“As expected, the defense here is much tighter.”

“The defensive protective shield has also changed. Now it is even more rigorous. Also, there is a Heaven-earth Formation hidden in the city walls. Only the Ancient Mine with its abundant resources can provide such a large formation.”

“But none of those can stop me.”

“Now I’m only one step away from the Innateness Realm Last-Stage. Even if I run into Si Nan, I am still confident. Although I can’t defeat him, I will be able to escape, unless he slaughters all the people in the city.”

“Anyway, nothing is more important than my safety. I should be careful not to do anything that I am not absolutely sure of.”

Zhang Han was very determined.

Safety was a priority that always came before resources.

In the past, Zhang Han would believe that the importance of resources was much greater and his safety was only a small part of his concerns.

But ever since he had Zi Yan and Mengmeng, his safety was an important factor, which outweighed the need for the resources.

Nevertheless, there were many times when his safety was at stake as he pursued his cultivation. So, what Zhang Han needed to do was to keep all sorts of risks to the minimum.

Of course, this Dragon Scale City was not a dangerous place in Zhang Han’s eyes. It was just an ordinary city of the Dark Shadow Clan, so it was not a big deal.

“This time is different from the last. I’ve been preparing for this moment for two months. I believe success favors those who are prepared.”

Zhang Han smiled and lingered outside of the city. Finally, he found a group who were delivering ingredients and joined them and managed to sneak successfully into City Lord’s mansion.

The target he chose this time was the leader of a small group of servants.

The servants were responsible for the cleanliness of City Lord’s mansion. They regularly cleaned the public areas, including the Holy Hall, the herb garden and even the Top-grade Crystal Palace.

Although the servants could only see those valuable items from a distance, it was convenient enough for Zhang Han to carry out his task.

Last time, with some prying, Zhang Han learned that each leader of the servant group was in charge of 20 servants. There were a total of 30 such groups, which was under the control of one person. That person was the tall subordinate of Si Nan, who was also his right-hand man.

Servants were generally inconspicuous and they were able to get close to high-end items when doing their chores.

“Mair, why are there still three fallen leaves in Concubine Mu’s garden? How should I punish you if that upsets Concubine Mu?”

The supervisor came to the residence in the outer area and questioned a man who was about 1.9 meters tall and had a nail-sized white speckle on the left cheek.

“My mistake. I’ll clean up Concubine Mu’s garden right away,” Mair cupped his hands in front of his chest and said in haste.

“Humph!”

The supervisor snorted, gazed at him coldly for two seconds and then left with a flick of his sleeves.

He found it a little weird. About this time every year, the leaders of the groups would give him some crystals to please him.

But what was it with Mair?

Had he forgotten the tradition?

All right!

In that case, he’d have to do the jobs of several people in the following days.

“Haha.”

The supervisor was discontented. He was at the God Realm Late-stage, so he did not have too many resources. Taking bribes from his subordinates was a way to get more resources, which was necessary for his cultivation. Recently, he wanted to make a breakthrough. So, he began to be stricter toward his subordinates and managed to get a good haul. However, it was a bit unscrupulous of Mair to forget to give his share of the contribution.

“Go clean up Concubine Mu’s garden again.”

The supervisor would never guess that Mair had already been replaced by another person.

Zhang Han, who now looked exactly like Mair, instantly led the group to the courtyard of Concubine Mu. As there were nearly 400 concubines in the harem, Zhang Han had no idea where Concubine Mu’s place was. Thus, he stayed at the rear and let the subordinates lead the way. It actually spared him a lot of trouble.

These subordinates chatted casually along the way.

Several of them actually expressed their complaints along the way. They said that they had carefully cleaned every inch of the garden already and it was obvious that…

They did not finish that sentence. Anyway, such things should not be said out loud.

“Alas, our leader is also having a rough time. It’s not easy for him to get those crystals. Still, he has to offer up part of them.”

“Be careful with your words. Lately, His Lordship has been in a bad mood. Five people in the Lord Hall have been killed. I don’t know what they did that angered His Lordship.”

