The night passed, and dawn was not far behind.
After a night of turmoil, Linyuan City finally settled down as dawn arrived.
The many bandits of the Heaven and Earth Incense Cult had all been captured or executed.
Besides them, two small Flying Head Zombies, no longer controlled by their corpse drivers, had also been captured and locked up together, awaiting the arrival of the Demon Suppressing Division's officials.
The turmoil stirred up by the Heaven and Earth Incense Cult's corpse drivers had been quelled, but the city's people had suffered terribly.
Aside from a few unlucky wealthy gentry who had been robbed and killed, many innocent people had also died at the bandits' hands that night. Some young children had been caught up in it, too, and had met their deaths far too soon.
After the swelling in Chu Ge's arms had gone down, he heard the commotion outside and immediately left the house to see what was happening.
Steward Fu sighed. "Young master, a lot of people died last night. Some families lost every last one of their members, and there was no one left to bury them.
"I heard Lord Tian of the County Yamen is overseeing the burials despite his injuries. The yamen is covering the expenses, and they're recruiting people throughout the city to carry all the bodies to Snake Coil Mountain, outside the city, for burial. Lord Tian really is a good man."
Auntie Li from the kitchen had red-rimmed eyes. "I went to the market to take a look. It was awful. So many little children, not even as tall as a winnowing basket, had been decapitated. Oh, the sight of it—my heart just ached."
"If Lord Tian hadn't led his men in a counterattack last night, even more people might have died in the city by now. Sigh."
The servant Hei Gouzi chimed in, then glanced at Chu Ge and grinned through his gap-toothed smile. "We should thank you, too, young master. If you hadn't told us to hide, we might have been in danger as well."
"Good people get good fortune. That's why we were all lucky."
Chu Ge smiled and comforted them. As they talked, they couldn't help looking toward the house across the street.
Inside, a fat country squire was howling in anguish—but not because anyone in his family had died. The bandits had ransacked his home the night before, and he had bought his life with his money.
Seeing this, Chu Ge couldn't help feeling a pang of sympathy.
Fortunately, though Linyuan City had been ransacked twice, none of his money had been stolen.
If anything, he had gained quite a bit through several counter-raids.
What a mess!
Linyuan City was far too chaotic.
He had to get ready and leave for the prefectural city as soon as possible.
So far, he had heard that many towns across Great Zhou had been ransacked by wicked cults, but he hadn't heard of any prefectural city being attacked.
That meant he could not only find more resources in the prefectural city, but would at least have a relatively safe and stable environment for cultivation.
When the sky fell, it was the tall ones who held it up. That was better than spending every day in fear in a small county town.
After all, if the sky over Linyuan City came crashing down, it would land on either Tian Youji and Hu Xuezhi—or on him, the tall one. Sometimes, once you were in the martial world, you had no choice in the matter.
After returning to his room for breakfast, Chu Ge went out alone to the observation points where he had hung his Thousand Mile Kites the previous day, retrieving them one by one.
Along the way, he occasionally saw people using well water to wash bloodstains from the streets. From some of the single-story houses came the cries of men and women.
The dead. So many had died in a single night.
Families with means arranged their own funerals and burials for their loved ones.
Those without means laid the bodies on thin wooden stretchers.
Or they loaded them onto handcarts and took them to the west gate, where the funeral procession hired by the yamen would transport them together to Snake Coil Mountain, outside the city, for burial.
Every so often, Chu Ge stopped by the roadside and watched cart after cart, stretcher after stretcher, disappear amid sobbing and fluttering white mourning cloth. He looked at the paper money scattered across the ground, stained by dirty water and blood.
He felt that the Linyuan City where he had lived for several years had suddenly become both real and unfamiliar.
For many families torn apart, perhaps the city had suddenly become unfamiliar, too.
Ordinary people lacked the strength to control their own fate or protect their lives, and so they could only be at the mercy of the strong.
In a world where martial strength reigned supreme, once order and rules had been trampled into the dirt, everything seemed so cold and bloody.
"Strength. I'm still weak. I mustn't grow complacent or arrogant. I have to move forward cautiously.
"If I'd rashly revealed my strength and stepped into the open before, Soul Chasing Old Man might have come after me right away. Who would have won? Hard to say."
"I'll have to stay cautious from now on, too. If I need to stick my neck out, I'll do it as a porter."
Chu Ge pondered to himself, examining himself three times a day.
"Senior Brother Chu!"
A voice called from a nearby street.
Chu Ge turned and saw a junior fellow disciple from the martial arts school, accompanied by two constables and Wang Xiuyun, the eldest daughter of the Wang Family.
