"Papa! Eat?" Little Zhe asked in an innocent tone while edging near the contents of the box nonchalantly. Han Xuhan, who was busy deciphering the terrible handwriting on the paper that had come with it, lightly gripped the snake by a rib and pushed it back.

The main issue concerning little Zhe was that its appearance had screwed up Xuhan's personal control over his dao tower far more impactfully than its two predecessors. While Zhanxian and little Tian had started showing signs of becoming partially owners of their 'rooms' in the tower, little Zhe's appearance had changed something much more basic and fundamental.

Han Xuhan couldn’t control this third minion's summoning. While he could summon it and send it back to his dao tower freely, it too could appear and disappear from the real world as it pleased. Coupled with its extremely young mental state, it was no different from a lively child running back and forth all over the house, barging into rooms and randomly trying to eat stuff with and without permission. The only positive thing Xuhan could think of concerning its existence that it at least didn’t need its nappy changed every few hours.

Moreover, as an undead sensitive to qi, little Zhe feared cultivators like nothing else. Just then when Xuan Zi had shown up inside his hut and noticed the snake, it had ran off, crossed worlds and hid inside his dao tower where a snake pit had appared right in the middle of the main room.

Han Xuhan had taken a good look at it from above when it had first appeared. It was at least a few yards deep, with a radius of only one meter. The bottom was like a dark maw of a leviathan waiting for food to drop in conveniently. The sensory connection he had with the dao tower told him it was just an empty hole with a bottom made up of flat rocks and walls that could be climbed easily. But his astral eyes had refused to believe his mind. The hole looked too sinister. Being around it made him feel the nervous pressure of a claustrophobic's worst nightmares. Xuhan had no idea what caused this uncanny feeling, but he had decided to trust his senses and hadn't gone down to investigate. Instead, he had thrown Zhanxian and little Tian inside. They should have been out by now if nothing was wrong with the pit.

The new development was, however, not much of a surprise compared to what he discovered upon reading the contents of the paper.

The first bit with the atrocious handwriting was from crazy Xie. He seemed to have intentionally written it that terribly in order to inconvenience Xuhan. In all honesty, the only remark Xuhan could make about his little petty games was 'damn, this guy is good at this'.

There are five vials in the box. Each vial contains a certain amount of a potion called 'mind killer'. As you can guess, the moment someone takes a sip of this potion, their mind will be 'killed' in a certain sense. The dosage here, however, is pretty low. Once you make somebody drink from a vial, or inject it in their bloodstream, they'll become mentally crippled for a few days. What you need to do during that time is to inform me that you’ve done your job using the method I've shown below. Once I've identified all the targets in the tournament, another message will be forwarded to you. Do not try to double cross me, and our little contract will end in its due time.

Beneath the paragraph was a simple looking qi formation that even an amateur like Xuhan could design easily.

However, the contents of the paper did not end there, because a new, more legible handwriting started beneath the formation design.

Disciple, maybe you're surprised, maybe you're not, that your tasks involve poisoning people and mentally crippling them. As you're aware, his targets are talented youths from various sects. This task is quite risky, and almost impossible for you to do by yourself. So I've taken the risk to modify the formation design he his given you. You can find this upgraded version on the other side of the page. The new version will not only allow him to connect with the paralyzed mind of his victims but also let ME appear at the place of the crime to help clean up the clues and ward off any potential threats around. While I do not support what Fang Xie is doing, it will not stop me from extending a favour to a disciple as valuable as yourself.

Han Xuhan turned the page over and observed the next formation design. It hadn’t been modified too heavily. He could still make one on the go.

"Papa! Big brother cried !"

Broken out of his thoughts, he turned to look at little Zhe who had gone into the dao tower while he was reading. The skeleton didn’t have any expression on its draconic face, but a state of panic radiated from the way its body twisted and turned on his shoulders.

Placing the paper inside the box, Xuhan hid it inside one of his qi-print sensitive trunks where he usually kept his most treasured resources. Then he entered meditation to investigate what was going on inside his dao tower.

Soon, the bright white palace inside his mind surfaced in front of his mental gaze. Floating inside, he found Zhanxian and little Tian curled up in one corner of the main hall, hugging each other shivering quietly.

"Zhanxian, little Tian stole your spice flavoured qi juice yesterday. Little Zhe was not the culprit."

The moment he finished speaking, Zhanxian leapt upwards and threw the owl at the nearest wall in fury, his fearful act forgotten in the wake of massive torrent of emotions raging inside his nonexistent heart.

"Bastard, I trusted you! This is how you repay me?"

"Big brother Xian, don’t bully a young man just because he is poor! The river flows thirty year to the east-"

BANG!

