What surprised Zhou Xuan even more was that Ma Shu had an aura of ice. Could he be the Ghost Mask?
Zhou Xuan was so shocked that he almost jumped up, but since Wei Xiaoyu had put on makeup, the change in his expression didn't show anything.
However, this was of course not hidden from Ma Shu. Although it could not be seen from his face, Zhou Xuan's icy aura was the same as his, so how could he not know?
Ma Shujia stood up abruptly. He hadn't thought about this when he came in, nor had he used any ice energy, so he didn't know that there was someone in the living room with ice energy!
Is it Zhou Xuan?
Ma Shu pointed at Zhou Xuan's face and shouted, his expression changing drastically. His voice trembled as he asked, "You're not dead? How did you get out?"
Zhou Xuan was panting heavily. The ghost mask had finally revealed its true form. He never expected it to be Ma Shu, the person he had once crushed like an ant, and the only one with special abilities. How could it be him?
Ice Qi is special, and it has special abilities. How could Ma Shu possess ice Qi abilities? Back in Hong Kong, Zhou Xuan was absolutely certain that Ma Shu didn't have ice Qi abilities, and that this ability was non-transferable unless one possessed a golden stone through blood transfusion. But where would he find a golden stone? And how did he even know about ice Qi abilities?
Zhou Xuan didn't understand or explain any of it, but he was mostly shocked!
At the same moment, Zhou Xuan reached out and dragged Wei Xiaoyu behind him. In that instant, the two people's icy energy collided, creating layers of invisible energy fluctuations. Zhang Jing, Fang Dacheng, and Lin Shilong were blown away as if they were blasted into the air and crashed into the wall. They passed out without even uttering a sound, their fate unknown.
Zhou Xuan was distracted by protecting Wei Xiaoyu with his ice energy, and when he continued to fight Ma Shu's powerful attacks, he was immediately at a disadvantage.
He had never met anyone with the same ice-energy ability before. It turned out that Ma Shu had stolen his own memories to obtain the secret of the ice-energy ability. He couldn't find the golden stone, but he retrieved the memory of finding it at the bottom of the sea from his own mind. Although he no longer had the golden stone, the sea turtle that had been with it for a long time and absorbed some of its energy became Ma Shu's hope. And unexpectedly, he actually found the sea turtle there!
During the battle with Zhou Xuan's ice energy, Ma Shu took out the crystal and connected the ice energy to it. A huge amount of ice energy surged out, and Zhou Xuan could not withstand it at all. The tables and chairs in the living room instantly turned into gold and were then swallowed up and disappeared without a trace!
And that rosewood chair worth millions also vanished into thin air, turning into nothingness!
If Ma Shu didn't have crystals, Zhou Xuan wouldn't be in such a predicament even if he had to take care of Wei Xiaoyu. After all, Ma Shu's ice qi cultivation was too recent and far less refined than Zhou Xuan's. Moreover, Zhou Xuan had one advantage over Ma Shu: his ice qi was combined with his internal martial arts training, while Ma Shu had never practiced internal martial arts. The difference in their abilities was obvious, though Zhou Xuan was unaware of it. Ma Shu couldn't cultivate or achieve many other abilities, and his greatest strength was converting and absorbing gold, which was also Zhou Xuan's most powerful ability.
Ma Shu was determined to obliterate Zhou Xuan, to erase him from this world. Only Zhou Xuan posed the greatest threat to him; as he put it, he couldn't sleep until Zhou Xuan was dead!
So when Ma Shu was communicating with Zhou Xuan, he took out the crystal and prepared to transform and devour Zhou Xuan in one go by taking advantage of the strongest ice energy in the ice!
Zhou Xuan's heart pounded like thunder as he was pressed under immense pressure. The area supported by the icy aura was shrinking. In his haste, Ma Shu withdrew the encirclement and launched a direct attack from the side facing him. By removing the encirclement from all sides and attacking from only one direction, Zhou Xuan was finding it even harder to hold on. Fortunately, Wei Xiaoyu's pressure had greatly decreased, and she was just about to reach her breaking point.
Zhou Xuanlan was the first to be affected; the front half of her clothes and pants were transformed and disappeared under the powerful pressure of the icy air.
However, Zhou Xuan must have taken a liking to the blue and white porcelain vase that Zhang Jing brought over. In Wu Xiulin's building, his expression showed that he really liked and was quite pleased with it.
