Mo Fan was straightening the front of his robe, rumpled from the fight, and answered flatly:
"Genuine article."
The girl's expression grew stranger and stranger, as though she were looking at a monster.
"Are all the body cultivators in your Azure Cloud Sect..."
"...this freakish?"
Mo Fan glanced at her, his tone perfectly level:
"No."
"I'm just exceptional."
For the first time, the girl looked Mo Fan over properly.
Seriously.
It was only now that it truly dawned on her.
The "free Senior Brother" she'd grabbed on impulse in a moment of panic seemed...
Not ordinary at all.
However, the ease and composure on Mo Fan's face didn't last long.
The next moment...
His hand stopped midway through straightening his robe.
His head snapped up, his gaze knife-sharp as it fixed on the distant mouth of the alley.
The girl followed his line of sight and saw nothing at all.
"What is it?" she asked, puzzled.
Mo Fan didn't answer.
He just kept staring in that direction.
From the far end of the dim street came footsteps.
Exceedingly faint, yet somehow landing precisely on the rhythm of one's heartbeat.
A figure walked slowly out of the shadows.
Just one man.
He looked to be in his forties or fifties, dressed in a dark robe about as ordinary as they came.
No artifact guarding him.
No spiritual light wreathing him.
Not even a scrap of exaggerated fanfare.
He simply walked.
Casually.
But the instant he appeared, the air in the entire alley seemed to congeal.
The Foundation Establishment cultivators who'd been groaning on the ground in pain visibly changed expression the moment they saw him, their agony replaced by deep reverence.
One of them forced himself up through the pain and called out respectfully:
"Retainer Chen..."
The man they called Retainer Chen paid him no attention.
He merely swept a bland glance across the wreckage strewn through the alley, and finally let his gaze, placid as still water, settle on Mo Fan.
It lingered on him for a moment, as if to see straight through him.
"These people."
Retainer Chen's voice wasn't loud, yet it reached every ear with perfect clarity, carrying an unquestionable pressure.
"You did this to all of them?"
Mo Fan met his gaze without flinching in the slightest.
"More or less."
He nodded, admitting it.
A trace of surprise entered Retainer Chen's eyes, as though he were reassessing Mo Fan's strength.
Then he looked at the girl standing behind Mo Fan, visibly tense.
"Theft in the black market, refusal to cooperate with the investigation, and now wounding the guards."
Retainer Chen's tone was entirely calm, as if stating some trivial matter.
"You two."
"Things have gone far enough that running away won't settle it anymore."
He didn't speak harshly.
There wasn't a shred of thunderous warning in it.
And yet the look on Mo Fan's face, in that moment, turned serious for the first time.
Golden Core.
That restrained, unreleased aura, unfathomable as an abyss, as an ocean...
And absolutely a genuine Golden Core cultivator!
A month ago, Mo Fan's first reaction upon seeing an existence at that level would definitely have been figuring out how to run.
But this time...
He didn't.
Mo Fan watched him, the muscles of his body drawing tight fiber by fiber, degree by degree.
Within that thoroughly tempered body, qi and blood began to surge like rivers.
His mind even started, quite coolly, to run the numbers.
Was there actually a chance of winning?
If he launched a sudden ambush...
With his current level and physical body, closing the distance first and locking down the man's casting space...
It wasn't necessarily impossible.
But...
Very dangerous.
That was the conclusion Mo Fan reached after running through the possibilities again and again.
Hard fight.
In fact, very possibly an unwinnable one.
But this was no longer the kind of gap where he could only lie down and be slaughtered.
Across from him, Retainer Chen, as an experienced Golden Core cultivator, naturally picked up on the subtle shift in Mo Fan's aura.
He'd come to collar a couple of troublemaking juniors, expecting it to be trivially easy.
Yet this young body cultivator in front of him, after clearly sensing that he was at Golden Core, showed none of the panic and awe any ordinary cultivator should have.
Instead...
He'd assumed a stance to fight.
That made Retainer Chen's eyes turn a shade more serious.
"Young man."
Retainer Chen looked at Mo Fan, a note of warning entering his voice.
"I advise you not to do anything foolish."
Mo Fan didn't answer.
He simply shifted his feet apart slightly, settling into the opening form best suited for both explosive force and defense.
The atmosphere strung itself instantly to the breaking point.
The girl standing behind Mo Fan had still been a little thrilled and fascinated by how he'd dropped several Foundation Establishment cultivators in a few punches and kicks.
But the moment that dark-robed man appeared, the smile on her face slowly, completely faded away.
Of course she recognized a Golden Core cultivator.
In fact, because of her particular background, she understood far better than the vast majority of ordinary cultivators in this world exactly what a true Golden Core cultivator meant.
That was absolutely not a chasm a body cultivator, even a freakish one, could leap across easily.
The girl looked at Mo Fan's broad back.
She also saw the faintly tensed muscles of his arms, and that unyielding stance.
This person...
He really was preparing to fight.
For a stranger he'd met by chance, a stranger who had, frankly, dragged him into this...
He was going to go head-on against a Golden Core cultivator.
The girl suddenly found her throat tight, unable to get the words out.
When it came down to it...
This whole affair, from beginning to end, had nothing to do with Mo Fan whatsoever.
She was the one who'd panicked and dragged him bodily into the whirlpool.
Wounding a few Foundation Establishment cultivators...
Maybe a few spirit stones in compensation could smooth that over.
But now...
Because of her, Mo Fan was actually preparing to trade blows with a Golden Core cultivator.
That was the kind of thing where you could lose your life at any second!
She'd been guarding her true identity fiercely all this time.
Because she knew perfectly well that the instant her identity was exposed here, this trip, the one she'd worked so hard to sneak out of Dragon Capital for, was basically over.
Cangqing City's City Lord would absolutely place her under protection immediately, and word would reach home in no time.
She'd be hauled back without the slightest mercy.
She hadn't had her fill of playing yet.
This vast world...
She'd seen only a sliver of it.
But if she kept hiding...
The girl took another long look at that back standing in front of her like a mountain.
That last bit of girlish mischief and hesitation at the bottom of her eyes slowly, completely disappeared.
Forget it.
If she had to go back, she'd go back.
She couldn't very well let this guy actually lose his life for her sake.
And in the very instant Mo Fan's gaze hardened, qi and blood driven to their limit, ready to strike first...
A soft, pale little hand suddenly reached out from beside him and gave his sleeve a light tug.
Mo Fan's motion halted.
He turned his head slightly.
The girl had already stepped out from behind his broad frame.
"That's enough."
She patted his arm, her tone returning to its original calm.
"Stop fighting."
Mo Fan frowned slightly, looking at her.
"What is it?"
The girl didn't answer his question.
She just looked quietly at Retainer Chen across from them, that abyss-deep presence, and for the first time her face held none of its earlier impish, grinning mischief.
In its place was an indescribable, innate composure and nobility.
After a moment...
She let out a heavy, thoroughly displeased sigh.
"So annoying."
"I wanted to play a few more days..."
As she spoke, the girl reached into the front of that oversized gray robe.
Then she slowly lifted her head.
Her gaze settled calmly on the Golden Core cultivator opposite, though it also sounded like she was speaking for the benefit of the thoroughly bewildered Mo Fan beside her.
"Forget it."
"I'm done pretending."