Zhanxian rushed toward the owl and kicked it away like a football.

"I don’t know where the river flows but I know where I'll be scattering your crushed bones!"

"Dammit brother Xian! You gave away our plan-"

Little Tian yelped in sudden realization, making Zhanxian who was rushing toward him once more come to a stop.

Awkwardly, both skeleton avatars turned around and faced Xuhan, not quite meeting his eyes. Han Xuhan, having guessed that their traumatised state was probably an act, hurrumphed loudly.

"You have ten seconds to tell me why I shouldn't cut off your resource allotments for the next month."

". . . . Because you need us for the tournament," Zhanxian answered in an honest tone.

". . . .hehehehe," wordlessly, Xuhan started chuckling after a few seconds.

"Wha-why are you laughing ? What's so funny ?" Han Xuhan's creepy, familiar laughter unsettled the eldest minion greatly.

"Have you considered the fact that before something serious happens to me during the tournament, you two will probably die? Because I'll definitely set up all of my strategies in that exact order. I know you do not fear death, Zhanxian. But I don't think little Tian is going to agree, in which case I'll let him take your share of resources so that he can surpass your cultivation fast and order you around like a dog."

"Little Tian wouldn’t-"

"Heheh, did you just say....little Tian? Really, minion, how could you forget how much Tun Shi Tian hates that nickname? Have you never noticed the hatred in his eyes everytime you call him by that name?" Han Xuhan's voice was like a devil's whisper behind Zhanxian's neck.

"His eyes?" The skeleton asked nobody in particular as it looked toward the dumbfounded owl skeleton.

"Zhanxian, Zhanxian, Zhanxian, you foolish little thing. How could you not notice its malice, its schemes? Ever since its birth, the owl has concocted plots after plots against me. But do you think you were spared despite having tormented and insulted its humongous ego?" Han Xuhan silently used his control over the dao tower to isolate his voice, making Zhanxian the only audience. It was one of the two very unorthodox functions he had learnt recently from elder Kong Ye's personal guidance sessions after actively requesting for it to the flummoxed elder. Now was the perfect time to execute it.

"Ohho, little minion....The owl has repeatedly made you comply with its reckless, foolish plans, thinking I wouldn’t notice. Even the greatest of fools would know better than to doubt my intelligence after being with me for so long. So why, just why did you keep agreeing to it, knowing fully well that the bird's plans would almost never succeed?

Have you considered the fact that it might have been targeting YOU the whole time? To make me take out my anger on you? To make me resent you and let it become my number one minion so that it can have the bigger share of resources? After all, you’re the leader of every task I set for you two. Upon your failures and attempted tricks, my wrath shall obviously fall on you most of the time!"

"He wouldn’t-"

"Ahahaha....come on, try to remember, Zhanxian. Or even better, let me help you remember!" His whispers fiercer and darker, Xuhan executed his second newly learnt function of the dao tower and mentally connected to Zhanxian's avatar as if he wanted to summon it back to the real world. But instead, he directed his qi toward his head and created a secondary cycle.

A chain of memories he had readied in his mind surfaced from the depths of his thoughts. Zhanxian, whose avatar had frozen mid air suddenly shook as scenes after scenes played themselves out in its mind, out of its control.

The scenes were blurry and often unfocused. The sound hardly matched with the scenes either. However, Zhanxian recognised it instantly. He was seeing the memory of little Tian's first appearance to the real world, from Xuhan's point of view this time.

"Trash," Tun Shi Tian's familiar voice said coldly.

"Trash, watch your mouth or I'll sew it up for you!

"DIE FOR MEEE!

"For now, I'll accept your tyranny, demon!

"Could you accept being forced to serve a talentless trash as cannon fodder?

"But perhaps this was meant to be. Perhaps you shall be my stepping stone, the catalyst that will guide me on my way.

"But I'll prevail one day and gain my freedom, remember that demon!"

The scenes played out ceaselessly, impacting Zhanxian's mind like a battering ram again and again. The hatred and malice in the owl's voice never subsided. Despite knowing this was Xuhan's point of view, Zhanxian felt a streak of wariness and animosity taking shape in his heart.

"Think about it, minion. Every task you screwed up in, was it really all your fault?"

"Not entirely.... No...."

"Maybe, just maybe, little Tian was merely hiding his animosity toward you and using ME as the target of its malice as the distraction...? Surely, all clues line up to say that, YOU were actually the initial target of the bird's insidious schemes?"

Looking at Zhanxian's silent avatar, a sinister smirk appeared on Xuhan's face.

Divide and conquer, that was the only way to keep his minions under his control, he'd come to realize.