Extraordinary Perception

"Hey, Xinxia — your brother here might be away for a little while. Take care of yourself, okay?" After watching Tang Yue finish coaxing the serpent into cooperation, Mo Fan called Xinxia to let her know he was safe.

"All right. Be careful on the road." The quiet worry so uniquely Xinxia's colored every soft word she spoke.

"Don't worry... Are you at the apartment? It sounds a bit noisy on your end." Mo Fan caught the sound of frantic female voices through the phone and asked without thinking.

"I'm in the student dormitory. A few students came down with a strange illness, and I'm treating them — but Healing Element magic doesn't seem to be very effective against it. More and more people have been getting sick lately, so they've divided the affected students into quarantine zones," Xinxia said.

As a Healing Element student, Xinxia occasionally helped the school handle medical duties.

"Be careful yourself, then. Strange illnesses are usually contagious," Mo Fan reminded her.

"I will!"

He hung up to find that Tang Yue had somehow already sealed the Sky-Scraping Serpent inside the Totem Pearl without him noticing. The pearl, which had shimmered with a blue-green hue before, was now completely overtaken by a deep blue-black, and something could be faintly seen squirming within.

"It actually fits in there?" Mo Fan eyed the Totem Pearl with curiosity and gave it a rub with his fingers.

"Stop that. We need to leave now — it won't be long before Zhu Meng's people seal off the area," Tang Yue said.

Mo Fan nodded, and they pushed off from Mid-Lake Island, fleeing westward from Hangzhou.

Tang Yue had already mapped out their route in advance. She planned to bring the Sky-Scraping Serpent to a small town called Bai Town, situated along the Safe Zone border at Hangzhou's westernmost edge.

Bai Town sat at the far western reaches of Hangzhou, a considerable distance from the city proper. On Bai Mountain above the town lay a hidden cavern known only to the successive clan chiefs who had served as Totem Guardians across the generations — a refuge set aside for dire times, to protect the Totem.

The journey to Bai Mountain was neither so long as to seem daunting nor so short as to feel easy. Mo Fan's task was simply to escort Tang Yue and the Sky-Scraping Serpent to the Thousand Caves of Bai Mountain.

The Thousand Caves were a labyrinth of interconnected tunnels and hills — an entirely unexplored subterranean world. It would be the perfect sanctuary for the Sky-Scraping Serpent. Even if Zhu Meng's people found the entrance, it would do them little good; anyone sent into that maze would never find their way back out.

"Alright — move out!"

"Move out!"

Under the cover of deep night, the two of them slipped out of Hangzhou without a soul noticing, racing swiftly toward the far western border.

In an elegantly appointed villa, a heavily bearded Zhu Meng hurled his expensive teacup to the floor in a fury, watching it shatter to pieces. He glared at the line of subordinates standing before him with heads bowed, none of them daring to utter a word, and his rage burned hotter still.

"Useless — every last one of you! A serpent that size just vanishes?! I told you to keep watch on the Totem Clan. What exactly have you all been doing?!" He stabbed a finger at them as he shouted.

"Councillor, please calm yourself. We did keep close watch on every key member of the Totem Clan, exactly as you commanded. What we failed to anticipate was that they would entrust the Totem Serpent to a woman named Tang Yue. Her abilities are not particularly remarkable within the clan, so we did not immediately assign anyone to shadow her closely..." said Wu Pinjing, captain of the palace guards.

"Tang Yue holds the rank of Tribunal Agent, and she openly defied me. Issue an arrest warrant immediately. If anyone in the Hangzhou Tribunal raises objections, arrest them along with her!" Zhu Meng snarled.

He had not expected his entire plan to be undone by such an unremarkable woman.

"Councillor Zhu, there is no need to keep punishing your subordinates." An elderly man in an antique brocade robe strolled in unhurriedly from the courtyard, a pot of fragrant tea in hand, his goatee swaying gently with each step.

Captain Wu Pinjing froze, studying the man with surprise he could not conceal. This was Councillor Luo — the very man who had clashed with Councillor Zhu at every turn. What on earth was he doing here in Zhu Meng's manor?

"Wu Pinjing, you are still too young. In your eyes, white is white and black is black..." Luo Mian stroked his beard with the measured air of a senior imparting wisdom to a junior.

"Councillor Luo Mian is one of the supporters behind this operation to eliminate Hangzhou's threat. However, given his own standing within the Hangzhou Tribunal, he preferred not to openly turn against the Totem Clan," Zhu Meng explained offhandedly.

Wu Pinjing opened his mouth, then closed it, unable to find the words.

The relationships between Councillors were far more tangled than they appeared. The two men had argued with flushed faces in open session — Wu Pinjing had been fully convinced that Luo Mian was firmly in the Totem Clan's corner. He never imagined the man had long since entered into a private arrangement with Councillor Zhu.

*Could it be...* Could the bombshell news about the Sky-Scraping Serpent entering its Molting Season have come from Councillor Luo Mian's side all along?

"I actually knew right after yesterday's meeting that Tang Yue would be the one to take the Totem Serpent away. Unfortunately, Chief Adjudicator Tang Zhong seemed to have already grown suspicious of me — he kept me at his side playing chess all night and wouldn't let me get word to you in time. That Tang Zhong is no pushover," Luo Mian chuckled.

"Spare me the chatter. I brought you here because I need a solution. I've already deployed sentries at every critical location. What I cannot fathom is how someone as unremarkable as Tang Yue managed to slip through every net I laid across Hangzhou," Zhu Meng said.

Wu Pinjing nodded in agreement.

That had been the question gnawing at him most. Beyond assigning watchers to Tang Zhong, Hei Yu, and the other core Totem Clan members, they had established a complete surveillance perimeter across the West Lake area. Tang Yue was, at best, a High-Level Mage — it was simply inconceivable that she could have slipped past the collective senses of that many elite palace guards.

"I've just learned the answer from one of my sources. Although the Sky-Scraping Serpent's combat power drops sharply during the Molting Season, its perceptive ability multiplies many times over. No Commander-class creature or High-Level Mage within a twenty-kilometer radius can escape its awareness. This is a key survival mechanism the Totem Serpent employs during the Molting Season — it allows the creature to sense danger almost before it arrives, successfully avoiding any enemy that might pose a threat. Tang Yue must have used the Sky-Scraping Serpent's heightened perception to steer clear of your best men at every turn," Luo Mian explained.

Zhu Meng's thick brows shot upward, genuine astonishment crossing his face.

Captain Wu Pinjing raised his head, sudden understanding dawning in his eyes.

"The Sky-Scraping Serpent stands among the most powerful of all Sovereign-class creatures in existence — of course it possesses extraordinary abilities. That is precisely why deploying more elite fighters to pursue them now would be futile. The Totem Serpent can track the position of any pursuer with ease," Luo Mian continued.

"Then what do you propose?" Zhu Meng asked.

"The Tribunal has no shortage of trainee agents. Send the trainees to intercept and delay them — not necessarily to capture them outright, just to buy enough time for your palace guards to close in. At that point, Tang Yue will have no choice but to surrender," Luo Mian replied, stroking his beard, as though this plan had been fully formed in his mind long before anyone thought to ask.