Chapter 236: Must Repair Relations with Jiang Chen
The scene within Yang Zhao’s secret chamber was too ghastly to look at. Yang Xiaoqian’s heart ripped in two as she gnashed her teeth before crying out crazily, “Jiang Chen, Jiang Chen! I’ll have your clan annihilated!”
“Iron dear, you must take action on my behalf! I only have one elder brother and one nephew, and they both died because of Jiang Chen! In the end, my brother was a vice director of the Dragonteeth Guard and your, a Precious Tree Sect elder’s, brother-in-law. Tell me, are you just going to watch over his death like this?!”
Elder Iron’s face turned ashen as all sorts of tests verified that this was indeed Yang Zhao’s corpse, and that he had died a grisly death.
“Xiaoqian, that dumb animal Jiang Chen will die for sure! However, look at this injury, it couldn’t have been created by an ordinary person. It looks like a monster chewed on him, and not just one at that.”
“Monster?”
Yang Xiaoqian’s face drained of color, “Dearest Iron, what kind of monster is horrifying enough for even an earth spirit realm pract.i.tioner to be unable to fight back?”
Elder Iron’s expression was grave as he shook his head, a trace of fear emerging on his face as well.
“Xiaoqian, we’re going back to the sect. This Skylaurel Kingdom is d.a.m.ned bizarre as h.e.l.l.” Elder Iron broke out in cold sweat as his scalp tingled and chills ran down his spine..
His training was at the sixth level spirit realm, more than twice stronger than Yang Zhao’s fourth level spirit realm.
However, sixth level spirit realm was still just within the earth spirit realm at the end.
For Yang Zhao to die such a grisly death, even though Elder Iron was at the peak of the earth spirit realm, he was unsure whether he’d be able to escape unscathed in the same situation.
Although Elder Iron was arrogant and considered everyone beneath his notice, that was all built on the foundation of his mighty father.
And now that he was away from sect territory, he was beyond his father’s protection.
If there really was a monster lurking in the surroundings, then his life was in grave danger.
As c.o.c.ky as Elder Iron was, he still valued his life quite a lot.
“Iron dear, we’re going back just like that? My brother died a pointless death just like this?” Yang Xiaoqian was sobbing up a storm as her tears flowed.
“Bring his corpse back for my father to take a look.” Elder Iron was unsure what to make of this scene after inspecting it for a while.
He wanted to find any excuse possible to hurry back to the sect.
At this point, Shangguan Yi had also brought a large number of people to the door of the secret room.
Yang Xiaoqian was filled with rage when she saw Shangguan Yi. Finally having found an outlet for her suppressed anger, she lunged forth, ranting and raving.
“Shangguan Yi, this is all your fault. My brother’s dead, are you happy now?! No one can threaten your position now, is it?! You can sleep soundly at night, huh?!”
Yang Xiaoqian was a madwoman. “Don’t you get c.o.c.ky! My brother’s death won’t be in vain! If it turns out that you have anything to do with this, you’ll go down with him!”
Shangguan Yi’s face grew cold, “Ms. Yang, I understand your anguish caused by your brother’s death. But forget it if you wish to make a big deal out of this. If I really wanted Yang Zhao dead, why would I go through all this trouble? The crimes I have on hand are enough to put him to death. I had lengthy discussions with the king and suppressed so much evidence because I wanted to give Yang Zhao another chance. I can tell you clearly that his death had nothing to do with the Dragonteeth Guard!”
“Stop crying fake tears and pretending to be the good guy!”
Yang Xiaoqian however, was completely beyond reason. “If you’re really that much of a good guy, why didn’t you apprehend Jiang Chen just now?”
“Jiang Chen is the Crown Prince’s confidante and the honored tutor’s person. Can he be apprehended just like that? Not to mention that His Majesty wants balance and not to lean towards any particular side.”
Elder Iron was enraged, “Shangguan Yi, stop bulls.h.i.+tting me with this c.r.a.p. I’ll tell you here and now that today’s matters are not over yet!”
Shangguan Yi didn’t hold out for hope of resolution when he saw that these two were completely unreasonable. He smiled faintly, “I have a clear conscience. Think whatever you’d like to think.”
After Ye Chonglou’s words, Shangguan Yi had thought things through as well. He knew that if he tried to please both sides, he’d end up pleasing neither.
Since Elder Iron was completely unable to be reasoned with, Shangguan Yi was naturally leaning towards Jiang Chen.
Elder Iron laughed coldly and carried away Yang Zhao’s corpse, sweeping a frosty glance over Shangguan yi. “Shangguan Yi, I hope you can remain on your position as a general director with ease!”
Shangguan Yi replied noncommittally, “The position of general director was authorized by the king himself. If the king thinks I am unfit, then why would I continue sitting in it?”
The connotations of his words were that it’d be up to the king to impeach him, and not the intervention of an elder overstepping his boundaries.
Elder Iron was naturally even more enraged when he saw Shangguan Yi was having nothing of his act.
However, he was in no mood to tarry at the moment. He left in a great huff, putting Shangguan Yi on his mental blacklist as well.
Shangguan Yi’s face sank after Elder Iron left, “Summon all the generals and vice generals, I have an announcement to make.”
Qi Tiannan shook all over as he looked at Shangguan Yi’s frosty demeanor. He knew that the general director was truly incensed this time and had made up his mind to clean house.
