Hu Jiudao and his group dragged the half-dead Wang Laosan along with them. Their figures vanished around the alley bend, but that shrill laughter seemed to keep spinning in the damp air.
For a moment, the alley fell deathly silent.
With a thud, Wei Datong slid down the mottled wall and slumped to the ground. Cold sweat mixed with dust at his temples, running down in two muddy streaks. The little show of an official runner's authority he had desperately maintained had now vanished without a trace.
He panted heavily, his chest heaving violently. Looking up at Ye Qingxuan, he trembled several times before forcing out, "You... you're crazy! Why did you provoke him? That was Hu Jiudao! The maddest dog under Duan Tianbao!"
Xiong Tiezhu hurried over as well. His honest face was filled with worry, and the hand gripping his great saber tightened again and again. "Qingxuan, Brother Wei is right. We... we'd better keep our distance from these people."
Ye Qingxuan said nothing. He merely lowered his head and looked at the hand that had just pressed down on the hilt of his saber. That hand had been utterly steady, without the slightest tremor.
He turned and walked away.
"Hey! Where are you going?" Wei Datong struggled to his feet and chased after him for several steps before grabbing him. "Don't do anything stupid! Listen to your brother's advice. Don't go home for the next few days. Come squeeze in at my place. It's shabby, but Hu Jiudao and the others don't know where it is. We'll talk after the storm passes!"
He rambled on, keeping his voice extremely low. "Those fourteen taels of silver... that's a huge sum. If you really can't scrape it together, then... then go hide somewhere for a while! Don't throw your life away just to save face! Your little sister is still young..."
Ye Qingxuan paused and glanced back at him.
Wei Datong was usually loose-tongued and fond of boasting, and he was timid whenever trouble arose, but these words had come straight from his heart. In this turbid world, that tiny flame of mutual warmth between the little people at the bottom stirred a trace of warmth in the heart.
"Brother Wei, I know what I'm doing."
After saying that, he did not linger. He walked straight toward the mouth of the alley.
Wei Datong watched his back. He opened his mouth, but in the end, all that came out was a long sigh. He slammed a fist into the wall, shaking loose a patch of plaster.
After his shift ended, Ye Qingxuan did not linger in the streets. He hurried back to the Southern District.
When he pushed open the courtyard gate, Ye Caiwei was sitting on a little stool, using the afterglow of the setting sun to mend one of his old garments stitch by stitch. Hearing the gate, she raised her head and revealed a sweet smile.
"Brother, you're back."
For the sake of that smile alone, he could never retreat even half a step.
Hu Jiudao's threat was like a poisonous thorn lodged in his heart. He absolutely would not allow anyone to set their sights on Nannan.
At dinner, the siblings ate in somewhat heavy silence.
Ye Qingxuan's appetite remained astonishing. Ye Caiwei merely watched him eat in silence, constantly adding more rice to his bowl.
It was deep into the night before, hearing his sister's even breathing from the inner room, Ye Qingxuan quietly rose and came to the outer room, where he secured the door bolt.
He took off his shirt, revealing a lean, sturdy body. Several days of bitter cultivation had layered a thin film of muscle over him. The lines were smooth, brimming with strength.
He sat down cross-legged and began that night's cultivation.
[Merit:14/15]
Only the final point remained.
He wrapped the cloth bundle around his hand. His movements steady, he began another round of rubbing and grinding.
The pain arrived right on schedule, burrowing through his skin and piercing straight to the bone.
He clenched his teeth. Hu Jiudao's face, full of contempt and venom, surfaced in his mind, as did his sister's clear, innocent eyes.
His hand moved faster and harder.
Sweat poured like rain, soon soaking the bedboard beneath him. By the time he had finished executing the entire method of the Indestructible Vajra Body, all the strength had been drained from his body. His left arm was numb, sore, and swollen, as though it no longer belonged to him.
At that moment, the scroll in his mind unfolded with a roar, and a point of light poured into it.
[Merit:+1] [Merit:15/15]
Done!
Before he could even breathe a sigh of relief, the golden characters on the scroll suddenly blazed with light!
[Merit perfected. Heavenly secrets stirred. Realm connected!]
A torrent far grander and more searing than the one during his previous breakthrough surged out from the depths of his mind, instantly smashing through every bottleneck in his body!
This time, there was no tearing, reconstructing agony. Instead, there was a feeling of being tempered and refined until he became transparent, as though he had been repeatedly hammered in raging flames. The blood and qi throughout his body were no longer a river. They transformed into surging lava, wrapping around and burning every inch of flesh, every sinew and bone, even every particle of marrow, tempering them all!
His entire body turned scarlet. Beneath his skin, countless fiery threads seemed to course through him. His joints cracked with a series of "pop-pop" explosions, denser and duller than last time.
The many profound mysteries of the minor mastery realm of the Indestructible Vajra Body—how blood and qi condensed inward into force, how strength connected inch by inch, and all the other essential meanings—surged into his soul like a mountain flood bursting its banks, fusing with his bodily instincts.
The disturbance lasted for a full quarter of an hour.
