Daily life of a cultivation judge-Chapter 1068: List of suspects (1)
"The relationship between Bai Chen and the Gold Earth Bank seems to run deep… or is it just with one of its members?" Yang Qing mused.
Earlier, when he posed as the owner of the Green Pavilion, and visited the Gold Earth Bank to withdraw funds held under the pavilion's name, It was one of the staff members there who had suggested Bai Chen's escort agency for his travels.
Now, from the recording and the accounts shared by Liu Ying and Duan Ting, it was becoming clearer that Bai Chen's relationship with the bank ran slightly deeper than Yang Qing thought. If Bai Chen had seriously considered requesting their help in searching for Jiang Hao, then he must have been confident they would agree.
Few things could inspire such confidence: either he was certain he could afford their assistance, or he had a relationship deep enough that they wouldn't deny him. Yang Qing was more inclined to believe the latter.
Deciding to shelve the matter of Bai Chen's connection to the rank-two entity for now, Yang Qing refocused on the issue at hand.
Duan Ting's analysis regarding the noble's likely innocence in the disappearance aligned with his own thoughts. Even before asking, Yang Qing hadn't truly believed the noble's involvement was plausible. His question had served a different purpose: to gauge the depth of the relationship between the two sides and to get a better sense of the noble's character.
As it stood, Yang Qing knew next to nothing about the noble or the Azure Sapphire Kingdom beyond the bare bones of its current turmoil. While he could shore those gaps later when he returned to the Order, he was well aware that even the most thorough reports might miss certain critical nuances— fresh first-hand accounts from those who had interacted directly with the region and its key players.
It didn't hurt to get a feel for the noble through Duan Ting's perspective. After all, even if the noble seemed less likely to have been involved in the disappearance, the fact remained: Bai Chen, Escort Supervisor Jiang Hao, and everyone else on the ferry had vanished within that noble's territory.
At the very least, this warranted a closer look at the noble, those in his circle, and his broader relationships.
Who knew? Perhaps one of his rivals had orchestrated the incident to sabotage his development plans for the territory—a territory in which the Bluefin Spine-tailed Swift Agency clearly played an integral role. Or maybe the motive lay much closer to home.
From Duan Ting's description, the noble was someone who prioritized the needs of the territory above all else, even above his own family. In Yang Qing's experience, such a stance—especially when followed with religious fervor—was bound to ruffle feathers. There were always those who believed their personal needs should take precedence over the collective good. Resentment could simmer among those who felt sacrificed, sidelined, or wronged in the name of a greater cause.
Perhaps someone within the noble's household—one of these spirits of discontent—had struck out against Bai Chen and the others as an act of vengeance or rebellion. It wasn't out of the realm of possibility that they had colluded with a rival noble, trading their loyalty in exchange for promises of support, revenge, or even a path to power.
Those were potential routes for Bai Chen's and Jiang Hao's disappearance, born out of his growing insight into the character of that noble.
Of course, there were still other avenues to look at. For instance, Duan Ting's claim that the noble would only act against the agency if he stood to gain something far more valuable than his current benefits struck a chord with Yang Qing.
While Duan Ting might not see the escort agency as remotely comparable to the noble's vast territory—and rightly so—Yang Qing knew better. The agency's assets might pale in comparison, but its founder, Bai Chen, possessed something far more valuable: His cultivation art. The cultivation art he practiced was a subset technique derived from the Frozen Serenity Scripture.
The moment Yang Qing first suspected something had happened to Bai Chen—and later had those suspicions confirmed by the two escort supervisors—his mind had immediately turned to the cultivation art he'd witnessed Bai Chen using during their previous trip.
The escort agency's entire worth might not amount to much, but Bai Chen's cultivation art? That was another story. To someone who knew what they were looking for, it could rival—if not surpass—the value of the noble's territory.
Presently, Yang Qing harbored unconfirmed suspicions that the segmented cultivation arts tied to the Frozen Serenity Scripture likely held a hidden secret—a secret that could potentially lead to the complete manual itself. And if not the complete manual, then perhaps it pointed to some other legacy of the Frozen Serenity Sect.
Given the sect's stature during its prime—rivaling modern-day holy lands like the Radiant Sword Sect and the Flowing Leaves Valley—any information that hinted at its legacy would undoubtedly provoke widespread greed. Even figures from the current holy lands wouldn't be immune to such temptation, let alone a noble from a shattered rank-three kingdom desperately striving to rebuild his territory.
If that noble knew the true worth of Bai Chen's cultivation art, there was little doubt he'd resort to any means necessary to acquire it.
The only question now was whether the noble knew about it or not. For Yang Qing, it was a fine line to tread. If not for the Ice Emerald Sect incident in which they had begun hunting organizations and individuals possessing arts linked to the Frozen Serenity Scripture—he wouldn't have even thought to examine the cultivation arts tied to the scripture, with a closer eye.
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Given the circumstances, Yang Qing felt confident this knowledge was not widely known. Even for him, it had taken the incident with the Ice Emerald Sect to push his thoughts in that direction. And yet, even now, it was little more than conjecture. He hadn't walked far enough down that path to form grounded suspicions, let alone uncover concrete proof.
To avoid the pitfalls of tunnel vision, Yang Qing still remained open to other possibilities. Bai Chen's disappearance might have had absolutely nothing to do with his cultivation art. After all, the continent was turbulent and riddled with conflict. A missing ferry and a missing palace realm expert weren't exactly earth-shattering events. Disappearances were not unheard of. They were the bread and butter of the continent along with a murder here and there, a mugging, a kidnapping, a backstabbing, and the like.
Its presence was woven into the functioning fabric of the continent. Almost every second that passed, there was someone somewhere who had disappeared or was in the process of disappearing.
Case and point, it wasn't too long ago that Yang Qing handled a case involving the Yellow Lotus Sect, whose three palace realm experts had all disappeared at once, leaving the sect in a precarious position besieged on all sides by its enemies and 'allies' alike because of their absence.
His best course of action was to approach the matter step by step—working the story piece by piece, following each thread of possibility to see where it might lead.
And right now, the thread he wanted to follow was the identity of that noble.
