Ah, yes, yes, yes!

Seeing the many Demon Suppression Guards disperse and the matter resolved perfectly, Xiao Hong still had no smile on his face.

He felt as though his heart were bleeding.

Those Purple Flame Crystals were nothing to him. After all, his family owned a mine.

But those two Blood Spirit Pills had taken him tremendous effort to obtain. They did not belong to Purple Flame Hall—they were his personal assets.

After shooting Kong Wu a vicious glare, Xiao Hong led him inside.

In Jin Hefeng's study, Xiao Hong reluctantly handed over a white jade porcelain bottle.

Jin Hefeng took the bottle and gave it a shake. The corners of his mouth curved upward, and he hurriedly ordered someone to prepare tea.

After going through all that, Xiao Hong had long since lost any interest in tea. He got straight to the point. "There's something I need your help with."

"Senior Xiao, please give me your orders!"

As the person in charge of the Demon Suppression Division in Purple Flame County, Jin Hefeng had dealt with Purple Flame Hall quite often.

Having accepted Xiao Hong's benefits, he now respectfully performed a junior's greeting, his tone extremely gentle—as if the person who had sternly berated Xiao Hong at the door had been someone else entirely.

Seeing him like this, Xiao Hong snorted unhappily. "There should still be quite a few demons and fiends locked up in your Demon Suppression Prison, right?"

Jin Hefeng nodded, somewhat unable to figure out what he meant.

"This junior of mine has a kind heart. He can't bear to see those demons and fiends suffer, and wants to help them escape their sea of misery. Make the arrangements."

At this, Jin Hefeng lifted his teacup and blew across the floating tea leaves, not agreeing immediately.

He was rapidly thinking over what Xiao Hong was really plotting.

As he drank his tea, he glanced from the corner of his eye at Kong Wu, who sat there expressionlessly.

For this man, the old fellow had even been willing to make an enemy of the Demon Suppression Division.

What exactly did he have that was worth Xiao Hong making such sacrifices?

Why did he want to go to the Demon Suppression Prison?

Was it related to Purple Flame Hall's recent abnormal behavior?

Question after question flashed through his mind, yet he could not find a single definite answer.

Thus, he decided to test the waters.

"Senior Xiao, none of the demons and fiends imprisoned in the Demon Suppression Prison have finished yielding the important intelligence they possess. We can't simply kill them at will. This favor... might..."

Seeing him hem and haw, Xiao Hong immediately understood.

This bastard wanted to extort another sum from him.

What important intelligence? Demonic beasts below the Golden Core stage could barely speak coherently. What important intelligence could they have?

As for those demonic cultivators, if they truly had important intelligence, they would have been sent to the prefectural city long ago for a soul-searching technique. Did he really think Xiao Hong knew nothing?

Thus, Xiao Hong smiled. "I heard that the various Hundred Household Offices of the Demon Suppression Division have begun their evaluations recently. Captain Jin's work this year seems to have been less than satisfactory."

At those words, Jin Hefeng cursed inwardly: old fox.

As Hundred Household Offices dispatched by the Qingzhou Demon Suppression Division's Thousand Household Office, they had to undergo an evaluation every year.

The Demon Suppression Division's duty was to slay demons and exterminate fiends, protecting the peace of the local people, so each year they had certain quotas to meet.

However, those demons and fiends were exceedingly cunning. Once they hid themselves, they were extremely difficult to find again.

Therefore, whenever they failed to meet their annual quotas, they would ask the disciples of Purple Flame Hall to help search for evil demons inside and outside the county.

After all, as the largest cultivation sect in the area, many matters were far more conveniently handled by them than by people from the Demon Suppression Division.

Now that Xiao Hong had seized this weakness, Jin Hefeng could only submit.

Jin Hefeng gritted his teeth and put on an extremely troubled expression. "Since Senior Xiao has made a request, even if this matter violates the rules, I'll bear the responsibility if anything happens."

With that, he summoned a Minor Banner and had him lead the way.

Xiao Hong motioned for Kong Wu to follow, then remained where he was, picked up his teacup, and began drinking.

Seeing this, Jin Hefeng was somewhat surprised.

Watching Kong Wu's tall figure gradually disappear into the distance, he pondered in silence.

At first, he had assumed that Xiao Hong had recently acquired some secret technique and needed demonic beasts to assist in his cultivation.

But now, it seemed that the main purpose was Kong Wu.

That astonishingly powerful body of his, far beyond that of an ordinary person—could it require the blood or souls of demons to cultivate?

At that moment, Xiao Hong was actually pondering the same question.

Otherwise, there was truly no way to explain Kong Wu's bizarre request.

However, he had heard that the cultivation method of the Barbarian Tribe in ancient times involved hunting demonic beasts, using their blood to outline totems, connecting with the power of heaven and earth, and thereby increasing one's physical strength.

But there were no tattoos or anything similar on Kong Wu's body.

After pondering for a long while, neither of them came up with an answer.

And with such a once-in-a-thousand-years opportunity before him, Jin Hefeng began probing Xiao Hong.

"Senior Xiao, I heard that you recently recalled all your disciples who were outside. Did you encounter some difficult matter? Is there anywhere our Demon Suppression Division can help?"

By then, Xiao Hong had returned to his usual smiling, benevolent old-man appearance. Hearing this, he shook his head. "It's nothing major. It's just that my hundredth-birthday celebration is approaching, and that wretched son of mine wants to prepare some things for me in advance."

A hundredth-birthday celebration?

Are you freaking fooling children?

Didn't you just hold your hundredth-birthday celebration last year?

And the year before that, and the year before that...

How many hundredth-birthday celebrations have you had by now?

Unwilling to give up, Jin Hefeng probed a few more times, but without exception, the answers he received held no value whatsoever. His teeth itched with anger, yet he could do nothing about it.

Before long, Kong Wu returned.

Xiao Hong rose to his feet, exchanged a few more pleasantries with Jin Hefeng, then left with Kong Wu.

"Go down and take a look!"

Just now, Jin Hefeng had caught the faint scent of blood on Kong Wu. It seemed that the demons and fiends suffering inside the Demon Suppression Prison had already escaped their sea of misery.

As soon as he entered the Demon Suppression Prison, Jin Hefeng saw that every demon in that row of cells was gone, each with a small hole in the center of its brow.

He beckoned over a nearby jailer and asked, "Repeat the scene from just now to me step by step. Don't leave out a single detail!"

From the jailer, he learned that after Kong Wu came down and saw the demonic beasts and demonic cultivators, his eyes had first lit up.

But after making a circuit, the disappointment on his face was impossible to conceal. Then, he picked up the peanuts on the jailers' table and walked past the cells one by one. With a light flick of his fingers, each peanut made the prisoners' heads bloom.

Jin Hefeng's brows drew tightly together as he stood there, stroking his chin and thinking.

Although it was shocking that all this could be done using nothing but physical strength, after witnessing Zhang Hao's miserable state, he did not find it strange.

However, judging from the jailer's account, Kong Wu had simply slaughtered those demons and demonic cultivators at random. There had been no strange actions or bizarre rituals.

Could it be merely because he hated evil and did not want to let those demons and fiends live in this world?

How was that possible?

"How is it not possible?"

On the main road outside the Demon Suppression Division, Kong Wu spoke with a righteous expression. "You know, I hate those harmful demons and demonic cultivators the most. I hate evil as my enemy, understand?"

Xiao Hong perfunctorily nodded at this, the meaning on his face crystal clear.

Ah, yes, yes, yes!