When that lava-like torrent of blood and qi gradually subsided and settled back into his meridians and dantian, Ye Qingxuan felt his entire body grow lighter. An unprecedented sense of fullness came from every corner of his limbs and bones.
He slowly opened his eyes. Two flashes of radiance vanished in the darkness.
He looked down. His battered left arm had now returned to normal, yet beneath the skin shimmered a warm, jade-like luster. He extended his right hand, bringing his five fingers together like a blade, and struck his arm hard.
"Clang!"
The muffled impact sounded as though he had struck an iron plate wrapped in thick leather. Only a faint white mark remained on his arm, and even the pain was barely perceptible.
With another thought, the scroll in his sea of consciousness had already updated.
[Name: Ye Qingxuan] [Realm: Body Tempering First Layer Perfection] [Martial Art: Indestructible Vajra Body (Realm: Minor Mastery, Measure: Two Inches, Merit: 0/45)]
Body Tempering First Layer Perfection!
Indestructible Vajra Body, minor mastery!
From entry-level to minor mastery, the measure had gone from one inch to two inches, and he had needed only nine short days. Yet the Merit required for the next breakthrough had skyrocketed to forty-five points.
Ye Qingxuan rose from the bedboard and casually moved his hands and feet. His figure had not changed, but every gesture now carried an oppressive steadiness. He went to the corner, where two wooden barrels filled with water stood, each weighing more than a hundred jin.
He extended his left hand and lifted one of the barrels with effortless ease using only three fingers. His arm was steady as a rock.
He drew a deep breath and slowly threw a punch into empty space.
His fist tore through the air, producing a muffled "puff," as though a bolt of cloth had been ripped apart.
This was strength.
Tomorrow would be the tenth day.
He went to the battered wooden chest in the corner and opened it. At the bottom lay only a small string of copper coins—their entire savings, scraped together by he and his sister through frugality. Added up, they amounted to barely a hundred wen.
Fourteen taels of silver remained an astronomical figure to them.
Yet there was not the slightest trace of anxiety on Ye Qingxuan's face.
From the very bottom of the chest, he pulled out a squarely folded piece of black cloth. Then he found several copper coins and tucked them into his robe.
"Everything's ready," he murmured to himself.
He pulled the black cloth over his face, leaving only his eyes exposed. Those eyes shone startlingly bright in the darkness.
He silently opened the courtyard gate. With a flash, his figure melted into the deep night of the Southern District.
Tonight, he was going somewhere.
Linyuan Prefecture had a bright side, and it had a shadowed side.
By day, carriages and horses streamed through the streets. Beneath the night sky, another set of rules bred within the shadows. The Ghost Market in the west of the city was the deepest place within those shadows.
There were no government offices there, no laws. The only things that granted passage were silver and strength.
Ye Qingxuan moved lightly through the winding alleys, avoiding the routes patrolled at night by the Fengtian Division. His movement speed was more than twice what it had been before, and his entire body seemed like a shadow gliding close to the ground.
After a quarter of an hour, he arrived before a secluded dead-end alley.
At the end of the alley stood a high wall, yet an inconspicuous little door had been cut into it. Two burly men stood before the door with their arms folded, a bloody aura emanating from their bodies.
Ye Qingxuan walked up without a word and handed over a copper coin.
One of the burly men accepted it, weighed it in his hand, and stepped aside.
Ye Qingxuan pushed open the door and entered.
Beyond the door lay an entirely different world.
It was a vast underground space, formed by transforming several natural caverns. The air was thick with the damp, earthy stink of soil and the smell of cheap lamp oil. Torches burned along the walls, their dim yellow light stretching people's shadows into twisted, grotesque shapes.
Countless stalls lined the cavern walls, selling every conceivable thing. There were weapons of unknown origin, antiques of uncertain authenticity, rare medicinal herbs, and even slaves bound in iron chains.
Most of those coming and going were masked in black cloth like Ye Qingxuan, their steps hurried, each keeping a wary distance from the others.
This was paradise for fencing stolen goods, a playground for desperadoes, and a dangerous place where the people at the bottom fought for a thread of survival.
Ye Qingxuan's purpose was clear.
He went straight through the noisy market toward a stone platform deep within the cavern, where a wooden placard reading "Bounties" hung.
Behind the platform sat a thin, gaunt old man. His eyes were half-open and half-closed, and he paid no attention whatsoever to the surrounding din.
Ye Qingxuan walked up to the platform, lowering his voice until it was slightly hoarse.
"I'm taking a bounty."
The old man lifted his eyelids and pointed toward a row of bamboo slips hanging on the wall beside him.
"Look for yourself."
Ye Qingxuan's gaze swept across the bamboo slips one by one.
"Recover Steward Zhang's Persian cat, lost in the eastern part of the city. Reward: five taels of silver."
"Escort a shipment out of the city. Payment: ten taels. Life and death at your own risk."
"Take the head of the Third Chief of Black Wind Stronghold. Reward: fifty taels of silver."
His gaze finally stopped on a blackened bamboo slip at the very bottom.
[Wanted: Remnants of Green Fish Gang. Capture one alive. Reward: five taels of silver.] [Posted by: Fengtian Division.]
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