Dangerous Instinct

Half a month later.

With Evening Moon's taboo period behind him, Li Mo finally breathed a sigh of relief. His nerves had been taut the entire time.

He had seemed relaxed these past few days, but in truth, he had remained cautious at every turn.

Now he could finally move about freely outside without worrying that he might suffer that inexplicable, irresistible harm.

Meanwhile.

The Pingshan Society's gang leaders had begun leading their men in frequent raids near the Lishan Gang's territory. The conflict between the two sides had officially begun.

"Doctor Li, please save Wang Mazi!"

Several men carried a fellow bandit into the clinic.

Li Mo motioned for Hei Wa to keep an eye on the patient he had been treating earlier, then went over to Wang Mazi. Seeing that the man had only suffered superficial injuries, he remained utterly unruffled.

"Put him there."

He slapped a dose of Trauma Medicine onto the wound, and the man immediately let out a pained cry.

"Keep the wound dry. Come back for a follow-up in three days."

Then Li Mo waved his hand, signaling that the man could leave.

"Thank you, Doctor Li! Thank you!"

Li Mo had no desire to say more. He stole a moment to look out the window. Since the two gangs had officially gone to war, fewer people were willing to spar with him. He had even resorted to jokingly threatening to withhold treatment for their future injuries before the powerful gang leaders would put on helpless expressions and patiently spar with him. In private, they had even started calling him Li the Martial Arts Fanatic instead of Doctor Li.

Perhaps Evening Moon's recent changes had affected him. Li Mo had become even more diligent.

"Doctor Li!"

Someone else had arrived.

Li Mo glanced over, about to leave the apprentice to handle it, but then he recognized the man as one of Jade Fox Wang Ying's subordinates. Remembering what he had once promised Wang Ying, he had no choice but to pause his martial arts practice and carefully bandage and treat the man.

After quite a while, the man was finally carried out.

"I wonder how long this fighting will last."

He shook his head and sighed.

Two months later.

The Dragon Boat Festival had arrived. Although the Pingshan Society had stocked up on a good supply of herbs in advance, after more than two months, their supplies of medicine for treating bruises and sprains had still run low.

They had completely run out of Trauma Medicine in particular.

"Big brother, we're having a rough time, but those bastards in the Lishan Gang are having it even worse!"

"Exactly!"

"Even by the most generous count, we've lost fewer than twenty brothers during this whole stretch. The Lishan Gang doesn't have Doctor Li. They must have lost at least fifty or sixty of their men. We've even taken down their gang leader, Flying Over the Grass. I say if we hold on for two more months, the Lishan Gang will be finished!"

"Victory or defeat will be decided in this battle!"

Everyone was fired up, growing bolder with every fight.

After giving it some thought, Bloodface Lion Gao Po finally looked toward Li Mo, who had remained silent.

"Doctor Li, could we use other herbs as a temporary substitute for Trauma Medicine to treat the brothers' knife wounds?"

Everyone turned to look at Li Mo.

Li Mo thought it over briefly before replying, "We can, but they won't work nearly as well. And the pharmacy has no stock, so I'll have to go into the mountains to gather herbs."

Gao Po said, "Sorry for the trouble, Doctor. Once this battle is over, the top credit will be yours!"

At that, Li Mo remembered how he had repeatedly given away money to help others lately. He really was short on silver. Earning some money for his efforts sounded good. Besides, he couldn't leave this place this year anyway. He might as well focus on cultivating his martial arts to the peak as soon as possible.

The next day.

Li Mo left the stronghold alone to gather herbs in the mountains.

By now, he was familiar with the terrain around the Pingshan Society and knew where the herbs grew, so he no longer needed Hei Wa to guide him.

About an hour and a half later.

He reached a cliff and confirmed there were plenty of Blood Red Flowers growing below. He took a rope and some dry rations from his basket, then rested there for a while to make sure he was in peak condition.

