Chapter 269

At these words, a thoughtful look appeared in everyone’s eyes. That’s right. When a business inconveniences its customers, they hand out red envelopes and gift vouchers as compensation. How much more so for a colossal and reputable entity like Wesi Sanctuary?

They weren’t asking for much, just another free entry to the island would suffice.

Thinking this, everyone looked back at the fighting guards, their eyes lighting up. They no longer saw people fighting, but rather fighting gold coins.

Seeing that the crowd had gone up to break up the fight, Si Zhaohua looked at Su Bei suspiciously. “What’s your motive for persuading them to stop the fight?”

Given Su Bei’s personality, he should have preferred to watch them keep fighting. Why would he want to stop it?

“More than their fighting, I want to know the reason they’re fighting,” Su Bei said with a grin.

If they just wasted time here and waited for Wesi Sanctuary to send others to stop them, this group would be taken away directly, and he would surely miss the chance to learn the inside story. But Su Bei was very curious about that inside story, so naturally, he had to make them stop early to leave him time to pry for information.

Just as others had thought, Su Bei could also sense that the fight between these two groups wasn’t due to a simple moment of impulsiveness, but rather old grievances between the two sides.

But who did “two sides” refer to here?

On the surface, it naturally referred to the two groups currently fighting. But as far as Su Bei knew, the guards for each project in Wesi Sanctuary operated on a rotation system. It wasn’t a case of a few guards staying at one project for a long time; they were broken up and reassigned every so often.

In other words, this group of people were likely not long-term colleagues. If they weren’t, where did so many people share a common old grievance?

Therefore, the “two sides” here probably referred to more than just these two groups, but two different factions within Wesi Sanctuary.

From the perspective of the manga, although Jiang Tianming and the others came to Wesi Sanctuary to find a cure for Zhou Renjie, since they were already here and would be staying for a full five days, it was naturally impossible for nothing to happen and for them to pass the time peacefully.

Without a doubt, today’s group brawl held the shadow of a plotline.

For something like this that didn’t involve the main storyline and happened spontaneously, it was difficult for Su Bei to be prescient. So he had to seize every opportunity to gather intelligence before the situation fully erupted. This way, even if he couldn’t know everything, he could at least be somewhat prepared.

Of course, Su Bei wouldn’t handle such troublesome matters himself. He decisively chose to trick the other Ability users into helping. He wasn’t lying, anyway. By doing Wesi Sanctuary this favor, they certainly wouldn’t mind giving them some benefits as a thank-you fee and hush money.

But speaking of which, Su Bei didn’t have the ability to change so many people’s destinies at once. Although he had just boosted his Mental Energy quite a bit, he hadn’t fully integrated it yet and couldn’t use it directly.

It was worth mentioning that the “Holy Spirit Banyan That Reaches the Sky” was truly a treasure. The 0.1% increase in Advanced Mental Energy was a significant amount, and Su Bei could feel a distinct jump in his Mental Energy.

His mental power hadn’t budged in a long time. To have a visually discernible increase this time, even knowing that trouble was imminent, couldn’t dampen Su Bei’s good mood.

“What did you prophesize?” Feng Lan asked with sharp perception. Although Su Bei’s own explanation was reasonable, he just felt that the other party might have foreseen something to make him actively intervene.

Su Bei nodded, then shook his head, but gave no specific answer. He hadn’t actually foreseen anything, but he knew something was bound to happen here. Could that be considered a form of prophecy in itself?

Seeing his reaction, the other two quieted down and waited patiently for the others to handle it. Since Su Bei had decided to inquire about something based on a prophecy, they naturally had to support him.

The people who dared to stay and watch the drama indeed had some strength, more or less. Before long, they had the situation under control. After all, no matter how heated the guards’ fight got, they knew to restrain themselves somewhat in front of tourists, making it relatively easy to stop them.

