“Lingxue, have you traveled by transference array before?”
How was travel via transference array?
To this day, An Fei’s recollection of transference arrays were not pleasant, not in the slightest.
The sheer mention of such a creation was usually sufficient to induce a green shade onto her countenance, if not a faint quiver of the body.
It was unreasonably fast, traveling thousands of meters in mere seconds.
But unreasonably fast wasn’t the issue.
Creating the array resembled something more of a gruesome ritual than an awe-inspiring scene. And yet, decorum wasn’t the problem that the young girl hated the most.
It was rather simple.
“The concept is simple. But does it have to be so turbulent!?”
An Fei’s furious reply startled the elderly man from his languid seat, prompting his saggy body to flop onto his seat cushion and hang on for dear life.
The formerly kidnapped and now domesticated horse responsible for pulling the carriage skittered his feet across the paved stone road of the city, eliciting a few surprised cries and not so little number of agitated curses.
But the young girl wasn’t finished, and had just started on her holy tirade.
“It really is simple. Accelerate to a fast speed, with a targeted direction. At the finishing stages, simply apply deceleration to avoid ending up with meat paste instead of mortal humans. So… why is it so difficult!?”
A small dainty fist reared its head towards the world, howling its malignant resentment to the bitter ends of the frontier.
“–ah?”
“They can’t make objects accelerate at a gradual pace – everything has to be instantaneous!” the young girl roared in indignant fury.
“Acceleration is instantaneous! Deceleration is instantaneous! Why does everything have to be in an instant, an instant, an instant!? Why don’t they think about how the occupants feel when they’re tossed around in a wind tunnel that has no concept of turbulence control and suspension!?!?!?”
“Lingxue, h-h-hold on for a little, ah…”
“And that woman! Watching us bounce around like packed sardines in a can, did she think that was funny!? Just she wait – I’ll rip apart her smiling face with my hands!!!”
An Fei’s vision blurred with the distorting and horrifying memories of her single experience with transference arrays.
Recalling how she, Zhang Yuewen, and Luo Xi had been hurled from one end of the imperial carriage to the next without pause during the entire trip, the young girl’s fist shook with even more wrath.
“Lingxue…”
“Ah? Old man, what do you want this time?”
The hoarse, aged voice anchored her thoughts to reality, and An Fei swiftly broke from her mental rampage. The young girl glanced around, discovering a pale, wizened countenance force a benevolent smile on its countenance.
“Lingxue, take a deep breath to steady your emotions, ah,” Wang Qinian soothed with outstretched hands.
“Everything must be steady… look, you’ve startled the people around us!”
The young girl blinked, an embarrassed flush slithering up her cheeks as she soon realized the implications of the elderly shopkeeper’s reprimand.
As An Fei glanced around, she soon wished to bury her head into the ground.
Mm, she had caused no less than five little children to break into tears from her tantrum, eighteen young men looking as though their hearts had been torn apart, and four elders who seemed to be barely restraining their consciences from lashing out in anger. Thus…
The young girl raised a sheepish, trembling smile onto her countenance.
“Ah Wen, come to mommy, ah. Don’t linger around the scary girl, lest you get hurt!”
The smile was eradicated within the next second, a stormy glint suffusing her irises. The young girl’s feet lurched forwards, only for a willow branch to wrap around her right arm and hold her steady.
“Lingxue, have you forgotten what we have come here to do?”
“…ah.”
Was it not to bid for a slot of the quota for the transference array?
Shooting a final glare towards the young mother who had dared slap such a hat onto her head, An Fei puffed her cheeks in indignation and turned to face the center of the plaza.
There, a massive wooden platform occupied the central region of the large clearing of space, with five men standing atop with airy expressions on their countenances.
Only their lips were exposed; the rest were neatly concealed underneath a protective layer of a thin silken mask.
Furthermore, each of the five men were dressed in a pure-colored robe of cotton fabric; dazzling columns of gold, blue, red, green, and violet graced the gazes of those standing in the plaza.
