A breeze rose, flames swayed, and the hems of clothing fluttered in the wind.
Ye Xiaofan walked forward step by step, as though he had not seen Shi Chui and Liu Dàdāo charging at him.
Shi Chui and Liu Dàdāo exchanged a glance, and in that instant, their minds became one.
Liu Dàdāo launched the frontal assault while Shi Chui spun on his feet, flashing around to attack Ye Xiaofan from behind.
Attacked from both front and back, man upon man—this was their favorite way of taking down prey.
"Clang!"
Sword Drawing Technique, and blood must be seen when the sword was drawn!
Shi Chui had barely stepped half a pace sideways when he heard a pleasant sword cry. His neck turned cold, and then his consciousness sank into endless darkness.
A sword sliced across Shi Chui's throat. With a twist of his wrist, Ye Xiaofan's sword momentum did not lessen in the slightest, and the blood-colored blade, like a flood dragon emerging from the sea, stabbed straight at Liu Dàdāo's heart.
Liu Dàdāo raised his saber to block, but Ye Xiaofan flicked his wrist, the sword tip lightly tapping the saber's blade and making it pause for an instant.
"No—"
Liu Dàdāo's eyes bulged with fury as he frantically drove the qi and blood within his body, trying to force the saber in his hand forward another inch.
The saber did move, but it was already too late. The blood-colored sword pierced his chest and shattered his heart in an instant.
"You—"
The saber slipped from his hand and stabbed into the cracks between the bluestone slabs. Liu Dàdāo's lips moved before he crashed to the ground.
Ye Xiaofan had killed Liu Dàdāo in no more than one or two breaths. After Shi Chui's throat was cut and his life extinguished, his body's instincts carried him several steps forward before he fell almost at the same time as Liu Dàdāo.
He sheathed his sword!
As though he had done nothing at all, Ye Xiaofan continued walking forward step by step.
It seemed that only heavy breathing and footsteps remained between heaven and earth.
The Black Tiger Gang members stared in terror, cold sweat pouring down their bodies. Watching Ye Xiaofan draw nearer, their Adam's apples bobbed as they tried to retreat.
Yet their legs seemed no longer their own. Their knees trembled like sieves, nailed to the spot and utterly refusing to obey.
Some whose courage had been thoroughly shattered even felt warmth spreading down their trouser legs.
"Everyone, don't be nervous. I only want wealth, not lives."
Ye Xiaofan stopped, cradled his sword in both arms, and spoke in a very gentle tone.
"I-I know where it is. Don't kill me, I'll take you there."
At the very front, a thin young man with a pale face and panda eyes dropped to his knees with a bang, continuously kowtowing to Ye Xiaofan as he spoke in a trembling voice.
With the first came the second, then the third...
Everyone followed suit, kneeling on the ground and smashing their heads against it, shouting over and over, "I know too, I know too!"
"You. Get up and lead me there."
Ye Xiaofan pointed at the panda-eyed man who had been the first to kneel.
Overjoyed, the panda-eyed man said, "Thank you, sir! Thank you, sir!"
The panda-eyed man knocked his head against the ground several more times with bang bang bang, only struggling to his feet after his forehead had split open. Bent at the waist, he approached Ye Xiaofan.
"Heh!"
A trace of mockery surfaced at Ye Xiaofan's lips. He gave a cold laugh of unfathomable meaning, frightening the panda-eyed man so badly that his whole body trembled and his movements froze.
"Sir, please follow me. I know where all the Black Tiger Gang's wealth and cultivation techniques are."
The panda-eyed man seized the opportunity to remain where he was, bowing and scraping as he spoke ingratiatingly, while making a gesture of invitation.
Seeing this, the other gang members fell into despair.
For the useless, there was only one road—death.
Once this mysterious expert had found someone to guide him, they were doomed.
Because this was how the Black Tiger Gang usually conducted itself. Keeping useless people alive was merely a waste of air.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
"Sir, I know better than him where the silver is. Please let me guide you."
The sounds of heads striking bluestone slabs and pleas for mercy continued without end.
Ye Xiaofan remained unmoved, walking toward the crowd with his sword held in his arms.
Just as he drew near the panda-eyed man—
A sudden change erupted.
The panda-eyed man, who had been bowing and scraping moments ago, suddenly erupted with vicious light in his eyes. A jet-black dagger instantly appeared in his hand.
But Ye Xiaofan was even faster. The dagger had barely revealed its tip when the scabbard had already tapped the man's forehead.
The jet-black dagger slipped from his hand and fell onto the bluestone, letting out a crisp clink.