Zhang Jing, also getting restless, stood up with a smile, intending to invite Zhou Xuan to his collection room to view and select items, when suddenly a cell phone rang outside the hall. A man in his twenties then came in with the phone and whispered to Zhang Jing, "Boss, a guest has arrived!"
Zhang Jing gestured to Zhou Shang and then said, "Excuse me, I need to take this call!"
Zhou Xuan smiled and made a hand gesture. Zhang Jing then answered the phone, pressing the answer button. As he walked out of the hall, he said, "Brother, what brings you here? Hehe, I had a guest here, so your arrival is perfect. Hehe, what a master..."
Zhou Xuan didn't pay any attention. Hearing Zhang Jue talking to his friend about his affairs, he stopped listening and turned to look at the furnishings and decorations in the room. This Zhang Jing was obviously quite well-off. There were actually several genuine works hanging on the wall, each worth tens of millions. It seemed that these were his decorations to show off. Real experts would be impressed as soon as they saw them.
Zhou Xuan tested it with ice energy, and it was true. He had just released the ice energy to probe other parts of the house and hadn't paid attention to what was in front of him. This Zhang Jing was very cunning. His face was all real, but everything he sold behind the scenes was fake. Moreover, the simulation was so sophisticated that if he hadn't had ice energy, he really wouldn't have been able to recognize it. However, no matter how clever their methods were, everything would only reveal its true form under the ice energy!
Just as Zhou Xuan was gazing at the calligraphy and paintings on the wall, he heard Zhang Jing's cheerful voice and followed him in with another person. Once in the living room, Zhang Jing said to Zhou Xuan and the others, "Hehe, sorry, my friend is here. Since you're here, let's chat. We're all like-minded people. Hehe, let me introduce you!"
As Zhang Jing introduced the guest he had brought in to the public, Zhou Xuan was immediately taken aback upon seeing him!
Zhang Jing's guest turned out to be Ma Shu!
Others naturally don't know that the main body of Zhou Zhangjing's master armchair isn't made of very large pieces of wood, and it's not the finest old rosewood. But for such a large chair, it still uses a lot of material, though not the main trunk, but mostly branches as thick as an arm. Even so, the value of this chair would exceed two or three million.
Furthermore, since fully formed sandalwood is practically extinct, the only way to make sandalwood furniture nowadays is to acquire beams from undiscovered old houses in the countryside. But even finding one is like finding a needle in a haystack, so no matter how expensive it is, it's priceless and unavailable!
Zhang Jingqi was surprised that Zhou Xuan could recognize his rosewood chair so easily. Few people could tell the difference these days. It's not easy to recognize something you've never seen before. He was quite astonished, not knowing that Zhou Xuan had such a keen eye. It was a huge threat to his counterfeit goods.
However, Zhang Jing remained somewhat confident. His magical artifacts, let alone someone as young as Zhou Xuan, even national-level experts and mentors, had all been kept in the dark. In recent years, he had sold far more than just machine parts to museums through his distributors. And which expert had actually noticed?
However, Zhang Jing was still cautious. He brought Zhou Xuan to his small hideout without making any further tests today, mainly because Zhou Xuan's jade micro-carvings were simply too amazing. The magical items he made were already a highly profitable business, but one of Zhou Xuan's micro-carvings was worth more than dozens of his other items. Moreover, these items were small and convenient, unlike his antiques.
When Zhou Xuan said that the chair was worth more than two million, Lin Shilong and Fang Dacheng were quite surprised, as was Wei Xiaoyu. She had been following Zhou Xuan for a few days and hadn't seen much else, but she had witnessed many strange things. A casual, ordinary item could be worth millions. In Zhou Xuan's world, money was no longer money, or rather, money shouldn't be measured in hundreds of millions, but in tens of millions or hundreds of millions.
Several people's eyes were fixed on the dark-colored wooden armchair. It didn't seem particularly unusual; even if it were inlaid with gold, it wouldn't be worth millions, right? Ice against ice, Zhou Xuan felt as if he were filming a special effects movie. The image of ice energy battling Ma Shu's ice energy appeared in his mind—an energy clash!
"Ma Shu, how do you know how to use my ice energy ability? Did you steal my crystal?" Zhou Xuan asked, panting and gathering his strength, while staring at Ma Shu.
