On the streets in the early morning.
The two people standing on the side of the street were a young man and an old man, with two black-clad guards beside them.
On the surface, they look like an elderly person taking a walk, casually chatting with young people on the roadside.
The old man had a smile on his face, while the young man was deep in thought.
But in reality, the atmosphere between the two was far colder than most people imagine.
"What do you mean by that, sir?" Zhang Rongfang asked with a puzzled look, then chuckled. "Could it be that you've gone mad with old age? The Lin Family, Sea Dragon, tsk tsk, what a powerful force they're using to suppress a mere lowly nobody like me. Isn't that a bit too much?"
Basali chuckled.
"Team Zhang should know better than anyone what I'm saying. It's actually quite simple to keep me from telling anyone."
Team Zhang should also know what the consequences would be if I were to hand over your whereabouts to the Lin Family or Sea Dragon at this critical juncture.
Sea Dragon and the Lin Family are acting like they've gone mad.
Zhang Rongfang's expression remained unchanged.
"Interesting. Why don't you give it a try, sir? What crime would it be to frame a Government Office official without cause?"
Neither of them spoke for a moment, they simply looked at each other directly.
Several minutes later.
Basali nodded slowly.
"Good, as expected of a ruthless character who could take this old man hostage and break through the encirclement. It seems that Team Zhang still doesn't understand why my Black Ten Holy Sect dared to mobilize so many people to surround you."
Alright, that's enough for today. If Team Zhang has thought it through, feel free to come find me here later.
He reached out and handed over a slip of paper.
Zhang Rongfang smiled as he took the paper, pinched it through his sleeve, and unfolded it to read it.
No. 19 Minghai Street, Dongfeng Town.
"By the way, if Team Zhang has made up his mind, please come here as soon as possible. It would be best if you came before the 11th. I remember that on the 10th, there was a fugitive tracking mission assigned to Ninth Squad."
This old man hopes that Team Zhang will be responsible and thoroughly investigate each suspect, ensuring the safety of every innocent person, especially my devout follower of the Black Ten Holy Sect.
Zhang Rongfang also received a mission assignment, but it was all nonsense about innocent people; there were no Black Ten Sect members among the innocent people.
On the contrary, among the fugitives being pursued, one was a member of the Black Ten Sect.
Clearly, the old man wanted him to deliberately go easy on the person and secretly help him change his identity so he could escape quietly.
After speaking, Basali didn't linger. He gently patted Zhang Rongfang's arm, smiled, turned around, and calmly left with the two of them.
"Don't worry, sir. I will definitely enforce the law impartially and not let a bad person go unpunished, nor will I wrongly accuse an innocent person."
Zhang Rongfang suddenly replied in a deep voice.
Basali didn't turn around, as if he hadn't heard, and got into a carriage and left.
Zhang Rongfang did not linger and turned back into the courtyard.
He never expected that after only a few days of hiding it, he would be targeted and threatened at his door.
If it weren't for the fact that his position might still be useful, that old man would probably have turned on him on the spot, or he might not have even come, and would have exposed him directly.
Standing in the courtyard, Zhang Rongfang's gaze passed through the door to the inner room and landed on the Leaving Injury hanging on the wall.
Once his affair is exposed, the Lin Family and Sea Dragon forces will be far beyond what he can handle in his current state.
There's no way to deal with it right now, at least not at the moment.
His original plans and schedules were all disrupted by this sudden situation.
On the carriage.
Basali, holding his cane, smiled as he watched the street scene recede outside the window.
Willow catkins drifted in the air and blew into the carriage. Usually, these annoying things would make his nasal cavity uncomfortable, but at this moment, he felt much more at ease.
"Elder, is this Zhang Ying really the one who framed Sea Dragon and instigated the Lin Family?" Inside the carriage, another guard couldn't help but ask.
"I don't know." Basali shook his head slightly. "The brothels he went to were almost all different, and in the brothel industry, only 30 or 40 percent of the brothels in Tanyang are under our supervision. Who knows where he went every day? However, our people found out that he went out at night. There was one time when he didn't go to a brothel, but pretended to have."
"Then what do you mean?" The man was immediately taken aback.
"If you have nothing to hide, why should you be afraid of what I just said?" Basali laughed. "If he is really worried about the Lin Family and Sea Dragon, he will definitely give in to what I just said."
His giving in and agreeing to my demands means he has a problem.
In this way, even if Zhang Ying wasn't the one who crippled Lin Qixiao, he was definitely related to her.
"By then, when we hand this intelligence over to the Lin Family and Sea Dragon, we'll receive much more than this."
"But you didn't need to come in person." The guard swallowed hard. It was unclear whether he was intimidated by the elder's cunning or had some other thought.
"Coming here in person was just a passing fancy. After all, this Zhang Ying doesn't seem simple, and others might not be able to handle him so well. He's incredibly bold, courageous, and resourceful; he's not someone to be easily fooled," Basali said simply.
The two men beside him were his trusted confidants, the backbone he hoped to cultivate for future deployment. But now it seemed their martial prowess was adequate, but their intelligence was lacking. Unconsciously, he suddenly thought of Zhang Ying. If these two were like Zhang Ying, perhaps he wouldn't have to do everything himself. 'This time, we need to act quickly, otherwise, once the Ling Ting Garrison is free, our lives will be difficult.'
The Black Ten Sect's network throughout Tanyang is growing larger and larger, which has already displeased those above.
This mission, which involved the Ninth Squad directly carrying out a massacre, was merely a warning.
