Chapter 56: Master Li Hongyi of the Fierce Phoenix Hall

Li Yuchun stared with a deathly pale face at the door that had been broken down.

Just as she mentioned Li Fengtang’s madwoman, Li Hongyi had already stormed up to her!

It wasn’t that Li Yuchun couldn’t defeat Li Hongyi; she simply wanted to avoid trouble.

Though Li Hongyi was just a young girl, she was utterly obsessed with martial arts.

Once you got on her bad side, she would insist on sparring with you from time to time, whether you agreed or not!

Li Hongyi sauntered over and plopped down beside Li Yuchun. With a thud, she slammed her spear onto the ground and sat opposite her.

“Sister, I’m not trying to cause trouble, but Spring Breeze Hall’s methods are just not fair!”

“Cut the nonsense. When have you, Li Hongyi, ever cared about reason?” Li Yuchun snapped.

“Hey, Sister, don’t wrong me. I, Li Hongyi, am the most reasonable person here!”

At the side, Gao Wu listened in stunned silence, dumbfounded by their relationship. Were all the women at Seven Star Tower this fierce?

Cheng Qingfeng, at that moment, shrank like a quail, too scared to speak—a clear sign of how fearful he was!

The reason Li Hongyi had barged in was mainly because Spring Breeze Hall had taken a hit. Had they managed to capture someone from the demon clan, the situation wouldn’t be so dire.

Not only had the Right Vice Minister of Rites caught onto them, but there was also discontent within Seven Star Tower’s Li Fengtang.

Gao Wu felt a heavy weight settle in his chest as his mind raced, searching for a way to break the deadlock.

“You two may leave for now. Don’t relax—keep investigating the culprit!” came Chun Ge’s calm voice. Beside him, Cheng Qingfeng visibly breathed a sigh of relief, quickly pulling Gao Wu away to take their leave.

Tch. Look at Feng Ge, so spineless—what a disgrace to men!

Not to be outdone, Gao Wu scampered off in a similar fashion.

Outside Spring Breeze Hall, Zhou Zhiruo was waiting at the door.

“Zhiruo, what are you doing here?”

“Heh, the hall master brought me,” she replied.

“We searched the entire Wanyi Pavilion today but found no sign of the culprit.”

Zhou Zhiruo already knew this news and responded, “Either there’s a secret passage inside Wanyi Pavilion, or the culprit is a master of disguise. Either way, catching them now is nearly impossible.”

“Disguise?” Cheng Qingfeng nodded, acknowledging the possibility. That demon clan member looked much the same to them all. With disguise techniques added, it was only natural they couldn’t recognize him.

“I think that Right Vice Minister of Rites is suspicious. Should we assign someone to tail him?”

“That’s difficult. Whether he returned to the Ministry of Rites or stayed at Wanyi Pavilion, our people can barely keep up.”

Cheng Qingfeng knew the capital’s situation better than Gao Wu and the others. Since he said that, Gao Wu said no more.

“Let’s leave this case for now. We’ll act when new leads surface.”

“No!” A white-clad figure hurriedly approached the three.

“Hey! Who dares barge into Spring Breeze Hall like this today?”

“It’s you!” Gao Wu recognized the woman in white—Zhao Feifei, who he had once struck down in the arena.

“What are you doing here?”

“My brother’s body is still lying in Seven Star Tower’s morgue. Are you just going to stop investigating?”

“Who’s your brother?”

“Zhao Mingjian! The Zhao Mingjian who died at Gui Xiang Pavilion!”

Zhao Feifei wore plain white clothes, her face a bit haggard but still strikingly beautiful. Her brows and eyes revealed a stubborn resolve.

Though her relationship with her brother was ordinary, their parents had been devastated upon hearing of his death, and that pain had touched her deeply as well.

Her sword trembled lightly with her breath, as if voicing defiance and persistence.

Only then did Gao Wu recall that after Seven Star Tower took over the case, Zhao Mingjian’s corpse had indeed been brought there.

Now, the body was of little use. It would be better to let Zhao Feifei take it away and lay him to rest.

“Zhao Mingjian is your brother? Do you know the one who killed him was from the demon clan? Your brother might have had dealings with them!”

“Impossible. My brother was just a small-time thug. How could he be linked to the demon clan?”

With the culprit long gone, words were futile.

“You can take your brother’s body. We will find the murderer soon, and then you’ll know if it really was the demon clan.”

“But, didn’t the gentleman just say the investigation would stop?”

“You heard wrong. How could we stop? Every case that enters Seven Star Tower is pursued to the end!”

Cheng Qingfeng’s face was stern, determined not to rest until the culprit was found.

“Good. This case also requires understanding who your brother offended in life. Come with me to the police station and tell me about him,” Cheng Qingfeng declared righteously as he led Zhao Feifei away to gather information. Yet Gao Wu suspected Feng Ge had other motives.

Outside Spring Breeze Hall, only Gao Wu and Zhou Zhiruo remained.

“How’s your health? Still feeling unwell?”

Zhou Zhiruo shook her head. “Much better.”

She seemed reluctant to speak about her condition. Glancing inside Spring Breeze Hall, she lowered her voice.

“From what the three of us understand, to gain a spot in the secret realm, you need to reach at least Five-Star Master rank. We entered at Innate level, so we’re only Three-Star Masters. To advance, we must achieve significant merit.”

“You’re still too impatient. I told you before, at the peak of Innate, you must build a solid foundation, harmonize with the heavens and earth, and ideally grasp your own path. Only then can you ascend with minimal risk.”

Zhou Zhiruo fell silent. Gao Wu made it sound simple, but after reaching the Innate peak, they both harmonized with and conflicted against the world. Their mastery of martial arts clashed with the natural order.

In this state, Zhou Zhiruo’s Yin energy grew heavier, Zhao Liying’s withered vital energy became more domineering, and even Liu Yifei grew increasingly mysterious.

Zhou Zhiruo looked at Gao Wu and said, “Though you came from another world without any martial arts, you started from scratch, building a stronger foundation and steadier inner power. We’re different—we arrived already at Innate peak, on the edge of breakthrough. That gives us power but also great danger.”

“In short, you must quickly ascend to the Innate realm. Otherwise, even if we secure a secret realm spot and enter, breaking into the Qimen realm will be very difficult.”

For Gao Wu, ascending to the Innate realm was not hard. He was already at the peak of Qi Guidance and just needed a little more accumulation to break into the Qi Sea realm.

His cultivation methods were top tier, and with the Innate-level techniques gained from the others, ascending to Innate was only natural.

In the following days, Cheng Qingfeng indeed stopped involving Gao Wu in Zhao Mingjian’s case, but it seemed Feng Ge continued searching for clues himself.

Heroes rarely overcome the trials of beautiful women; Feng Ge’s romantic troubles appeared far from over.