Chapter 876: Investigation

The immense Mount Torch Dragon trembled slightly, followed by a deep, hoarse voice. “I’ve been cultivating in seclusion here for countless years, and even my body has turned to stone. On the decree of the Sacred Emperor, I hid my soul in my body and never once did I come out to cause any trouble. How would I know what happened in the outside world?”

Wu Qi looked down at Torch Dragon’s colossal body and said coldly, “It’s not up to you to say whether you know anything or not. Senior, please reveal your soul in the human form and stay in jail for some time. Otherwise, you will perish today in both body and soul.”

Torch Dragon slightly twisted his body in rage, causing the ground to shake violently. Even the great hall was swaying as if it were about to collapse. “You ignorant punk! Who gave you the guts to bully me like this?” Torch Dragon roared furiously. “Do you really think that just because the Sacred Emperor has imprisoned me here, I can be freely humiliated by you?”

Wu Qi said nothing but waved toward the sky. Immediately, 108 blue swords transformed into towering light beams and descended from the sky, slowly approaching Torch Dragon’s body. Fierce sword intents whistled through the void, hacking at the few-miles-thick layers of rock that had piled over the dragon’s body throughout the long years, reducing them to the finest dust. Soon, the body of a dragon, dark-purple and densely covered in huge and heavy scales, was revealed.

The crowd could now clearly see the real look of Mount Torch Dragon. It was an immensely huge Torch Dragon with his body coiled up, and his head was placed right in the middle. The hall Great Yu used to hold court in was sitting right on top of a huge torch that stuck up from his head.

The torch was emanating a strong Primal aura. Apparently, it was a unique artifact produced in the Chaotic World. Bronze in color, it was not made of gold, iron, stone, or jade. In fact, it was not made of any materials of the five elements. However, its surface had a faint metallic sheen. A column of fire, about a thousand feet in diameter and ten thousand feet in height, towered from it, and the great hall was suspended atop this fire.

The square the great hall was built on was a whole block of hard rock. Countless complex formation diagrams and runes were engraved on its underside; thousands of ‘Yuan Stones’, each as large as a water bucket and colorless, were embedded in them. They were constantly drawing the flame from the torch and sending the infinite power into the surrounding formation diagrams.

Wu Qi’s eyes flickered. With his current attainment in the field of formations, he could easily tell that the huge torch was the heart of the formation. It was used as the driving force to trigger the power of the Yuan Stones, which was then used to control the operation of Liangzhu’s defensive formation. If something went wrong with this torch, Emperor Haozun would not be able to control the formation.

After thinking for a brief moment, his gaze swept across the thousands of Yuan Stones. The so-called Yuan Stones were actually the first batch of energy stones condensed from the infinite chaotic energy when Pangu was creating the world. Each one of them contained an endless energy and could be used as the energy core of any divine-grade formation that was capable of posing a fatal threat to Dao Reasoning experts.

This formation was embedded with thousands of them. Wu Qi could not help but sigh in his heart, marveling at the formation’s terrible power.

Even as he was sighing, he kept on pushing the swords down toward the dragon’s body. Sword intents clashed violently against the scales, leaving countless tiny scratches across them while sending bright sparks flying in all directions and filling the air with loud rumbles. Torch Dragon’s body quivered slightly, and an ancient, suffocating aura rose to the sky.

“Fine, I’ll do as you say. Listen, punk! If you can’t find out my involvement in His Majesty’s murder, don’t blame me for being rude to you!”

Amidst Torch Dragon’s exasperated roar, a beam of bright light rushed out of his forehead and quickly materialized into a three-feet-tall old man, his hair and beard both white. He was all skin and bones, looking like a mummy; but, he had a pair of bright, piercing eyes. A sun was spinning slowly in his right eye and a moon in his left, both emitting blinding rays. No one could look into his eyes except Wu Qi.

The Primal Dharma Eyes and the Sun and Moon Divine Eyes met with each other in midair. Wu Qi felt needles in his eyes as tears trickled down his face, while Torch Dragon staggered back a step with sparks darting out of his eyes. Both men snorted coldly at the same time. The old man clasped his hands behind his back and held his head up high, assuming a proud look. Wu Qi, on the other hand, made a gesture. With that, Princess Zhang Le hurried over to Torch Dragon and inserted 360 Soul Imprisoning Nails into the various vital meridian nodes throughout his body.

As soon as the needles got in his body, the sun and moon in his eyes quickly dimmed down. His body swayed, and a streak of purple-gold blood dribbled down from the corner of his mouth. Torch Dragon stared at the princess in horror. He tried to open his mouth as he wanted to say something, but he was unable to do so as all of his strength had left him. Princess Zhang Le, who had inherited the Primordial Dao of Divinity, mastered numerous bizarre curses and spells. So, even though Torch Dragon was a mighty figure, she was able to turn him into a harmless sheep.

Wu Qi gave Torch Dragon a deep look and then cried out, “Somebody, put Torch Dragon in jail. I want him under strict supervision. Ao Buzun, Lord Xiansheng, you are in charge of his safety, and that of the other suspects.”

