Explosion

"He had stayed here for a long time!" Shi Ximing judged from the prompt transmitted by the Intermediate Tracking Talisman, based on the density of the lingering aura.

Before him stood an artificial hill, one of the more secluded spots in the garden.

After a while, a puzzled look appeared on his face.

He could only sense Escort Chief Wang's aura here; he could not sense any aura of Escort Chief Wang leaving.

Under normal circumstances, Escort Chief Wang should still have been here.

Even if Escort Chief Wang had died and his corpse had been moved away, traces of his aura should have remained.

Yet the aura here indicated that Escort Chief Wang had stayed here for two days, then vanished into thin air.

Though Shi Ximing was filled with deep confusion, finding Escort Chief Wang was not the Most Important thing. The key was to find that item.

With a wave of his hand, a flash of Green Light flickered.

He had not fared well in the cultivation world, but it was not as though he had no specialties. What he excelled at most was planting.

This was a garden, filled everywhere with all kinds of flowers, grasses, and plants.

The Wood Spiritual Qi he activated allowed him to easily sense the condition of the surrounding plants.

This was far more convenient than Li Shiming's analysis using the IBMz15 Mainframe. In just a moment, a smile appeared on his face.

"Found it!" He came to the spot where the Wooden Box was buried.

The aura of a small patch of grass here was wrong. Once he activated the Wood Spiritual Qi, this little area stood out like a lamp in the night.

He reached out and dug away the surface soil, revealing the Wooden Box.

His smile widened at the sight of it.

The Wooden Box looked ordinary, but the Rune Pattern upon it was an Aura Isolation Pattern commonly used in the cultivation world.

Whatever was stored inside such a Wooden Box definitely did not belong in the mortal world.

He did not take any protective measures. On one hand, this was the secular world, and the concealed weapons a box this small could trigger would have limited power. Moreover, Qi Refining Stage 3 cultivators were immune to secular poisons. On the other hand, he was poor.

The value of a single Elementary Defense Talisman was equal to three or four offensive talismans. He truly could not afford to waste one.

Opening the Wooden Box, he found it filled with a water-like liquid. At the same time, he saw a trace of white powder ignite because he had opened the box.

Had Shi Ximing known what was inside the Wooden Box, he would have fled as far away as possible, using every Defense Talisman he had been reluctant to use.

But because their systems of knowledge differed, he had no understanding of either the liquid or the white powder in the Wooden Box.

He even thought it was some little trick Escort Chief Wang had used, meant to destroy the item in the box should it fall into someone else's hands.

Alarmed, he hurriedly tried to remove the visible items from the box.

He had seen two books. Their material was the kind normally used for books in the cultivation world, capable of remaining intact and unspoiled for a thousand years.

Li Shiming had filled the Wooden Box with Nitroglycerin. As for the white substance, it was White Phosphorus.

The craftsmanship of this Wooden Box was unknown, but its sealing properties were exceptionally good.

When Li Shiming came over, he placed some of the Nitroglycerin from the Server Room Space into the box, then shut it. He extracted the excess air from inside the box and transferred it into the Server Room Space, then placed a little White Phosphorus on the surface of the Nitroglycerin inside.

Nitroglycerin was an extremely unstable explosive. Even a slightly larger movement could set it off.

White Phosphorus burned upon Come into Contact With air.

What would happen when it burned atop Nitroglycerin was something Shi Ximing was about to experience.

And it happened right before his eyes. There was no small amount of Nitroglycerin here; the box held roughly one kilogram of it.

The power of one kilogram of Nitroglycerin produced 715 L of gaseous matter while releasing heat, approximately 3980 J of heat, with pressure of around 9000 × 10^5 Pa.

With such an explosion occurring right in front of him, even if Shi Ximing used a Defense Talisman, there was no need to consider an Elementary Defense Talisman's defenses. Even an Intermediate Defense Talisman had limited effect.

Shi Ximing reacted the instant the explosion occurred, but everything was already too late.

"Which fellow cultivator set this trap? Why was there not the slightest trace of Spiritual Qi?" Filled with bewilderment, his body was blasted into pieces by the terrifying explosion.

The explosion did not merely kill Shi Ximing. Centered on the blast, everything within five meters was suddenly cleared away, and the unfortunate artificial hill was blown into shattered stones that filled the sky.

Inside the small study, Li Shiming only felt the entire room tremble. The violent explosion left his ears ringing without end.

"Young Master!" Outside, Si Qin let out a shriek, calling desperately for the Young Master.

In Si Qin's heart, the Young Master was her entire sky.

"Si Qin, don't be afraid. I'll go see what happened!" Li Shiming said, soothing Si Qin.

"Young Master, don't go. We should wait for the government soldiers to arrive!" Si Qin grabbed Li Shiming and pleaded.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine!" Li Shiming said, patting Si Qin on the head.

When he walked out of the courtyard, he saw devastation covering the ground. Though the explosion had occurred in the garden, the scattered stones had flown far and wide.

Many flowers and plants had been damaged by the fragments of stone. Dust swirled through the air, forming a gray mist.

He knew very well that there was only one possibility for the trap he had left behind to be triggered: someone had discovered that Wooden Box.

It had been hidden in such a secret location and concealed so carefully, and it was in the Back Garden of the Government Office. Even if ordinary people knew the item was here, they could not have found it without a sound.

The trap he had left behind was meant to deal with that cultivator. Presumably, the one blown up this time was that cultivator.

As for whether that cultivator had been blown to death, one only had to look at the miserable scene before them to know.

If that cultivator could still survive an explosion of such power, Li Shiming would have to wonder whether he was still human.

At this moment, people from the Government Office, as well as guards and servants from the rear courtyard, rushed frantically toward the garden.

Such a major incident in the garden where the prefect lived was even more serious than the murder of over thirty people from the Mighty Escort Agency.

Unlike those people, who searched aimlessly like headless flies, Li Shiming knew where the center of the explosion was. He hurried straight toward the artificial hill.

The closer he got to the artificial hill, the more terrified he became at the explosion he himself had created.

A box full of Nitroglycerin had caused an explosion of such power. The spot where the artificial hill had stood was now an open expanse.

A deep pit, one meter deep, had appeared in the ground. In the surrounding area, all grass and trees had been reduced to fragments.

Li Shiming's gaze narrowed. He saw flesh and blood on the ground, the remains of a human body torn apart by the explosion.

This discovery eased his heart. No matter how much damage had been caused, as long as that cultivator had been killed, the greatest trouble had been resolved.

Then he saw a Leather Pouch lying on the ground. Despite enduring such a powerful explosion, the Leather Pouch was not damaged in the slightest.

Li Shiming stepped forward and picked up the Leather Pouch. This Leather Pouch should have belonged to that cultivator.