Blood Red Flowers generally grew on steep cliffs, making them a serious test of a herb gatherer's footwork.

After resting.

Li Mo secured the rope and checked it carefully before starting to pick the Blood Red Flowers growing on the cliff. He was quite lucky: in just two hours, he had filled his entire basket with Blood Red Flowers, all of them potent.

Just as Li Mo was about to leave, he caught sight of a bright red flower in a crack in the rock.

"A century-old Blood Red Flower!"

Once a Blood Red Flower passed the hundred-year mark, its medicinal properties underwent a transformation, granting it all sorts of miraculous effects. At market prices, a single century-old Blood Red Flower was worth at least seven or eight taels of silver.

How could Li Mo not be tempted?

So he hurriedly tried to get closer.

Fortunately, he was a martial artist. His practice of Three-Way Swordplay had given him quite nimble footwork. Otherwise, he was no professional herb gatherer, and that century-old Blood Red Flower grew in such a sheer, treacherous spot that one careless slip would send him tumbling to his death.

Only after he had the century-old Blood Red Flower in his hand did Li Mo finally relax, a delighted smile spreading across his face.

One day, this century-old Blood Red Flower might save someone's life.

By the time Li Mo climbed back up the steep rock face, it was around Weishi in the afternoon.

He gathered up the rope, let out a long breath, and headed back toward the stronghold.

Just then!

Li Mo suddenly felt a prickling danger at his back. Almost instinctively, he shifted aside. A figure lunged past him and landed in front of him.

It was a leopard!

Judging by its size, it was a little larger than the average adult. Its weight seemed almost equal to that of a grown man, and it radiated menace. It let out a series of low growls, then, after a brief standoff, sprang toward Li Mo again with blinding speed.

By now, Li Mo understood the limits of a martial artist.

Without Inner Strength or a weapon specifically made for hunting, fighting a carnivorous beast of roughly equal weight was the limit of an ordinary person.

Some adult gray bears and tigers in the mountains weighed several times as much as ordinary people, even without having become spirits. In a one-on-one fight, even a so-called peak second-rate expert could only run for his life.

With smaller beasts such as large jackals, wolves, and leopards, if they grew to about the size of a person, a second-rate martial artist from the world of martial arts had roughly even odds in a one-on-one fight. The outcome depended on the circumstances.

The leopard before him clearly fell into that category. Its explosive power was astonishing, and its reflexes were practically unbelievable. It lunged and snapped at Li Mo again and again. The beasts of the Eighteen Mountains seemed harder to deal with than those elsewhere, all of them huge monsters on the verge of becoming spirits!

Li Mo dodged, rolled, and fled, looking utterly miserable. The leopard's claws had only grazed him, but they had ripped his coarse hemp clothes to shreds, and blood ran down his shoulder.

The leopard grew fiercer once it drew blood!

Li Mo twisted and turned, dodging its attacks in desperate disarray.

He knew this couldn't go on. He had to fight back, or he'd be doomed the moment his strength gave out.

So he gripped his sword and suddenly thrust it backward at the leopard with all his might, but the beast nimbly dodged.

The leopard's front paws touched the ground. It spun around, ready to leap at him again. Meanwhile, Li Mo had lost his balance after that forceful counterattack and was about to fall. Just as the leopard seemed ready to lock its jaws around his throat, he suddenly thrust out his left hand. A bamboo tube hidden in his sleeve sprayed a cloud of white powder into the leopard's face.

Caught off guard, the leopard's eyes were blinded. It rolled away in a panic.

Its terrified snarls echoed through the forest.

Li Mo's heart pounded. Seeing that his backup plan had worked and the leopard had lost its sight, thrashing about among the trees, he hurried over with his sword.

After his experience at the Zhang siblings' shady inn, Li Mo had cast aside the constraints of his medical ethics.

Those who would achieve great things did not concern themselves with trifles!

