Chapter 106: The Man Under Her Spell

He spoke with righteous indignation, as though he had suffered all of it himself.

Someone beside him tugged at his sleeve. The disciple turned back and snapped, “Am I wrong?!”

Yuwen Che’s expression turned cold. He lifted the corners of his mouth in a thin, chilly smile, his eyes full of mockery. “You speak so grandly and with such moral fervor—why did you not step forward to condemn it before? You hear a few scraps of rumor and immediately style yourself a champion of justice. You cannot tell right from wrong, you believe slander without question, and you pass judgment without the slightest basis. Someone like you is the true disgrace to the Primeval Sect!”

The disciple was stunned speechless by those words.

Such merciless sarcasm—was this still their elegant, refined, and gentle Senior Brother?

He looked toward the others, only to find that aside from a few like him, who were entering the Brahma Secret Realm for the first time and looked equally shocked, everyone else seemed unsurprised, as though they had expected this all along.

The disciple still wanted to say something, but before he could even open his mouth, Yuwen Che said coldly, “To condemn others on the strength of a few rumors you have only heard is no different from the chatter of a meddlesome gossip. If you call yourself a righteous man, at the very least you ought to have the courage to stand up for justice. Hiding behind people’s backs and speaking ill of them will only make others despise you.”

“We are sword cultivators. Above all else, we must not follow the crowd. If we cannot distinguish right from wrong, our sword hearts will be unstable. From now on, do not bring up such idle gossip again!”

The disciple was admonished several times in a row by Yuwen Che. Under everyone’s watchful eyes, he grew embarrassed and angry. “Senior Brother is so sure this is only rumor? How do you know those stories are not the truth?!”

At that, Yuwen Che gave him a cold look. “At the very least, I would not make wild judgments based on a few rumors. They have spent ten years in the secret realm and know nothing of what has happened outside. Whether there was fault or not, whether the truth is what you think it is, that is all an internal matter of the Profound Heaven Sect. Before the Profound Heaven Sect gives its verdict, any rash criticism or private judgment is sheer stupidity!”

The disciple was about to argue again when the senior sister beside him hurriedly held him back. “Enough. Senior Brother makes sense. No matter what, this is the Profound Heaven Sect’s internal affair. Wait until they have reached a conclusion before speaking out.”

The disciple reluctantly shut his mouth, but his eyes darted toward Shan Zhiqing, hoping she would help say a few words.

After all, the one who usually showed the most contempt for Xiao Jihan and Yan Shu was her.

If she had not brought them up so often, how would he have known what that master-and-disciple pair were like?

Yet Shan Zhiqing did not meet his gaze. Not only did she ignore him, she instead looked at Yuwen Che with a face full of agreement and said, “Senior Brother is right. Although Yan Shu and I have had some misunderstandings in the past, I believe she would never be that kind of person.”

The disciple was even more bewildered and looked at her in disbelief.

Just then, he received Shan Zhiqing’s private transmission: “Senior Brother, stop talking. Senior Brother has always been somewhat biased toward Yan Shu. There is no point saying more. You might as well admit your mistake early. Once the Profound Heaven Sect publicly exposes their disgraceful deeds to the world, you can then reclaim your dignity.”

The disciple hesitated for a moment, then finally lowered his head to Yuwen Che. “Senior Brother is right. I spoke rashly.”

Yuwen Che withdrew his gaze from him and looked around at the others. “Very well. The secret realm is about to close. We only need to wait.”

Yan Shu and Xiao Jihan wandered at random through the Brahma Secret Realm, and along the way they encountered several disciples from other sects.

Those disciples looked at Yan Shu with strange expressions, and some even spat after they had passed.

Yan Shu frowned and asked in a low voice, “Are these people sick? Did we provoke them?”

Xiao Jihan had already anticipated this. Hearing her question, he merely said indifferently, “Just a pack of fools who fancy themselves righteous. Ignore them.”

As he spoke, the Brahma Secret Realm closed.

In the blink of an eye, they were transported out of the secret realm and arrived outside.

Those who had remained in the Brahma Secret Realm for a full month were all elite disciples among the younger generation.

Perhaps it was fate’s habit of arranging enemies to meet, for among them were Sun Changfeng and Qiu Shoran.

They had clearly not expected to run into Yan Shu and Xiao Jihan.

The two of them paused in surprise. Once they recovered, they immediately strode forward with cold smiles and said loudly, “Xiao Jihan, how do you still have the face to appear before me?!”

Yan Shu and Xiao Jihan were both striking in appearance, and their arrival had already drawn many eyes. Now that Sun Changfeng had shouted like that, everyone outside the secret realm turned to look at them in unison.

Seeing Sun Changfeng come striding over with such a fierce air, Yan Shu asked in a low voice, “What’s going on? Why is he so angry that he’s not even pretending anymore? Did you dig up his ancestral grave?”

At that, a smile curled at the corner of Xiao Jihan’s mouth, but before he could answer, Sun Changfeng and Qiu Shoran had already reached them.

Qiu Shoran was even less composed than Sun Changfeng. He immediately pointed at Xiao Jihan’s nose and cursed, “You wretch! Not only did you secretly refine Beast-Luring Powder, you also spread it on my master in order to seize the opportunity that belonged to my master and me.”

“If my master had not crushed her jade token in time, she would almost certainly have been killed! You sinister, treacherous beast who harms your fellow sect members—come with us to the Punishment Hall at once and receive your sentence!”

As soon as those words fell, the crowd erupted into discussion.

After all, this matter had been spreading wildly throughout the cultivation world for ten years.

On the surface, the cultivation world seemed calm and harmonious, friendly and peaceful, but in truth, let alone between sects, even within a sect there were plenty of filthy affairs.

It was just that everyone concealed these ugly matters. No one had ever made such a spectacle of things as the Profound Heaven Sect had, to the point that practically everyone knew about it.

“The Profound Heaven Sect is truly far too lax in its discipline. For the sake of a bit of fortune, they even allowed fellow disciples to slaughter one another.”

“Competing for opportunities is understandable enough, but secretly refining Beast-Luring Powder and then scattering it on fellow sect members—that is no small matter.”

“That Yan Shu, who shields Xiao Jihan, is no good either. As the saying goes, when the beam is crooked, the rafters are crooked too.”

“I heard from a disciple of the Profound Heaven Sect that Xiao Jihan is nothing but a four-attribute false spiritual root. He owes everything he has today to that face of his, shamelessly becoming Yan Shu’s kept man!”

“Tsk, tsk. Who would have thought that a generation’s cultivation prodigy would be such a lecherous fool, blinded by beauty and utterly without shame!”

Yan Shu: ???

If you have something to say, say it properly. What did that have to do with her? Why was she being dragged in and insulted?

Her eyes turned cold as she glanced at the one who had criticized her.

She already had a cold, otherworldly beauty; now that her gaze had gone icy, it only sharpened her presence.

The man was immediately unsettled when she looked at him. He stiffened his neck and said, “What? Was I wrong? He is your direct disciple. If he committed such filthy deeds, was that not because you failed to discipline him properly? He is nothing but a false spiritual root, and yet you accepted him as your direct disciple, traveled with him day and night—if not for coveting beauty, then what else could it be?”