"Then that depends on how much you're really capable of."
Bai Yu flatly refused the masked man's demand.
A cold glint flashed through the masked man's eyes as he sprang forward.
"Fierce Tiger Leaps the Ravine!"
He crossed several zhang in a single leap and appeared before Bai Yu in an instant, driving a fierce punch at him.
Bai Yu did not dare be careless. He crossed his arms and blocked the blow.
"Bang—"
A tremendous force surged into Bai Yu's arms, driving him back several steps in a row.
The masked man pressed forward, taking the chance to unleash punch after punch.
"Fierce Tiger Descends the Mountain!"
"Arhat Subdues the Tiger!"
"Taming Tiger, Subduing Demons!"
Every move he made was heavy and powerful. His arms carried the force of a thousand jun, as though they bore the might of a savage tiger.
Bai Yu unfolded the Four Elephants Five Elements Fist and battled the masked man in a tangled melee.
He understood now. The masked man was using a famous, fiercely aggressive boxing art—the 42-Road Tiger Subduing Fist!
Bai Yu lacked experience in actual combat. At first, he could only block repeatedly, but as the fight went on, he grew increasingly at ease.
Unable to take Bai Yu down after fighting for so long, the masked man shouted:
"Kid, I never expected you to be born with divine strength. You're only a Second-Rank Martial Artist, yet you can block my Tiger Subduing Fist."
"Unfortunately, divine strength alone won't save you!"
He feinted, leaped backward, then slapped a yellow talisman onto himself.
At once, a layer of blood-red light enveloped his body.
The muscles all over his body swelled violently, and blue veins crawled across his arms like pythons.
Bai Yu immediately sensed that something was wrong.
That yellow talisman looked far too strange. He could not provoke it lightly.
Of the thirty-six stratagems, fleeing was the best.
Bai Yu drew in a breath, and after a few rises and falls, appeared dozens of zhang away.
Yet at that moment,
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Three piercing whistles tore through the air in succession.
Three crossbow bolts shot out of the darkness and all struck Bai Yu.
He gave a muffled groan and fell from the air. He struggled twice on the ground, then stopped moving altogether.
A bald, burly man emerged from the darkness.
The man carried a crossbow mechanism in his hand. He was a Second-Rank Martial Artist.
"Hmph, this brat truly doesn't know what's good for him. We invited him to join the Divine Teachings, yet he kept making excuses."
"Senior Brother Liu, what should we do with this brat's corpse?"
The masked man called Senior Brother Liu said:
"This brat is a Second-Rank Martial Artist with abundant vitality and blood. Naturally, we'll take him back to feed those treasures."
"Baldy, are you sure this brat is dead?"
The bald man laughed.
"Senior Brother Liu, you worry too much. With the Armor-Piercing Crossbow and Five-Step Snake Venom, does this brat have any chance of surviving?"
Senior Brother Liu snorted.
"This matter is of great importance. We must be careful. I'll confirm it myself."
He drew a throwing knife from his robes and flung it with all his strength.
The throwing knife struck Bai Yu's neck with a clang, yet it could not break through his defenses at all.
"Not good! He's in the Third Rank Skin Tempering Realm!"
Senior Brother Liu's face changed drastically, and he was about to retreat.
"Wrong. Fourth Rank!"
Bai Yu sprang up violently, a dagger somehow already in his hand.
Using the dagger as a saber, he slashed down fiercely.
Third move of the Soul Severing Blade: Lineage Severing Strike!
A cold gleam swept upward and cut into Senior Brother Liu's crotch. Blood gushed wildly.
Senior Brother Liu suffered a fatal strike to the balls and instantly became an old man with nothing left, letting out a shrill scream.
Yet instead of retreating, he advanced. With hatred in his heart, he swung a punch in retaliation. Truly, one ball had made him bold.
Bai Yu did not fear him in the slightest. The dagger in his hand flashed like lightning.
Soul Severing Saber Technique, one slash to sever the head.
Senior Brother Liu's head flew high into the air, his eyes staring wide open.
Even in death, he could not believe that the Second-Rank sheep had suddenly become a Fourth-Rank man-eating tiger.