Once both sides had mostly calmed down, Su Bei walked up. Taking advantage of his young and innocent-looking face, he put on the air of an adult and said with childlike innocence, “Big brothers and sisters, why were you fighting? My teacher said our abilities are for dealing with Nightmare Beasts, not our own comrades. If you have a small conflict, can’t you just ask a teacher—I mean, your supervisor—to mediate?”

His first sentence did make the guards feel a bit ashamed. As he said, abilities should be used against Nightmare Beasts. Their internal conflict, especially to the point of using abilities to fight, was truly improper.

But hearing the second half of his sentence, they couldn’t help but laugh. He really was just a kid, completely clueless about the complexities of the adult world.

One of the women, who looked like she was from their country and had a high ponytail, rubbed her already bruising cheek and said with a grimacing smile, “Little friend, our conflict isn’t something a supervisor can resolve. Our supervisors have the same conflict we do.”

It really was a matter between two factions, involving not only these low-level guards but also their supervisors, and even their supervisors’ supervisors.

“Lin Qi!” another person sternly cut her off. “You’ve said too much.”

“Sorry, sorry.” Lin Qi also realized she had spoken out of turn and apologized repeatedly. However, Su Bei could see that she was only apologizing out of protocol and didn’t actually care that much, which suggested that revealing the secret didn’t matter much to her.

Hmm, a potential target for information gathering.

With that thought, he offered a few more harmless words of comfort, then returned to Si Zhaohua and Feng Lan’s side, pretending to chat with them.

“Is that it?” Si Zhaohua was skeptical. In his view, the only useful thing Su Bei had said was the first sentence; he couldn’t figure out the purpose of the rest.

Of course, it wasn’t over. Su Bei shook his head, signaling them not to rush. In any case, today’s project was already completed, so waiting a little longer here wouldn’t hurt.

Soon, the guards returned to their posts, putting on a facade of each performing their duties in perfect harmony. After the heat of the moment faded, the emotion of fear finally returned to them.

A mass brawl during work hours, and one that had to be broken up by tourists at that—if their superiors found out, they would surely be punished. A pay cut and a scolding would be minor. Wesi Sanctuary had a dedicated enforcement hall, and getting caught by them would be truly miserable.

Now, they could only hope that the tourists who had fled earlier hadn’t called customer service to report the situation. Or that when the investigators arrived, they would see their obedient demeanor and decide not to pursue the matter further.

Seeing that they had all dispersed, Su Bei approached Lin Qi again, who was standing inconspicuously in a corner. “Sister Lin Qi, I can’t find the way to the next project. Could I trouble you to take us there?”

With the map specially provided by Wesi Sanctuary, most people should be able to find their way, unless they had no sense of direction. Lin Qi knew Su Bei’s team had three people. It couldn’t be that all three of them were directionally challenged, could it?

She raised an eyebrow, a playful look on her face. “You want to keep hearing about what happened earlier, don’t you?”

Since she had figured it out, there was naturally no need for Su Bei to hide it. He put on a deliberately embarrassed yet curious expression. “I guess I couldn’t hide it from you. Is it okay?”

“Hmm…” Lin Qi pretended to think it over with difficulty, then suddenly broke into a brilliant smile. “Of course, you can, but you can’t tell anyone after you hear it! Even if you do, you can’t tell them I was the one who told you.”

Su Bei’s face also broke into a smile, and he readily agreed. “No problem!”

After they finished their discussion, Si Zhaohua came over and asked doubtfully, “Is it okay to just leave like this?”

In other words, wasn’t this considered deserting her post? But asking that question might make it seem like he didn’t want her to agree. So Si Zhaohua just mentioned it tactfully without saying it all.

Of course, even if he didn’t say it all, the meaning was clear enough. Lin Qi smiled smugly. “What deserting my post? I’m just going to the restroom. They assign so many guards here precisely so we can go take care of our physiological needs at any time.”

What a great technique for slacking off by going to the restroom. Su Bei gave her a very respectful thumbs-up. “Then let’s go, let’s not waste any more time.”

