Call me Bai Long

Bai Yun woke up from his sleep a little after midnight. His headache had gone down a little, but was still very distracting. Bai Yun once again left the burrow and decided to wander about to find the supreme weed fruit.

After he left the area controlled by Bai Shan, Bai Yun started to run into others. The number of people here was indeed much higher than the first day. He ran into a few groups on his journey. Not only where there more people, he even ran into stronger and stronger people too. He even found a person in the seventh stage of qi condensation in the valley. Other than the supreme weed fruit, there was no other fruit that could entice a person in the seventh stage of qi condensation in the weed valley.

And along with the increase of the people, the demonic beasts in the valley seemed to be increasing as well as getting stronger too. Demonic beasts could sense things like the supreme weed fruit. This only increased his assurance that the supreme weed fruit was real. Bai Yun came across two second circle demonic beasts on the way. Thankfully they were not as troublesome as the grey rock python, and he was able to deal with them with some effort.

Bai Yun spend the next few days searching for the supreme weed fruit. But he had no luck so far. Today was the full moon and the supreme fruit would mature. Once it matured, then the fragrance of the fruit would quickly spread until it was plucked and then people would be able to find it soon enough. If one was unable to pluck the fruit a few minutes within the time it became ripe then every one would be able to find out about the fruit and then a great fight would occur. Bai Yun had a much lower reserve of qi than all the other people here and he wanted to avoid a prolonged battle as much as possible.

In the last few days Bai Yun had come across many instances of people fighting beasts or each other. When it happened, if it seemed as if someone was about to die, Bai Yun would lend a hand. Thanks to all of this Bai Yun had gained a lot of fame. Last night he had heard someone call him a guardian angel. The fact that he was wearing a bandage mask to hide his identity only added to his fame.

It seemed as if people had noticed the disappearance of Bai Shan's group, but no one had been alarmed by it yet. They all seemed to think that he had found the supreme weed fruit and was preparing to take it, or attack the people that had them. Basically no one was suspicious that he had died. Which was a good thing for Bai Yun.

Bai Yun moved through the weeds. His perception was much stronger than that of anyone else as he had walked in all there paths of cultivation. So even with the suppression brought about by the weeds he could cover a larger area and thus had run across almost the entire weed valley. Right now he was nearing the edge of the weed valley.

The weed valley was surrounded by mountains on three sides and a large river was flowing behind it. The river was very treacherous with numerous under currents that made crossing the river very dangerous. And beyond the river was the region belonging to foundation establishment cultivators.

As Bai Yun moved through the weeds he sensed two people in his perception. He quickly moved towards them. He had been doing this for the last two days. By sneaking up on people after hiding his presence by using both the Assassin God's techniques as well as his god sense, it would be incredibly difficult for anyone to notice him. He had started doing this in order to see if any of them had found the supreme weed fruit, but he had had no luck so far. But he did hear an awful lot of gossip as well some general information about the the clan and the surrounding areas which ended up being very useful for him. Bai Yun did not expect to hear anything important this time too but he did it out of habit anyway. He had finally found out that his greatest weakness was the lack of information. Even though the rumors about the supreme weed fruit had been going on for a few days when he entered the weed valley, he had no idea of it. If it wasn't for a series of lucky and unlucky events he would have missed it for sure.

"What should we do about the supreme weed fruit. Bai Hao had already blabbed to everyone about us finding it." Bai Yun heard a female voice speak.

Bai Yun was surprised by the development. He did not expect to hear anything good. He could not believe his luck. He quite quickly inched closer to the couple. He saw two people sitting in a small clearing, eating something. It was a man and a woman. Both of them were sitting facing each other, and Bai Yun was standing at a right angle to them. He simply peered out from the weeds, not taking a step into the clearing.

"What can we do now. Considering that there were three supreme weed fruits, we decide to share them between ourselves and not let anyone else know of them. Their location is so secluded that other than luck there is no chance in funding them. Who would have thought that Bai Hao would start bragging about finding them."

"By now a lot of people had found out about them. But as long as we don't let anyone know that we know about the supreme weed fruit's location, we can go to the cave and collect them when it nears midnight."

