Chapter 59: Revenge
Cheng Mingxiang’s face became serious as he heard the student yell. Taking the letter from him, Cheng Mingxiang began to rip open the letter.
As he read the contents of the letter, Cheng Mingxiang’s face grew darker and darker as his eyes began to show a raging anger within them.
Seeing Cheng Mingxiang’s reaction, the youth who had just sparred with him asked cautiously, “Lord Cheng, what is the matter, has something bad happened over at the sect?”
Clenching his hand together to become a fist, the letter became a crumpled up ball of paper as Cheng Mingxiang grew angrier and angrier. The look in his eye had already evolved to contain a look of extreme hatred.
“Changyang Xiang Tian…” Cheng Mingxiang gnashed at his teeth as his fingers clenched tightly into his palms. Just by looking at him one could tell just how angry he was.
Hearing Cheng Mingxiang mentioned Changyang Xiang Tian’s name, the youth grew even more confused. Opening his mouth to ask once more, he said, “Lord Cheng, what in the world has happened?”
Cheng Mingxiang growled with a dark voice, “His Majesty has just betrothed Princess Ge Lan to Changyang Xiang Tian, and has already officiated it.”
The youth’s face changed when he heard him. He knew that Cheng Mingxiang had fond feelings for the princess. Ever since Cheng Mingxiang had first seen her at the imperial palace, he had essentially placed her beauty on the same level as a goddess and developed a deep crush on her. Since then, he had been unable to get over those feelings.
Within Cheng Mingxiang’s own heart, he had already marked Princess Ge Lan as his own. After all, within the Gesun Kingdom, he was the only suitable match for a princess like her. Whether it be familial background or his own cultivation talent, Cheng Mingxiang was not at all lacking in these 2 fields. With his Hua Yun Sect, they had power that almost rivaled the power of the royal family of the Gesun Kingdom. Within the sect itself, Cheng Mingxiang’s status was majestic beyond any other person.
In the past, Cheng Mingxiang had wanted his parents to ask for the princess’s hand in marriage from the emperor multiple times, but his parents had continuously wanted him to focus on cultivation instead. They didn’t want his cultivation to be interrupted by a girl in the end.
His parents refusal to help him propose to the princess had made him resentful, but he didn’t say anything. For in his mind, Cheng Mingxiang had decided that Princess Ge Lan was already his and that no one else would be able to snatch her away from him. After all, within the Gesun Kingdom, there was no one else worthy of Princess Ge Lan, causing him to feel safe.
But he didn’t expect at all to meet someone else in Kargath Academy that was no weaker than himself. Changyang Xiang Tian’s gift at cultivation had exceeded his own, and he had even taken over Cheng Mingxiang’s title of Kargath Academy’s number 1 cultivation genius. Not only did he steal that, but Changyang Xiang Tian had even stolen away his one love, causing Cheng Mingxiang to be unable to endure this any longer.
The youth that fought against Cheng Mingxiang cautiously looked at him before whispering, “My lord, what do you plan to do now?”
Cheng Mingxiang’s eyes flashed with a murderous tint as he snarled, “Princess Ge Lan is mine, within the Gesun Kingdom, only I am suitable to be married to her.” His voice was filled with an unquenchable hatred, “Sha La, bring some people over, we shall head towards Changyang Xiang Tian. This time, we will definitely teach him a lesson on trying to steal someone else’s woman.”
“Yes, my lord.” The youth immediately scurried off in order to gather about people.
Due to Cheng Mingxiang’s strength, he had quickly amassed a large group of people. There were at least 16 of them and all were from noble families and had reached Sainthood. Not only that, but the majority of these people had their monster cores taken from them by Jian Chen, causing them to fail the assignment in the forest. So because of that, they all harbored a grudge towards him; and when Cheng Mingxiang had started to gather people, each one of them eagerly signed up to take part in this.
Among the group, there were two other people Jian Chen was very familiar with. They were Luo Jian of the Luo Clan and Ka Di Yun of the Ka Di Clan.
Cheng Mingxiang gave a steady glance at everyone, a great big smile on his face. “Good, there’s plenty of people here. Even if we were to turn Changyang Xiang Tian into a cripple, the Changyang Clan wouldn’t dare say anything. The people gathered here today have no small amount of influence, even the emperor would get a headache if he were to try protecting Changyang Xiang Tian.”
Cheng Mingxiang was confident that he could beat Changyang Xiang Tian in a fair battle, but now that His Majesty had officially declared the wedding between Changyang Xiang Tian and Princess Ge Lan, his status was like black and white compared to before. Not only did he have the backing of the Changyang Clan, but now he had the royal family supporting him. With this combination, even Cheng Mingxiang who had a considerable amount of power and influence would need to think carefully before planning. If he wanted to teach a simple lesson, then there would not be as big a problem, but Cheng Mingxiang didn’t think it would be that easy. So for that reason, he had called many influential people to join him. With a coalition of power like this, the emperor would have to think twice before investigating. The Changyang Clan itself didn’t even have a voice at all against this group.
