New Target

"Zhou Boss is awake."

"Zhou Boss, how are you feeling?"

Zhou Bao slowly came to and found himself back in his own residence.

Several of his subordinates stood beside him.

And all the goods, silver, and other things stolen by the Iron Saber Society had been returned.

Not only had they been returned, there were also over ten thousand taels in banknotes.

"How did this happen?"

Zhou Bao was bewildered.

He vaguely remembered being captured by the Iron Saber Society and thrown into a dungeon, where he was brutally tortured and nearly lost his life.

At the critical moment, a Mysterious Person had appeared and rescued him.

What happened afterward, he did not know.

"It was Boss. He found some friends from the martial world and got you out."

Chu Liang said.

Li Bai, that young fellow—he came?

Zhou Bao was utterly astonished.

Was the mysterious master who had saved him a friend of young Li Bai's?

Young Li Bai actually had such formidable friends.

Zhou Bao's admiration for Li Ye deepened by several degrees.

Before leaving the Iron Saber Society, Li Ye had thoroughly looted the place. Besides the tens of thousands of taels in banknotes taken from Chen Hong and Shen Heng, he had also found quite a bit of gold, silver, jewels, and treasures.

Altogether, they were worth around a hundred thousand taels.

But Li Ye could not possibly give it all to Zhou Bao. It was not that he was greedy; there was simply too much gold, silver, jewelry, and treasure. For one thing, it was inconvenient to carry, and for another, giving Zhou Bao such an enormous fortune might bring disaster upon him.

More than ten thousand taels was already enough.

Li Ye hid the rest underground.

"Where is Boss?"

Zhou Bao asked through clenched teeth.

Most of his injuries were superficial, but some had damaged his muscles and bones. Even the slightest movement sent stabbing pain through him.

He could barely move at all.

"Boss has left. He bought medicine for you and told you to rest properly. He'll come again in a few days."

Chu Liang said.

"Good!"

"But brothers, this matter must be kept secret. No one can breathe a word of it."

Zhou Bao warned.

Night fell.

By then, Li Ye had returned to the Corpse Refining Courtyard.

Inside the Corpse Incineration Hall, he lifted the Corpse Wrapping Cloth.

What a coincidence—a familiar face.

Li Ye smiled. This was the burly man who had led the pursuit of Chu Liang during the day.

At the time, the man had raised his machete, about to chop down a woman. At the crucial moment, Li Ye had shattered the machete with one punch, then knocked him unconscious with another.

The burly man had fallen to the ground and was later trampled by the panicked crowd, his organs ruptured and his life lost.

Even now, his eyes were half-open, unwilling to close in death.

"Rest easy, brother."

Li Ye smiled. Since they were acquainted, he did not stand on ceremony and shoved him straight into the corpse-burning furnace.

That spared him all the cumbersome procedures.

Buzz!

Before long, Li Ye gained a portion of cultivation.

It raised his strength slightly, by roughly two hundred jin of strength.

The Iron Saber Society was ruthless and savage, treating human lives like blades of grass. Ordinarily, no one even dared pass by their gates.

And so, an entire day passed before anyone discovered that the Iron Saber Society had been wiped out.

It was not until late at night, when Chen Hong and Shen Heng's wives and children came looking for them after the two failed to return home, that they discovered something had happened to the Iron Saber Society.

Blood covered the ground inside, yet not a single person was in sight.

This eerie situation instantly spread throughout the city.

"Something happened to the Iron Saber Society?"

"They were supposedly slaughtered to the last man. The ground was covered in blood, but there were no bodies."

"...Could it be that Snake Demon has appeared again? Or perhaps some Great Demon that eats people?"

"Impossible, unless this so-called Great Demon has forgotten White Snake's cautionary example."

"Could it have been some Immortal walking among mortals? I heard Immortals can command wind, rain, thunder, lightning, and powerful flames. Could the Iron Saber Society people have been burned straight to ashes by the other party's Dao Fire, which is why no bodies can be found?"

"The authorities think so too, but no ashes were found at the scene."

Early the next morning, the streets and alleys of Licheng City were abuzz with heated discussion.

Those who heard it were shocked; those who listened shuddered.

Several hundred people had simply vanished into thin air.

It was terrifying.

"Good and evil will receive their due in the end. How many evil deeds has the Iron Saber Society committed over the years? This is the Heavenly Lord punishing them. Retribution."

