Chapter 162: Stressful walk

(A/N: Join the discord, to have intellectual conversations with your fellow cultivators! We have graphs and stats on the cultivation worlds there! Plus you can actually cultivate and go to closed-door cultivation.

Link: discord.gg/SC9HNKVj5e

)

——(POV third person)——

Li Huang who was just about to step through the secret exit suddenly thought of something.

'Wouldn't they be shocked if I looked at them directly?' Li Huang knew that they were looking at him so he decided to waste a few seconds and locate the place of that artifact that was helping them in monitoring him.

In a few seconds, he was able to find the artifact with the help of the peeping eye of heaven and he turned in that direction. He looked directly at it with his eyes closed and then turned to the exit to get out of that place.

The masters who were seeing this all gasped in shock as they didn't expect Li Huang to not only find the secret exit but find the [Formation eye] too.

"He knew…" One of the masters said and he didn't need to say more to convey his message. Every master in the room understood that Li Huang was aware that they were watching him.

Some of the masters thought that Li Huang might come out of the illusion formation but no one thought that he might come out of the formation like this, and now that he did, they didn't know how to face him. If Li Huang didn't have much skill they could act like a senior and guide him so that he wouldn't feel resentment toward them for the test, but now that he came out of the formation from the secret exit it would be shameless of them to look at him like that as he is already ahead of them in some aspects.

Li Huang didn't even give them time to come up with a plan as he started walking again as he got out of the formation, as far as he knew he was supposed to follow this path and he will reach the meeting place soon enough.

Li Huang put on a good show before but even that wasn't as shocking as him walking. Every single master who was watching Li Huang turned white as a sheet when they saw him walking.

No, it wasn't simply because he walked, that would be absurd. The reason for their shock was that Li Huang was walking toward the other formations that they had in the courtyard.

They could somehow explain this last formation as a test but if Li Huang were to walk in one more, it would be interpreted as an attempt on his life.

"Deactivate it! Do it fast!" one formation master shouted at his fellow formation master was panicking. Li Huang was only a step away from the formation when the master responsible for it deactivated it.

"Haha, it was close." The formation master said as he was clutching the activation key of the formation with shaky hands.

Just as the formation masters breathed a sigh of relief, one of them saw something that made his heart stop working for a fraction of a second.

"Heavens! He is moving toward the next formation!" He shouted and the other formation masters all turned to see Li Huang. He was still walking and he was close to the next defensive formation.

"Stop it! Destroy it! Just do something before it's too late!" Master Xinyi shouted. He couldn't understand why this was happening, but he didn't have time to think about something like this.

Again, they were able to deactivate the formation in time but they didn't stop there as they could see that Li Huang was still moving.

"What should we do?" One of the formation masters asked anxiously.

"Deactivate every formation! We have no time! I will go there to stop him…" Master Xinyi said and marched outside of the room.

Just as he left and the other masters were deactivating all the formations that were in his way, master Tu was frowning in a corner.

"That brat…" He muttered.

…

Li Huang who was peacefully walking toward the meeting place was really in dark about the situation that he was creating for the other masters. He was only following the path that the guard told him about and he was unaware of the tension that he had created for the formation masters who were mass deactivating the formations.

His walk was interrupted by someone calling him.

"Young master Li, please wait!" It was master Xinyi who called to Li Huang after getting close enough to him.

Hearing the unknown voice, Li Huang turned to face him. At a glance, he could see that this formation master was an expert as the pattern on his robes suggested so.

"Greetings formation master." Li Huang said as politely as he could. This formation master was not as rude as the last one so he had no problem with showing him the respect that he deserves for his accomplishments.

Master Xinyi nodded with a smile but then remembered that he was here for another matter other than just talking to Li Huang.

"Young master Li, forgive me for interrupting your walk but allow me to guide you to the meeting place…" Master Xinyi said. He didn't want to outright assume that Li Huang was walking to the formations on purpose but even if he did, it was justified for him to do so.

From what Xinyi could understand, they disrespected Li Huang first by throwing him in that formation so if he was looking to create a problem like this, they could only accept it and try to minimize their loss.

"Of course, thank you." Li  Huang said and nodded. He didn't mind someone who knew what is where guiding him to the meeting place. From Li Huang's understanding, this formation master was probably not the one who wanted to test him, or he is really a good actor.

Master Xinyi Pointed the direction to Li Huang and started walking toward the meeting place. Needless to say, this path was different from what Li Huang was taking before.

"I thought the meeting was that way as the guard told me to follow this path…" Li Huang said as he couldn't understand why the path is different from what he thought. At the same time, Li Huang thought that maybe this formation master is trying to kill or abduct him so he readied a couple of scrolls and explosions to defend himself as fast as he can.

"Ah! I see." Master Xinyi said as he just now understood why Li Huang was walking to the formations one after another.

"The exit that you found in the formation was the secret exit of the formation so you have got out of the formation in a different location. This path is the same as the one you should have taken but in a different direction." The formation master explained. He now knew that Li Huang wasn't walking to the formations on purpose as he thought that this path was the one he had to take to the meeting.

"Is that so? Then I have to thank the formation master again."  Li Huang cupped his fists and said. Although this story somewhat made sense to him, he didn't drop his guard and held his defense high.

…

"This is the meeting room, please go on." Master Xinyi said.

"Thank you, master Xinyi." Li Huang said and thanked the formation master. Along the way, he got to know the name of the master Xinyi.

Li Huang didn't say a word about the formation that he was forced to go in and master Xinyi felt weird but he didn't want to bring the matter up himself. Li Huang didn't want to be hostile with a whole group as it was wartime and it would be counterproductive for the family to be against two groups, so he decided to make his moves with more consideration.

The guards opened the door for him and Li Huang walked inside the meeting room.

There was only the grandmaster and him here.

"Grandmaster Huili." Li Huang said and cupped his fists.

"Chief disciple of the heavenly sword sect, Li Huang. Welcome, please take a seat." Grandmaster Huili said and asked Li Huang to sit down.

"Please wait a few minutes so that other formation masters could be here too." Grandmaster Huili said when Li Huang was seated and he nodded.