Once they reached a deserted spot, Lin Qi, who was leading the way, stopped. She sat down casually on a bench by the roadside and patted the spot next to her. “Don’t just stand there, you guys can sit too.”

Soon, everyone found a place to sit, and Lin Qi began to recount their conflict. “The conflict between us has been going on for several years. Oh, when I say ‘us,’ I don’t just mean the few people who were fighting just now, but many, many people. Basically, all the original inhabitants of the island are involved.”

This statement was within the three’s expectations. They had long figured that a conflict that could make a group of people fight so openly must be a public issue on the island.

Just talking about it made Lin Qi frown, and she made no attempt to cover up for Wesi Sanctuary. “To put it simply, some of us hope to continue guarding this island and live the same life as before. you can call us the Conservative Faction. The other group, naturally, is the opposing Radical Faction. They think that since we control so many resources and are the birthplace of abilities, we should become the leaders of all Ability users.”

Wesi Sanctuary was indeed the birthplace of abilities. The meteorite back then had crashed in this very region, and after the shockwave erupted, it had entirely entered the Nightmare Beast World.

This was also why the island had so many natural wonders of the Ability World. After all, if people affected by the meteorite’s impact could become Ability users, and souls affected became Nightmare Beasts, then the land and vegetation affected would naturally undergo mutations as well. Especially given such close proximity to the impact, it would be difficult for anything to remain as it was.

“Aren’t you already a holy land in the eyes of all Ability users?” Feng Lan asked, puzzled. His family had a partnership with Wesi Sanctuary, so he was naturally more concerned about their internal conflicts. If they really had some self-destructive ideas, he could lead his family to break away in time.

As the head of a family, no matter how composed he appeared on the surface, his upbringing had determined that Feng Lan had to prioritize his family and consider its interests to some extent.

However, the Feng family was a family of prophets. As long as his ability was there, he held an absolute advantage. He could leave things like managing the family to others; Feng Lan only needed to cultivate his ability. Therefore, he didn’t hold actual power at home and was more of a mascot-like family head, though he did possess absolute authority.

Si Zhaohua was also devoted to his family, but unlike Feng Lan, due to the different nature of their families, he was destined to become a family head with real power in the future and had learned far more family strategies than Feng Lan.

Before Lin Qi could answer, he exposed the truth: “Because of insatiable greed.”

A holy land was, at best, a check-in spot that was very beneficial to Ability users. To say it had any ruling power was pure delusion. At most, they could use the benefits of the sanctuary to make Ability users work for them.

But any powerful faction could do that. It was normal for some people in Wesi Sanctuary to be dissatisfied. As Lin Qi said, they were the origin of abilities, and their current development was indeed lagging compared to their reputation.

“Exactly.” As expected, Lin Qi nodded in agreement. “They’re greedy enough to swallow an elephant. If they just wanted to expand Wesi Sanctuary’s power, that would be one thing, but they’re even planning to use crooked methods.”

Crooked methods? Su Bei raised an eyebrow. “What crooked methods?”

Realizing she had misspoken again, Lin Qi’s expression changed slightly. A hint of annoyance flashed in her eyes, but she smiled and changed the subject. “Anything that disrupts our harmonious and stable life, aren’t those all crooked methods?”

The three of them exchanged glances, deliberately pretending not to have caught her slip of the tongue, but in reality, they had all secretly started brainstorming.

Su Bei was the first to finish his thoughts and continued to ask, “Sorry, but may I ask why you’re telling us this? Logically, you shouldn’t air your dirty laundry in public. Even if you have internal conflicts, you shouldn’t be telling outsiders like us, right?”

Regarding this point, the attitude of the person who had tried to stop her earlier made it clear. Apparently, the people of Wesi Sanctuary also believed in not airing their dirty laundry and didn’t want to tell tourists about this matter.

“Because I don’t want you to be fooled by those people from the Radical Faction,” Lin Qi said as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “Besides, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with talking about it. Are you going to invade us just because we’re fighting among ourselves?”

