Dao Companion Crippled, Coveters Move

Chapter 203 - 202: Bei Lingyin's Bizarre Adventure in the Cold Palace Sword Mansion

Qing Yueqiu's aptitude for killing was, indeed, the greatest Bei Lingyin had ever witnessed.

She had a natural intuition for the various weak points of the human body. In terms of raw talent alone, even the current chief assassin of Yama Hall might not have been her match in his youth.

For Bei Lingyin, teaching Qing Yueqiu the Killing Technique was an absolute delight.

It would have been even better if she could just ignore the fact that Qing Yueqiu, no matter what, refused to call her "teacher."

After witnessing Qing Yueqiu's extraordinary aptitude for slaughter, Bei Lingyin's appreciation for her talent grew even stronger. She became even more determined to help Qing Yueqiu sever her twisted, pathological bond with Pei Yuhang.

"Yueqiu, let's stop here for tonight. Your mastery over the Killing and Stealth Techniques is coming along faster and better than I ever imagined."

"I must be going. I'll likely be busy for the next few days, so I'll come teach you again some other time."

After she finished speaking, Bei Lingyin silently melted into the darkness outside the window and vanished.

Qing Yueqiu watched her senior clanswoman leave, her crimson eyes narrowing.

'You couldn't have learned these exquisite arts of stealth and assassination in a place of pleasure and indulgence like the Yin Yang Sacred Land, could you?' But in the end, Qing Yueqiu didn't open her mouth to ask.

'Everyone has their own secrets. I have them, Master has them, and of course, Bei Lingyin has them too.'

...

...

After leaving Qing Yueqiu's home, Bei Lingyin turned toward the main residence, where Pei Yuhang, the master of the Cold Palace Sword Mansion, lived.

If she wanted to find out whether Pei Yuhang truly had a hidden side, the best method, of course, was to use her Heart Eye Divine Abilities to take a look for herself.

But the Sword Immortal's reputation was formidable. It was said that Pei Yuhang had now returned to the Divinity Transformation realm. Even Bei Lingyin, who specialized in stealth and assassination, wasn't confident she could approach him without being detected.

If Pei Yuhang discovered her, not only would it jeopardize her mission to sabotage the alliance between the two sects, but it would also make Qing Yueqiu lose all trust in her completely.

'After all, it's as if Pei Yuhang has cast some kind of Black Magic on Sister Yueqiu. If I show even the slightest ill intent toward Pei Yuhang, I'm one hundred percent certain Qing Yueqiu will turn on me completely.'

Faced with such a high cost of failure, Bei Lingyin hesitated for a moment before finally giving up on the idea of prying into Pei Yuhang's thoughts.

However, as a professional spy and assassin, just because Pei Yuhang was a tricky target didn't mean she was completely out of options.

'I hear Pei Yuhang has another, younger disciple. I can go probe her mind and uncover his secrets that way.'

With a glint in her eye, Bei Lingyin slipped into the darkness and arrived at Yu Xiaoyan's courtyard.

She transformed into a thin, imperceptible shadow, easily slipping through a crack in the window before hiding in the shadows of a corner inside the room.

As it happened, Yu Xiaoyan had witnessed a rather disgraceful side of her Master during the day and had subsequently used it to blackmail him...

After such an emotional rollercoaster, from deep sorrow to sheer ecstasy, she was mentally and physically drained and had naturally gone to bed early.

This gave Bei Lingyin the perfect opportunity to probe Yu Xiaoyan's Sea of Consciousness.

'Come on, let me see what you really think of Pei Yuhang!'

Bei Lingyin closed her physical eyes, but opened the Eye of Divine Power in her mind.

Her Divine Thought became a thin thread, silently entering Yu Xiaoyan's body.

[Master, I love you~ love you~]

[Gotta pat my little Master~ He's so cute~]

[Drooling... SLURP~]

'What in the world is this nonsense? Is this woman having a wet dream about Pei Yuhang?!'