“Sha La, immediately fetch someone to go look for Changyang Xiang Tian’s location. Remember, this should not be let out at all. If the vice headmaster or the headmaster find out about it, all of our plans will be ruined.” Cheng Mingxiang ordered his training partner.
“Yes, my Lord.”
Afterwards, Sha La either directly spent money or relied on connections within the academy to secretly hear of Changyang Xiang Tian’s immediate location. At the same time, he also dispatched quite a few of his trusted people to search the entire academy.
It was extremely calm within Kargath Academy; nothing had been riled up by Cheng Mingxiang and his group of people’s movements.
Two hours later, the 20 students that Sha La had dispatched all returned, one by one.
“Lord Cheng, we’ve searched the entire Kargath Academy, but there was no signs of Changyang Xiang Tian.” A person reported to him.
Cheng Mingxiang frowned and said, “How is that possible? Could it be that Changyang Xiang Tian is not currently within the academy?”
“I’ve heard Changyang Xiang Tian loved to read in the library, have you searched that building yet?” Luo Jian asked from the side. Although Luo Jian had been stabbed by Jian Chen, the medicine had healed his body back to the point of it being as good as new.
“We’ve also searched the library. Changyang Xiang Tian isn’t there.” The leader of the search continued.
At that moment, a slightly chubby youth said, “I heard that Changyang Xiang Tian is the Freshmen Ruler. The Freshmen Ruler has the special privilege of being able to enter the library’s first 5 levels. Could it be that Changyang Xiang Tian is hiding within the 5th level? If that really is true, then we can only wait until he comes out before we act.”
Hearing their fellow student, everyone in the group nodded, what that person had said had some logic behind it.
The leader in charge of the search shook his head and said, “That can’t be. I already asked the janitor lady within the library; she said that Changyang Xiang Tian didn’t enter the library at all today.”
“Could it be Changyang Xiang Tian is truly not within the academy grounds?” Cheng Mingxiang frowned.
At that moment, another student hesitated slightly before saying, “Lord Cheng, although we didn’t find Changyang Xiang Tian, we did discover that Changyang Hu is in the eastern grove. Changyang Hu is Changyang Xiang Tian’s older brother; I feel like he might know of Changyang Xiang Tian’s whereabouts.”
Luo Jian’s eyes lit up, but his expression soon fell again. He had just remembered everything that had happened that night; the monster cores in his possession had all been stolen from the Changyang brothers and Tie Ta. Although he didn’t dare to get revenge on Tie Ta, he wasn’t afraid of the consequences of confronting Changyang Xiang Tian’s brother Changyang Hu
“Not bad, Changyang Hu definitely knows where Changyang Xiang Tian went. I recommend that we go ask him.” Luo Jian said in a lower voice, his eyes flashing dangerously.
“Alright, we’ll go find Changyang Hu first.”
Everyone else quickly agreed with Luo Jian’s suggestion. For the sake of not attracting other students’ attentions, a dozen of them split with the group and took different paths towards the eastern grove.
When the dozen of them rushed to the grove, they saw that Changyang Hu was still there, practicing his martial arts.
At the sight of Changyang Hu, Luo Jian’s eyes immediately burned in hatred, as if he could spit out flames. Perhaps Changyang Hu was too absorbed in his practice, but he didn’t sense Cheng Mingxiang’s people’s arrival.
Cheng Mingxiang’s group of people walked up to Changyang Hu, and in unison, they stood in a circle surrounding him. Realizing this, Changyang Hu finally awoke from his concentration. By the time he had reacted, he had already been surrounded by dozens of students
Changyang Hu’s gaze surveyed his surroundings. After he saw the expressions on the other party’s faces, his heart skipped a beat as he had a bad premonition. Especially after he saw Luo Jian’s hatred-filled glare towards him, Changyang Hu’s expression could not help but grow heavy.
“What do you guys want?” Changyang Hu said. Despite the dozen or so people surrounding him, his face still did not show a single trace of fear.
Luo Jian sneered, “Changyang Hu, do you not remember what happened in the forest a few days ago?” His face grew dark as he spoke and glared at him. “Your group dared to steal my three days worth of hard work and caused me to fail. For this slight, I will definitely pay you back an eye for an eye.”
Changyang Hu snorted, and his gaze at Luo Jian showed no trace of fear as he coldly said, “Luo Jian, that was trouble that you had brought onto yourself; there’s no way we are to blame for what happened. If you hadn’t first tried to steal our monster cores, then the following events wouldn’t have occurred. Everything was your own fault; if you want to blame something, you can only blame your lack of strength. You even got defeated by my fourth brother, who hadn’t even reached Sainthood yet.” Changyang Hu mocked, as he looked at Luo Jian in disdain.
“You…” Luo Jian was momentarily so indignant at Changyang Hu’s response that he couldn’t respond. The event that had occurred that night in the forest was a humiliation that he would never be able to wipe from his memory. Despite his strength as a middle-ranked Saint level, he had lost to a freshman that hadn’t yet become a Saint. In addition, the monster cores that he had spent 3 days of painstaking efforts to collect had all been taken away. This result was definitely something that the Young Master of the Luo clan couldn’t accept.
If word of his humiliation reached the clan, then Luo Jian would not be able to hold his head up high in the future.