Chapter 256: The Uneasy Senior Sister Meng
Han Yu remained in his balcony seat, nursing the same cup of jasmine tea as he kept a watchful eye on the building across the street.
After a few more minutes, the window curtain shifted again, and Senior Sister Meng stood from her seat. Her movements were composed, almost graceful, but Han Yu caught the faintest tremor in her shoulders before she left the room.
By the time she stepped outside and walked down the building’s front steps, the poise had returned to her stride. Her face, once pinched with strain during the meeting, now bore the same impassive serenity of a seasoned cultivator. From any outsider’s perspective, she might have looked like a disciple returning from routine sect business.
But Han Yu had been watching her too closely for too long. He could see that something was off.
She didn’t immediately return to the Mist Eye Sect branch. Instead, she wandered for a few minutes through adjacent alleys and backstreets, walking a casual loop that may have been a check for any potential tails.
Han Yu didn’t bite. He remained seated, watching her vanish around a corner before pulling his hood tighter and finally rising from his seat.
He didn’t follow her directly back to the Mist Eye Sect compound. Instead, he searched the nearby area for a location where he could lie in wait unnoticed.
A tavern two buildings down caught his attention.
Its signboard was cracked and faded, swinging lazily on a rusted hook: "The Roaming Gourd Tavern." Inside, it was dimly lit, musty with the scent of fermented grain and old wood. A place for rogue cultivators, mercenaries, and failed adventurers to drown their regrets with a few too many drinks.