After receiving the reminder from the bailiff Little Qin, Chu Ge had thought about leaving Linyuan City immediately at the very first moment.
This notion, however, only spun around in his mind for a moment.
Considering Lin Hongtu of the Demon Suppressing Division who had been heavily wounded, he dismissed this rather risky idea.
Since Tian Youji had specially sent someone to issue a warning, it was obvious that outside the city was already extremely dangerous.
If he left the city alone, it would be fine if he managed to escape safely.
Yet if he unfortunately ran into the corpse driver and the Flying Head Zombie, he might not be able to escape with his life.
Life only happened once.
Without foolproof certainty, Chu Ge was unwilling to take a reckless gamble and risk it.
Stepping back to think about it, staying inside the city meant he at least still had those two Bone Training Realm martial artists, Tian Youji and Hu Xuezhi, bearing the brunt of the pressure.
The safety factor was much higher than him leaving the city alone.
Having thought through these pros and cons, Chu Ge had Steward Fu head to the Wang Family that very night to inquire whether Wang Xiuyun had already prepared the antique items.
Simultaneously, he also personally went to the Tiger Martial Arts School to pay his respects to his master, Hu Xuezhi.
He hoped to hear his master's analysis of the current situation.
To his surprise, this trip turned out to be in vain.
Hu Xuezhi was not inside the martial arts school; instead, he had been staying at the yamen to assist Tian Youji with official business.
Given the grim state of affairs at this moment, Tian Youji was likely also rushed off his feet and overwhelmed.
Chu Ge did not rashly rush over to the yamen to pay a visit in the middle of the night.
On his return journey riding in a carriage.
Through the lifted carriage curtain, he saw children on the streets outside being scolded and beaten by their respective parents as they were shooed back home, and watched men shouting and finger-guessing inside the restaurants that had recovered a bit of bustle; Chu Ge felt a tinge of emotion.
These ordinary people had only received notification a few days prior that the bandits outside the city had been resolved and that the lords of the Demon Suppressing Division had come to take charge, which was why they had all set their minds at ease and resumed normal lives.
Yet now, one wave had barely receded when another rose.
As for the danger outside the city, the yamen had only notified the wealthy gentry within the city.
The news had not even been passed down to ordinary households.
Many people were still kept in the dark.
Was this ignorance a blessing or a misfortune after all.
He did not possess an excessive amount of sentimental benevolence.
Merely sighing as if to release a bit of suppressed emotion, he returned to his own estate.
Steward Fu had already returned, bringing back good news.
"Young master, the eldest young lady of the Wang Family has already sorted out a batch of antique items, numbering over twenty pieces, but it's inconvenient to transport them over tonight. She instructed that we should come for the trade tomorrow instead."
"Oh? There are actually over twenty pieces?"
Chu Ge felt a pleasant surprise.
Although he desperately wanted to get his hands on them right now, this matter also required respecting the other party's stance, and he immediately nodded slightly, "Tomorrow is fine as well."
"In addition, the eldest young lady of the Wang Family said that to congratulate you, young master, on breaking through to the Bone Training Realm, there will still be congratulatory gifts sent over tomorrow."
When Steward Fu mentioned this, he also felt somewhat emotional.
He truly had not expected that the young master would actually stir up a name for himself; he had once thought the young master only practiced martial arts just for fun.
Even Wang Xiuyun knows I've broken through.
Chu Ge was startled, immediately realizing that it was probably the bailiff Little Qin who had run his big mouth and spread the word while delivering the message to the Wang Family.
He did not take it too much to heart either; one always had to display some strength and potential for others to look up to them and be willing to forge connections.
His disguise and concealment were merely for self-preservation, not self-inflicted torment.
Instructing the maid Little Spring Flower and the others to first prepare the scented bathwater and warm the rooms, he himself headed into the secret chamber.
The Thousand Mile Kite crafted yesterday had also already taken shape, and he could attempt to infuse it with alien power.
At the same time, inside the Dragon Clock, the five people including Ding Ying had also all completed their sacrifices.
Chu Ge abandoned inheriting martial arts such as the Snow Blade Technique; offensive martial arts of this mortal sort were not of much use to him right now.
As for the major-completion or consummate-state movement techniques that he needed, none of these people possessed them.
After converting all the martial arts, he harvested fifty-three wisps of alien power.
As a result, even with the consumption of eleven wisps of alien power over the past two days due to cultivation and innate talent, he still had a remainder of one hundred and thirty-three wisps of alien power now.
Chu Ge picked up the Thousand Mile Kite.
The Dragon Clock tattoo on his arm shone faintly, sweeping out a wisp of alien power and infusing it into the kite.