Someone said this with red-rimmed eyes.

"This brother is right. The Iron Saber Society's wickedness is beyond measure. Their destruction is a good thing. Besides, did no one know that Shopkeeper Chen of Hongbin Tower and the Iron Saber Society's president were brothers-in-law?"

A youngster said.

It was Li Ye, who had rushed over first thing in the morning to calm the people.

After returning last night, he had burned the big man's corpse. Then, after considering the possible consequences this matter might cause, he had come here.

"W-what?"

"Shopkeeper Chen of Hongbin Tower is connected to the Iron Saber Society? Little brother, is that true?"

The people were shocked.

"Of course it's true. Otherwise, why would their wives have appeared at the Iron Saber Society at the same time last night? And why would they have gone to report it to the authorities together?"

Li Ye explained.

The crowd exploded into an uproar.

If the shopkeeper of Hongbin Tower was so closely connected to the Iron Saber Society, did that mean he had also played a part in the Iron Saber Society's evil deeds over the years?

With that thought, the people's outrage surged.

Before long, a crowd had gathered outside Hongbin Tower. They smashed the place apart and looted it clean.

And after Li Ye's reassurance and guidance, the people also came to believe that the one who had killed the Iron Saber Society was an Immortal who had rid the people of a scourge.

The other party would not harm Ordinary People.

Thus, the atmosphere of panic in Licheng City quickly faded.

"Madam, terrible news! Hongbin Tower has been smashed!"

At Chen Hong's residence, a steward said in a panic.

What?

Chen Hong's wife's expression changed drastically. She immediately began packing up gold, silver, and soft valuables, preparing to flee.

Wearing the Shapeshifter Mask and a clean set of clothes, Li Ye wandered leisurely through Licheng City.

Suddenly, as he passed a pawnshop dealing in Antiques called Yaji Xuan Antique Shop, he stopped in his tracks. His gaze fixed intently on a middle-aged man inside.

The man looked somewhat familiar.

"He's the superior of those two Jin Kingdom people."

Li Ye realized, slightly surprised.

He had seen this man in the life Images displayed by those two Jin Kingdom Qi Gathering Stage Masters.

So this was the Jin Kingdom people's contact point. The Middle-aged Man was probably not the Holy Son the two Jin Kingdom people had spoken of.

There was someone else who was the Holy Son.

Could that person also be inside Yaji Xuan Antique Shop?

Li Ye thought to himself. It felt like he had found another target.

His previous target had been White Snake.

Someone called a Holy Son had to be formidable just from the sound of it.

If he could find a way to kill these two, then burn them...

He could break through at least three realms.

Look for outside help and have Junior Disciple Qin Yu kill him?

Li Ye felt that was too risky. Qin Yu was lazy as hell, and his cultivation was hardly outstanding. He might end up getting killed by the other party instead.

What about looking for Junior Disciple?

That would not work either. Junior Disciple's Heaven Severing Sword was far too tyrannical. If he severed the other party's cultivation with a single stroke, it would not be worth the loss.

"Boss, what's wrong with you?"

Inside Yaji Xuan Antique Shop, the clerk looked at the middle-aged man, who had suddenly drifted off, and asked.

Only then did the man snap back to his senses. "My neck suddenly feels a little chilly."

The clerk was surprised. "You haven't caught a cold, have you? Shall I fetch you a couple doses of medicine?"

The latter refused.

What a joke. He was a cultivator—how could he catch a cold?

Could some enemy have tracked him down?

Had the Divine Concealment Sect noticed him?

The middle-aged man instinctively looked outside, but Li Ye was already nowhere to be seen.

In the end, the middle-aged man found nothing.

"A Da, has there been any unusual news lately?"

the middle-aged man asked again.

"There really has. I heard that a Golden Ginseng ran out of a Devil Sect elder's medicine garden a few days ago, and its whereabouts are still unknown."

"The Devil Sect has dispatched a large number of masters to search for it all over the world."

the clerk said.

Oh?

The middle-aged man's face filled with surprise.

A Spirit Ginseng—and a Golden Ginseng that had grown in a Devil Sect elder's medicine garden at that. This was no ordinary cultivation resource.

If they could find this ginseng, perhaps Holy Son's cultivation could advance another step.

But if they ran into people from the Devil Sect, they risked exposing themselves.

For a moment, the middle-aged man could not make up his mind.