"What the hell was that?"

Rather than being angry at the loss of the potential source of the information, I was simply baffled by the appearance of this strange monkey. But even after I scanned the place where it appeared, I was unable to find any energetical traces that could lead me to where it escaped after silencing the first witness of mine!

With a bad premonition born in my mind, I turned back to the man who claimed himself to be just a decoy juts in time to see the glint of the spear that this damned monkey threw at him!

Relying on my muscle memory rather than conscious thought, I erected a set of barriers right at the path that the weapon would have to take in order to do any harm to the last remaining witness.

Clang!

Contrary to my expectations, despite how strange the appearance of this monkey was, the spear it threw at my last remaining witness failed to penetrate even a single barrier, simply falling down below my feet with an annoying sound of metal hitting stone.

"No way…"

Hearing the remark of this stupid man who just realised what did it meant for him to be a decoy here, I almost allowed this damned monkey to once again split past my attention, listing its track once again. Yet with how it already proved to be quite skilled in concealing itself, I would have only myself to blame if I were as careless as to relax my vigilance for even a fraction of a second!

That's why, while not even attempting to follow its movements by my eyes, I simply limited myself to feeling how the surrounding air changed. Just when I felt the flow of the air suddenly change behind my back, rather than relying on the power of shields, I simply turned around on the spot and shot my fist towards the source of the distribution!

SMASH!

Most likely not expecting me to react so suddenly and violently, the monkey had no chance of avoiding my attack. As my fist broke through the barrier of the sound right before sinking in this peculiar enemy chest, I could swear I felt and heard something breaking on my knuckles!

"That's what you get for playing dirty!"

With those words on my mouth, I calculated the trajectory of my enemy as my hit pushed it away from any form of foothold and jumped right after it, hoping to nail it down to the ground with my own feet and get rid of this annoying animal.

Crash!

Even with most of my strength severely limited in order to avoid raising the suspicions of soon-to-be enemy sects, it didn't take long for me to reach the ground with a barely conscious monkey, allowing me to follow the steps of my plan that I created while midair.

"Who sent you?!"

While I knew that this monkey was most likely unable to answer any of my questions, even if they were as simple as what was the weather right now, I still put on the act as if I was actually curious what was going on.

Yet to my surprise, this monkey actually opened its mouth, took its breath and…

"Handaraparia!"

As soon as its strange chant came to an end, a powerful wave of energy erupted right between us, throwing me off the ground and several feet away. Despite how this eruption of force didn't manage to hurt me in any way, it still gave this damned animal a window to escape.

Which it promptly used!

Unable to find any leads that would allow me to follow it as soon as it disappeared from my view, I tried to repeat my previous trick with sensing the changes in the air around me, yet it was perfectly stale if one were to exclude the breaths of all the cultivators still gathered in the circle as I left them.

Yet I didn't let this momentary peacefulness to get in my head. With my vigilance at its max, I awaited even the subtle change that would indicate yet another attack, yet no matter how long I stood on the spot raising my attention to its maximum, nothing unordinary happened!

"He…"

Hearing the broken word from the place where I left the man claiming to be a decoy, I realised my mistake.

I wasn't the target of this monkey in the first place!

Lowering my centre of mass and tensing all my muscles in my legs, I jumped with all my power even going as far as to cast small shockwaves under my body to propel myself even further up.

Reaching back the place from where I dropkicked the monkey, I saw this poor guy already nailed down to the ground with a spear. Thankfully, this weapon has to be thrown rather than used manually as it didn't reach any of his vitals, allowing me to still get some information out of him!

"What happened, who did this to you, what is this monkey?"

Flooding the poor victim of the internal conflict in this city with a question, I pulled all the stops on my charm, hoping to use it to kill his pain and make him capable of answering my inquiries.

"This was… It was all… gorilla sect! They forced me… to act as a decoy… And those monkeys are their… tamed…"

By the time this poor boy reached the most important part of what I wanted to know, the internal damage reached the point where his body couldn't hold itself together anymore, cutting his sentence short as blood from his ruptured lungs flooded his throat.

Seeing that I would be unable to get anything else from this guy, I stood up and raised my hand covered in that guy's blood right o my air.

"I will revenge you. I WILL REVENGE ALL THOSE WHO FELL VICTIM TO YOUR SCHEMING, YOU BASTARDS!"

Just like I shouted those words, I felt ever so slight fluctuation in the air. Yet it was too small to indicate an incoming attack, so I didn't pay it any mind.

After all, I wanted them to know I was going for them. I wanted them to prepare for my vengeance! I wanted them to do their best and have hope of surviving my onslaught!

Because in the end, all I would do was to obediently wait for the challenge to start, while they would waste their resources on preparing themselves for the threat that would never come!