'A cave!' Bai Yun thought in wonder. The only was there could be a cave in the weed valley would be near it's edges on the cliffs, and even then there were weed in the way to hide them. It would take supreme luck to find such a cave.

Bai Yun decided to follow the duo in order to find the location of the supreme weed fruits. And when they were ripe, he could sneak in and steal them. Since there were three supreme fruits, and a person could only eat one of them, as the second one onward would not be of much effect, he could take one and leave two for them.

"It definitely wont be easy for him. If Bai Hao were to go to the cave now, I suppose he would be surprised by the three third circle lava spiders. I know that their group hasn't been to the cave in order not to tip anyone off."

The moment Bai Yun heard the name of lava spiders, he frowned. Lava spiders were a special kind of demonic beast that could even reach the immortal realm. Of course they were a far cry from beasts like the grey rock python, which had a trace of god's bloodline. And most importantly the most annoying thing about the lava spider was its defense. It was quite slow and clumsy. While its attacks were deadly, it was not that difficult to dodge. With three lava spiders protecting the supreme weed fruit it would be more difficult to steal them, but not impossible. There was no way any of them could break the defenses of a lava spider. All he had to do was sneak in when the group was fighting and take the fruits. Bai Yun's plan had no change until now.

"But Bai Hao has already joined prince Qing's group. They will definitely be there tomorrow. Even though they are searching a little far off in order to confuse everyone, I am sure that prince Qing would bring someone to get the fruit, leaving behind most of his group as a distraction." the woman said.

"I bet that Bai Hao started the rumor on purpose. After all it is not easy to join the group of a prince. And once the rumor spread, someone like prince Qing would definitely come to hear of it as he is in the exact cultivation to use the fruit. And then it would be easy for someone of his position to find the start of the rumor and find Bai Hao."

"I don't mind that he did it. It is better for people like us to become a subordinate of a prince. It would mean that we would be able to get better resources. Even I would give up the supreme weed fruit if it meant that I could join a princes group. It is a much better choice in the longer run. But what I cannot forgive him for is that he suggested that the prince kill us in order to hide the location of the fruit. If it wasn't for the fact that we were careful and fled when we heard that they grouped up, we would be dead by now." The woman said venomously.

The frown on Bai Yun forehead deepened. He did not expect to hear a familiar name here. Prince Qing was one of the two princes that had a mole in the moron group, and also the one who had Bai Shan sent to the library that day.

The princes of Bai clan was not an official title. It was said that a long time ago a clan leader of the Bai clan declared that the most talented member of the clan was the little prince of the clan while talking to some one else. Nowadays a person is considered as a prince of a clan if either the clan leader of a great elder declares it in front of people. Since then the title of prince had become popular and even other clans had adopted it.

The title of a prince did not come with any power or responsibilities. It was simply given to the younger generation of the clan to show that they have they potential to be nurtured in he future, and might be in a position of power later. Many people in high positions in the clan used to be princes when they were younger.

There were three critical criteria to be considered as a prince: talent, brains or leadership and ambition or service to the clan. Bai Yun's father Bai Mu, even though he was extremely qualified, was never given the title of a prince. But when he joined the Shadow Stream Academy every one started to call him a prince anyway. And none of the other princes from his generation has reached the dao step yet.

There were currently eleven princes in the Bai clan. Bai Qing was the only prince in the qi condensation stage. There were two in the foundation establishment stage, one of which was Bai Song. The rest were all in the core formation stage, as it takes a while for people to be aware of their talents or gain enough merits.

The presence of Bai Qing threw Bai Yun off a bit. But he thought that he could continue with the old plan of following them to the fruit and then stealing it in the confusion. Bu the more he thought about it, the deeper his frown became. He started seeing problems with the plan that did not exist before. Finally a wry smile came on his face.

'So what did we learn from all of this.' Bai Yun thought. 'Plans are useless. Boycott all plans. Burn them in hellfire.'

Bai Yun made sure that his mask was on place, and then made use of the disguise technique in order to change his appearance and then parted the weeds and stepped into the clearing. The two people who were sitting there stood up in a moment. They took out their weapons and turned to him in a battle stance.

"Who are you?" The woman asked.

BaI Yun was about to give his name when he stopped. A smile appeared on his face. Then he declared.

"Call me Bai Long."