Lin Mu almost froze upon seeing the shocking scene. There was a masked man standing behind Bilao who was calmly mediating without a care in the world.
The thing is, he should have woken up but there was no spirit Qi fluctuation coming from the masked man either.
Lin Mu’s mind worked at the speed of lighting, and he disappeared from his position before appearing beside the masked man. He extended his hands and quickly grabbed onto the masked man. One hand was on his head and the other on the sword blade that was approaching Bilao’s neck.
A brown glow appeared on Lin Mu’s hand as it defended against the sharp edge of the blade. The masked man though, was absolutely bewildered. Out of nowhere, someone had appeared beside him and grabbed onto him.
He tried to resist, but the man’s grip was extremely strong, not letting him budge. His struggle was short lived though, as in the next moment he felt like he lost control of his body and his vision went dark.
The masked man disappeared from the real world and Lin Mu immediately used fade to enter the parallel world.
"WHO!!!" Alchemist Bilao suddenly woke up with a shout as he felt the movement of spirit Qi in his room.
His eyes darted around as he looked for an intruder. His shout was loud enough that the guards that were outside came rushing in soon.
"QUICK! TO ALCHEMIST BILAO’S ROOM!" The guards shouted.
They all barged into the room only to find it empty except for Bilao who had a confused expression on his face.
"Senior Bilao, did something happen?" The guard asked, seeing no one in the room.
Bilao didn’t answer right away and spread his spirit sense around, unable to find anyone there.
"No... nothing." Bilao answered.
"Why did you shout then?" The guards questioned.
"I thought I felt someone, but no one is here. Must’ve been my imagination." Bilao answered.
The guard leader didn’t feel at ease though, and asked the others to check the area. A few minutes later, they all came back to report.
"What did you find?" The guard leader asked.
"Sir, a lot of the other guards who were supposed to patrol the streets are missing. At least the ones in our block are gone." The guards reported.
"WHAT! Where are they?" The guard leader asked.
"We don’t know, sir. I’ve already asked the other guards from the blocks and they don’t know either." The guards replied.
The guard leader’s expression fell, and so did alchemist Bilao’s.
’Did someone really enter?’ Bilao wondered.
Lin Mu who had just saved Bilao though, was quickly getting away as fast as possible from the area. By the time the duration of fade ended, he had already reached the area near his residence. Though he had overshot and appeared in one of the disciple’s residences.
That took inside one of the walls.
The wall that Lin Mu appeared inside was suddenly broken apart as Lin Mu’s body resisted it. A brown glow was visible on his body as it shielded him from any damage. But Lin Mu didn’t pay attention to this first. He checked if there was anyone inside with his spirit sense and took a breath of relief when there was found to be none.
"That was a close call..." Lin Mu muttered to himself as he looked at the broken part of the wall.
"This... I didn’t know the Mortal Strengthening scripture would work too." Lin Mu said, feeling surprised.
If he had normally appeared inside a wall or any other place, while Phase was not active, he would have definitely sustained some flesh injuries as the molecules of the wall would have tried to push his body’s molecules.
"Seems like the Mortal Strengthening scripture is good as a safety net for when you use Fade." Xukong said.
"Maybe for weaker materials wooden wall. If it were something stronger, I’m pretty sure I would have gotten injured." Lin Mu replied.
"Still, it is a good addition that you got to know. Though you should probably leave this place." Xukong suggested.
Lin Mu simply nodded his head and blinked to his own residence. Once he reached there, he looked outside to see if anyone had come to check on the residence that he had just damaged.
Thankfully, it seemed like no one had listened to the noise made by him and he was still undiscovered.
"Looks like someone does not want Alchemist Bilao to live." Xukong spoke.
Lin Mu narrowed his eyes and nodded.
"Don’t know what kind of a storm would have started if Bilao died there. Our plan would have definitely failed had Bilao been killed." Lin Mu said.
Lin Mu then looked at his hands that were still glowing with the brown light of the mortal strengthening scripture.
"Thought appearing inside a wall did drain a lot of durability of the armor. It’s barely at fifty percent." Lin Mu said.
"Oh? Lin Mu you should take a look at this person." Xukong suddenly said in a surprised tone.
Lin Mu then remembered that he still had the masked man inside the mysterious ring. He didn’t have many choices back then. He could either quickly kill the man there with an attack or restrain him.
But the thing was Lin Mu could not let out any spirit Qi fluctuations that were strong, thus he had chosen to forcefully put the masked man inside the ring.
Though Lin Mu knew the man would be killed if he did that. But this was not something he was bothered with, since he was intending to kill another person anyway.
Lin Mu willed it and the body of the masked man appeared on the ground, but his mask was half broken, evidently due to Lin Mu gripping his head too hard. But through the broken part Lin Mu could see the appearance of the person.
"It can’t be..." Lin Mu muttered and quickly took off the rest of the mask.