'What the hell! She's even more shameless than Qing Yueqiu! A disciple having a wet dream about her Master... This is beyond defying a master, it's defiling one!'

When the Heart Eye Divine Abilities were used on a sleeping person, one would read a large amount of useless information. After all, when a person is asleep, their Divine Thought fluctuations are unstable and emit a lot of junk information.

Bei Lingyin, currently being bombarded by this junk information, remained unfazed. She intended to probe deeper into Yu Xiaoyan's Sea of Consciousness.

However, inside the Sea of Consciousness, she saw another figure.

'Crap, she has two souls in one body!'

"Who's there?!"

Yu Gu Nan awoke with a start, raising her hand to use her Divine Thought to lock down the entire room.

Only after searching carefully several times and finding no trace of an intruder did she breathe a sigh of relief. The Help-seeking Jade Pendant she had been clutching in her palm, used for emergency contact with Pei Yuhang, was placed back beside her pillow.

"Have I been too stressed lately? To actually start hallucinating... Damn it, it's all that brat Ji Xichan's fault, doing *that* to Master right in front of me—

It's unsettling my Dao Heart. Hmph!"

...

...

Bei Lingyin withdrew her gaze from the room, frowning slightly.

'Good thing her Cultivation is far below mine, otherwise I would have been in deep trouble... To think the Cold Sun Sword Immortal's little disciple has such a peculiar constitution. A real miscalculation.'

Although she hadn't been discovered, Bei Lingyin adhered to the assassin's code: never make a second move on a target after the first attempt goes awry.

Bei Lingyin decided to temporarily give up on spying on Pei Yuhang's younger disciple. She shifted her focus to another young woman of extraordinary status—Ji Xichan.

Ji Xichan, a super prodigy from the Dao Sect who had been famous for years, the sole True Disciple of the current Daoist Sect's Saint Son.

Yet now she was lodging at Pei Yuhang's estate.

Considering Pei Yuhang's famed good looks, Bei Lingyin couldn't help but imagine something sordid.

After all, the Pei Yuhang of today was no longer in the spotlight like he had been when competing with Chen Tiansheng for the position of Saint Son.

It didn't seem impossible that he might be selling his looks for Heavenly and Earthly Treasures or some sect resources. Investing in a rising star like Ji Xichan—who had the Saint Son for a backer and limitless potential—seemed like a plausible move for him.

Bei Lingyin believed that if she could find proof of an affair between Pei Yuhang and Ji Xichan and reveal it to Qing Yueqiu, then Qing Yueqiu would surely be completely disillusioned with her Master.

At this thought, a smirk touched Bei Lingyin's lips. She once again slipped into the darkness and arrived at Ji Xichan's room.

The cold, solitary young woman with waist-length black hair was currently suspended in the middle of the room, her breathing steady as she performed her Qi Cultivation.

'The stars have aligned,' Bei Lingyin thought. 'Ji Xichan is completely unguarded and isn't asleep. I can use my Heart Eye Divine Abilities to perfectly peer into her mind!'

'Come now, let's see just what kind of secret relationship you have with Pei Yuhang!'

Bei Lingyin closed her eyes, preparing to open her mind's eye and begin probing the young woman.

But before her Heart Eye Divine Abilities could fully activate, she vaguely sensed an aura of immense terror.

A phantom image of a goddess statue, its face indistinct, appeared behind Ji Xichan.

Its ancient, indescribable aura was enough to make even a top-tier assassin like Bei Lingyin, a veteran of countless bloodbaths, feel suffocated.

'Not good... Retreat...'

Without a moment's hesitation, Bei Lingyin activated a Great Transposition Talisman, transforming into a streak of light and fleeing the Cold Palace Sword Mansion.

As she left, only one thought remained in her mind.

'Why is every single Female Cultivator in this Cold Palace Sword Mansion such a handful?!'