Chapter 55

The academy elder hurries by moonlight to the clan head’s pavilion after learning that Jia Jin Sheng, brother of the rank four Gu Master Jia Fu and son of the rank five Jia family head, has gone missing, aware that a large clan like the Jia family could badly damage the middle-sized Gu Yue clan’s trade and reputation if the dispute turns hostile. ^{ch. 55}

In the hall, clan head Gu Yue Bo receives Jia Fu, who stands with five to six followers rather than sitting, a deliberate show of pressure, and sends the academy elder to fetch Fang Yuan. Jia Fu apologizes for his urgency, saying that days without word from his brother have left him unable to wait. Only in these few days has he understood why his father paired him with Jia Jin Sheng for the caravan, as a test of his nature. ^{ch. 55}

Once Fang Yuan is brought in, the female Gu Master from the gambling den confirms to Jia Fu that he is the one they seek, though Gu Yue Bo, wary of ceding ground before a rank four guest, questions her certainty by noting that Fang Yuan has a twin brother who looks just like him. Privately, Gu Yue Bo has already decided that he will hand Fang Yuan over if he proves guilty, since a C grade talent is no great loss, but that Fang Yuan will bear the blame instead if Fang Zheng was responsible, since the clan is counting on Fang Zheng, its only A grade in three years, to one day face Bai Ning Bing of the Bai clan. ^{ch. 55}

Pressed gently by Gu Yue Bo on whether he knows Jia Jin Sheng, Fang Yuan first claims not to recognize the name, prompting the female Gu Master to describe how he bought six purple gold rocks at the den and opened a mudskin toad on the fifth, one Jia Jin Sheng had tried to buy from him for five hundred primeval stones. Fang Yuan then pretends to suddenly place the name, admitting he knew Jia Jin Sheng from the gambling den incident but insisting he never saw him again afterward. ^{ch. 55}

A male Gu Master employed at the wine shop contradicts him next, describing a night when Fang Yuan drank a mouthful of monkey wine, fed the rest to a Liquor worm, and refused to sell the worm despite the man’s interest. Fang Yuan reacts with feigned shock, and when the academy elder presses him on where the Liquor worm came from, he clenches his fists and refuses to answer until the surrounding clan elders demand an explanation, at which point he insists loudly that he obtained and opened the Liquor worm himself. ^{ch. 55}