402 Trouble?

Alex looked at the giant wall that was under construction as well.

'So the beasts really did come here. Thankfully, the damage doesn't seem to be a lot. Even the disciples are already going back to the forest to hunt,' Alex thought as he looked around.

The caravan soon stopped and got into the queue of people. Alex looked towards the woman in red and Ying Wu, and then said, "Thank you for giving me a ride till here, I will leave now."

He then jumped out of the carriage. He was about to leave, but then he turned around and looked at Ying Wu and her mother.

"You guys will find help at the Hong Wu sect, right? Use my name, that should help a bit," Alex said.

"Sure… if we need it, we will," Ying Wu said without questioning why a disciple's name would be of use.

"By the way, do you have a place to stay? I can maybe arrange some for you, as a means of paying back the favor for bringing me here," Alex said.

Ying Wu smiled and said, "It's no need. I have a cousin who lives in the city, so we will probably take residence there."

"Oh, alright then. Goodbye for now. See you guys later," Alex said as he left the caravan and walked towards the gate.

"He… is not bad," the woman in red said as her expression relaxed after Alex left. "Seems quite genuine too."

Ying Wu smiled at the compliment from the woman in red. Not many people were able to get that. "You know…" Ying Wu said as her expression drifted off towards a pleasant imagination, "… if he was just 10 or maybe even just 8 years older, I wouldn't mind marrying him."

The woman in red showed a shocked expression. Ying Wu quickly got back to reality and her face got serious again. "Let's hurry and go meet my cousin; we need to heal her as soon as possible."

* * * * * *

Alex entered the gate and went inside. He was quite famous amongst the people of both sects now; he was the direct disciple of two first grade sect's Sect Leader after all. However, people mostly only knew him by name.

Not many people actually knew what he looked like. Only those that went to the competition did, and that was just a few amongst the thousands.

So, even though he walked through the street wearing dark green robes that caught attention left and right, nobody actually could tell who he was.

He watched around but not a single thing in the city seemed out of normal.

'Hmm… so the beasts didn't even make it past the walls? Then what happened in the capital must truly be a once-in-a-while occasion. Ying Wu did say that the second time was not as bad as the first one,' Alex thought.

Since the Tiger sect was much closer to the gate, he decided to go there. It was around 5 pm now, and the sun was starting to set. The sky was painted with a mixture of blue, purple, and orange.

He reached the small marketplace outside the Tiger sect where the various disciples were doing their daily shopping. Alex smiled when he saw this and walked past them.

He was wearing the Hong Wu Sect's clothing, but he didn't care about that right now; he needed to let the people know that he was alive.

The guards stopped him, but weren't disrespectful as from their perspective, he was a core disciple of an alchemy sect. He wasn't someone to make an enemy out of.

"Stop! Why have you come here?" one of the elders standing guard asked.

Alex didn't immediately answer and instead rummaged through his storage bag before taking out a circular badge.

"Here! I am a disciple of the Tiger sect too," Alex said as he handed them the badge. The guards didn't even have to check carefully to know that it was a legit badge, but that just made the situation more confusing.

Is he a disciple? Did someone give it to him? Did he steal it? They were unsure.

"Umm… I am the Sect Leader's Disciple. You can ask my senior brother Liu Xun to confirm it," Alex said.

When they heard the Guard Leader's name, they wasted no time and immediately called him. In mere moments, Alex felt a familiar spiritual sense pass through him.

"Junior brother?" Liu Xun looked at him with a shocked face. "You… You… you are alive?" he said, too stunned to do anything else.

"Hello Senior brother, it's been a while," Alex said.

Liu Xun immediately ran forward and started checking on him. "What? How? I thought you died; They said you died," Liu Xun said.

"Yes, stuff happened and I was in a place where I couldn't leave for a month, so I could only come now," Alex said.

"Good! Good! Thank god you survived," Liu Xun said. "Right, I should message master about it soon."

"Oh, I can message him," Alex said as he took out the communication talisman. He placed it on his forehead and tried telling his master that he was back, but the connection wasn't successful.

'Huh? What's going on?' he thought.

"Junior brother, Master isn't in the sect right now," Liu Xun then said. "He's still in the capital."

Alex was a little surprised. "Master is in the capital? Why? I thought he would return after hearing about the beast attacks," Alex said.

"Of course not! You were missing and presumed dead, so he and junior sister stayed behind to search for you," Liu Xun said.

"Oh," Alex said. 'So they didn't abandon me even after a month of going missing?' he thought. A special warmness started spreading through his chest as he realized just how much he was loved.

"So… we should contact them and let them know that I am back, right?" Alex asked.

"Y-Yes! Yes, we should do that immediately. Uhh… I will go ask the elders to message him right now. What will you do?" he asked.

