This scoundrel is a bit of a swordsman.

"Who is Cao Cao?"

Ruoxue was taken aback and turned to ask, which surprised Xiaoxingchen as well. He quickly changed the subject.

"These men in black appear to be from two groups, no doubt about it, the Zhan Shuai Mansion and Wu Xie. They must be from those two families. Although I don't know why they are so close, it's clear that they don't trust each other, so they each sent people."

"You were absolutely right. But what is there about this ancestral temple that they would want?"

"Why don't we go in and see for ourselves? Let's be the fishermen tonight,"

Xiao Xingchen smiled darkly, then leaped down and rushed after the man in black. Ruoxue sensed her surroundings and, after confirming that there were no spies behind them, she disappeared from the rooftop in a flash.

The ancestral temple was silent at dawn. The old guards had left, and the shift workers were absent, which allowed both the man in black and Xiao Xingchen to sneak in without any hindrance.

Ruoxue followed closely behind, and when she saw the man in black leap over the main hall and head straight for the library at the back, she grabbed Xiaoxingchen, who was about to rush over as well.

"Why are you pulling me? Didn't you see those people heading towards the library? I seriously suspect there might be some martial arts manuals here,"

Xiao Xingchen had a question.

"Don't move, shush."

Ruoxue acted as if she hadn't heard him, gesturing for him to shut up, and there was even a hint of seriousness in her eyes.

"what happened?"

This gave Xiao Xingchen a jolt; Ruoxue's actions were definitely not without reason.

"Shut up, this place is strange, let's wait and see."

"Weird?"

Xiao Xingchen continued to observe from the shadows. Apart from the fact that no one was around, he couldn't see anything unusual.

The two hid on the rooftop, watching below without daring to move.

The two groups of men in black moved with great coordination, probably because they had gathered information about the library beforehand. There were many rooms in the library, and they went directly to different rooms without any overlap, striving to get what they wanted as quickly as possible.

Half an incense stick later, Xiao Xingchen rolled his eyes at Ruoxue, as if to say, "Are you feeling something wrong?"

As the men in black moved between rooms, their silhouettes visible by candlelight as they searched for something, what awaited them was not something eerie, but rather everything as usual.

Even Ruoxue herself doubted whether she had imagined it, wondering why that eerie feeling had mysteriously disappeared.

“I understand. Sometimes it’s easy to make mistakes based on intuition. Let’s go down now. I’m curious to see what kind of martial arts manuals might be here.”

Xiao Xingchen offered a way out, because what he was seeing was so similar to a scene from a TV drama: men in black, a library, searching for books—wasn't this just the usual plot for finding a secret manual?

It couldn't be that Wu Xie was eager to learn and wanted to move books to learn to read and write, could it?

The thought of the secret manual excited him, and in the moment Ruoxue was distracted, he leaped down.

"you.."

Ruoxue instinctively tried to grab it back, but Xiaoxingchen moved too quickly, causing her to miss completely.

"Could it be that I was wrong?"

After carefully observing everything again, the eerie feeling in her heart disappeared, and she followed.

The library had been ransacked, books scattered everywhere. The men in black seemed unfazed by the mess, brutally destroying everything in their path.

This is what Xiao Xingchen saw when he entered the library: the man in black picked up a book, didn't even look at the contents, but flipped through it and then threw it away.

They didn't seem to be looking for a book. Anyone looking for a book would carefully examine the text before deciding whether to damage it, but these men in black never seemed to linger on the text.

"eccentric,"

Seeing that Ruoxue had already reached the door, Xiao Xingchen went around to the side of the bookshelf and quietly approached a man in black.

“Baku, don’t bother with those useless books. The map must be huge; those books can’t hold it all.”

A man in black in the distance spoke to them, which made Xiao Xingchen realize something. Baku, that's the name of the Wilderness people. They really are Wu Xie's people. And they mentioned the map. These people are actually here for the map of the Great Qian Dynasty. The map is something that every household had in their previous life, but in the Great Qian Dynasty, is the map a rare commodity?

Xiao Xingchen was puzzled. Why go through all this trouble just to find a map? Are you crazy?

“Spark, the commander said that we can’t miss a single place. I don’t want to fail the mission and be punished when I get back, so we have to check every corner.”

"You're such a blockhead! That's a map, at least ten meters long. How could it fit on a bookshelf? Stop wasting time and go straight to the next floor, or those people will get there first."

"The Grand Commander said that whoever finds the map first will gain the upper hand, and we absolutely cannot let the Zhan family find it first."

Xiao Xingchen, who had been silently listening to their conversation, leaned against the other side of the bookshelf, her eyes filled with confusion. A map had attracted the attention of both the War General's Mansion and the Wilderness, which meant that the map was extremely important. Since it was important, they naturally couldn't be allowed to succeed.

The library was too large for one person to find. Although making a commotion might attract attention and thwart the black-clad men's operation, he still wanted to see the map for himself to see what made it different.

He was eavesdropping on the discussion about maps when he turned around and saw Ruoxue still loitering by the door. This gave him a headache; this girl was usually quite clever, so why was she acting so confused now?

"Grandma, what are you doing? You're looking at this whole courtyard with such interest. Have you forgotten that we're here to fish?"

Frustrated and disappointed, he rushed out, grabbed Ruoxue, and hid in the shadows.

However, the seriousness between Ruoxue's brows did not dissipate; instead, she appeared somewhat tense.

"What's wrong? You're acting strange."

Xiao Xingchen asked anxiously,

"Something flashed past me just now, then disappeared into the ground,"

"What?" Xiao Xingchen was shocked. He had witnessed Ruoxue's strength before. How could someone have flashed past her like that?

Ruoxue nodded, half-squatting on the ground, her right hand touching the ground as if sensing something. A white light flashed from Ruoxue's palm, and a sudden change occurred.

The entire area they were in began to glow red; the ground, rooftops, walls, trees, flowerbeds—everything tangible—began to turn red.

"what is this?"

Xiao Xingchen was shocked. For some reason, upon seeing this red color, the image of the blood river in Xiao Jianxian's tomb flashed into his mind, and he seemed to hear the sound of the river lapping against the banks.

"Incense array,"

Ruoxue spoke solemnly, then slowly stood up.

“We’re in trouble,”

Before they could catch their breath, a scream rang out in the library, and the silent ancestral temple was suddenly awakened by the scream, like a silent beast.