***Nighttime.
When Zhang Rongfang returned from his inspection, he didn't give a speech but directly announced the team's disbandment.
Tanyang has been acting strangely lately.
On the Government Office side, high-ranking officials such as the Chief of the Ministry of Justice and the minister of justice were cooperating with the State Governor and others to investigate something.
The Lin Family and Sea Dragon's affairs didn't seem to be their primary focus of investigation. Instead, these matters were mostly left to lower- and middle-level officials at various levels.
For several days in a row, Zhang Rongfang inspected the area and saw fully armed soldiers Garrison, patrolling the streets of the city.
In some places, traces of blood can still be seen, indicating that the blood has not been completely cleaned up.
Outside of Tanyang, news of uprisings in Seven Counties kept coming in. The Garrison there, in coordination with the surrounding armies, was also constantly fighting against the Righteous Army, and the battle was at a stalemate for a time.
Two of the Ninth Squad also took leave to go home because their families had relatives in the Seven Counties.
The door creaked open.
Zhang Rongfang walked up to Wish Wheel Leaving Injury and gently took it off.
After hesitating for a moment, he put it back.
He didn't plan to use this weapon until he mastered the Breaking Limits Wheel of Wishes Art.
On the contrary, Dagger and short swords, which are extremely common everywhere, are less likely to be exposed.
'It's a pity that the man's sword and shield were exceptionally sharp. If I had taken them with me, they would have been very useful.'
With a sigh, Zhang Rongfang recalled the threat from that old man from the Black Ten Sect in Basali.
You must never reveal yourself.
This is his bottom line.
The problem now is that since Basali dared to threaten him, it means that he wasn't the only one who knew about this.
In other words, even if he dies, this matter will definitely spread to many people.
At that point, under the pressure from both the Lin Family and Sea Dragon's forces, he would have no choice but to flee, and might even be implicated by the discovery of his sister-in-law, Yang Hongyan.
These days, Zhang Rongfang hasn't dared to visit his sister-in-law at all, and that's why.
Forced by the need to survive, he had to offend one troublesome person after another.
If it were discovered that he had a relationship with his sister-in-law Yang Hongyan, the Yang Family would definitely be used by the enemy as a tool to threaten him.
Just like right now.
Under the moonlight, Zhang Rongfang's face was terribly gloomy.
This is the price of acting in the shadows.
He was mentally prepared from the beginning, but when he was actually threatened with it, he realized how convenient the covert methods were, and how severe the backlash would be.
He paced back and forth in the room, worried that he would be exposed, worried that his sister-in-law would be implicated, worried that his true identity would be revealed, and worried that all his efforts over the years would be in vain.
Layer upon layer of concerns caused him increasing pressure and anxiety.
"It seems I have no choice but to agree to that old man's demands for now and cooperate with him. I'll figure out a way to reverse things later."
Zhang Rongfang was filled with bitterness.
This Great Ling, burdened by layers of pressure, had barely managed to glimpse a sliver of hope when it was now entangled in new troubles.
Endless and without end.
When will this end? He opened the window and gazed at the half-moon peeking out of the sky.
"I just want to live the life I desire peacefully. But life seems to have left me no place to go."
His Barbarian Confucian background blocked his path to advancement.
Without upward mobility, one cannot enter a safe social class.
With a sigh, Zhang Rongfang finally closed the window and returned to his bed.
Anyway, let's just take it one day at a time.
Since Basali came to talk to them in person, it means that the other party needs him and wants to use him.
Otherwise, this person wouldn't have needed to say so much to him; simply informing on him would have been enough to kill him.
After taking off his clothes, Zhang Rongfang lay flat on the bed and closed his eyes.
This is the price he paid for not doing things perfectly in the past. Even now, he doesn't understand which step in his work was exposed.
Feeling distressed, he gradually became sleepy and drifted off to sleep.
***Midnight.
Swish.
Zhang Rongfang suddenly sat up straight, standing up from the bed.
"That's about it." He glanced at the water clock on the wall; it was around 2:15 in the morning.
He sighed. He got up and began to put on his clothes, one layer at a time.
This time, Basali really scared him.
Once his act of starting the fire is exposed, the consequences will be absolutely dire.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, Zhang Rongfang couldn't come up with a good solution no matter how hard he tried.
"What should we do about this?"
He stood up and paced back and forth in the room.
"In the end."
"How exactly do we kill Basali and everyone who knows the truth?"
There are too many people in the Black Ten Sect; if even one is missed, it will be a disaster.
No one knows exactly how many people Basali told the whole story.
He can't possibly wipe out the entire Black Ten Sect, can he? Besides, Basali is a man who has no fixed abode and frequently changes his residence.
To guard against assassination, this old man always had a number of people protecting him.
Just because he managed to catch them off guard last time doesn't mean they'll be so careless the second or third time.
To find out this person, we first need to know where this Old Undying lives.
At this moment, Zhang Rongfang deeply realized the importance of intelligence.
These days, there aren't many opponents as easy to deal with as the Rice Gang of Huaxin County back then. Now, he finally couldn't tolerate it any longer. In any case, he decided to take action first.
What if we kill that old man, and then kill some people around him, and everything will be fine?
People always have a tendency to take chances.
Zhang Rongfang the same way, so he decided to try killing someone first. After all, it wasn't certain anyone would find out he was the one who did it.
This is the benefit of always hiding your strength.
He quickly changed into his night clothes, put on an overcoat and a face mask, tucked a short sword into his pocket, and then lightly leaped out of the window, disappearing silently into the shadows of the night.