Doubt

"Something happened? What do you mean?" Li Qi shook his head, casting away his earlier stray thoughts, and studied Uncle Liu before him carefully.

Uncle Liu was an elder of the Wave-Pushing Gang, as well as a leader respected by everyone. He handled matters fairly, was warm-hearted, and had seasoned experience, so he had earned everyone's unanimous trust.

The man in his forties or fifties already had graying hair and a deeply stooped back. Years of hauling boats had twisted his spine somewhat, and a clear scar ran from his neck down across his back. One look was enough to tell it had been worn there by tow ropes rubbing against him year after year.

Most elderly boatmen had these physical traits, especially the strikingly warped spines.

Using mere flesh and blood to drag ships weighing thousands of tons—it was impossible not to be left with some ailments.

"After the River Opening ends, the first route gets a reward. But wasn't the Mighty Gang supposed to take the first route?" Uncle Liu said.

"What use is what was originally planned? The River Opening's already halfway through, and we've finished hauling the first route. The prefect saw it with his own eyes. Could they possibly snatch it away now? Even if they retaliate afterward, the Mighty Gang is only evenly matched with us. Competing for the first route has always depended on skill. What's the problem?" Li Qi asked, not understanding.

If this counted as being targeted, then the several boatman gangs could be said to be targeting one another at every moment.

They were competitors to begin with. Each relied on their own ability, that was all.

"Yes, it used to be like that. The Mighty Gang had no ability to go to war with us. They only lost one River Opening. But just now, word came from our informants: not a single Mighty Gang member came to watch the River Opening today," Uncle Liu said.

At those words, Li Qi frowned.

He sensed that something was wrong.

"We have the first route, and the Water-Horse Gang has the second. There's no third route, but some of our men will always run out of strength, leaving spots that need filling. There must be people in the Mighty Gang capable of filling in, yet not one of them came?" Li Qi stroked his chin and muttered to himself.

By custom, once someone participated in the River Opening, even if they could not compare to those on the first or second routes, they would still receive some reward in the end. There were also people in the Mighty Gang struggling to make ends meet. If they came here and filled one or two vacancies left by exhausted or injured men, at least a dozen of them could probably scrape together a reward.

Thus, in the past, the three gangs fought over the first route. If they could not seize the first route, they took the second; if they got neither, there would usually still be people coming to join the bustle, hoping to scrape together a reward.

But now, not a single person from the Mighty Gang had come?

No wonder Uncle Liu had hurried over to discuss a countermeasure with him.

When things defied the norm, there had to be a demon at work.

Li Qi clapped his hands. "Uncle Liu, when the shifts change later, I won't go. I'll head over to the Mighty Gang and take a look."

Uncle Liu nodded. "That was my thought as well. You're clever, and you're skilled in a fight. You've also mastered Wave-Pushing Strength. In the gang, you're second only to me. I'll be most at ease if you go."

Perhaps Li Qi truly had talent for cultivation. In any case, in the two years since obtaining Wave-Pushing Strength, he had already surpassed most of the gang members.

Together with the clever mind granted by his education, he had effectively become the Wave-Pushing Gang's second-in-command, subordinate only to Uncle Liu.

"Then I'll head over first." Li Qi was not one to procrastinate. He immediately rose to his feet.

"Be careful. Watch your safety. Keeping yourself alive matters most," Uncle Liu instructed.

"Don't worry." Li Qi nodded, then left at a brisk pace.

With that, Li Qi quickly departed.

During the River Opening, every household in Lizhou City was preparing supplies.

Merchants stocked goods, peddlers prepared food, all busying themselves for the business that would come once the river was open.

After the River Opening, goods and merchants from many cities throughout the Great Deer Kingdom would gather in Li Prefecture's capital, then use the Li River to transport them in every direction.

Therefore, the River Opening was Lizhou City's most important event of the year, even more important than the New Year.

At this time, everyone in the city had their own work to do. Aside from laborers transporting goods and postmen carrying messages, there were scarcely any idlers to be seen on the streets.

So when someone dressed as a boatman wandered through the city, quite a few people cast strange looks his way.

Most were merely curious, however. No one came over to meddle in his affairs.

They could barely finish handling their own business. Why bother with a boatman?

Li Qi wandered the streets for a while, then suddenly stopped a peddler setting up his stall. "Brother, why does everyone seem so surprised to see me?"

The peddler rolled his eyes and gave Li Qi a sideways glance. "You're a boatman. Instead of going to fight for the first route during the River Opening, you're wandering the streets. Why do you think they're looking at you?"

He was not polite in the slightest, because boatmen were no match for merchants.