“What else can it be other than the incident that happened six months ago? No one knew who did it. Anyway, I heard that a lot of treasures in City Lord’s Mansion have gone missing.”

“The most annoying thing is that soon after His Lordship issued an announcement to the whole world that Concubine Lan was finally expecting, she disappeared. So did Ling Mo. Many people suspect that Ling Mo did it. It’s true that one should not judge a book by its cover. That Ling Mo is really wicked. Now, the Holy Hall, the herb garden and the Top-grade Crystal Palace are all guarded by two masters. His Lordship now trusts no one.”

“I heard that His Lordship does not want to stay in the outer domain anymore. He wishes to return to the King’s Domain. Yet, it seems hard for those who have come out of that place to go back there.”

“…”

Listening to his subordinates, Zhang Han started to muse.

Every place was guarded by two people. However, this time, he did not plan to touch the Top-grade Crystal Palace. It was at the core of the mansion, so getting into that palace would be very difficult. As for the Holy Hall and the herb garden, the odds of success there were relatively more optimistic.

At least, as far as Zhang Han believed, cleaning the places around the two spots would provide good opportunities.

There were a lot of decorations in City Lord’s Mansion. In the vital places, the only thing they needed to clean were those decorations.

As they walked, the conversations gradually quieted down.

Of the two courtyards located on different sides of the road in the front, one must be Concubine Mu’s courtyard.

Sure enough, the group of people turned to the right. About ten minutes later, they entered the garden from the back door only to see two maids with haughty looks on their faces, in the yard.

“Clean every inch of this place again. If we find that you have missed a spot, you’ll be in deep trouble,” one of the maids said harshly.

“Yes.”

Zhang Han responded hurriedly, then looked at those servants and yelled, “Get started on the cleaning. Don’t just stand there. Hurry up!”

The group of people grabbed their cleaning equipment and started to clean the garden.

The place was covered by flowers, grass and trees.

The fallen flowers and leaves on the lawn had to be removed. Some decorations needed to be polished. There were also some pavilion-like buildings that needed cleaning.

After five hours of cleaning, the group went back to their residence. Just after they had something to eat, the supervisor gave them another order.

They were ordered to clean Concubine Feng’s garden.

In the next three days, they worked round the clock and had little time to rest.

The servants began to voice their complaints in private. They all wondered why the leader still had not offered up the crystals as he used to do in the past.

Zhang Han remained silent.

He really did not know that servants had to abide by such a rule. After all, when he came here last time, he had only come into contact with City Lord and the higher-ups.

Since it was his first time to come to this place as a servant, he had to act according to circumstances. After all, refusing to offer bribes was better than giving bribes recklessly.

Just like that, Zhang Han led the group to work in City Lord’s Mansion for five days.

During this period, they received their salaries. Then, the supervisor came again, but Zhang Han still did not offer him anything.

The next day.

“You’re to clean the Holy Hall and the herb garden in the morning and polish the decorations in the Lord Hall in the afternoon.”

As soon as the order was given, Zhang Han laughed while his men cried.

“I don’t want to go there.”

“If anything goes wrong in these two places, we might get killed!”

“How unlucky we are! Leader, what’s the matter with you recently?”

Someone questioned, “You know better than us that you have to offer up the crystals. But why do you insist on going against the supervisor? If you really need crystals for your breakthrough, we can scrape together some. But if you keep going on like this, sooner or later, some of us will get killed. His Lordship is in an irritable mood these days.”

“That’s right. Leader, why don’t you go talk to the supervisor?”

“…”

The task of cleaning up the concubines’ gardens was relatively easy. However, jobs in the Holy Hall and the herb garden were different. Even though there were not many facilities in those places, if something went wrong, all of them would suffer.

“Fine, I’ll go and talk to him in the evening. Let’s do the cleaning first.”

Zhang Han nodded.

In the end, he arrived at the Holy Hall amid the sighs of his subordinates.

