Chapter 00168: A Long Term Plan
# A Long-Term Plan
Chapter 168
Novel: AFK Game: Portal to Another World
Chapter 168: A Long-Term Plan
For a Wuxia script to produce something that felt like Xianxia was strange enough.
No wonder Qin Yan was so astonished to see the Sky-Upholding Stone being sucked into the Jade Tablet.
Li Chengxi, too, found it odd at first, feeling that the styles were quite mixed up.
However, when Li Chengxi saw another unclickable and irretrievable Sky-Upholding Stone appear in the Sumeru Realm, he let out a sigh of relief.
At the very least, this important objective was not lost.
As for adding points?
He could think about that later.
It was true that the Jade Tablet had absorbed the Sky-Upholding Stone, but the tablet was not in Yang Yiyi's hands at this moment.
Despite witnessing this unscientific scene, Qin Yan reacted immediately, reaching out to grab the Jade Tablet floating in mid-air.
Yang Yiyi was even more anxious.
The Sky-Upholding Stone was important, but the Jade Tablet was her only channel of communication with Li Chengxi.
Of course, she could not lose it.
She didn't know that the Jade Tablet could not be too far away from her; in reality, even if Qin Yan got her hands on it, she wouldn't be able to take it away.
Thus, the two once again fell into a scuffle.
The only difference from before was that the fight for the Sky-Upholding Stone had now become a fight for the Jade Tablet.
Qin Yan held a dagger in a reverse grip in her left hand and brought it down toward Yang Yiyi's head.
Perhaps because the Jade Tablet was at stake, Yang Yiyi had no intention of dodging this time.
She brought her hands together and pulled hard, using this strange posture that looked as if she were letting her opponent strike her to meet the dagger head-on.
As a result, Qin Yan's dagger strangely stopped not far in front of Yang Yiyi.
Only upon closer inspection would one discover that the blade was actually entangled in a transparent thread.
When Yang Yiyi left Peach Blossom Valley, she hadn't left empty-handed.
The demons had given her a full set of equipment, which was like leaving the starting village with divine gear.
On her hands, she wore the Spider Silk Gloves gifted by the Spider Demon.
These gloves allowed Yang Yiyi to scale walls and could also produce an incomparably tough strand of spider silk.
If she knew how to use the Coiling Dragon Silk, this would be an excellent assassination weapon, but Yang Yiyi didn't know how to use it at all.
For now, she was just using the blade-proof spider silk to block the sharp weapon.
Taking advantage of Qin Yan's momentary surprise, Yang Yiyi turned and rammed her shoulder into Qin Yan's chest, simultaneously grabbing the Jade Tablet in Qin Yan's hand.
Yang Yiyi's strength held an absolute advantage over Qin Yan's.
Qin Yan only felt her fingers go numb, and the Jade Tablet was already out of her grasp.
If she tried to grab the Jade Tablet again, she would be hit by Yang Yiyi's shoulder charge.
The outcome would be akin to a heavy truck hitting a compact car—smashed to smithereens.
Helpless, Qin Yan could only change her footwork, spinning around to avoid Yang Yiyi's shoulder and looking for another chance to snatch the Jade Tablet.
To be on the safe side, Yang Yiyi stuffed the Jade Tablet into her robes.
Now, trying to snatch it would be difficult.
Qin Yan's mind worked quickly.
Seeing that the Jade Tablet was hard to get, she deliberately led Yang Yiyi to smash the other two statues nearby, probably wanting to see if there were Sky-Upholding Stones inside them as well.
Yang Yiyi didn't have so many schemes.
With a few cooperative thuds, the statues of the Numinous Treasure Heavenly Sovereign and the Virtuous Heavenly Sovereign also suffered heavy blows, both seeming to declare, "I'm cracking up."
However, no new Sky-Upholding Stones were found inside the statues this time.
Qin Yan had no choice but to try and snatch the Jade Tablet from Yang Yiyi's robes again.
The two exchanged several more blows in a flurry of back-and-forth action.
It sounded very complicated, but in reality, less than a minute had passed since Qin Yan was pulled down from the rooftop by Yang Yiyi.
The fight was just truly intense.
Just as they were entangled, Escort Leader Wang Zhen suddenly let out a furious roar:
"You are from the Sixteen Fortresses! The Xingyuan Escort Agency has no grievances with you in the past, nor any enmity today. Why are you robbing our cargo?"