Merchants also had their own associations, gathered under different wealthy businessmen. These associations generally set uniform prices within their trades and strangled competition. Knife and scissors dealers had their guilds, blacksmiths had theirs, and even porters and traveling merchants had organizations.

In this world, everyone banded together to survive around a cultivation method, and boatmen clearly belonged to the very bottom rung.

"I see. But aren't there plenty of boatmen on the streets today? Why are they only staring at me?" Li Qi scratched his head, seemingly puzzled.

"Have you gone mad? Other than you, where do you see another boatman on this street? Enough. If you're not buying anything, get lost. Don't delay my work. The River Opening is about to end, and people are arriving. Are you going to compensate me for my losses?" Seeing that Li Qi had no intention of buying anything, the peddler hurriedly waved him off.

Li Qi immediately stepped away so as not to disturb him as he stocked and arranged his stall.

He had obtained what he wanted.

Just as he had thought, under normal circumstances, boatmen would definitely be at the River Opening site, not wandering about everywhere.

That meant the Mighty Gang's people had neither gone to the River Opening site nor wandered the streets...

Clearly, they had not gone out. They were holed up together.

Most ordinary boatmen worked one day to eat one day and had practically no savings. Even if they did, it would not be much, not enough to last several days. Young, single dogs like Li Qi had it easier—once one person was full, the whole household was full, and they could save a little.

For boatmen who were already married, the financial pressure was even greater.

Yet they gathered together under such pressure instead of going to the River Opening, and they were not milling around on the streets either. This problem was enormous.

In this era, what could more than two hundred boatmen gathering together possibly be doing? Throwing a party or something?

This was not Chengdu.

Li Qi decisively quickened his pace.

With so many people gathered together, they might be holding some kind of oath-taking assembly. He had to hurry over and probe the truth.

He knew where the Mighty Gang's headquarters was. It stood beside a tributary of the Li River within the city.

The Li River's tributaries spread throughout the city like capillaries, making it resemble a Jiangnan water town. They were the source of water the entire city relied upon for survival.

He quickly reached the riverbank. The Li River tributaries threading through the city were still frozen over, but the ice remained on top.

That was exactly what he wanted.

Due to the heat island effect, local temperatures in residential areas were much higher than beside the main river.

That meant the ice here was more fragile.

He casually found a tributary, stepped onto it, stomped twice, and looked around. No one was there.

Very flimsy.

Good.

He slammed one foot down, and the ice shattered.

Without hesitation, he dropped straight through the opening.

There were three boatman gangs in Lizhou City.

The Water-Horse Gang's cultivation method excelled at endurance. They boasted endurance like oxen and horses, able to haul for three Chen without rest. Their skin was also thick enough that tow ropes could not chafe it open, allowing them to last even longer.

The Mighty Gang's cultivation method, on the other hand, excelled at increasing strength. A ship that the other two gangs needed fifty men to haul could be pulled by only thirty of theirs.

As for the Wave-Pushing Gang's cultivation method...

One could tell from its name alone. The Wave-Pushing Gang excelled in water; they could pull ships from within the water without needing to stand on the shore.

Li Qi took a deep breath and circulated Wave-Pushing Strength. Like a fish, he swiftly moved beneath the frozen surface.

The frozen ice gave him nearly perfect cover. Though he could not breathe, with Wave-Pushing Strength's support, he could remain underwater for two quarters of an hour without breathing.

And he needed only five minutes to swim to the Mighty Gang's territory.

Soon, he reached the waters beneath the Mighty Gang. This was a small alley within the city, through which a tributary ran.

The people living here were all poor. A group of tailors and the Mighty Gang, two factions, lived in the area. Because of this, the Mighty Gang's clothes were much better than those of the other two gangs.

Those tailors were no easy targets either. They wielded flying needles as concealed weapons and had a close relationship with the Mighty Gang. Since the two sides had no conflict of interest and lived together, they had formed an alliance, helping one another.

Having arrived here, Li Qi became much more cautious.

He could see several holes cut into the ice, with fishhooks dangling down through them.

They were all mud-legged paupers. Living by the water, naturally they had to catch some fish to supplement their households and give themselves an occasional taste of meat.

But there were only fishhooks, no fishing nets.

That was because fishing with nets was the Fish Market Bosses' privilege. Whoever dared use a fishing boat or net in private would become the enemy of all the Fish Market Bosses in the city. Those fishermen wielding fish spears were no one to provoke.

That was the state of this world: every group and every class was divided into clearly layered ranks.

Carefully avoiding the fishhooks, he swam all the way to a spot near the bank with neither holes nor hooks.

He pressed an ear to the ice and listened.

