Luo Chen brought Fu Qinglan to a broad plain enclosed by three mountains, about eighty li from her cave residence. The open ground stretched roughly ten li in either direction, but the surrounding peaks bordered it so tightly that there was only one easy way in or out.

Fu Qinglan surveyed the area in confusion. "Is there a fourth-tier illusory beast here? We're already this close, but I can't sense anything."

"Not yet." Luo Chen crouched and pressed one hand against the grass under him. "But there will be soon."

Before she could ask what he meant, he took out a jade box lined with soft silk and set it on the ground. When he opened it, Fu Qinglan saw a dazzling white pill resting inside. She immediately recognized it—this was one of the five precious pills personally refined by the Saint Alchemist before her Ascension! Something so valuable should have been carefully stored away, yet Luo Chen had simply left it exposed in the middle of an empty plain!

Still trying to understand what he was doing, Fu Qinglan looked up and found him watching her with an unreadable expression. She mistook that look and quickly shook her head. "Brother Luo, don't worry. It's yours. I wouldn't dream of taking it from you."

The corner of Luo Chen's...