"Something's wrong—my wife is missing!"
As he shouted this, Prince Adrian's face was filled with terror.
Yet, the others in the room barely reacted; they simply sat there, quietly watching him, unmoving.
For a moment, the atmosphere felt strangely off.
Prince Adrian looked at Monkey, then at Tripitaka, then at Marshal Silver. After a long pause, he stammered in confusion, "I said, my wife is missing... Why aren't you reacting?"
"What kind of reaction do you want?" Monkey asked.
"You... you should at least be worried!"
"Why should we?"
Prince Adrian was momentarily speechless.
Faced with that question, he truly didn't know what to say.
Why should we?
Frowning, Prince Adrian struggled for a long time before muttering, "My wife is missing. Isn't that serious enough? You're asking why I should be anxious?"
"I'm asking why we should be anxious," Monkey said with a blank expression. "Don't you often run away from home yourself? Why is it a problem if your wife leaves once? Does she have to wait at home for you forever?"
"This is different!" Prince Adrian cried out, protesting, "Every time she left before, if I wasn't home, she'd at least leave me a letter. But this time, nothing! Not even her Jade Tablet! That means something's happened to her!"
Even after all his shouting, Prince Adrian still looked terrified, but the room remained silent.
Monkey and Marshal Silver exchanged uneasy glances, their brows slightly furrowed.
Trying to emphasize the seriousness, Prince Adrian shouted again, "I'm telling you, something's happened to my wife!"
After a moment, Monkey asked softly, "Was there any sign of damage at your home?"
"No," Prince Adrian shook his head.
"Then why are you so anxious?" Monkey said, removing the Adamantine Ring from his wrist and holding it in his hand. He infused it with spiritual power and called softly, "Belle Whitebone."
There was no response.
Monkey's expression changed slightly. He softly called, "Marshal Silver."
Still no response.
"Gavin Pig."
This time, there was movement—the Adamantine Ring flashed and trembled violently, as if trying to break free from Monkey's grasp and fly toward Marshal Silver.
Everyone around watched Monkey in silence.
Monkey glanced around at the group, hesitated slightly, then lowered his head and softly called, "Tripitaka."
The Adamantine Ring kept trembling, this time pointing toward Tripitaka.
"Aiden Ao."
The Adamantine Ring then shifted, pointing toward Prince Adrian.
"How is it?" Marshal Silver asked.
"Strange—I can't sense Belle Whitebone at all. It was the same when I tried to find General Curtain before. What's going on? Is there something that can block the Adamantine Ring's sensing? That shouldn't be possible—not even the Buddha has a way. " Monkey pondered for a moment, then called out, "General Lee."
The Adamantine Ring continued to flash, but stopped moving, lying still in Monkey's hand like an ordinary steel hoop.
"Nathan Young."
Still no response.
"Tina Ao."
Again, no response.
"Barry Bear."
This time, there was movement—the Adamantine Ring trembled fiercely, pointing toward Barry Bear.
Monkey let out a small sigh of relief, slid the Adamantine Ring back onto his wrist, and said calmly, "I understand now—the Adamantine Ring's sensing range has shrunk."
"It's normal for a sensing artifact to lose range after centuries without maintenance," Marshal Silver said.
"Do you know how to repair it?"
Marshal Silver took a sip of water from his bamboo tube and replied, "We're both on the Traveler's Path. Do you think I know how?"
Staring at the Adamantine Ring on his wrist, Monkey frowned helplessly. "If only I'd realized sooner. I should have asked Zhenyuan to help while we were at Five-Fruits Temple."
"You're oversimplifying," Marshal Silver said, raising his eyes. "Only Lord Lao truly understands how to repair his own artifacts. Asking Zhenyuan wouldn't have helped."
...
Meanwhile, in a cave manor tens of thousands of miles away, Belle Whitebone was tightly bound to a massive pillar.
A figure in a blue Eight-Trigrams Daoist robe, with a high topknot, graying temples, and one eye turned red and multi-pupiled, paced grimly before her. It was Many-Eyes the Centipede.
"Speak! Why is your husband traveling with the Great Sage?"
"Didn't I just explain?" Belle Whitebone frowned. "He's trying to get a Peach of Immortality for me. That's why he agreed to go west with the Great Sage."
"I'll give you one more chance."
"You can give me as many chances as you want. I'm telling the truth."
Many-Eyes the Centipede stopped, turned slowly, and looked down at Belle. "Then tell me—why would the Great Sage want your husband to join him on the journey west?"
"How should I know?" Belle's frown deepened. She stared at the empty ground, clearly angry but helpless.
