Her legs moved so fast that she was behind Da Niu within seconds, her sharp dagger on his neck. The ox hadn’t regain his equilibrium from the powerful, forbidden heavenly powder of euphoria; hence she was able to take him by surprise.

“You dare to touch my brother?” Yu Liang snarled, her voice dangerously low and ominous.

Da Niu face darken, black lines appeared on his forehead. “Nothing happened between us; although we were stuck in the same room, we only tried to shed our clothes to lessen the weird heat circulating through our body.” He turned his head and spat with disgust, “As handsome as I am, I don’t go for little boys and if something had really happened between us, do you still think we would be standing here unharmed?”

Yu Liang knitted her brows tightly, but she didn’t retrieved her dagger. The sharp edge nipped a bit of the Ox’s skin, and small drips of fresh blood trickled down her blade.

Suddenly, his strong grip wrung the dagger out of her hand and before she could comprehend what was happening, her body was sent flying. Just as she was about to crash miserably into the walls, a potent, husky masculine scent invaded her nostrils and she was safely cradled in Huo Wei Hu’s arms.

Da Niu sent her a barbaric look, his mighty ox body fuming with rage. “Don’t flatter yourselves humans, I’m only interested in four legged beasts, not those with two!”

Yu Liang stared deeply into Da Niu’s furious eyes, but she saw no lies; however, before she could release a breath of relief, Huo Wei Hu’s arms tighten around her as his rigid body turned taut with anger.

His precious family treasure, he couldn’t even pamper her enough and this stupid ox dares to be so rough with his woman! Since he has the courage to hurt my future empress, then he should accept the consequences of his actions! The ramification of angering this lord, can be worse than death. Using his ox hind and skin, maybe this lordship could use them to make wedding shoes for my future wife…

The creepy glint sparkling in Huo Wei Hu’s eyes sent a shiver down Da Niu’s spine. His animal instincts told him this man was dangerous, and he had greatly riled him when he might have used too much force to throw that human woman away.

Luckily, he was saved from his impending doom due to the human. Da Niu was quite surprised at how a small touch from her and a smile could so easily dispelled the killing intent. He promptly moved toward the activated transportation seal when the couples were distracted with one another— putting as much distance as possible between him and that cunning fox.

For once, he was thankful for how he had accidentally saved her life once, but if she had died in the first trial, how would he even be in this predicament?

Yu Liang watched Da Niu escaped swiftly with such a strong look of grievance, she didn’t know if she should cry or laugh. Since Yu Tian was safe and nothing happened, her mind was consoled and her heart pacified. Thinking about the disgruntled ox, she couldn’t help, but released another hearty laughter.

Hearing her lovely laugh, it was the most pleasing musical Huo Wei Hu had ever heard in his life. The corner of his lips hooked into a demonic smile as he carried her briskly toward the transportation seal, while her younger brother followed behind with a trot after he retrieved her dagger.

As the bright beam of light slowly faded, Yu Liang opened her mouth in awe as a small gasp left her lips. “This…is this the staircase to the heavenly realm?”

Before them, stood an extraordinary view — a grand staircase made entirely out of clouds that appeared to continue upward forever, like a road leading to heaven. It was marvelous! Lofty and regal, soaring proudly in the sky.

All of them were standing on puffs of clouds, so feathery light that Yu Liang was afraid it would buckle under their weight! Such a thin veil of vapor really caused her heart to be uneasy! Not like she and Yu Tian could fly in midair!

Huo Wei Hu clasped their hands together, stopping her fidgety movements, “Don’t worry, I won’t let you fall to your death.” His eyes twinkled with dark humor as he whispered softly in her ears.

A loud annoyed female voice echoed throughout the wisps of fog as she was about to quip back, effectively ending their flirting.

Guardian Yin Mei gave her an irate look, irked by their flirtatious interactions with one another. Yu Liang met the challenge in her eyes straight on, refusing to back down.

“Congratulations on making it to the fifth trial! You only need to reach the top of this staircase to reach the next floor of the pagoda. The first one to arrive on the sixth floor will receive a hint to help them in their next trial. Now best of luck!” Guardian Yin Mei gave Yu Liang a snobbish smirk.

“There are also baskets of colorful beans, if any of you are interested. Sort these beans into their respective color and a hint will appear once you’re done with one basket to aid you in this trial.” She disappeared into a puff of smoke as she finished her explanation.

Loud boisterous laughter erupted around them. “Who would waste time to sort such a large basket of beans? It’s only walking up those cloud staircase! How stupid can anyone be to not even know how to do such a simple task?” one of the contestants jeered and the rest soon followed.

Yu Liang scrutinized the cloud staircase, trying to decipher any hidden mechanism. She snorted, how could a trial be as easy as merely just reaching the top? These people were such fools! With such thoughts, she decided to stay back and watched the others climb the stairs.

At first, their pace was normal, but very soon, sweat accumulated on their forehead and their steps slowed down by a huge margin. She narrowed her clear eyes as she studied those who could fly, but their wings suddenly seemed heavy as they plundered unceremoniously downward, before landing on the soft clouds.

Interesting! It appeared the magical air here prevented anyone from flying over to the top. That meant everyone must manually climb the staircase, yet with every step they took, the next one required more energy.

Her sharp eyes darted to the pile of kaleidoscopic beans. Walking over, Yu Liang investigated the basket as she slowly inspected a few of the colorful beans in her palms. Her intelligent eyes scanned back to those eagerly attempting to climb the stairs, but had barely walked thirty steps out of maybe six hundred steps or more.

Returning her gaze back to one of the basket filled with multicolored beans, she sighed before resigning herself to sort them all. Making herself comfortable on the fluffy clouds, she sat down and began to explore the basket, arranging the beans one by one with their respective color.

Huo Wei Hu and Yu Tian sat down beside her and began to help. From the corner of her eyes, she saw a languid and leisure smile on Huo Wei Hu. She was momentarily distracted by such a carefree smile, before returning her attention to the task at hand.

Those who stopped to rest on the cloud staircase, sent them mocking looks. None of them had courage to give them trouble outright because of Huo Wei Hu, so they could only resort to such petty methods. The three of them ignored the idiots as they focused on categorizing the beans.

After what felt like hours, the last bean was finally sorted together with the rest of his kin. The beans emitted a soft glow before they disappeared, leaving behind a bamboo scroll and three small rainbow beans.