“…truly amazing, ah…”
An Fei smacked her lips with an appreciative sigh, her heartfelt feelings extended towards the five men whose dignity were certain to have been tarnished at the amazed and awestruck expressions towards their clothing.
Alas, when she carefully scrutinized the countenances of those around her, the young girl was startled at her discovery.
“Five Heavenly Guardians? What are such magnificent figures doing at this city?”
“Are you certain about that? Surely that’s not just the Di Clan attempting to increase profits by having stage members dress as the Five Heavenly Guardians of the Hundred Clan Coalition?”
“Surely… not? Who would have the gall to dare assume the Hundred Clan Coalition’s identity – much less the Five Heavenly Guardians?”
The younger generation was engaged in fervent discussion regarding the five peculiar men standing upon the wooden platform, their opinions unable to discern a point of convergence. Feeling intrigued by the debates occurring in every direction from her, An Fei followed the crowd’s instinct to gaze onto the five brightly colored robes, her delicate brows furrowed in thought.
They… lacked any sort of aura that resembled of a cultivator?
Unless just as they couldn’t detect that she was somehow nestled securely within the Spirit Building Realm, she wasn’t able to discern their attainment in cultivation?
But that shouldn’t be the case, as Wang Qinian’s aura was fervently billowing out at every given moment of a day – and the result was an easily noticeable prickling sensation at the base of her skin…
An Fei’s thoughts soon faded into silence, for the man dressed in the scarlet robe raised his palm for the crowd to calm and quiet down. As the thunderous din in the city plaza dithered into a gentle lull, the man parted his lips, a sonorous voice escaping his throat to charm the populace.
“Due to rather special… circumstances regarding Great Yan and the central border, “the man began with an apologetic twitch of his lips.
“The Hundred Clan Coalition shall be regulating the auction of the transference array quotas. This is not to show preference towards those of our affiliation, but to ensure that all military spies of been ruled out.”
The words were a bombshell just as they were arrogant and lofty, inconsiderate of the listener’s thoughts and judgements. As the final sentence left her lips, An Fei could quite feel the air vibrate as the crowd around her literally burst into discussion.
“So it really isn’t the Di Clan messing with us as they did so every instance they got ahold of the city? But why would the Hundred Clan Coalition come to this Tianfeng City – when we’re not anywhere near the central border?”
“That’s right, since the nearest cities to the central border are the Fengshu Boundary, the Zhishou Range, and the Jade Embassy. The first two are several times larger than Tianfeng City regarding population or even just sheer size, and the third has the greatest number of transference arrays in the entire Shattered Star Continent. So… why are the Heavenly Guardians here?”
“Perhaps the Hundred Clan Coalition has a massive number of Heavenly Guardians? They are the greatest powerhouse under Jiang’an that controls Great Yong, after all…”
“…that better be a joke, ah. Look, in all of Great Yong, there exists three powerhouses: Han Lin Academy, the Tayi Sect, and the Heavenly Guardians of the Hundred Clan Coalition. A Peak Core Formation Realm practitioner barely qualifies to be an Earth Guardian of the Guardians of the Hundred Clan Coalition – anyone can think with their arms that a Heavenly Guardian… should at least be within the Nascent Soul Realm, no?”
“You idiot, only His Imperial Majesty is of the Nascent Soul Realm – who are you trying to fool? Do you think the Lu Imperial Family will tolerate another power attaining powerhouses of the Nascent Soul Realm under their nose?”
The impassioned young men and women of Great Yong couldn’t help but engage in fervent discussion, each statement eliciting a further aggravation of emotion and sentiment. As she spectated from a standpoint of curiosity, nonchalance, and utter confusion towards the unceasing slew of arguments, premises, and conclusions hurled from either standpoint of the debates, An Fei tapped the base of her chin in thought.
The five men standing at the top of the wooden platform… what were they doing?
To smoke out foreign military spies, the best action was to continue the proceedings in a normal fashion, only to spring a deadly trap at the end.
Alternatively, they induce a subtle hint that only those suspected spies would cling to, perhaps the results of a recent battle between the two nations, and so forth…
To simply declare their intentions like that before everyone, were they really attempting to catch spies?
