Chapter 96: A Veiled Team

In truth, rather than dealing with the mountain road itself, Zhang Pu found himself more interested in the people traveling alongside him. The mountain path was indeed difficult, no question about that. According to the map, there were places where no road existed at all, because no one had ever passed through there. But what could be done? Detouring risked losing the way, so the only choice was to carve out their own route.

For a vast band of warriors like this, however, hacking a road through the wilderness was no great matter. As for the venomous insects and fierce beasts lurking in the forested mountains, they were mostly just destined to become a pleasant feast for the group.

For Zhang Pu, only the legendary Black Dragon was truly worth his attention and caution.

But the Black Dragon still seemed impossibly far away.

Zhang Pu gradually felt that the map was rather circuitous, twisting the route this way and that. Yet when he noticed some of the natural barriers near the road, he also thought that the mapmaker had, after all, tried his best to take into account those heading toward Poison Dragon Pool.

Faced with those nearly insurmountable obstacles, Zhang Pu believed that among such a large group, unless one were exceptionally formidable, there were probably not many who could cross them.

This mountain range was so vast, stretching away into such deep distance. No wonder this huge region had become a lawless no-man’s land. Yet it was not that no one cared; it was simply impossible to govern. There were no economic features worth mentioning, only poor mountains and harsh waters, places no one bothered to visit.

After hacking through the brambles for most of the day, the party finally decided to rest where they were.

Although the group had no true leader and had not formally chosen anyone to take charge, it was plainly centered around Divine Healer Li and Zheng Lan.

Under Zhang Pu’s subtle prompting, Liu Yingde deliberately kept a low profile. In fact, after asking the questions he had wanted to ask, Liu Yingde no longer walked almost shoulder to shoulder with Divine Healer Li as he had before.

What was more, Divine Healer Li often had to consult the map with Guang Cai, Caihua, and Zheng Lan, and direct some of the warriors in how to cut a path forward. So even if Liu Yingde intentionally kept some distance after apparently learning certain “intelligence,” Divine Healer Li would not think anything of it.

Zhang Pu had no need to study the map at all. In truth, with his cultivation, once he had traversed this route even once, he would be able to make the journey alone the second time without any trouble.

While the others were still studying the map, some had already stopped to rest and eat.

As for Zhang Pu, he now began to concentrate and quietly examine the other, more concealed team. Why call this team concealed? Because Zhang Pu had secretly noticed something strange.

At first glance, anyone not especially observant would likely assume they were merely a loose collection of drifters gathered from Black Dragon Town, much like the families that had sent people to join the expedition—superficially united, yet inwardly divided.

But in truth, the minds of these four or five people were as one. Their outward form may have been scattered, but their spirit was not. That was the very core of their team, and Zhang Pu had carefully discerned this in secret.

Even so, he still saw that two of them often huddled together, whispering among themselves.

Zhang Pu thought to himself: these people are definitely up to something. Could they be after nothing more than that Black Dragon in Poison Dragon Pool?

He was, at any rate, somewhat suspicious.

Earlier, he had also instructed Liu Yingde to inquire with Divine Healer Li about this group. Since these people had originally seemed to be brought by Divine Healer Li, probably no one besides him knew their background clearly.

Divine Healer Li had told Liu Yingde that he did not actually know them personally. They had been introduced by an old-established gentry family in Black Dragon Town, and according to that man, the leader of the group was an old acquaintance from his younger days of training abroad.

At one moment, Zhang Pu studied the supposed leader of the group very carefully and saw that he was probably around forty-five, extremely composed and capable. Forty-five would not ordinarily be considered old in the modern age; it might even be called relatively young middle age, since people now aged more slowly. Yet Zhang Pu could still see the weathering of time etched across his face.

Ordinary people would not notice such marks of age, but Zhang Pu could. He had lived two lives, and on top of that had spent a thousand years in the various star realms of the cultivation world. So when his gaze turned sharp, it became truly sharp indeed. It did not merely see the weathering on another man’s face; it could even pierce straight into the very essence of a person’s heart.

After seeing that weathering of years, Zhang Pu further concluded that this man had not spent a little time training abroad, but had in fact done so for much of his life. Was his bringing people to Poison Dragon Pool this time also a form of training?

From this, Zhang Pu further judged that the man was absolutely formidable.

The middle-aged man had dark skin and a broad face. He was not especially handsome, but neither was he ugly. His body was powerfully built, fully comparable to the two burly middle-aged men under Old Master Zeng Guoxing, Wang Gang and Zhou Yu.

In fact, Zhang Pu let his gaze rest on the middle-aged man only briefly before moving on. He knew that if his eyes lingered too long on such a person, it would certainly arouse suspicion.

That was right: Zhang Pu currently looked like a student, and in itself that was like a natural veil, a kind of blind that could hide a master. To be honest, how many of the people present actually knew he was a master? Aside from Liu Yingde and the two capable subordinates of the Witch Ghost Sect, even Guang Cai, Caihua, and Divine Healer Li—though Liu Yingde had introduced Zhang Pu to them as his junior uncle—still tended to think this: even if Zhang Pu really had some ability, a child-student like him could never possibly be stronger than Liu Yingde and the like.

People like Divine Healer Li and the others might not be able to see through Zhang Pu, but some experts were different. A master’s powers of observation were exceedingly keen, especially for that seasoned expert Zhang Pu had just been watching. Zhang Pu could not even be sure that, along the way, some tiny clue might already have stirred a ripple in that man’s mind.

The more Zhang Pu thought about him, the more he felt that man was no ordinary figure.

Zhang Pu even tried to estimate the other man’s combat strength.

He still did not know exactly which school of martial arts the man practiced, but judging from his latent strength, even if he had not reached the level of a grandmaster, he was likely among the finest within the ranks of martial arts experts.

In secret, after observing the leader of that group, Zhang Pu also swept his gaze across the other four members under him.