“You can drop the act.” Lu Yun shook his head when he met the plotter’s cowering eyes. “It’s only one of your replicas here.”

The strained expression on the plotter’s face shifted when he heard the young man’s words.

“So you saw right through me.” The man shed the pretense of being terrified out of his wits and stood up to face Lu Yun. “That’s right, this is just one of my replicas.”

He no longer displayed the same fear that he’d shown moments ago, but wariness still gleamed out of his eyes when he looked at the withered wood. The flash of emotion wasn’t fake, he really was cautious, or even afraid of, the wood.

His interactions with Lu Yun had been playing for time so...