"Chu Ge, you're here too. Judging by the way you look, you weren't in any danger last night."
Wang Xiuyun wore a jade-green silk dress. Slender and graceful, she was a little surprised to see Chu Ge's tall, burly figure. Then she looked at the kite in his hand, seeming even more bewildered.
Just who was her childhood friend?
He was far too carefree.
So many people had died in last night's turmoil, and he still had the mood to go out flying a kite?
"I was just..." Chu Ge raised the kite in his hand, at a loss for words.
Wang Xiuyun smiled with her lovely eyes and spoke first. "Lord Tian invited me to look at a house up ahead. I heard a mysterious expert stepped in last night and helped defeat a powerful enemy.
"That expert might be the senior who saved me last time. Chu Ge, why don't you come take a look, too?"
"That's right, Senior Brother Chu. Come take a look with us."
The junior disciple from the martial arts school chimed in with an invitation, his eyes fixed on Chu Ge's burly, muscular figure, full of admiration.
The news that Chu Ge had reached the Bone Training Realm had already spread.
With strength like his, he was one of the top martial artists in all of Linyuan City. Many of the Tiger Martial Arts School's disciples already regarded him as their senior brother.
"No need. I have other things to do. Go ahead, and give Lord Tian my regards. Thank him for killing the bandits yesterday."
Chu Ge immediately smiled and declined the invitation.
He had just been there last night. What was there to see again?
Did criminals like hanging around the scene of their crimes?
He wasn't a criminal, of course. He punished evil and upheld justice. Still, it felt rather strange.
Wang Xiuyun and the others didn't say anything more.
Before leaving, the martial arts school disciple did mention that Hu Xuezhi had been badly injured and had lost part of his hand.
"Oh? Master Hu lost part of his hand?"
Chu Ge stood where he was, watching Wang Xiuyun and the others walk away, surprised.
He had only gotten a brief look at Hu Xuezhi the previous night and hadn't noticed that part of his hand was missing.
Hu Xuezhi's vitality had already declined. Now that he had lost part of his hand, he might even fall to a lower realm in another couple of years.
Chu Ge thought it over, then continued along the city's brick-paved streets to retrieve the other kites before changing course and heading to Tiger Martial Arts School.
A quarter of an hour later.
The room at Tiger Martial Arts School was thick with the scent of medicine.
Chu Ge looked at Hu Xuezhi's bandaged right hand and sighed. "Master, did you cut it off yourself?"
"Don't talk nonsense!"
Hu Xuezhi rolled his eyes. Leaning back in his chair, his pale face twisted into a wry smile as he shook his head. "I'm not that cruel. Old Tian chopped it off. That Flying Head Zombie is vicious. If it bites you, you have to cut off the hand right away. If the corpse poison gets into your body, you'll lose more than just your hand."
As he spoke, he unexpectedly took out a tobacco pipe, lit the tobacco, and started puffing away.
Chu Ge was surprised. "Then what about Lord Lin?"
Hu Xuezhi kicked off his shoes and even squatted on the chair. He hissed and furrowed his brow. "He's almost done for. Unless the officials from the Demon Suppressing Division get here quickly and bring good medicine, I'm afraid things look bleak."
"Is the corpse poison really that bad?"
Chu Ge was shocked—and relieved he had gotten away unscathed.
Fortunately, he hadn't tangled with the Flying Head Zombie for long the previous day, and he hadn't held back from using the wine poison.
Otherwise, if it had bitten him, he might have had no choice but to see himself off, sacrificing himself to the Dragon Clock so he could at least die with dignity.
He chatted with Hu Xuezhi for a while, offering words of concern and praise and thanking him for fighting the enemy with all his might the previous night.
Hu Xuezhi suddenly paused, his expression turning solemn, and asked whether Chu Ge had seen any mysterious demon martial artists in the city.
"Demon martial artists? What are those? You mean the snake-skinned monsters with human bodies and snake heads that storytellers talk about?"
Chu Ge didn't even blink. His gaze was blank as he launched into his usual award-winning performance, pretending he knew nothing.
Demon martial artists, porter seniors—those were all powerful big shots, and had nothing to do with an ordinary rich young master like him.
"Demon martial artists are powerful, but many of them have their personalities twisted after coming into contact with the blood of Exotic Demons or other demons. They become wicked. Few are like the senior who stepped in last night and held fast to justice."
As Hu Xuezhi spoke, he exhaled a puff of smoke and sighed. "Sigh, the one we really ought to thank is that senior. Otherwise, Old Tian and I would've been in serious trouble this time.
"If you ever see that senior, bow down and knock your head on the ground a few times for me, all right?"
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