This was not how one hid one's realm! Others suppressed themselves by one rank, but he had fucking suppressed himself by two!
On the other side, the bald man was scared senseless.
What was going on?
Senior Brother Liu was a Third-Rank Martial Artist, yet in the blink of an eye, he had become Senior Brother Liu's corpse.
He was only Second Rank. How could he possibly fight a Fourth-Rank expert?
Gritting his teeth, he swiftly pulled a white ball from his robes and hurled it hard at the ground.
With a bang, the white ball exploded, and white smoke instantly spread through the area.
Lime powder mixed with chili powder and other substances made it impossible to keep one's eyes open.
While Bai Yu retreated repeatedly, the bald man tossed aside the crossbow mechanism and ran for his life.
Though his body looked bulky, he was remarkably nimble. Within a few breaths, he had fled more than ten zhang.
But just then, a black dog pounced out of the night.
Its front paws slammed down, knocking the bald man to the ground.
The bald man was about to fight back when pain shot through his hand. One of his hands had been severed outright.
Bai Yu had caught up, gripping the dagger as he looked down at him coldly.
Clutching his severed arm, the bald man cried out in panic:
"Don't kill me! Don't kill me! I had no choice!"
Bai Yu said coldly:
"Answer a few questions, and perhaps I'll spare your life."
"Speak. Why did you try to ambush and kill me?"
The bald man hurriedly replied:
"Senior Brother Liu has recently been recruiting Yin-Yang Practitioners from all over. It seems he wants to draw blood talismans."
Bai Yu asked in a low voice:
"If they refuse recruitment, do you just use underhanded means to get rid of them?"
The burly man cried:
"The other Yin-Yang Practitioners weren't treated this way."
"Senior Brother Liu said you were selling large numbers of yellow talismans in the Black Market, disrupting their plans. That was why you had to be eliminated."
Bai Yu could not help feeling a headache coming on. He had only sold yellow talismans twice, yet he had already been targeted.
He asked again:
"How did you know my movements?"
"It was Scarface Liu Si. He specializes in raising birds. He can spy on people and pass along information. Senior Brother Liu is his third uncle."
Bai Yu asked again:
"Then the most important question: what gang or organization do you belong to?"
The bald man hesitated.
Without another word, Bai Yu swung the dagger down and cut off one of his ears.
The burly man screamed repeatedly:
"I'll talk, I'll talk! We are the Crimson—Crimson—"
His eyes bulged wide, as though an invisible hand had seized him by the throat.
The next instant, he died on the spot!!!
Bai Yu hurriedly retreated and watched the corpse warily.
Too strange!!!
What exactly had stopped the bald man from saying that name?
Yet aside from that, there did not seem to be any other danger.
There was no use overthinking it. He would loot the corpse first and see what he gained.
From the bald man, he obtained eighteen taels of silver, an Armor-Piercing Crossbow, over a dozen crossbow bolts, and a bottle of poison.
The silver was nothing special, but the crossbow mechanism delighted Bai Yu immensely.
From now on, he had another trump card.
Bai Yu then went to search Senior Brother Liu's body.
This time, he was even more delighted. He found a stack of banknotes, and after roughly counting them, discovered there were over five hundred taels.
He was rich, rich!
This was truly wealth falling from the sky.
Bai Yu beamed.
Besides that, he found some loose silver, an iron token, and a small booklet.
The token was surprisingly heavy in his hand. A dark-red lotus was engraved on the back, while the number nineteen was written on the front.
Bai Yu could not make heads or tails of it, so he put it away for now.
The small booklet was somewhat strange.
"Yin-Yang Blood Talisman Scripture, Volume Six"
This was actually a secret manual on blood talismans!
Blood talismans were an extremely important inheritance. Even Uncle Jiu's Yin Talisman Scripture contained only three to five kinds, and every one of them was incomparably precious.
Bai Yu was overjoyed. He put away the items, circled around several times on the road, and only took a shortcut back to the funeral manor when dawn was nearly breaking.
"I'd like to see what this Blood Talisman Scripture contains."
Before you continue