She was absolutely confident about this. For Wesi Sanctuary to have stood strong for so many years while possessing so many coveted treasures, its defensive measures must be excellent.

And that was indeed the case. Wesi Sanctuary was an island surrounded by the sea on all four sides, and the surrounding sea area had a unique name: the “Sea of Taboo.” The name alone told you that this was a place akin to a forbidden zone of life. The seawater was highly corrosive and could also suppress the use of abilities.

There were no natural barriers to block an attack from the air, but precisely because the sky had no barriers, it was very easy for the people on the island to detect an air raid.

At that point, the attackers would enjoy a comprehensive, 360-degree, no-blind-spot attack from Wesi Sanctuary, guaranteeing that the enemy would never return.

Hearing this, Si Zhaohua couldn’t help but ask, “What’s your method for choosing who to tell?”

This news hadn’t spread at all yet, so it was clear she didn’t tell everyone.

“I tell whoever asks me,” Lin Qi gave a surprisingly simple answer, followed by a ridiculous yet logical explanation. “Anyone who takes the initiative to ask me must have already noticed a problem. A little investigation will reveal the answer. Since that’s the case, what need is there for me to hide anything?”

That explanation was indeed sound. The three had no more questions. After thanking her, they turned and walked towards the hotel. It was now lunchtime. The hotel front desk had said that meals at the hotel were free. However, it wasn’t like they were short on money, and the academy would reimburse them anyway, so they certainly wouldn’t deliberately save money.

While waiting for their food, Si Zhaohua, who had been thinking all the way, spoke up. “Whatever the Radical Faction is trying to do must be very damaging to Wesi Sanctuary’s reputation if exposed. Otherwise, Lin Qi wouldn’t have helped cover it up.”

She was willing to directly state that Wesi Sanctuary had internal conflicts and was personally very opposed to the Radical Faction. If the exposure of the Radical Faction’s actions didn’t affect her own interests, Si Zhaohua believed Lin Qi would have told them without hesitation.

“Indeed. It’s probably related to human lives or Nightmare Beasts,” Feng Lan pointed out with pinpoint accuracy.

To be able to affect the reputation of Wesi Sanctuary, these were the only two keywords. Either the Radical Faction had secretly killed many people, or they were secretly cooperating with Nightmare Beasts. Only these two major issues could deal a precise blow to a behemoth like Wesi Sanctuary.

At his words, Si Zhaohua’s brow furrowed tightly at first, but it quickly relaxed, and he said in a firm tone, “Regardless of which it is, we can’t just stand by and do nothing.”

If it were Su Bei saying this, it would be that the Radical Faction could do whatever they wanted. As long as it didn’t affect him, they could mess around all they liked.

But here, there were two members of the protagonist group. Si Zhaohua was a completely hot-blooded youth; upon encountering such a thing, he would definitely investigate personally. And while Feng Lan was usually indifferent to everything, Wesi Sanctuary did have a partnership with his family, so he would certainly have to investigate as well.

Although he knew it wouldn’t do much good, he couldn’t help but try to persuade them. “Have you ever thought about why the other people who got the news aren’t investigating? Without evidence, your investigation won’t even be legitimate.”

Besides, everyone else was worried about encountering danger and knew very well that it was difficult to investigate clearly with one’s own power. Only manga characters would be foolish enough to actively get involved in such troublesome matters.

“You’re right,” Si Zhaohua said with a look of agreement.

Just as Su Bei thought he was starting to see the light, the other’s next sentence shattered his delusion. “We do need to find evidence first for something like this. We’ll start by looking for evidence.”

Su Bei: “…”

He was dumbfounded. After a moment of stupor, he couldn’t help but retort, “Have you been possessed by Mo Xiaotian?!”

Who did he learn this ability to interpret words only as he wanted to understand them from? Shouldn’t a normal person understand that he was advising them not to investigate, not giving them investigation advice?

