Bai Buyu walked over to Li Lianhua, touched a little of the red liquid that had accidentally spilled onto his sleeve, and brought it to her nose to sniff carefully.
"It's fire ant oil from the southern border. It's extremely flammable and hallucinogenic. If we had taken torches instead of flint just now, we'd probably be dead in that tomb tunnel by now."
Li Lianhua said leisurely, "With precautions this meticulous, it seems Old Prince Yongjing intends to take the Buddha-Descending Sarira with him to his eternal rest."
"I wonder if he ever thought that one day he'd be dug out of his grave because of this treasure."
Bai Buyu produced two pearl-sized pills from somewhere and shoved one to Li Lianhua. "Hold it under the root of your tongue. This old bastard's tomb isn't clean; who knows if there are any more of these cheap aphrodisiac mechanisms."
"Miss Buyu is most thorough in her considerations." Li Lianhua smiled, helped himself to a few wooden planks from the corner, rummaged left and right through a wooden chest to dig out a scrap of cloth, and fashioned a simple torch with a look of regret, muttering "What a waste, what a waste" before lighting it.
The two of them followed the tracks of the Qi siblings forward. Along the way, there were many traces of triggered mechanisms. Walking through one section, Li Lianhua picked up a snapped arrow shaft. It was stained with a trace of blood that wasn't easily noticed.
"Ah," Li Lianhua let out a puzzled sound. Bai Buyu leaned in, not knowing what his "ah" meant.
"There's poison on this arrowhead. I wonder if it's the corpse poison Qiu Yurong contracted."
"No," Bai Buyu said with certainty. "The arrowhead has a blue sheen, not corpse poison. It's most likely insect poison that seals a person's meridians so they dare not use internal energy again. I told you this old bastard's tomb isn't clean. Who do you guess got hurt this time, Qiu Yurong or Qiu Yucheng?"
Li Lianhua tossed the arrow to the ground, clapped his hands, and stood up. "Whoever it is, they probably aren't having an easy time right now."
The two of them had no time to say anything more because upon entering the next side hall, several corpses that had not yet gone cold blocked their path.
"Freshly dead," Bai Buyu glanced at them. "Almost all killed with a single strike. It must be Qiu Yucheng."
"Wrong," Li Lianhua shook his head. "If it were Qiu Yucheng, his head would have parted ways with his neck long ago. This slash looks fierce, but the force is lacking. I'm guessing it's Qiu Yurong."
"Qiu Yurong?" Bai Buyu exchanged a glance with Li Lianhua. Under what circumstances would Qiu Yurong take Qiu Yucheng's saber?
"It seems Qiu Yucheng is poisoned."
"Mmm."
"There are guards in the tomb. It looks like their luck isn't very good today."
"Your and my luck aren't very good either," Li Lianhua added.
Bai Buyu gave a light hum. "When this young lady walks the martial world, she never relies on luck."
Although the Qi siblings had alerted the guards protecting the tomb and had been poisoned, Qiu Yurong's martial arts were good, and she had hacked down quite a few along the way. It seemed that no matter what, the brother and sister had no intention of returning empty-handed today.
"A turtle in a jar."
Li Lianhua had been silent all the way, but suddenly blurted this out as they neared the main tomb chamber.
Bai Buyu paused and looked back at him.
"Doesn't Miss Buyu find it strange?" Li Lianhua said slowly. "Old Prince Yongjing has been dead for over a month now, so why are there still so many guards laid out in his mausoleum to this day? Furthermore, every single one of them is heavily equipped, not like ordinary tomb guards, but rather as if they came prepared, knowing someone would break in tonight."
"You mean……"
Before Bai Buyu could finish her sentence, a cold flash cut through the air as several hidden weapons flew out from behind the huge stone doors. Bai Buyu bent her waist in time, and the poison-coated cross-shaped flying daggers grazed her face and embedded themselves into the stone wall behind her.
The force was so fierce that it showed the attacker possessed profound internal energy.
"Yowzah," Li Lianhua slumped to the ground, barely dodging the hidden weapon, looking thoroughly terrified.
"Cross-star flying blades, Mu Qianli."
There was no panic on Bai Buyu's face; instead, a weird, sneering smile curled her lips. "Since you old bald donkey are here, I suppose that shameless Feng Wuqi is here too. Come out together."
Mu Qianli had just struck Qiu Yurong's shoulder with a palm blow, causing her to spit out a mouthful of blood from the force. He was about to press his advantage when he heard movement outside the stone doors, and decisively hurled his cross-shaped flying blades.
He looked at the fallen Qi siblings with furrowed brows; this unexpected complication was truly beyond his expectations.
Mu Qianli glanced at the half-open coffin. Before he could decide whether to take the treasures first or deal with the trouble outside, the person who had just been spouting nonsense outside had already entered the tomb chamber.
Of these two, one was a delicate-looking, fair-faced scholar who looked frail, and the other was a bright-eyed, sharp-toothed little girl who looked rather young.
When Mu Qianli saw the newcomers, he couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. He had expended quite a bit of effort to defeat Qiu Yurong just now; if experts like Qiu Yucheng and Qiu Yurong had arrived, he truly wouldn't have had much chance of winning.
"Just you alone? Where is Feng Wuqi?" Bai Buyu surveyed the surroundings. Apart from the fallen Qi siblings, Mu Qianli standing not far from her, and the old bastard lying in the coffin, she was certain there was no one else in the tomb chamber.
Mu Qianli let out a cold snort, not even sparing them a proper look. "To deal with two nobodies like you, old me alone is more than enough."
Bai Buyu retreated behind Li Lianhua unhurriedly. "He looks down on you. Hit him."
"Me?" Li Lianhua pointed at himself, but before he could react, Mu Qianli was already before him. With a full-strength palm strike bearing down on him, Li Lianhua hurriedly ducked while simultaneously pinching his fingers to lightly tap two acupoints on Mu Qianli's elbow and chest. Mu Qianli's expression froze, and in shock, he hurriedly withdrew his palm force and retreated several steps.
"Who are you?" To be able to dodge his palm techniques in such a short time and seal two of his major acupoints—this person was definitely not simple.
Li Lianhua waved his hand, polite, calm, and modest in tone. "I'm just a nobody, not worth mentioning."
"You……" Mu Qianli circulated his internal energy, preparing to deliver another palm strike, only to find his Dantian somewhat congested for reasons unknown. With no other choice and unwilling to become overly entangled, he prepared to hurl a dozen flying blades hidden in his sleeves as cover so he could seize the treasures and make his escape.
Yet before Mu Qianli could make a move, Bai Buyu, standing behind Li Lianhua, took a large stride forward. While sending a burst of purple smoke straight at Mu Qianli's face with a flick of her hand, she did not forget to pull Li Lianhua back two steps. The entire sequence of movements was as smooth as flowing water.