This bamboo-tube weapon was made from a mixture of lime powder and a potent drug that induced blindness. It was an excellent trick for a surprise attack in close combat, and one of his signature moves. Seeing that the beast was at his mercy, Li Mo moved with lightning speed, repeatedly driving his sword into its vital spots.

A moment later, the leopard finally fell dead.

"Whew."

Once everything had settled, pain spread through his wound. Li Mo grimaced as he bandaged it. Only then did he retrieve his basket and gather up the Blood Red Flowers scattered across the ground.

"Could this guy have been guarding that century-old Blood Red Flower?"

Herb gatherers often said that fearsome beasts tended to guard the areas around rare medicinal herbs.

But rare herbs were used by cultivators to make pills. This century-old Blood Red Flower was only an herb, so how could the two be compared?

What delighted him, though, was the dangerous instinct he had just displayed!

The moment the leopard had ambushed him, he had clearly sensed that hair-raising danger, which was why he'd managed to dodge in time. It seemed all the money he had spent helping others lately hadn't been wasted. Every bit of it had been worth it.

"First, I have to figure out how to haul this thing back. It's really heavy. I'll skin it and make a fur cloak—hm, there probably won't be enough hide, so I can only make a vest. We can divide up the meat, and use the bones to make liquor. The leopard's penis is a potent tonic. I could give it to the two gang bosses as a gift and have them spar with me for some real combat practice? No, I'd better give it to Wang Ying..."

When Li Mo returned to the stronghold, several gang leaders came out of their rooms to look at the leopard he had carried back.

Little Arhat Han Kui exclaimed in surprise, "Doctor Li, did you hunt this all by yourself?"

"I just got lucky."

Li Mo was so exhausted he could barely catch his breath.

Speaking of Han Kui, the monk from Chanyu Temple, Li Mo had sparred with him several times. Their matches had seemed even, but Li Mo knew he was no match for him at all. It was because of Han Kui that Li Mo realized he had been practicing behind closed doors and lacked real combat experience. He had yet to develop the so-called dangerous instinct, which led him to start making up for lost time in every way he could.

Seeing this, Tang San Dao, a gang leader known as Three Blades, burst out laughing.

"Ha ha! Just as I'd expect from Doctor Li. Not only are your medical skills superb, but your martial arts are incredible too. I'm impressed!"

He meant every word.

Tang San Dao had sparred with Li Mo many times. At first, they had been evenly matched, but as the days passed, Li Mo had become harder and harder to read. His martial arts seemed to be improving at a breakneck pace.

Only after resting for quite a while did Li Mo get back to his feet and carry the Blood Red Flowers to the clinic.

And so.

The fighting between the Pingshan Society and the Lishan Gang began around the Flower Festival at the start of the year. It lasted through the Dragon Boat Festival, then continued all the way to the Mid-Autumn Festival. After half a year, it finally ended with the defeat of the Lishan Gang, led by River-Taming Dragon Ke Chen'e.

When the tree fell, the monkeys scattered.

The Lishan Gang vanished from the Eighteen Mountains.

After taking in some of the Lishan Gang's bandits and gang leaders who had surrendered, the Pingshan Society not only restored its partnerships with Songjiang Town's three major escort agencies but also seized several trade routes controlled by the Lishan Gang. For a time, it rode high on the crest of success.

Li Mo also received thirty taels of silver as a reward.

That was enough to buy a young, unmarried woman down at the foot of the mountain.

When he thought of the thirty taels of silver he had once needed for Zhao Siman's wedding dowry, he realized he no longer felt any attachment to such worldly possessions. Without the slightest stinginess, he gave away more of his money and continued to befriend the gang leaders and spar with them.

For a while, his reputation as Li the Martial Arts Fanatic even eclipsed his fame as a doctor.

This place brought together all kinds of people from every walk of life. Everyone had a past, but those with far-reaching ambitions for the future were few and far between.