Ao Buzun walked up to Torch Dragon and lifted him up with a hand. Looking at the old man’s white hair and white beard, he said, “Why another male dragon?” As he mumbled complaints under his breath, beads of cold sweat could be seen breaking out of Torch Dragon’s forehead.

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Cupping his fist at the Kings of the council, Wu Qi said in a deep voice, “My Lords, please allow me to command Liangzhu’s Punishment Court. I will not touch those higher-ranking officers. I just need help from ordinary investigators and spies.

In Great Yu, Punishment Court targeted the descendants of the powerful clans more, punishing those who violated the laws. Sometimes, for the sake of their own interests, the powerful clans in Great Yu would carry out deeds that were in violation of Great Yu’s laws, such as using civilians for blood sacrifices. Whenever such things happened, the Punishment Court would punish the clan severely.

Apart from that, the Punishment Court would also punish immortals and itinerant cultivators who had caused troubles. If there were immortals or itinerant cultivators who tortured Great Yu’s people, the Punishment Army would be dispatched to hunt them down.

To be precise, the Punishment Court was an organization specializing in violence and espionage. It had countless expert detectives who served as Great Yu’s hunting dogs and falcons; they cultivated specialized techniques and were best at tracking and torturing. They could squeeze out all the information they needed even from a soul that had disintegrated completely.

In order for Wu Qi to solve the murder of Emperor Haozun, it was necessary for him to draw on the Punishment Court’s expertise. All the Kings of the council knew that, and they certainly would not say no to his request. It was nothing compared to the unlimited power they had given him.

At Wu Qi’s order, countless experts from Liangzhu’s Punishment Court were quickly assembled, and were sent into the God’s Jail located in the heart of the Secret Palace together with all the suspects.

The so-called God’s Jail was the jail used to imprison Gods. In ancient times, humans and Gods fought for control of this world. Whenever humans captured defeated Gods, they imprisoned them in this jail and used cruel tortures to dig out all the magic, divine abilities, and everything the Gods knew. Many of the mystic arts practiced in Great Yu’s Directorate of Celestials could be traced back to Ancient Gods, and ninety percent of them actually came from the God’s Jail.

It was a dreadful place from where even the mighty Ancient Gods could not escape, and also the most frightening place for the powerful clans of Great Yu.

While Wu Qi was traveling to God’s Jail with a host of men through a special teleportation formation, King Xin Shan brought the Flying Bear Army—comprising of over a million soldiers—into the imperial palace. He was going to honor his own words and search every inch of the palace for clues related to Emperor Haozun’s murder. However, as the imperial palace stretched tens of thousands of miles long, his great army was like a handful of beans in a great lake. It was almost impossible for him to find any clues.

It was obvious to others that King Xin Shan was only putting on a show. If he could do that, why couldn’t others? Soon, King Li Shan and several other princes who wanted to make an effort to take over the throne also brought their armies into the palace, searching for clues everywhere. If it had not been for King Yang Shan and the other Kings supervising the situation, preventing them from making too much of a fuss, the entire imperial palace might have been turned over by them with magic.

In God’s Jail, Wu Qi ordered the investigators and spies from the Punishment Court to torture the detainees. Soon, plenty of clues were presented to him.

First, the Human Emperor’s edicts were made with unique materials by a special office, and each of them had a serial number. The secret edict that said Emperor Haozun was passing the throne to King Yang Shan was indeed a genuine edict, according to its serial number. However, the chief eunuch in charge of the blank edicts died of a serious illness years ago, and there was no record of where this edict was used.

Secondly, on the night Emperor Haozun was murdered, the imperial guards on duty outside the great hall disappeared. Thousands of imperial guards vanished from the well-guarded palace. But, their disappearance went unnoticed, and their names were not included in the roster for the next few days. The generals responsible for arranging the guard rotation had also disappeared in the past few days.

Thirdly, the eunuchs on duty on the same night at the palace’s front gate, the second gate, third gate, all the way to the various halls and sentry posts, had also vanished. Wu Qi had requested the Secret Palace’s revered elders to search them with mystic arts, but to no avail.

Wu Qi was not in the mood to speak politely to the detainees, so he ordered the Punishment Court to interrogate them with the most direct method—soul searching. Because of that, all kinds of information and clues were quickly extracted. With those three main clues as the core, bits of disconnected information, including rumors, were quickly put together, bringing him closer to the truth.

Just as the Punishment Court’s experts were dealing with those small fishes and shrimps, Wu Qi and Princess Zhang Le came to Torch Dragon’s soul with a group of fierce generals. With a smile on his face, he nodded at the old man, who was tightly bound to a torture instrument, and said, “Old Senior, I know you know something. Tell me, and I will send you into transmigration, but if you don’t tell me, I will cut you up inch by inch!”

Torch Dragon looked at Wu Qi with wide eyes and shook his head contemptuously.

“I don’t know anything!”