Chapter 710 - Secret Sabotage
Lin Mu and the rest ended up waiting, or about thirty minutes before Fu Delun actually appeared. Lin Mu could tell that King Hong and Adviser Liu had stern appearances on their faces upon seeing the time required for the man to appear.
Lin Mu looked to the entrance of the empty court and saw the minister of Law appear. The man was about six feet tall and wore the uniform robes of a court official along with his designation, which was imprinted as the crest on his robe 'Minster of Law'.
The man had a long mustache with no beard and had broad eyes. Lin Mu couldn't tell anything from him directly, but the moment he used his spirit sense he knew it… there were traces of the Human Controlling Blood curse on him.
Lin Mu kept his cool though and didn't show any change in expression on his face. He didn't know the details of how Gu Yao communicated with the people he controlled. He knew that he had to verbally give them commands, but the exact methodology over long distances was unknown.
Even the information that Lin Mu got from Wu Hei back then was not fully accurate as Wu Hei's scope of action was reduced to the Shuang Qian Kingdom and thus he never got to come in contact with the more complex operations.
According to the theories Lin Mu, Jing Luo, and senior Xukong had come up with, they were most likely using communication jade slips to do it. And that was exactly what could make it very difficult for them.
If someone was found out that they were working for Gu Yao and managed to send out a message, their entire plan might end up failing due to Gu Yao becoming aware of them and directly acting against them.
Lin Mu certainly didn't want that to happen and already had made a few plans about what to do with people such as those. The first thing Lin Mu did after confirming the fact that the minister was truly controlled by Gu Yao was to see where his communication jade slip was.
Normally, cultivators hung it on their waists, but some also had custom ones made for them, which were in the form of bracelets and pendants. In the case of Fu Delun, Lin Mu quickly spotted it on the left side of his waist.
But this was just one of the communication jade slips. While most cultivators only had one communication jade slip, some of the more affluent ones will keep more than one in case of emergencies.
After all, the problem with keeping communication jade slips on their bodies was that they could break during a battle or get lost. And while communication jade slips were hard in themselves while also having reinforcement formations on them, strong attacks could still break them.
These extra communication jade slips would, of course, be kept in the spatial storage treasures of that cultivator. While they could be of various forms and hid on one's body, to Lin Mu this was the easiest part to control.
Lin Mu easily sensed the two spatial storage treasures the man had on him. One of them was the ring on his left hand, and the other was a pendant hidden underneath his robes.
'Hmm… one low grade spatial storage treasure and one… mid grade one? I doubt even a minister should be able to obtain a mid grade spatial storage treasure… this is definitely suspicious.' Lin Mu thought to himself.
Within three seconds of seeing the minister, Lin Mu had already obtained the facts that were needed for him.
"This might be the best time for you to try out that trick I showed you before. At your skill level, you should be able to execute it… and even if you don't it will still be fine in this situation." Xukong suddenly spoke.
Xukong had actually been watching the entire series of events for the past few hours. He had decided to take a break from cultivating to see how his disciple takes care of the current situation.
Hearing Xukong's words, Lin Mu understood what he was talking about. Lin Mu had a hunch that he would be able to destroy or break spatial storage treasures if he wanted to a long time ago, but he had never actually gotten to do it.
While he could have figured it out on his own at one point, Xukong showed him a faster trick to do the same.
"I understand, senior." Lin Mu said and focused on the two spatial storage tools using his spatial perception.
The first one he targeted was the low grade spatial storage tool, which was none other than the ring Fu Delun was wearing. Then, Lin Mu's spirit sense condensed into a very fine thread before shooting towards the ring.
There, it quickly met with the formations on the spatial storage rings while avoiding alerting the man. The formations Lin Mu was targeting were not the surface one, but the deeper ones that interacted with the space directly.
Usually, these were buried deep within the formation array to protect them, but this also made it difficult for most average cultivators to sense them. Thus, when they got damaged, one would not know until it was too late.
'There!' Lin Mu found the node he wanted and attacked it with his spirit sense.
A wave of spatial fluctuation arose from it and impacted the ring. The formations within the ring subtly changed, but the surface stayed the same.
'Success! Just the second one left now.' Lin Mu thought to himself.
By the time he was done with the ring, Fu Delun had reached the end of the court where Lin Mu and the rest were sitting. Fu Delun had of course, noticed Lin Mu and the other two Nascent Soul realm cultivators and was a bit confused.
He could sense their cultivation bases and was a bit unnerved, but seeing the king sitting there calmly, he didn't panic either.
"To what do I owe this visit, King Hong?" Fu Delun questioned.