At work, they did not dare to say a word. The place where they worked was 50 meters away from the Holy Spirit Water. By the window on the second floor of the house on the side of the Holy Spirit Water sat the two senior members. The two did not speak. They were resting with their eyes closed.

Guards!

In the past, each of the places was guarded by only one guard. But now, there were two.

“Nothing in the world is difficult for one who sets his mind on it!”

Zhang Han exclaimed internally.

This place was heavily guarded, but it was still impossible to block him out.

Losing something by theft was no big deal, but being targeted by a thief was. What Zhan Han was doing was a little similar to a bandit’s operation.

“It could be said that Si Nan suffered an unexpected misfortune. But I do need those treasures at the moment. If there is a chance in the future, I will give him something in return.”

Zhang Han shook his head. One should not be ashamed of fighting for resources. But now, what Zhang Han was doing was stealing them. He could not help but feel a little guilty. After all, he was a cultivator, not a thief.

More importantly, the one he was stealing from was not his enemy at all. So, Zhang Han started to feel guilty and to think of ways to make it up to City Lord.

Zhang Han looked at the two people on the second floor out of the corner of his eye. If the two had kept an eye on Zhang Han, they would surely have noticed that the decorations that he chose to clean seemed to have formed a particular shape. Additionally, Zhang Han had applied something on the bottom of the decorations.

It was the powder of the Formation Stone!

After he had made all the arrangements in the surrounding areas, Zhang Han fixed his eyes on a stone statue five meters in front of the Holy Spirit Water.

The stone statue was half a meter high and its mouth was like a crocodile’s. What Zhang Han needed to do was to put the formation eye in its mouth.

Zhang Han looked up at the two guards sitting by the window.

“What if I directly threw it into the mouth?”

“Then they would definitely notice.”

“However, the cleaning will soon be finished. I don’t have time to hesitate.”

Zhang Han walked over decisively.

He squatted down and put a hand into the crocodile’s mouth.

“Swish! Swish!”

Two pairs of sharp eyes which had suspicion written all over them, darted over.

Zhang Han pretended not to notice that.

He then fished out a leaf from the mouth of the statue and sighed, “Turns out that we did not remove it the last time. If His Lordship saw this, he would be annoyed again.”

As he spoke, he walked away calmly, as though he had just done something trivial.

But unexpectedly, as soon as he went away, a guard jumped off. He took a look at the mouth of the statue and stuck a hand into it. After making sure that there was nothing suspicious, he leaped back onto the second floor.

“What’s there to check?”

The old guard sneered.

“I had to do it. Didn’t you lose the Holy Spirit Water when you were on duty alone?” The new guard who jumped up, mocked.

“Bullsh*t! That was taken by Concubine Lan. What does it have to do with me?”

“Oh, then why did His Lordship send me here? Wasn’t it because His Lordship does not trust you? Since so much Holy Spirit Water while you were on duty, it shows that you were not doing a good job.”

“Hahaha…”

The old guard cursed in his head.

“Under those circumstances at that time, who could stop Concubine Lan? That’s easy for you to say!”

The next task was to go to the herb garden and sort out the sundries around it.

The herb garden was much larger and so much harder to place a surveillance. Zhang Han circled the garden along in the innermost path and successfully set up the Formation Stones.

The morning passed very quickly and there was no time for lunch.

They then rushed to the Lord Hall without taking a break.

There were many decorations for them to maintain and polish, including many fierce beasts’ bodies and skins and some decorative bronze ware.

They worked there for three hours. On the left side of the Lord Hall, there was a balcony looking out toward half of the city. The door to a room next to the balcony was not completely closed. Zhang Han stole a glance through the slit and was immediately amazed.

There were eight bizarre paintings hanging on the wall.

Some seemed to be pictures of mountains, while others seemed to be pictures of lakes.

Seeing that, Zhang Han suddenly had a revelation.

“I can’t believe Si Nan is trying to study the Spirit Battle Methods.”