A Pawn's Passage

After Zhang Yuelu arrived at the Wanxiang Daoist Palace, she received an exceptional reception. After all, she was the successor of Sage Cihang, expected to join the ranks of Omniscient Sages in the future, so the Wanxiang Daoist Palace dared not neglect her. Thus, the Second Deputy Palace Master came forward to receive her.

Zhang Yuelu checked Qi Xuansu’s relevant files here and learned about his past grudges. To briefly summarize, Qi Xuansu almost died at the hands of Wan Xiuwu because Yue Liuli sent him out as bait.

This confirmed part of Zhang Yuelu’s guess, but there were still many things that could not be explained.

Just as Zhang Yuelu was planning to continue the investigation, Zhang Yuelu received an official note from Tiangang Hall regarding the two superintendents of Ecstasy Paradise. One of them was dead, while the other was imprisoned. The Golden Tower Council suspected that secret society demons were involved in this, so they ordered Tiangang Hall to conduct a thorough investigation.

Since Zhang Yuelu happened to be nearby, Tiangang Hall decided to let Zhang Yuelu take charge of the case.

Zhang Yuelu immediately set off for Purple Immortal Mountain.

It took a while for the Golden Tower Council to respond after Eighth Tianyang informed the Daoist Order about what happened. It was already the third day after the incident when Zhang Yuelu finally arrived at Purple Immortal Mountain.

At this time, Ecstasy Paradise was closed for business. No one was allowed to enter or leave.

Eighth Tianyang had taken Ecstasy Paradise under control. In the past three days, some Daoist deacons had raised objections, but Eighth Tianyang explained that it would not take long for the Daoist Order to send someone to deal with the aftermath.

Considering that the two superintendents were involved in this serial murder case, and Purple Immortal Mountain had repeatedly obstructed the handling of the case, the Daoist priests in Ecstasy Paradise were not allowed to act rashly. If they could not wait for even three days, it would make people doubt whether they were also involved in the murders.

Eighth Tianyang only blocked the exit of Ecstasy Paradise, Ecstasy Palace, the warehouse, and a few other places. He did not imprison anyone, so the Daoist priests no longer objected to his lead.

Liu Futong was imprisoned by Su Ran, not Eighth Tianyang.

After Zhang Yuelu met Eighth Tianyang, she quickly took over the control of Ecstasy Paradise and got a preliminary understanding of the case from Eighth Tianyang.

Eighth Tianyang did not know that Zhang Yuelu was tracking down Wei Wugui. But out of loyalty to his friend, he deliberately downplayed Wei Wugui’s existence. Instead, he used a vague term to describe Wei Wugui—a colleague from the Black Robes. Moreover, Eighth Tianyang said that killing Su Ran was a collaborative effort from his division.

Zhang Yuelu was not familiar with the situation yet, so she did not delve too deeply into it. After she had a preliminary understanding of the case, she went to check on Su Ran’s body first, ignoring Liu Futong, who was still imprisoned in Ecstasy Palace.

She was surprised to see the giant white fox in the warehouse. It was no wonder it took a whole team to kill this fox demon.

Her master, Sage Cihang, once mentioned that converts were often more fanatical and pious than the old believers. That was due to a mindset of atonement. Converts often thought that they could double down on their goodwill to gain recognition from the new group. They also wanted to draw a clear line with their past, so they did not want the group they were associated with in the past to live well.

This phenomenon was not just limited to religions. It also applied to tribes and nations. In the past, those from the Central Plains who defected to the Golden Horde treated their own people more harshly than those from the Golden Horde. They were most loyal to the Khanate, so they were favored and trusted by the Khan of the Golden Horde. These defectors also became a serious problem for the Central Plains.

It had been more than 200 years since the Qingqiu lineage was absorbed into the Taiping Sect, becoming a recognized member of the Daoist Order. It was not a short time, but compared to the thousands of years of the Daoist Order’s history, it was not worth mentioning.

However, there were no absolutes in anything. For example, the Three Yin Beings in the Ghost Kingdom had submitted to the Daoist Order, but they did not care about the Daoist Order and had begun to plan for their own future.

Zhang Yuelu figured that Su Ran probably fell into this rut. She was filled with emotion.

