Zhou Zishu coughed twice, pressed Zhang Chengling still, and instructed, “Don’t fidget. Follow us.”

When Zhang Chengling turned his head, Wen Kexing had followed Zhou Zishu out. Zhang Chengling looked at one of them, then the other, and asked, "Shifu, has your injury healed?"

Zhou Zishu replied without even looking back at him. “Am I not human?”

Zhang Chengling thought about it. True, with an injury that severe--brushing off Zhou Zishu’s unkind tone, he anxiously went up again to ask, “Then, shifu…are you able to walk on your own?”

Zhou Zishu inhaled deeply. It wasn’t only his body which was hurting; he felt that his brain was also starting to ache, too. “What else do you think I’m doing?”

Wen Kexing turned his head aside to laugh. Zhang Chengling scratched his head and said, “Shifu, I mean...you’re so severely injured…”

Zhou Zishu glanced at him expressionlessly. “Do you think I should be delicately frail for a moment in this godforsaken place? Unless you’d like to carry me on your back?”

Zhang Chengling was just about to demonstrate his sense of filial piety when Wen Kexing immediately spoke up. “I’ll carry you on my back. Or in my arms, that's fine too.”

Zhou Zishu turned his head aside to cough, pressed on the injury on his chest with his shoulders hunched, and said shortly, “Don’t talk nonsense.”

Making their way along the underground passage, the three of them cautiously neared the place where the gigantic crash had come from. For the sake of caution, Zhou Zishu wrapped his palm around the luminescent pearl, plunging their surroundings into darkness. Wen Kexing stepped forward to tug at Zhou Zishu, pulling him to one side. Reaching out, he took Zhou Zishu's Baiyi sword, and glided a finger along the blade. A hint of appreciation bloomed on his face. Then, with a quiver of his wrist, the tip of the sword trembled slightly, and the long sword was thrust out.

Blindsided, the person around the corner grunted, and extended a finger to flick the tip of his sword off-target. Wen Kexing instantly switched tactics. In Zhou Zishu’s hands, that flexible sword moved in clear and righteous strokes, but in Wen Kexing’s hands, it was extremely wicked and unearthly, as vexing to counter as a malignant cyst that had pervaded the bone.

Quick as lightning, the two exchanged about ten moves in the darkness. However, it was Zhou Zishu who suddenly spoke up after a moment’s listening with his brow furrowed. “Senior Ye?”

The other party humphed lightly. Zhou Zishu raised the luminescent pearl once more, and illuminated that uniquely foul expression of Ye Baiyi’s. Wen Kexing only withdrew his sword then, and cheerily saluted him with a hand over his fist. “It was a misunderstanding, a misunderstanding. A pure misunderstanding.”