Chapter 264: Guard a Stump and Wait for Hares to Bump into It

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Seeing Lou Mu Yan leaving safely, the rest of the team were rather surprised as to why Ji Xuan let her go so easily.
This was not his style of doing things at all.

Ji Xuan glanced at the person who opened his mouth and said: “Her strength isn’t as simple as it seems.
Her Demonic Plant who can suck human blood had already been lying in ambush not far from us and it will definitely be us who will suffer if we fight.”

“She really has a Demonic Beast that can suck blood essence?” Another member from a distinguished clan asked in surprise.

Lou Mu Yan’s reputation had gradually grown in the competition space, one because her points soared in the preliminary round and eventually entered the top ten, and two, because her talent in Arrays was excelling, being able to trap Demonic Beasts and be unafraid of Beast Tides.

And even after the preliminary round, news of her had never ended.

Many people had spread rumours that she had a Demonic Beast that sucked blood essence.
After all, each time a Beast Tide was annihilated, all the corpses of Demonic Beasts were presented to have had their blood dried.
Although they hadn’t seen it with their own eyes, but everyone all speculated such.

But they were all dubious.
After all, rumours were often not all true.

“It’s not a Demonic Beast, it’s a Demonic Plant.” Ji Xuan’s deep eyes revealed a strange look, “And if I judged correctly, her Demonic Plant just broke through from Tier 6 to Tier 7.”

“What?” The people behind Ji Xuan couldn’t help but exclaim.

They knew about the Fourth Prince’s shrewdness and abilities.
If he didn’t have confidence in something, he wouldn’t say it easily.

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Demonic Plant’s cultivation was a hundred times more difficult, that’s why at the same level, a Demonic Plant’s strength was much stronger than that of Demonic Beasts.
Demonic Plant Spirit Pets were extremely rare on Tian’ling Continent, and Tier 7 ones were even unheard of.

They really didn’t expect that a woman with only Sword Monarch cultivation base to have such a Spirit Pet.

Ji Xuan glanced at them and smiled lightly, saying: “And you may have all overlooked a more important issue.
She has at least three Spirit Pets.
What does this mean?”

“Could she be a Spirit Beast Master?” A team member blurted.

On Tian’ling Continent, a Sword Master who wasn’t a Spirit Beast Master could only contract two Spirit Pets at most with the help of a Spirit Beast Master.
Even strong Sword Venerable powerhouses and above were no exception.

Therefore, Lou Mu Yan, who had three Spirit Pets, must be a Spirit Beast Master.

Ji Xuan’s expression was obscure and said leisurely, “She has excelling talent in Arrays, and is also a Spirit Beast Master.
If we don’t kill her, then that’s that, but if we kill, then it was necessary to end her life completely, otherwise there will be endless troubles.

“We simply don’t have the confidence to take her life today, so it would be better to befriend her than to forge grudges.
Only such would be a good deal.” Then he added.

He also suspected that she was a Spiritual Wine Master, and even if she wasn’t, she still knew about brewing Spiritual Wine very well, otherwise she wouldn’t know the brewed effects of mutant snake gallbladder and internal organs.

“Fourth Prince is indeed wise.” That pupil of a distinguished clan wasn’t a fool either.
They had no grudges or grievances against Lou Mu Yan, so why would they forge a feud with her.

Even Ji Yu, that powerful hypocrite, was defeated by her.
They really couldn’t only look at the appearance of her cultivation base.

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Ji Xuan smiled without care, turned around, and walked towards the depths of the forest, “Let’s look for the other Tier 7 Snake Demon from the intel.”

“Yes!”

If Lou Mu Yan heard the conversation between Ji Xuan and the several people, she would be extremely surprised.
After all, Xue was well hidden and there wasn’t any aura revealed at all.
Unless one was a powerhouse above Sword Venerable, then they wouldn’t be able to detect anything.

Ji Xuan was only at Sword Sovereign cultivation base, so him being able to find the Human-Eating Blood Thorn Vine King meant he definitely met with some fortuitous opportunity or had a special ability.

At the same time, a cave in the depths of the abyss, a skinny man who was sitting cross-legged and cultivating suddenly opened his eyes.
He took out a red scale from within his pockets at his chest.

The originally lustrous scale suddenly dimmed and the Demonic Energy on it was instantly lost.

With a vicious look in his eyes, he muttered to himself: “Little Sister is dead.”

