Wei Zhao stood at the mouth of the three passages. He probed a little way into them, then resolutely took the right-hand passage once more. His jade pendant reacted to the other two — the middle one most strongly of all — so naturally he walked back into the right-hand passage.

The others kept following Wei Zhao onward. This time even Lord Hao said nothing.

After another few hundred meters or so, Wei Zhao stopped again. Once more there was no passage ahead.

Old Hei instinctively looked behind him. There was no passage behind them either. He had no idea what Wei Zhao meant to do by stopping this time.

"That man of yours died here," Wei Zhao said flatly.

"Ah?" Old Hei started, then hurriedly swept his flashlight across the ground. By its faint beam, sure enough, there was a pool of blood not far off on the cave floor — though unless one looked for it deliberately, it could not be seen at all.

"So that means this path is the right one? We didn't go wrong?" James cried out in delight.

Lord Hao's face turned grimmer still, but he said, "All roads lead to Rome. Who's to say the left one wouldn't get us there as well?"

But by now no one was going to argue with him. Everyone could see the joy of success — they had finally made it out.

"But where is Mr. Qiu's body?" Old Hei searched around nearby, somewhat puzzled. He found no body at all.

"I don't know," Wei Zhao said. "I'm under no obligation to find you a corpse. If you want to look for it, stay and look."

"No... I'll come with you!" This time Old Hei believed Wei Zhao completely. He thought to himself that it was a stroke of luck he had overheard Wei Zhao's words the day before, which had made him trust the man so utterly; otherwise he might not live to get out today.

This time there were traces of lime on the ground — clearly left there earlier by Mr. Qiu — and yet along the whole way there had been no sign of Mr. Qiu's body. That only hardened Wei Zhao's suspicion: there was another skilled hand in this tomb.

Of course, Mr. Qiu had been far too distant from Wei Zhao earlier. With so many people each gripping the hand of the one in front, the line stretched long, and so Wei Zhao had not sensed that expert's aura. But if the man came near, Wei Zhao would feel him.

"This is the place!" After walking a while longer, Wei Zhao stopped and turned around. "This is where we went wrong!"

At his words, everyone spun around. Sure enough, there was another tunnel mouth behind them — they had clearly entered the wrong one earlier.

"That's right, I remember now! There used to be a rock blocking the mouth of this tunnel. The rock is gone now, which is why I took the wrong one. I kept looking for that rock all along, never guessing someone had already moved it away!" Old Hei slapped his forehead as understanding dawned. "Who took the rock away?"

Wei Zhao frowned. It seemed that, without his knowing, he had been drawn into some conspiracy — and the man who had hatched it had an Earth Rank expert at his side. He had assumed that at most these tomb robbers might include a Mystic Rank hand, but what faced him now went beyond all his expectations.

Yet Wei Zhao did not regret coming to this ancient tomb. Even had he known in advance that an Earth Rank expert was inside, he still would have come! A true man does what he must and refrains from what he must not; for Feng Xiaoxiao's sake, Wei Zhao would come no matter the hardship or the danger — even if his opponent were an Earth Rank expert!

Try to stop me, and I'll blast you to death with an energy bomb even if it kills me! Once you're dead, I may still live, but even if you do not die, you will surely be crippled! So the appearance of an Earth Rank expert put some pressure on Wei Zhao, but it could not shake his resolve to keep exploring the ancient tomb.

"Someone has been inside this tomb!" James had remembered the rock here as well, and he cried out in alarm, "Someone came to this ancient tomb before us!"

"But... some little marks I set at the tomb entrance have not been disturbed..." Old Hei frowned, sounding doubtful. "Of course, if one's lightness skill is high enough, one could get into the tomb without destroying those marks. The thing is, apart from me, no one knew beforehand what those marks were for..."

Wei Zhao scoffed at this. Never mind an Earth Rank expert — even Wei Zhao himself could have entered the tomb ahead of them without disturbing those marks! Old Hei thought far too little of anyone above Mystic Rank.

"Only we few know about this ancient tomb. Who could have gotten in first?" James asked, frowning as well.

The two exchanged a glance, then suddenly turned their eyes toward Wei Zhao.

Seeing that they actually suspected him, Wei Zhao was caught somewhere between laughter and tears. Whether the real husband-and-wife master thieves had ever come here, he did not know, but he himself was the impostor — this was the only time he had borrowed their name.

"Hmph! If I had done it, why would I bother leading you out? Are you brain-dead?" Wei Zhao sneered.

The two were long accustomed to Wei Zhao's manner of speech. But he was right — if he had been the culprit, he truly had no reason to lead them all out.

And yet... could it really have been the dead Old Keng's doing? Now that the man was dead, there was no way to verify anything.

"That's true enough! This time we owe it to the Male Thief. I'd say this whole business was eight or nine parts the work of that dead bastard Old Keng," Old Hei snorted.

"I'm going on to the underground palace. Are you heading back, or coming with me?" Wei Zhao had no time for idle talk with them. What he had come for this time was word of the Fire Spirit Fruit; nothing else much mattered to him now.

"I think we'd best go back first, talk it over, and work out a plan before anything else," Lord Hao suggested. "Things have gone so badly today, and two men are dead — one of them without anyone even knowing how. If we don't get to the bottom of this, the whole business feels uncanny!"

"Oh. Then go back." Wei Zhao spoke flatly. To him, the greatest danger in this ancient tomb was that possible Earth Rank expert; everyone else was little more than passing cloud.

"Male Thief, I think Lord Hao has a point..." Old Hei said after a moment's pondering. Without Mr. Qiu's protection he now stood at a disadvantage, and he clearly meant to go back and find a few more skilled hands to guard him.

"That's true as well. Today is not an auspicious day. Better to go back and think it over at length..." James was none too eager to go on either. The perils just past still had him shaken, and now that the correct path had been found, there was no harm in going back to rest and returning another day! RO

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