Chapter 3639 — Three Questions

Lu Bianren gave a bitter laugh and retreated to one side. Had Zhao Hongbo scolded him sharply right then and there, nothing would have come of it afterward—after all, cursing out one's own child in front of outsiders was really a form of protecting them.

But now this Fourth Elder said not a word and only put it off for later. So once he returned to Azure Cloud Pavilion, there was no telling how he might be taken to task; perhaps before long he would not even be able to keep the empty title of Third Pavilion Master of Welcoming Pavilion!

This was something not only Lu Bianren himself knew full well—beside him, Pavilion Master Hu Yunfeng and Vice Pavilion Master Feng Song wore smug smiles as well. This was a trap the two of them had set together, and this was precisely the result they had wanted!

After this interlude, the open instruction day had drawn to its close. Everyone assumed they could now disperse, but unexpectedly Wei Zhao stepped forward and walked up before the three Elders. "Elder Zhao, this disciple has not yet asked his three questions. I wonder whether the Elder's earlier promise still stands?"

The crowd was momentarily stunned, and then every gaze in the hall fell upon Wei Zhao, each pair of eyes brimming with amusement and curiosity.

Although this Wei Zhao was the most useless of the Azure Cloud Pavilion newcomers, the various affairs that had come before—especially his clash with Xu Lingchong, the young master Xu—had made his name exceedingly prominent among this year's newcomers, surpassing even that of Kang Zhaoming, a lackey of Xu Lingchong's own inner circle.

Moreover, it was said that this man's strength was by no means weak; he could defeat a peak Heaven-Rank expert in a single move. Compared with those old-timers of the Mystic Mechanism Pavilion, such strength was scarcely inferior, so there should be considerable value in hearing him ask his questions.

Wei Zhao looked around. Under normal circumstances the newcomers of the three tiered pavilions would ask their questions separately, but now the newcomers of all three pavilions were present together, and even the great personages like Xu Yuanzheng were there. Faced with such an occasion, an ordinary person of timid disposition would likely have trembling legs and be unable even to speak coherently.

Yet Wei Zhao paid it no mind at all, and immediately asked, "This disciple is a newcomer transmitted up from the secular world. Might I ask the Elders: after we ascend to Cloud Terrace Island, can those unconscious inheritors be healed, and how must they be healed?"

Wei Zhao had asked Poor Bastard Senior Brother this question before, but Poor Bastard Senior Brother was, after all, only a lowly minor steward. At his level he could at best have a smattering of understanding of such matters, and as for how to heal the inheritors, he could not say anything definite either—Wei Zhao could only rely on his own conjecture.

But what Poor Bastard Senior Brother did not know, these lofty Elders certainly must know. Their strength and station determined that they could grasp information ordinary people could never touch, so with the grand opportunity of this instruction day, Wei Zhao naturally had to get to the bottom of it.

And this, too, was precisely why he had insisted on reserving his right to ask questions.

Hearing this, Zhao Hongbo was somewhat taken aback, a look of surprise on his face, for to ninety-nine out of a hundred newcomers, such a rare and hard-won opportunity would surely be spent on questions of vital importance to their cultivation, never on trivial matters. In the eyes of ordinary people this was nothing short of a waste of heaven's bounty!

Still, the open instruction day had never stipulated that one must ask questions related to cultivation, and because Xu Lingchong had spoken to him beforehand, Zhao Hongbo was quite content to let Wei Zhao squander the opportunity himself. After all, this was in full view of everyone; even if he wished to target Wei Zhao, he could not irresponsibly spout nonsense, or he would leave behind a fatal handle against himself.

"Those inheritors fell unconscious because their divine sense was damaged during transmission, turning them into mindless vegetables. As for how to heal them, so far as I know only one person has ever done such a thing—the great Master Zhang Liju, the Divine Physician of the Pill and the Sage of Healing. Many years ago he healed his wife, Great Master Bing, and Great Master Xue," Zhao Hongbo answered.

Though he was a radical who staunchly advocated banning the experts of the secular world, toward a legendary figure like Zhang Liju he held the same admiration as everyone else—only this did not prevent him from remaining steadfast in his convictions.

For Zhang Liju was, after all, an exceptional case among the very few; the vast majority of cultivators who came up from the secular world were weak in strength and generally of vile temperament, wasting resources while contributing almost nothing. To Cloud Terrace Island they were pests with no benefit whatsoever, and in his view they ought rightly to be banned.

So it really is Zhang Liju I must seek! Zhao Hongbo's answer confirmed Wei Zhao's earlier conjecture and made him breathe a sigh of relief. However it went, since there had been a precedent of successful healing, there was hope!

"Then how may this disciple get to see Great Master Zhang Liju?" Wei Zhao asked on.

"It is said that Great Master Zhang Liju resides on the Central Island. Only if you become an inner disciple of the three tiered pavilions will you have the chance to go to the Central Island on assignments. But a lofty figure like Great Master Zhang Liju is ever elusive as a dragon showing its head but never its tail; even if you went to the Central Island, the likelihood of seeing him is next to zero. There is, however, another opportunity: when the Central Island holds its grand tournament to select disciples, if you can enter the Five Luminaries Sect founded by Great Master Zhang Liju, that might raise your chances a little."

Zhao Hongbo answered in painstaking detail, and seeing that Wei Zhao seemed about to ask more, he cut him off with a half-smile. "All right, that already makes the third question. That will do, yes?"

That was it? The newcomers watching from the sidelines broke into an uproar. They had been hoping to hear something useful, and what did they get? Wei Zhao had not asked a single question related to cultivation; all three questions were mere gossip, of no benefit to them at all.

At this, even Wei Zhao himself was somewhat dumbfounded.

After all, this was the instruction day; to better help the newcomers of their own pavilions, the Elders under normal circumstances would generally answer newcomers' doubts as far as possible, and would not even begrudge an extra question or two as an exception. But this Zhao Hongbo—he had simply taken a single question, split it into pieces, and counted it as three. For a Fourth Elder of Azure Cloud Pavilion to be so miserly was truly a rare sight.

"This guy is a total idiot! With such a grand opportunity, he goes and asks idiotic questions like that! He's beyond saving!"

Xu Lingchong, Meng Jueming, and their crowd burst into laughter. They had earlier schemed to keep Zhao Hongbo from answering Wei Zhao's cultivation questions, and in the end Zhao Hongbo had answered anyway for the sake of appearances—only to find that Wei Zhao had asked such idiotic questions, wasting the opportunity all on his own.

With that pitiful intelligence, there was no need to go to such lengths to trap a man like this. What a waste it was that their whole crowd had racked their brains—looking back now, it had been utterly superfluous.

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