That human woman really dared to kill She Ji.
When the Great Decisive War began, he must drag out her Soul to pay homage to Little Sister.

Lou Mu Yan didn’t know that she was now a target of a Snake Demon at Peak-Phase Tier 7.
Even if she knew, she would simply hope impatiently for the Snake Demon to come quicker.
The more Crystal Cores of Snake Demons for Miao Miao to promote herself, the better.

After returning to the temporary cave that was opened up, Lou Mu Yan took out the Crystal Core of the Tier 7 Demonic Beast to refine into a Grade 4 pill that would be beneficial to the advancement of a Demonic Beast’s cultivation base.

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Only when her Fire Elemental Energy reached Peak-Phase Sword Monarch could she refine Grade 4 pills, but if she used the Purple-Gold Spirit Flame, and with her rich experience, she could still refine a Grade 4 pill now.

First, she didn’t take out the Crystal Core of the Snake Demon to refine, but instead took the Crystal Cores she obtained previously and after failing once, she successfully refined it.

Miao Miao also used the special effects of the pill to reach Peak-Phase Tier 6.
As long as she took the pill refined from the snake Crystal Core, at an opportune moment, she could advance to Tier 7.

Time passed in the mountains quickly while cultivating.
Although Lou Mu Yan was still thinking about the Scarlet Bee nest, but she also felt that it wasn’t time to go get it, so she could only temporarily give up.

After cultivating in the mountains for more than three months, the cultivation bases of the two teams had all improved a lot.
Lou Mu Bai and Yun Zi Mo had successfully reached Peak-Phase Sword Monarch using their talents and the pills given by Lou Mu Yan.
They could surely return to the Empire after the competition with Sword Sovereign cultivation bases.

“Let’s hatch a plan to snatch the identity jade tablets.” Lou Mu Yan suggested.

Ye Qing Han smiled and asked: “Let’s hear your plan.”

Since she said that, then she must have a plan in her mind.

“We don’t have to go find Sword Masters from other kingdoms to snatch at all.
Let’s ‘guard a stump and wait for hares to bump into it’1.” Lou Mu Yan replied.

Yun Zi Mo was silent, then asked: “How do we ‘guard a stump and wait for hares to bump into it’?”

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“After I advanced into the top ten in the preliminary round, I’m rewarded with various coloured jade tablets.
Many people from the elite teams of superpower kingdoms and large kingdoms would be unreconciled, so they would definitely take the initiative to find me and snatch my jade tablets, depriving me of my qualifications to enter the finals.
We’ll spread the news that I’m at a certain place somewhere, and it’ll naturally bring people to come.

“And our two teams only represent a small kingdom and medium kingdom, plus our overall cultivation bases don’t seem to be very high.
So when we encounter Sword Masters from large kingdoms, they will definitely act first, so we’ll just fight back.

“Most importantly, the red jade tablets in our hands are even rarer than the purple jade tablets.
If we want to enter the finals, we must hold seven kinds of jade tablets.
They’ll attack us even simply because they have to.”

Lou Mu Yan spoke her thoughts.
She was certain that each time they released news at a different location, there would definitely be people who would take the initiative to deliver themselves to their door.

“That’s a good idea.” The other’s eyes lit up.

The people who entered the semi-finals were basically all Sword Masters from large kingdoms and superpowers kingdoms, with very few from small and medium sized kingdoms.

After the semi-finals, these people from small kingdoms were also the first targets for Sword Masters from large kingdoms to clear out of the competition for the red jade tablets.
They believed that at this time, countless people had already started plotting against them.

After all, there was little porridge and many people.
There were not even five hundred people holding red jade tablets, and the organizer will use various methods to make up for the shortage of jade tablets, such as the top ten in the preliminary round being rewarded with fifty jade tablets each.

So although the quota for the finals was five hundred, but there may not be five hundred people entering the finals.

The several people discussed countermeasures in detail, then left the mountain together to set up camp near the central city, ‘guarding a stump and waiting for hares to bump into it’.

1an idiom meaning to trust luck or wait idly for opportunities to appear themselves, but is often used to teach a lesson as it is derived from an ancient story, basically saying that one cannot just trust in luck or wait idly.
When it’s used, it’s also often used when a person has hatched a plan beforehand, so it sounds as if one is saying to ‘wait idly and trust luck’, but the person, in fact, has already hatched a plan to make chance and luck on their side… if that makes sense XD.
I could be wrong in the latter half, since my only exposure to the idiom is through cdrama and novels hahaha