This damned feeling of being choked up made him momentarily see an illusion of Mo Xiaotian. If Mo Xiaotian had said that, Su Bei would think he was just brainless. But when Si Zhaohua said it, it just made people think he was doing it on purpose.

Upon hearing the name Mo Xiaotian, Si Zhaohua first smiled out of habit. But then he remembered that the current Mo Xiaotian had become an undercover agent and had put Zhou Renjie in grave danger, and the smile immediately vanished.

He pressed his lips together. “The teachers said they have a way to deal with Mo… Mo Xiaotian. I wonder how that’s going.”

The topic jumped abruptly, but Su Bei could easily keep up. “Endless Ability Academy has lost face; they won’t tolerate it for long. If the measure they placed on Mo Xiaotian beforehand was also a type of poison, then the Black Flash Organization is probably already in chaos.”

If something happened to the leader’s most beloved grandson, wouldn’t all hell break loose?

“Then do you think they’ll compromise for Mo Xiaotian?” Si Zhaohua asked thoughtfully. If they could make an exchange—the Black Flash Organization hands over the antidote for Zhou Renjie, and Endless Ability Academy lets Mo Xiaotian go—that would be a good option.

Before Su Bei could answer, Feng Lan spoke up first. “They won’t. This trip of ours is necessary.”

Apparently, he had received some prophecy related to this trip beforehand, so he knew that only through this journey to Wesi Sanctuary could they save Zhou Renjie.

His prophecy was correct; this trip was indeed unavoidable. After all, this was a manga world. If the protagonist group didn’t go on adventures, how could it be called a manga?

“Forget it, let’s not worry about Mo Xiaotian’s situation. The academy will have its own judgment.” Si Zhaohua sighed, his eyes returning to a state of peace. “Let’s talk about Wesi Sanctuary. I plan to start investigating the Radical Faction’s conspiracy. What about you two?”

Feng Lan rarely got involved in such matters. “I’ll investigate with you.”

Again, his family had a partnership with Wesi Sanctuary. Now that such a thing had happened within their partner’s organization, he couldn’t just ignore it. If the problem they uncovered could be solved, then it was best to solve it. If it couldn’t, he could also make a clean break and have his family sever ties with Wesi Sanctuary quickly. This was what he should do as a family head.

“I’ll support you guys spiritually,” Su Bei said shamelessly, with no intention of helping at all. This kind of thing was clearly very dangerous. The protagonist group would be fine, but he might not be.

By choosing not to participate and staying on the periphery, Su Bei could choose to either help or run away, greatly increasing his safety factor. It was naturally his best choice.

Neither Si Zhaohua nor Feng Lan was surprised by his answer. It would be a ghost if Su Bei were to actively help. However, unlike Jiang Tianming and the others, Si Zhaohua and Feng Lan had relatively reserved personalities and had no intention of forcibly dragging Su Bei along.

Si Zhaohua nodded helplessly. He didn’t ask Su Bei, who had openly declared his non-participation, to leave, and looked directly at Feng Lan. “Alright then, Feng Lan, let’s discuss what to do. Wesi Sanctuary won’t allow family members to come up and investigate. We have to rely on ourselves for everything.”

“I can arrange a meeting with the leadership of Wesi Sanctuary,” Feng Lan said, toying with his phone at the dinner table. “I’ll use the pretext of adjusting our cooperation to probe them.”

Hearing this, Si Zhaohua frowned. The reason Feng Lan gave was reasonable, but it would be difficult to handle afterward. After all, if the pretext was adjusting their cooperation, he would have to have specific adjustment items to discuss during the negotiation.

A cooperation between two factions would have been negotiated long ago and would be suitable in all aspects. How could it be easily changed? If he just used this pretext and couldn’t come up with anything concrete after meeting the other party’s leader, it would easily arouse suspicion.

His index finger tapped lightly on the table as he thought for a moment. Si Zhaohua then said, “How about this? You use the pretext of introducing a cooperation partner to meet the leadership. Just say that my Si family wants to cooperate with Wesi Sanctuary and that you’re acting as the go-between.”