The ropes binding her weren't anything special, but her cultivation was limited. Though she was a demon, Belle's aptitude was poor—even after six hundred years on the Traveler's Path and access to Dragon Palace techniques, she was only at the mid-stage of Spirit-Refinement, with no breakthrough in sight.
If not for that, she would have joined Prince Adrian on the journey west as soon as she learned about it—instead of waiting at home.
"Heh heh heh." Many-Eyes the Centipede stroked his beard and said slowly, "Your husband, Prince Adrian of the Western Sea, is only a Golden Immortal—not even a Celestial Adept. The Great Sage has as many former Blossom Mountain followers as he wants. Why would he choose someone on Heaven's wanted list, with ties to the Western Sea, like Adrian? Are you trying to tell me the Great Sage invited your husband to go west? Do you think I'm a fool?"
Belle turned her face away, silent.
After staring at Belle for a while, Many-Eyes the Centipede sighed, resumed pacing, and said softly, "Let me ask you something else. Why is the Great Sage heading west? What's the real goal of the journey? Why does Spirit Mountain claim Tripitaka's flesh grants immortality? Why did Zhenyuan first stir up trouble, then suddenly withdraw? Explain all this, and I'll let you go."
This chapter isn't finished yet~.~ Please click next page to continue reading!
"How would I know?"
"Your husband never told you?"
"No!"
"That's odd. Your husband suddenly decides to travel west with the Great Sage, and you don't even ask why?"
"I asked. He didn't know either!"
"And you didn't ask again?"
Belle pouted, shouting angrily, "How was I supposed to ask? That heartless idiot—if he doesn't know, he doesn't know! Asking again won't help! Aren't you one of the old Blossom Mountain crew? Why don't you ask your Great Sage yourself?"
Many-Eyes the Centipede stroked the whisk in his hand and laughed slowly, gazing at Belle with a sigh. "It seems you won't tell the truth unless you suffer a little."
...
At Prince Adrian's urging, Marshal Silver had entered his small courtyard.
There were only eight rooms in total, three halls front and back, with three storerooms and a kitchen. Marshal Silver moved through the rooms like a detective, examining every trace—from lingering spiritual energy to spider silk under the chairs, inspecting every clue.
Yet after most of the day, he found nothing.
Marshal Silver expanded his search to the area outside the house, finally stopping in front of the small vegetable garden behind it.
"How many people live here?"
"Just the two of us," Prince Adrian replied.
"Who do you usually interact with?"
"Hardly anyone. My wife has a friend or two who visit occasionally, that's all."
Bending down, Marshal Silver parted the sweet potato leaves, his eyes narrowing to slits.
Prince Adrian said, "We planted the garden when we built the house. Belle wanted to live like ordinary people, grow our own food, so we made a vegetable patch. But...we both have magic, so why bother with farming? If we need anything, we can just hunt in the woods—it's much easier. We argued about it a few times...eventually she handled it herself, and later, she planted only sweet potatoes because they're easy to grow."
He shrugged helplessly and sighed.
Turning to Prince Adrian, Marshal Silver gently parted the thick leaves, revealing several weeds that had been pulled up and left in the field.
"What's wrong?"
"These weeds aren't completely wilted. Do you just throw the pulled weeds in the field?"
"Usually she puts them in a basket when she weeds."
Marshal Silver thought for a moment, then stood up, surveying the garden. After a while, he brushed the dirt from his hands and said lightly, "Your wife was taken away by someone."
"What?" Prince Adrian cried out in shock.
Pointing at the garden, Marshal Silver said, "Look closely—there are at least six sets of footprints here, all different sizes. They're probably a few days old. The prints only appear in the middle of the field, which means they came from the sky, and your wife was weeding at the time. Judging by the size and shape, they're not Heavenly Army prints—they belong to demons."
Before Marshal Silver finished, Prince Adrian was already stunned.
Marshal Silver gently patted Prince Adrian's shoulder and sighed. "The good news is, there's no sign of a struggle, no strong lingering spiritual energy. That means there was no fighting. At least...it looks like they just wanted to abduct her, not kill her."
With that, Marshal Silver turned and left, leaving Prince Adrian standing there in shock.
"Abducted?"
Not the Heavenly Army, but demons... At this moment, the first person who came to Prince Adrian's mind was his father, the Western Sea Dragon King.
After all these years, everyone in the Western Sea knows he lives here, and both the Western Sea Dragon Palace and the Four Seas have always opposed this marriage. But it's been six hundred years—if they wanted to abduct her, wouldn't they have done it long ago? Why now? It doesn't make sense.
But if it wasn't the Western Sea Dragon Palace or the Heavenly Army, then who?
The couple lived here, never made enemies, and even had good relations with Louis Quickpaw's faction among the demons.
For a moment, Prince Adrian simply couldn't figure it out.