Another half-quarter passed, and Li Qi discovered that almost none of the fishhooks had moved.

After noticing this, he simply dove deeper, caught a fish himself, gripped it with his water skills, clutched its gills, and swam to a fishhook, where he hung the fish from it.

Its lips were pierced by the hook, and the fish thrashed wildly!

The fishing line kept stretching farther and farther, until it even dragged a rod down into the water.

Yet no one ever pulled the fish up.

There was no one above!

When Li Qi had pressed against the ice to listen just now, he had heard no sound at all. At the same time, he had noticed that the fishhooks were not moving, which was why he had tested them.

This time, after another test, no one pulled the rod. Clearly, there was no one above at all.

He waited a while longer, then grabbed the rod that had been dragged down, pulled the fish back, removed the hook, and hung it on another fishing rod.

Waste not, for catching fish was difficult too.

The fish was hung three times in a row, its mouth turned into a sieve, before it finally escaped the devil's clutches and fled in terror!

Killing a fish took but one stroke. Who had ever seen one hung three times?

Li Qi, meanwhile, was finally about to run out of breath.

The two-quarter limit was nearly up, and the icy water had frozen his hands and feet stiff. His face had turned bluish purple.

Even with Wave-Pushing Strength protecting his body, he was nearing his limit.

After confirming once more that no one was above, he found an ice-fishing hole and sprang out of it in a flash. Without wasting even a moment, he rolled and rushed toward the bank.

Originally, he had planned that if someone was stationed here, he would break the ice on the other side and make a disturbance to lure the tiger from the mountain.

But since no one was here, it was better to simply go up.

He was fast, and the ice was slick, so he shot across it with a whoosh.

Once he entered the alley, he immediately sprang to his feet. Keeping watch on his surroundings, he ran toward the Mighty Gang's headquarters.

The area was all residences, but there seemed to be few people. Just as he had estimated, their people had gathered together, leaving these outer residences mostly empty.

He mainly needed to watch out for the tailors, so he deliberately avoided their homes and moved through gaps whenever possible.

The streets were empty, and he was cautious. He went the whole way without being discovered, smoothly arriving at the square where the Mighty Gang usually gathered to discuss matters.

Calling it a square was generous. It was really just an open area before the Mighty Gang leader's house, perhaps sixty or seventy square meters. Ordinarily, everyone used it to dry fish and air clothes; when something happened, they gathered there to discuss it.

After all, in this whole alley, this was the only place that could fit one or two hundred burly men.

Li Qi carefully drew closer, hid his body behind a wall, pricked up his ears, and listened to the sounds from the square.

There were indeed sounds in the square. The boatmen had all gathered there.

Some boatmen were talking, and they were not keeping their voices down.

They were only boatmen, after all. It was impossible for them to possess great discipline. A group of people gathering without speaking was something even university students could not manage. How could one expect boatmen to do it?

Li Qi knew this, which was why he did not even look. He simply hid himself and listened intently.

At the same time, he took off his clothes and wrapped them over his face, leaving only his eyes exposed.

Several Mighty Gang boatmen standing nearby were loudly discussing today's matter.

"Tell me, can that sorcerer really be trusted?"

"You've asked that four times already. The boss believes him. What can you do if you don't?"

"You two, honestly. How can you not believe what you saw with your own eyes? That was sorcery! Who knows how much stronger it is than our body-tempering cultivation methods? We have a chance to learn sorcery, and you're still complaining?"

"Today is the River Opening! We skipped the River Opening. What if that sorcerer tricked us? Wouldn't we have lost the reward for nothing?"

"Stop talking. He's out, he's out!"

As soon as those words were spoken, Li Qi immediately heard a crowd rising to its feet, along with the sounds of doors opening and closing.

He had arrived at exactly the right time. A sorcerer... the Mighty Gang was involved with a sorcerer? And that sorcerer had promised to teach the Mighty Gang sorcery?

How was that possible!

Li Qi understood very clearly just how highly this world valued things called "cultivation methods."

Every cultivation method, even the crudest one, was a precious treasure sufficient to establish a household and pass down through generations!

Thus, upon hearing that, even he could not resist poking his head out from the alley to look toward the open space nearby.

Sure enough, a crowd of burly men stood in the open space, forming a tight encirclement, every one of them staring fixedly at the two people in the center.

One was a burly man Li Qi recognized—the Mighty Gang's leader.

The other was a Young Scholar, dressed in cotton cloth completely unlike the boatmen's hemp garments.

And that Young Scholar was holding something in his hand that Li Qi found extremely familiar.

Isn't that my fucking game console!? How did this half get here!?

(New book, please support it with a favorite!)