In fact, at this point, there was nothing to investigate. Su Ran was a conservative and regarded Ecstasy Paradise as a stain on the Daoist Order. After getting transferred to Ecstasy Paradise, she took drastic measures and took advantage of the situation to capture Liu Futong, a scum of the Daoist Order. As a result, the Green Phoenix Guard discovered what Su Ran had done, and Su Ran decided to silence them. But her plan backfired, and she was killed.

This story made sense and had no obvious flaws.

Zhang Yuelu agreed with some of Su Ran’s ideas, but she did not agree with Su Ran’s approach.

Morality and law should not be confused. When the Daoist Order and the Confucian School were fighting for dominance, Daoists criticized Confucian ethics and lynching. If the Daoist Order also encouraged lynching in order to enforce rules and precepts, they would be the biggest hypocrites.

Even if these people were found to be guilty, they did not deserve death. The Holy Xuan criticized private punishments and wanted transparency in the Daoist Order. If these people in Ecstasy Paradise were guilty, then the Daoist Order was also guilty of bad management.

Su Ran killed these people at will. If the Daoist Order condoned this, then it would mean that people could take matters into their own hands, just as how the Ancient Immortals attacked the Daoist Order because they disagreed with the ways of the Daoist Order.

Thus, Su Ran was wrong in her approach.

This was probably where Zhang Yuelu was better than Qi Xuansu. Qi Xuansu only instinctively felt that it was wrong, but Zhang Yuelu could point out exactly what was wrong about it.

However, Zhang Yuelu had no intention of arguing with Su Ran’s point of view. After all, Su Ran was dead.

The difficulty in this matter was how she could clean up the mess.

In any case, Su Ran’s identity was a fourth-rank Jijiu Daoist master. If word got out that a fourth-rank priest was killing innocent people at will, it would undoubtedly cause serious damage to the reputation of the Daoist Order. None of the Sages would agree to make this public knowledge.

There was no need to worry about the Green Phoenix Guards and the Imperial Court because they were on the same side in this regard. The Emperor wanted to gain control of the Daoist Order, not destroy it. The Li family was also a member of the Daoist Order.

However, if this case was suppressed, it would undoubtedly encourage this kind of behavior, which was what the Daoist Order did not want to see. If no punishment was imposed, someone would imitate Su Ran in the future. If so, the situation would go out of hand.

Thus, handling this case properly would test Zhang Yuelu’s political wisdom. That was when Zhang Yuelu suddenly realized that the suspicion of a secret society being involved in this case was just an excuse. This was actually a test for her.

After all, Zhang Yuelu was about to be promoted to the third rank. To truly enter the upper echelons of the Daoist Order, one must not only have a high level of cultivation but also be skillful and capable in politics.

To the Sages, the situation in Ecstasy Paradise had gone out of control because a superintendent died while the other was imprisoned, leaving many Daoist disciples without a leader. During this time, news of Su Ran’s death had probably spread all over Ecstasy Paradise. Thus, how to quickly settle the rumors without worsening the situation was a difficult challenge.

However, they did not expect Qi Xuansu to guide Eighth Tianyang on how to get things under control as soon as possible. Except for Eighth Tianyang and a few of his confidants, no one else knew about Su Ran’s identity. At most, they only heard about Su Ran’s death, but they did not know any details.

In fact, the situation was much better than the Sages expected.

Zhang Yuelu was also unaware that Qi Xuansu had unintentionally cleared up many difficulties for her. After she understood the situation in detail, she found that the difficulties she had to face were not as big as she imagined.

She admired Senior Major Eighth Tianyang’s leadership and problem-solving abilities.

Initially, Zhang Yuelu thought of suppressing the case externally, but she planned to make an example of this within Ecstasy Paradise to serve as a warning to others. She also planned to deal with Liu Futong publicly, with severe punishment to downplay Su Ran’s case, hence minimizing the adverse impact.

Zhang Yuelu walked over to Su Ran’s body and found traces of the Dragon Eye Bullet. This was not surprising. After all, the Green Phoenix Guard had access to this kind of ammunition as well.

However, some of the wounds on Su Ran’s body that had not yet healed startled Zhang Yuelu because she spotted traces of the Dayan Spirit Blade Technique.