Instantly, the kite, which had paper cutouts resembling a pair of pigeon eyes pasted on its surface, moved without wind.
The pair of pigeon eyes opened, blood-red pupils rotating.
As Chu Ge slightly pulled the spider-silk kite string, the kite easily glided and flew upward.
"It seems to have succeeded. Although it wasn't made with hawk eyes, it should still have some utility."
Chu Ge nodded, walking out of the secret chamber with the kite.
He leaped and vaulted onto the ridge of the roof.
He peeled off one of the 'pigeon eye' paper cutouts from the surface of the kite.
Pasting it onto the center of his own brow, he then slowly released the kite.
Immediately, a wondrous scene occurred.
The alien power within the kite began to circulate and consume itself, forging what seemed like a mysterious connection along the kite string he pulled in his hand.
The alien power within the pigeon-eye paper cutout pasted on the center of his brow also began to deplete, and the paper cutout grew hot.
Chu Ge felt a burning pain at the center of his brow, as if a 'heavenly eye' had been opened for him.
The pigeon-eye paper cutout at the center of his brow transformed into his vertical eye, and his vision was gradually pulled up into the high sky.
It was as if he had transformed into the kite itself, overlooking some sights within the city.
He could see streams of vital breath pillars resembling blood-qi wolf-smoke, varying in strength.
This was the vitality and blood of living beings.
The Thousand Mile Kite was not merely as simple as observing scenery.
It could also observe the strength of a person's vital energy, much like the qi-watching uncanny abilities of pugilistic fortune-tellers.
Especially since the Thousand Mile Kite made from pigeon eyes carried pigeon blood, it was exceptionally sensitive to the strength of vitality and blood.
He could see that the many qi pillars within the city were all like intermittent pale-red threads, mottled and entangled, extremely faint, as if they would sway at a breath of wind.
These were all the auras of ordinary people.
As the kite string was let out further, Chu Ge even gradually saw a partially blurred sight outside the city.
Though this Thousand Mile Kite he crafted for the first time could not truly peer across a thousand miles.
Yet for the present, it could also spy on the scenery within a range of one or two miles.
Experiencing this sensation of ascending high and looking far for the first time, Chu Ge felt stirred and played with it to his heart's content.
He had the kite draw slightly closer to the direction of the Wang Family.
From afar, he watched the blurred sights and the numerous auras inside the Wang Family estate for a while.
The pillars formed by several of those auras were strong, about the thickness of a little finger, longer than the red-thread forms of ordinary people, and might perhaps be the Wang Family's security guards.
There was also the qi pillar of a certain aura that was particularly thick and stout, about the thickness of a thumb, and very long.
Comparing the thickness and length of his own blood-qi, Chu Ge guessed that that qi pillar might perhaps be Wang Xiuyun.
The eldest young lady of the Wang Family is quite thick and long.
Chu Ge was just about to steer the kite closer to the direction of the county yamen.
Abruptly and vaguely, he caught sight of a black qi pillar in the night sky over the Xue Men River dock not far away—a pillar distinct from the usual pale-red qi pillars, exceptionally tyrannical, fully the thickness of an infant's fist, abnormally long, and raging like beacon wolf-smoke.
Hm? What is that?
A thought stirred in Chu Ge's heart as he slightly adjusted the kite string in his hand.
The blood-red pigeon eyes on the kite turned, looking toward the distant horizon.
Yet he saw that beneath the faint moonlight, a disheveled head was bizarrely and silently flying across the night sky.
A mouthful of fangs looked quite ferocious in the moonlight, and suspended beneath the head's neck was a string of things resembling bizarre intestines.
The Flying Head Zombie?!
Chu Ge's heart skipped a beat, and his hair nearly stood on end as he rapidly began to reel in the kite string.
Merely by watching for a few extra moments, he had unexpectedly spotted this ghostly thing.
Just as the kite flew back, that Flying Head Zombie also suddenly plummeted downward.
Faint screams drifted over from afar, and a faint red thread of vitality and blood snapped.
When that disheveled Flying Head Zombie flew up again, it seemed to have an extra new head bound beneath its gruesome intestines.
Almost at this same time, through the Thousand Mile Kite, Chu Ge saw what seemed like a faint black thread streak across the opposite street, darting toward this street here.
Swish—
A sense of alarm arose in his heart, leaving him no time to clearly see what aura that black thread represented.
He rapidly reeled in the kite, leaped down from the roof ridge, his expression very unsightly.
Hunting!
The evil-path corpse driver outside the city seemed to be driving the Flying Head Zombie to hunt living beings, and even seemed to be testing something.
This behavior was far too unbridled and ferocious.