"The gang leader won't let you go..."
The panda-eyed man stared blankly at Ye Xiaofan. The next moment, red and white matter flowed from his seven orifices, and he fell stiffly backward.
"Hall Master of the Shadow Hall, An Ying!"
Ye Xiaofan murmured. From this moment onward, every high-ranking member of the Black Tiger Gang had been slain by his hand.
The Black Tiger Gang, which had entrenched itself in Qingyang County for more than a decade, became history from this day forward.
The Black Tiger Gang members seemed to have been frozen in place.
The scene once again fell into dead silence.
"I only want wealth, not lives. I don't want to say it a third time."
"You, lead the way."
Ye Xiaofan spoke again, pointing at someone with Body Refining Third Level cultivation.
This person's cultivation was not bad. He should have been a minor leader and ought to know where the Black Tiger Gang kept its silver.
"M-Me?"
Li Dajiang swallowed, looked around, pointed at himself, and stammered uncertainly.
"Lead the way!"
"Yes, yes, sir!"
Li Dajiang pressed both hands against the ground to help his unsupported legs stand. Not daring to hesitate in the slightest, he took the lead.
Ye Xiaofan followed Li Dajiang through the crowd just like that. No one dared offer even the slightest resistance.
As Ye Xiaofan's figure disappeared—
"Run!"
No one knew who shouted it, but the crowd immediately came to its senses and scrambled on hands and feet toward the Black Tiger Gang's main gate.
"Does the Black Tiger Gang have any Mid-grade cultivation techniques?"
Now that Ye Xiaofan had Xiao Qiaofeng as backing, he could enter and leave the Demon Suppression Division's Technique Pavilion as he pleased. He no longer thought much of Low-grade cultivation techniques, but a Mid-grade cultivation technique would be worth taking to the Black Market for some silver.
"Yes, yes. Zhang Dahu cultivated a Mid-grade cultivation technique. I-I don't know where it is."
Li Dajiang cautiously glanced at Ye Xiaofan from the corner of his eye as he spoke.
Ye Xiaofan said nothing more. He could not be bothered to look for it. He would take the silver and leave.
The matter of the Black Tiger Gang could not remain hidden for long.
Seeing Ye Xiaofan remain silent, cold sweat poured from Li Dajiang. After walking only a few steps, he looked as though he had just been pulled from water.
Afterward,
Ye Xiaofan killed the Black Tiger Gang members guarding the storehouse, then followed Li Dajiang to the underground chamber where the Black Tiger Gang stored its silver.
The underground chamber was not large, about ten zhang across.
Inside, densely packed chests were arranged neatly by section.
There were medicinal herbs, ores, weapons, and pills.
Ye Xiaofan withdrew his gaze and looked at Li Dajiang.
"Go. Open every chest containing silver. After that, you can get lost."
A trace of delight flashed across Li Dajiang's face as he hurried forward and opened the chests.
There were a full four hundred chests. Li Dajiang spent quite a while opening every chest containing silver.
"Sir, I—"
"Get lost!"
Li Dajiang felt as though a heavy burden had been lifted from his shoulders. He rolled and crawled out of the underground chamber.
"I'm rich, I'm rich!"
Once Li Dajiang had left, Ye Xiaofan could no longer suppress himself. He rushed forward, grabbed the silver, and his pupils instantly seemed to turn into silver ingots.
"System, quickly, quickly! Recharge it!"
Ye Xiaofan brushed a hand over every chest, and the silver inside instantly vanished.
The balance on the panel continuously jumped upward.
+1000! +1000!
"Haha, four hundred thousand! Haha, Top-grade cultivation technique, here I come!"
Looking at the balance of 417,000 on the panel, Ye Xiaofan could hardly wait to begin fusing cultivation techniques.
Forcefully suppressing the excitement in his heart, Ye Xiaofan inspected the weapons stored here.
"The weapons are ordinary. None are as good as the one in my hand."
Afterward, Ye Xiaofan went to where the medicinal herbs and pills were stored.
There were more than ten chests of medicinal herbs, one hundred Blood Qi Pills, and two hundred each of healing pills and antidote pills.
"Ah, I really want to take them all. It would be great if I had a storage space."
Seeing so many medicinal herbs that he could not take away, Ye Xiaofan's heart ached so badly it was bleeding.
Fortunately, the seals on every chest described what herbs they contained and how many years they had grown.
In the end, Ye Xiaofan selected five chests marked as containing medicinal herbs over five years old.
Together with the chest containing pills, he carried a full six chests out of the Black Tiger Gang.
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