middle-aged Daoist out of Qixia Temple.

Lu Jing directly climbed over the back wall, avoiding the Directorate of Celestial Observations, and didn't rush to the place where the blood mist rose, but instead went to find Gu Caiwei.

By this time, the city gates were closed and he couldn't leave the city for the time being.

So Lu Jing asked Gu Caiwei to take her old mother and Xie Lili to the east of the city to avoid the increasingly large blood mist.

After arranging everything, it was already the time it takes to drink a cup of tea when Lu Jing arrived at the scene.

By this time, many supervisors had gathered there, and in addition, there were runners responsible for maintaining order and preventing nearby residents from approaching.

Lu Jing glanced into the blood mist, but he could only barely see things within two zhang. Any further, the light from the lanterns was blocked, and the blood mist was not fixed, but slowly flowing as if it were alive, which looked quite strange.

Lu Jing didn't dare to go forward for a while. He looked around and finally found an acquaintance in the crowd, so he went over.

“Senior, senior!”

The one-eyed Daoist was also staring at the blood mist, his brow furrowed. It wasn't until Lu Jing called out the second time that he turned around. “Supervisor Lu, you're here!”

“Yes, I saw an anomaly in the sky in the north of the city, so I rushed over,” Lu Jing said. “What happened here?”

“Several supervisors from the office were chasing a sneaky guy, which led to his accomplices. They fought, and at first our people had the upper hand, but then their people kept coming.

“So the office also sent reinforcements, and just as we were about to defeat them, blood mist rose into the sky, instantly covering half the street, and the blood mist is still expanding.

“We just used a formation to limit this blood mist, but we've lost contact with the people inside.” The one-eyed Daoist noticed the middle-aged Daoist that Lu Jing was carrying.

He was slightly stunned. “Isn't this guy Chao Yuan from Qixia Temple? Why did you bring him here?”

“He's Mr. Ji's man,” Lu Jing threw Chao Yuan down.

The one-eyed Daoist was surprised. “He knows Mr. Ji?”

“Yes, I just had a fight with him. This guy's cultivation isn't bad, probably a Three Palaces cultivator.”

“He, Three Palaces? Wait, you can beat a Three Palaces cultivator?”

The one-eyed Daoist gasped, not knowing whether to be shocked that a wild Three Palaces cultivator was hidden under the Directorate of Celestial Observations' nose, or that this wild Three Palaces cultivator was taken down by Lu Jing single-handedly.

“I took advantage of a trick… I pretended to be knocked down by his talisman water. He lowered his guard against me, and as a result, I directly touched his body, and then he was knocked down by me before he had time to use any spells,” Lu Jing said truthfully.

The one-eyed Daoist's face looked a little better.

Then he looked at Chao Yuan again. “Do you know what's going on with this blood mist?”

Chao Yuan sneered repeatedly, but still didn't answer.

So Lu Jing instigated from the side, “Take him back to the office and use [Geng Character Twelve] to make him speak.”

【When the chapter started, I asked you to silently recite it three times. Do you remember? Sharing on Facebook may bring surprises.】