Xin Wudao and Qi Fengxian had publicly disobeyed Shangguan Yi earlier. This made the latter fully realize that he wasn’t an infallible general director on high after all.
Two generals had dared openly defy him!
Even with an elder of the Precious Tree Sect mucking about in the middle, this was still absolutely intolerable in Shangguan Yi’s eyes.
The Dragonteeth Guard was the Guard. Regardless of position or reason, obeying the commands of the general director was their natural duty.
They would be unfit to be in the Dragonteeth Guard if they lost sight of this commandment.
Indeed, Shangguan Yi put aside his usually amiable att.i.tude once everyone was gathered and used methods as devastating as a thunderstrike to thoroughly clean out all of Yang Zhao’s influence, removing all men he’d appointed.
From general, down to commander, and even captain, all who were a.s.sociated with Yang Zhao were removed!
First vice director Zhou Kai was naturally in wholehearted support of these actions.
Qi Tiannan also deeply understood the importance of standing with the general director after this matter. He too, supported these motions.
Of the four directors, Yang Zhao was already dead and the two vice directors were both in support of Shangguan Yi. Everything was naturally carried out in a single swipe, meeting not the slightest bit of obstruction.
“General Director, Yang Zhao brought disaster upon the Dragonteeth Guard and caused our morale and reputation to suffer greatly. The general director should increase his control in the future and forge the Guard into one solid whole!”
Zhou Kai gave the following suggestion.
Shangguan Yi nodded, “Old Zhou, it was my oversight in trusting Yang Zhao too much before. You and Old Qi need to keep a closer eye on things for me in the future. As talented as people like Xin Wudao and Qi Fengxian were, they still cannot serve my Guard.”
People that would openly defy the Dragontooth Emblem like that would never enter the Guard again.
“Those were all Yang Zhao’s confidantes. In their eyes, Yang Zhao’s words were the divine decree.” Zhou Kai had more than your average hatred for Yang Zhao.
Qi Tiannan also added, “There’s nothing that our Guard cannot overcome if we are of one heart.”
“Old Qi, you’ve gone through a hard time today.” Shangguan Yi sighed.
A wave of grat.i.tude welled up in Qi Tiannan’s heart. At the end of the day, the general director had helped him out when Elder Iron had held him in his grasp earlier.
Qi Tiannan had more or less formed a distaste for Elder Iron and Yang Zhao after being humiliated by the former, and so his heart too leaned towards the general director.
“Don’t you worry, I, Shangguan Yi, am also not an easy target. The Precious Tree Sect doesn’t belong to the Iron family.”
Morale through the Dragonteeth Guard was rather low at the moment. After all, Elder Iron’s domineering performance had thoroughly robbed them of their face today.
Even Shangguan Yi as the general director had lost quite some face.
“General director, I feel that we should make use of the opportunity to repair our relations with Jiang Chen.” Zhou Kai finally said.
If it’d been before, he absolutely would’ve been jeered by Yang Zhao had he proposed such an idea.
But now, Shangguan Yi had to seriously consider this suggestion.
It wasn’t that the Dragonteeth Guard hadn’t interacted with Jiang Chen before. When Lu Wuji had thrown Jiang Chen into the Black Dungeon last time, he’d caused a great trouble and had caused the four sites to flare in open hostility with the Guard.
Shangguan Yi had known about Jiang Chen since that time but hadn’t paid him much heed. He’d only felt that Jiang Chen knew some tricks and had some decent relations with the four great sites, was all.
When he heard that the honored tutor had held Jiang Chen in high regard during his birthday banquet, he’d once again laughed, feeling that Jiang Chen knew some tricks to amuse the honored tutor.
But after the Autumn Hunt, Ye Rong had been the one to emerge from all the Crown Prince candidates, thanks to Jiang Chen and Dan Fei accompanying his entourage.
This was when Shangguan Yi had truly began seeing Jiang Chen’s worth!
He knew very well that with Ye Rong’s foundations, the only reason he could’ve emerged from the harsh compet.i.tion within the maze realm was Jiang Chen.
Although he wasn’t too sure what had happened in the maze realm, Jiang Chen had truly entered his line of sight since then and even the king himself sought to understand Jiang Chen better.
And in the current matter of Yang Zhao and Lu Wuji colluding with outside enemies to make a preemptive strike, who would’ve thought that the final result would be the two of them losing their lives in the end?
Elder Iron had slipped away himself as well, whereas Jiang Chen wasn’t missing even a single strand of hair on his head!
All these things added together made it impossible for it to be just a coincidence.
If Jiang Chen was only an ordinary youth, where would he gain the courage to directly kill Lu Wuji?
If he was just a young genius, where would he scrounge up the courage to face Elder Iron’s aura without turning tail to run?
If he was as simple as he appeared, why would the usually reclusive honored tutor personally make a trip to publicly defend him, even at the cost of offending the Iron family?
If there was nothing special about him, then how would one explain Yang Zhao’s death? Was it really as Elder Iron had said, that a monster had been present?
Even if there was a monster, why had it targeted Yang Zhao alone, leaving the others untouched?
All sorts of questions forced Shangguan Yi to reevaluate Jiang Chen, and to reconsider his understanding on the causes and effects of all these matters.
There was only one conclusion --
This Jiang Chen was something, alright!