Chapter 312: I am the Bandit Chief

“I am the Bandit Chief!”

The string of words created by the fireworks was the center of attention for many of the observers. Pointing up at it, many of them whispered to one another while several of the younger kids pointed and laugh as if to mock the one who set it off for taking himself to be so ‘awesome’.

“Yunfei, what’s wrong?”

Tang Xinyun asked, confused why Bai Yunfei was so surprised.

But he responded only after the fireworks faded away from sight. Still with an odd look on his face, he said, “I….Xinyun, did you see what that firework said?”

“Eh? Are you talking about the one with the strange words?” Tang Xinyun smiled, “I did. ‘Bandit chief’....the chief of all bandits. Haha, what an interesting man that person is.”

“I, er, I think I know who that person is.”

“Oh? Who is it?”

“You know this person as well.” Bai Yunfei looked back up to the sky. “If my guess is correct, that person is Jing Mingfeng.”

“Jing Mingfeng?” Tang Xinyun repeated in surprise, “It’s him? He’s here in Mo City too?”

“That’s what I think.” Bai Yunfei nodded. “How ‘arrogant’ he’s gotten. If he’s bored to the point of this, I’m sure he’s trying to find something fun to do. I’d like to see him again if that’s the case!”

“Haha, I agree...but it’s a shame he doesn’t know we’re here, so it’d be nice if we come across him sooner or later.” Tang Xinyun hadn’t a bad impression of Jing Mingfeng since she knew Bai Yunfei and him were good friends, also, she wanted to meet such an interesting person again herself.

“That guy likes hiding his soulforce and changes his face all the time. Unless he sees us first, us finding him will be unlikely. If we’ve nothing else to do, we should take a stroll around the city and see if we can find him.” Bai Yunfei laughed.

Later that night, the banquet was now officially over. Some of the guests had matters to attend to still, so they left straight away to return to their homes. Some of the guests were just younglings with nothing to do, so they decided to find some friends and look around the city to see the sights for the next few days; of the friends they invited, Tang Zhi was one of them.

There were a few young masters that were especially charmed by Kout Tingting, but they were each politely rebuffed by her when asked.

Tang Xinyun on the other hand, had no one come ask her. Whether it was because of her status as the daughter of the Tang, or the fact that Bai Yunfei was right next to her, no one bothered to even ‘bother’ her.

Bai Yunfei himself didn’t bother to try and talk with anyone else from the Tang. It was perchance due to the fact how the Tang was treating him or Tang Xinyun, but Bai Yunfei’s opinion on them were slightly negative. They might’ve treated him with more respect than before, but even that wouldn’t be enough to make Bai Yunfei forget about what happened to him before today.

Each time Tang Xinyun spoke about her ‘home’ in the past, she’d always look quite troubled or even hurt from the memories. Bai Yunfei never forgotten about it, so he was disinclined to approach her family. Other than Chu Qingxue or Zhao Mancha, Bai Yunfei wouldn’t even bother trying to talk to the married-in families like the Hua, or even Tang Xinyun’s brother Tang Jing. He was especially displeased with how they treated and hurt Tang Xinyun in the past.

On the way back, Chu Qingxue continued to talk and smile with her daughter with the same gentle expression as usual—or at least that’s how Bai Yunfei felt about it.

They continued to be lost in their own world even when they returned to the courtyards. With how close the mother and daughter were talking, Bai Yunfei saw fit to return to his room by himself.

“Today’s affairs seemed to have changed the Tang’s opinion on Xinyun and her mother a bit….”

On top of his bed, Bai Yunfei could finally relax a bit. If Tang Xinyun and her mother could live happily at home now, this would be the best case scenario.

“But...that step mother is weird….she looked like a fussy mother for the entire banquet and treated auntie Chu like she’d treat a sister.” Bai Yunfei thought, “Xinyun wouldn’t lie though. Hua Binbai was more than willing to tell her what he thought too, so does this mean her personality today was completely fake?”

Upon reaching that final verdict, Bai Yunfei had a strange look on his face, “If that’s the case, that woman is terrifying….”

He shook his head, “No matter the case, as long as the Tang knows that Tang Xinyun has the backing of the Crafting School, they won’t treat her too badly then. I shouldn’t interfere anymore with her family and see how things will go for her now….

“As long as Xinyun’s happy with her mother, that’s fine. If someone else tries to start anything with her, I’ll deal with them.” Bai Yunfei thought back to how Hua Binbai had completely disrespected her and her mother before he dealt with him. Spending the entire day with her mother made Tang Xinyun happy and seemingly allowed her to forget about the sadness she felt from losing her essence fireseed.

“I should be able to relax for now and upgrade some accessories for now. If I let the essence fireseed in the Cataclysmic Seal ‘reawaken’, then I’ll have to go back to those low success rates from before….”

Starting that day after the banquet, Bai Yunfei spent most of his times living in peace in the Tang residence. During the day, he’d go with Tang Xinyun and the others out to the city and enjoy the sights. At night, he’d hole himself in his room and focus on upgrading the equipment to his hearts desire.

In the following days, Bai Yunfei noticed that the amount of people in Mo City was growing by the day. The majority of them were soul cultivators that came into the city either by themselves or in groups. Some of them looked as though they belonged to a major house or school even.

These people were all here for the auction house planned by the Tang.

Seven days later after the banquet.

Under the guidance of Tang Jing, Bai Yunfei, Zhao Xiluo, and the others were lead to a place named the ‘Treasure Trove’. Upon seeing the auction house, Bai Yunfei finally realized just how grand in scale the auction would be.

Inside the Treasure Trove, the entire interior of the place was decorated similarly to how a theater would look. Rows of chairs and tables lined up the place with a large wooden podium at the very front of the place. All around the area, servants from the Tang worked and rushed left and right as they tried to accomplish their tasks.

There weren’t many people there when Bai Yunfei’s group arrived, but after they took their spots at a table near the front on the right side of the room, the place started to fill up. Servants from the Tang started to usher people to their seats, and soon enough, the entire place was lively with excitement.

Some of the guests started to speak with the ones they knew while other guests sat down quietly and waited for the auction to start. But every single guest there was without exception a very strong soul cultivator. Bai Yunfei could sense that the weakest person gathered nearby was a Soul Sprite at the very least. There were plenty of Soul Ancestors, but more importantly, there were even a few people Bai Yunfei couldn’t even tell how strong they were.

This was the very first time Bai Yunfei came across such a large gathering of people of such strong strengths. He was curious most especially and measured up the area around him constantly.

“No wonder the Tang are known as one of the Five Clans. If the auction they hold can have so many people like this, I wonder just how amazing the items will be….”