The Sixteen Fortresses was a stronghold formed by a group of Greenwood Heroes, similar to Liangshan Marsh.
They claimed to rob the rich to help the poor, but to put it more bluntly, they were a gang of bandits, at best, bandits with principles.
The name "Sixteen Fortresses" was strange because the first fortress master was an unrivaled genius, a prodigy in martial arts who had become famous at the tender age of sixteen.
Afterward, when his martial arts reached the Transformation Realm, he saw that the poor people of the world couldn't even afford a single meal while the noble clans feasted on fish and meat all day.
He decided to establish the Sixteen Fortresses, specializing in killing the unjust wealthy.
This was a group of bandits who, although they broke the law, genuinely worked for the poor and had a considerable reputation in the Jianghu.
At first, they had deliberately concealed their skills and were not recognized.
It was only after a few rounds of fighting that Wang Zhen recognized their style.
The Xingyuan Escort Agency had good relations with friends on the path; after all, it was impossible to run an escort agency without good relations.
They were also quite friendly with the Sixteen Fortresses.
In the past, when they encountered people from the Sixteen Fortresses, they would even be escorted for a while to make it easier for the Xingyuan Escort Agency to pass through the territories of other fortresses.
It was not uncommon for them to drink and chat together when there was no business.
They never expected to be attacked today without a single word.
Seeing that their identities had been exposed, the men in black all stepped back and said:
"Escort Leader Wang, we brothers have been dishonorable today. We will offer wine in apology another day, but the cargo you are escorting must be left behind."
"What charm does this cargo hold that it would make you disregard your own honor?"
Escort Leader Wang Zhen truly did not know what was in the chests.
The client wanted no one but himself and the recipient to know what was being transported, which was why the price was particularly high.
"Brother, I can only say this matter is of great importance. I can't tell you any more."
Of course, these few words were not enough to make Wang Zhen give up.
No matter what was being transported, an escort agency relied on its reputation to survive.
If they casually lost a shipment, how could they continue to do business in the future?
Seeing that negotiations had failed and a fight was imminent, Qin Yan broke free from her entanglement with Yang Yiyi and, with a leap, landed beside the men in black.
"Let's reconsider this, withdraw!"
With that, she threw out a few small pellets, and dark smoke instantly erupted.
Everyone knew it was a smoke bomb, but no one dared to give chase.
They all covered their mouths and noses, wary that the smoke might be a trick.
Faintly, they could hear the hurried footsteps of the men in black as they departed, and the last words they left behind:
"Escort Leader Wang, I advise you not to be stubborn. Today it was us, and we considered our old friendship. If you run into others in the future, they won't be as easy to talk to. It won't be easy to get out once you're involved."
The wind and rain outside blew, and the smoke in the main hall quickly dissipated, but there was no longer any trace of the dozen or so men in black.
––––––––––––
This fight started inexplicably and ended just as inexplicably.
Of course, Yang Yiyi and her two companions were just caught in the crossfire.
The attackers were after the Xingyuan Escort Agency.
It seemed that because the Xingyuan Escort Agency and the Sixteen Fortresses had a good relationship, they wanted to first use ghost tricks to scare the escorts and throw them into disarray, then seize the opportunity to take the cargo.
They had charged in because Yang Yiyi had caught Qin Yan, who was playing ghost on the rooftop.
They had no choice but to launch a frontal assault to rescue her.
Later, their identities were exposed, and with the presence of three uninvolved people, Yang Yiyi's group, they decided to retreat and wait for another opportunity.
It was clear that the road ahead for Escort Leader Wang and his men would not be an easy one.
As for their method of pretending to be ghosts, it was actually simple.
They quietly set up a thin iron wire, then coated an S-shaped piece of iron with phosphorus and lit it.
As it slid along the wire, it looked like a Ghost Fire flying overhead.
The thing that slit the neck of the escort named Erzi was not a hidden weapon, much less some invisible Ghost Hand.
It was just a thin iron wire that Qin Yan had dangled from the rafters.
This sounded overly simple.
Did no one present ever look up at the rafters?
No matter how good the camouflage of the night-traveling clothes was, the bonfire in the main hall provided light.
It was unlikely that no one would have noticed Qin Yan hiding on the rafters for so long.
That was correct, because Qin Yan was indeed not hiding on the rafters, but in another place.
Do you remember the story Yang Yiyi told to scare Zheng Yinping?
This Daoist temple was no ordinary temple.
It was a distribution center for smuggled salt...
(End of this chapter)