He had actually thought about leaving the city alone today to abandon this right-and-wrong place; fortunately, he had not recklessly charged out of the city.
Otherwise, he might as well have ended up the second unlucky fellow after Lin Hongtu to trade blows with the Flying Head Zombie.
Chu Ge quickly leaped down from the roof ridge, suddenly feeling the yellow paper corresponding to the Auspicious Ruyi Charm rapidly scorching black and generating an early warning.
"Hm?"
Concurrently, outside the courtyard, a blurred black shadow flickered into the compound, vaguely carrying what seemed to be the murmuring sounds of malevolent grievance.
Blood and flesh... blood and flesh. The ones just now were all too weak; there seems to be someone with abundant blood-qi inside this courtyard—a slightly stronger delicacy.
Within the corridor of the Chu Household, lamp after lamp of red lanterns instantly shone bright.
Chu Ge frowned as he looked at the lanterns.
Almost at this very time, within the darkness, a pair of eyes seemed to be staring fixedly at his back, brimming with malice and wickedness.
What is this thing?!
He suddenly let out a low shout, instinctively sensing the threat and abnormality like a premonition of heart and mind, his entire body's blood-qi instantly churning, emitting a horrifying and daunting aura of robust vitality. With his gaze shooting out majestic brilliance, he abruptly whirled around and punched out with a single strike.
Boom!—
This punch was incomparably ferocious, the peerlessly powerful force it wrapped carrying the sound of muffled thunder as it blasted and churned outward.
Within the darkness, the black shadow that had suddenly darted over instantly suffered immense terror, feeling that the blood-flesh which ought to have been its prey had abruptly surged and violently spiked in blood-qi—incomparably terrifying and unthinkable.
"Squeak—"
In the empty courtyard, a piercing sound suddenly rang out, seeming to toll from within one's spirit and drill straight into the brain.
The force of Chu Ge's blood-qi-boiling punch met the midstream boulder like roaring river waves, violently sliding and surging toward both sides as two torrents of force whipped the courtyard's trees into snapping, grasses into bending, and stones and sand flying away.
In an instant!
Smoke and dust permeated the air, and flower petals danced about.
Then peace and calm returned once more.
Chu Ge stared with crystalline tiger eyes, scanning all around, yet failed to detect the existence of any person or monster.
It was as if what he had just struck was merely a mass of air.
Yet his intuition told him that he had clearly hit something just a moment ago.
Pacing back and forth in the courtyard in bewilderment, he felt as though some chilling aura lingered in the air.
Aside from that, there was nothing else.
What was that thing just now? Could it be some evil wraith conjured by the corpse driver?
Thinking of the black thread he had observed earlier, his heart grew highly vigilant, and he moved closer to the Auspicious Ruyi Charm.
Borrowing its warding function, he checked whether he himself was in danger.
This time really was bizarre.
It was the first time he had struck and killed something, yet could not even find a shadow of it, leaving him with no way to perform a sacrifice even if he wanted to.
No way? How can it be this weak?
He remained uncertain whether any threats still lingered around him.
Yet through the already quieted Shadow Lanterns and charm, it seemed he could confirm that he was temporarily safe.
"Young master!"
At this moment, servants had already been startled by the commotion and hurried over carrying clubs.
After informing them that he was merely practicing martial arts, Chu Ge dismissed the servants.
Following that, he waited in the courtyard with high vigilance for a while longer.
Listening to the commotion outside.
Until the span of an incense stick later, when he confirmed there was no further danger, he finally dispelled the notion of going out to head to the yamen and entered his dwelling feeling suspicious and paranoid.
Tonight was destined to be a sleepless night.
Having experienced this whole ordeal, Chu Ge had no mood to enjoy the attentions of the maids either.
Fortunately, however, the early warning from the Auspicious Ruyi Charm was very stable, setting his mind at ease.
Even if danger arose, with the charm reminding him, he could still make preparations in advance.
Right now, his only course of action was to rapidly consume the alien power within the Dragon Clock and begin practicing the Tiger Crouching Technique; to elevate his strength by even a fraction was to gain a fraction more capability.
Only, at his current cultivation speed, even with sufficient pure alien power available for refinement to boost his blood-qi, it was not something that could be accomplished in a short time.
Introspecting upon the tiger head where his blood-qi converged, Chu Ge sighed inwardly.
On the path of making the qi pillar thicker and longer, I still need to exert myself for three months before I might reach the peak of the Blood Change Realm.
Yet the corpse driver's attack might happen in these next couple of days! I must make foolproof preparations. That medicinal wine and wine pot... I wonder if it can be refined in time.
[Seeking sticky-top, seeking monthly votes]
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