Wei Xiaoyu was unable to move behind Zhou Xuan. When Zhou Xuan used his ice energy alone, she didn't feel it at all. But when she was fighting fiercely against someone who also had the ability of ice energy, she felt it. Within the range of the energy, it was as if a huge boulder was pressing down on her. It was impossible to move an inch. Fortunately, Zhou Xuan shared some of his ice energy to protect her. If she had been in Ma Shu's ice energy, she would probably have been turned into gold and swallowed up completely without leaving a trace!
"Hahaha!" Ma Shu laughed wildly, also noticing that Zhou Xuan's ice energy had not fully recovered and was slightly inferior to his. Even if they were back to normal, he would still have a slight advantage, since his ice energy ability had come much later!
"Telling you won't hurt. You can't do anything to me now anyway, and with the crystal in my hands, surpassing you is only a matter of time!" Ma Shu said with a sinister grin. "That time on the Hong Kong ship, while you were distracted dealing with others, did you know I desperately used my mind-reading ability to reach the deepest recesses of your mind, thus learning the origin of your ice-qi ability? So I searched everywhere for golden stones, but they were indeed hard to find. These extraterrestrial objects are rare and hard to come by. I couldn't find them, but I searched for a long time in the sea south of you, and finally caught that mutated sea turtle. You know, it was truly heaven-sent! From the turtle's blood, I obtained the ice-qi ability, albeit a very small one, but I now possess the same ability as you. Later, I went to the capital and secretly stole your crystal. After obtaining the crystal, my energy greatly increased. Although I'm still a bit weaker than you, it's not by much. And I have the crystal, you don't. Given time, the difference in strength will become clear. You are definitely no match for me, haha. What I didn't expect was that you actually managed to come out alive from that cave. How did you get out?"
Listening to Ma Shu's arrogant words, Zhou Xuan finally understood that while the statement itself was correct, Zhou Xuan had specifically mentioned that it was a branch, which greatly reduced its value.
Zhou Xuan was taken aback. The age of this sandalwood was determined using ice energy. It was impossible to tell from the surface of the chair alone. He was at a loss for words to explain it.
Zhang Jing chuckled and waved his hand, saying, "Never mind, Mr. Wei, I was just being nosy. Everyone understands that the skills of a master are top secret and won't be passed on. I know that!"
Zhang Jing understood the meaning and went up to the next level. Zhou Xuan breathed a sigh of relief. It was good that he understood it this way, which was just right to cover up the secret he couldn't tell.
In fact, the most advanced techniques in every industry are kept secret. From science and technology to food, everything has a technique that is not passed on to anyone but the most important person. Many skills also have rules such as passing them down to daughters-in-law but not daughters, or to sons but not nephews.
After taking a few sips of tea, Zhou Xuan calmed down and wasn't in a hurry to look at the collectibles. Under his icy aura, he could practically see them; they were indeed the same as those seized from Fu Yuanshan—demonic items, and the methods were identical. Zhou Xuan was even more certain that the icy aura could detect the same minute molecular details in the mud used to seal the demonic items, indicating that the mud was made in the same place. This also confirmed Zhang Jing's importance in the case. Previously, the appearance of the ghost mask had killed all eleven people here, and that lead had been cut off. But now, this lead had been found again!
Zhou Xuan wasn't in a hurry, but Lin Shilong and Fang Dacheng were. They were eager to see Zhou Xuan make a deal with Zhang Jing, the bigger the better, so they could make more money. However, Zhou Xuan had already paid him for the Lanting Preface, so he wouldn't get any extra income from the exchange unless Zhou Xuan bought more antiques.
Zhang Jing was also a little anxious because the miniature carving was still with Zhou Xuan and hadn't been handed over to him. Since Zhou Xuan hadn't yet chosen what he wanted from Zhang Jing, the transaction wasn't considered complete. What if Zhou Xuan couldn't find anything he liked?
Volume 1, Chapter 363: Inexplicable
"The masked man, if only I had disappeared when I was in Hong Kong, I wouldn't have had to deal with all this trouble later. It seems that to be a good person, you should be kind to good people and ruthless to bad people. Being merciful to bad people is just being cruel to yourself; it only brings harm!"
Once on the shore, Zhou Xuan looked at the poison again and felt it looked somewhat familiar. He said, "This place is somewhat similar to the area along the west bank of the Chongkou Seaside Amusement Park when I used to work in the south. However, we were just in Jiangbei, which is inland. It's a bit hard to understand how we got to the seaside in the blink of an eye!"