"Umm… I should go back to the Hong Wu sect and let them know that I am alive too," Alex said. "Master and the rest must be worried for me."

"They sure are," Liu Xun said without thinking much, but then he froze. His expression changed to a slight bit of nervousness as he looked at Alex and asked, "So, you haven't been to the Hong Wu Sect yet?"

Alex saw the change in his emotions and wondered what that was for. "No, I just got back here on a caravan. Since Tiger sect was closer, I came here," Alex said.

"I see," Liu Xun said with a hint of hesitation.

"What's going on, senior brother? Do you want to tell me something?" he asked curiously.

Liu Xun hesitated a bit more and then spoke, "uh… you see. A week ago when the beasts attacked, we called the Hong Wu sect for help, they sent the help, but Sect Leader Ma never came."

"So, when we tried asking around a bit, the elders from the sect tried to dodge around with the question. So… I think something bad must have happened to your master," Liu Xun said.

"W-What?" Alex was surprised. 'Master is in trouble?' he thought.

His face immediately changed from confusion to resoluteness. "I shall leave, for now, senior brother. I will go and see what is wrong with my master," he said and immediately flew up.

There was a flight ban on anyone that was not the city lord, or the two sect's sect leaders. But Alex didn't care about that right now.

He suddenly hid his aura, put on the light veil to turn invisible, and removed all friction from himself to push himself to the limit.

In just a little over 5 minutes, he could see the gates of the Hong Wu sect in front of him. He didn't stop however, he was to go directly to his master.

Just as he entered the sect, an invisible aura passed through him, checking everything around him. However, it stopped when it noticed the nameplate with him.

By coincidence or by luck, Alex had forgotten the Tiger sect's badge at the hands of the two guards. If not, he would've had to face problems with the sect running formation right now.

As soon as he entered, he took out a talisman and started calling for her. He could tell that the messages were going through, but she couldn't pick them up.

He started getting more worried. He went past the sect valley and landed in front of the sect leader's house as he let the veil disappear.

He was running in when an elder walked out of the house. It was an old man with white hair, someone he didn't interact with a lot. It was the Grand Elder.

"Grandmaster," he said as he bowed deeply.

The grand elder was shocked to see someone appear out of nowhere, not to mention his grand disciple that was said to have died during a beast attack in the capital city.

"Yu- Yu Ming?! You are alive," he said with shock and happiness. "Child! You're alive."

His surprised face soon turned to a smile, then to a grin as he realized his grand disciple was really alive. "You… how?" he asked.

"No time to explain, Grandmaster. Is there something wrong with my master?" he asked.

Suddenly, the smiling face of the grand elder turned somber as he shook his head and said, "she is not in any good condition, and I do not know what is going on."

"Is— Is she inside?" he asked.

"Yes, the disciples are looking after her," he said. "Go and check for yourself."

Alex nodded and immediately sent out his spiritual sense to check inside the house. He could see inside the house clearly and saw a dozen or so female disciples gathered in a room.

That was also the room where Ma Rong was being kept on a bed with a water bath ready beside her. The female disciples were washing away any and all exposed surfaces of Ma Rong like her face and hands and legs.

Alex walked in after realizing it was okay. The female disciple was surprised at first, but then they got angry and were about to scream at him when one of the girls suddenly shouted out first.

"Mingming! You're alive!" she immediately ran up to him and hugged him.

"You— we thought you died," Zhou Mei looked in absolute horror.

Seeing the two of them act out like that, the other female disciple started getting curious as to who he was. But they didn't need anyone to tell them. Just by listening to the conversation a little more, one could easily deduce his identity.

"The sect leader's disciple?" someone asked.

"It must be. I thought he died," another person said.

"SHUT UP!" Fan Ruogang got angry. "We don't have time to gossip like this. "We need to heal Sect Leader's injuries, whatever they may be."

The women immediately started to get back on to their work and started applying the water bath. One of the women then suddenly brought out a sword.

Alex was scared that she might have had the intent to attack his master, but soon realized what she was doing. The buckets of water surrounding Ma Rong suddenly had snowflakes dropped onto them which caused them to freeze immediately.

"Is master too hot? Does she have a fever or is this something different?" he asked.

Even as he asked that the buckets of frozen water turned to regular water and the cool environment just created destroyed. Seeing the ices melt in minutes, Once could tell how much heat was radiating from her body.

"Do you know what's wrong with her? Why is she like this?" he asked.

The ladies looked at each other for a moment and then turned around to shake their heads.

Zhou Mei then spoke, "We do not know what happened to her, but it is likely something to do with where she went to recently.

"Oh," Alex said and asked, "Where did she go?"

Zhou Mei took not even a moment and answered, "The Forbidden Fields."