The Qin Mansion, East Wing.
Inside the room.
Qin Jiu placed the black-cloth-wrapped object on the table, then opened it to reveal a wooden box.
It was the Yin Underworld Soil he had sent someone to find earlier.
The name sounded intimidating.
In truth, it was merely soil from beneath a coffin.
Of course, the grave had to be at least a hundred years old.
Only then could Yin Underworld Soil form.
"I wonder how that kid got his hands on this. Hopefully, he didn't secretly dig up someone's ancestral grave."
"The conditions for Blood Sha's imprint are pretty sinister, too."
"It actually needs this stuff."
He shook his head to himself.
Then he reached out and brushed his fingers over the soil in the box.
The imprint conditions were sinister, but Qin Jiu couldn't bear to pass up a purple-grade talent. Now that he had reached Second Refining, the Red Seal's capacity for talents had increased from three to nine.
With that many slots,
there was no reason to give up on the imprint just because its conditions were so sinister.
As he pondered,
the Red Seal in the tiny space of his mind
rumbled.
The illustration of the ferocious beast slowly faded away.
A feeling of sudden enlightenment welled up within him.
Qin Jiu instinctively activated his newly imprinted Blood Sha talent.
"Bzz!"
In an instant,
his body, which had gradually grown sturdy from practicing martial arts, visibly grew thinner. His face turned deathly pale in the blink of an eye.
"..."
At that moment,
Qin Jiu couldn't help drawing in a sharp breath and hurriedly shut off the ability.
"Blood Sha..."
"So this is what its talent does."
His expression shifted uneasily.
This talent could refine qi and blood, allowing its user to undergo a transformation.
Its most terrifying aspect
was that it could devour the blood essence of other living beings to nourish the body.
"How is that any different from a demon...?"
Qin Jiu was deeply unsettled.
He closed his eyes slightly and sensed that after activating the talent just now, his qi and blood had developed a force of baleful yin.
The faint inner force in his body
was now mingling with that baleful yin.
"Is this the change brought about by the transformation of my qi and blood?"
Qin Jiu pressed a hand against the table in front of him and slightly circulated his inner force. A palm print immediately appeared.
Within the palm print,
the tabletop, made of precious Iron Wood,
was steadily eaten away, forming tiny holes like pinpricks. A cold, decaying aura spread through the air.
Qin Jiu took a deep breath at the sight.
"Though a blade may be sharp, in the hands of someone from the demonic path, it becomes a Blood-Slaughtering Demon Weapon. In the hands of someone on the righteous path, it becomes a blade for slaying demons and exorcising evil. I should face what I am, not reject it."
"But I'd better not let anyone see this inner force."
That was what he thought.
In truth,
aside from its unpleasant outward appearance, the improvement from refining his qi and blood was immense.
After activating the talent for only a short while,
Qin Jiu seemed to have lost a whole lot of weight, and his face had turned pale and weak. But that was only because his qi and blood had been depleted. In reality, his strength had just increased by nearly thirty percent.
If he fought Huang Jing and the other man again,
he was fully confident he could swiftly defeat them with sheer strength alone.
"And if I add inner force infused with baleful yin..."
Qin Jiu's thoughts churned.
He took a bottle of pills from his robes and swallowed them.
Then he staggered out of the room.
"Uncle Wang, go to the storeroom and bring me some Blood Strengthening Pills."
"Young Master, what happened to you...?"
Wang Yue was alarmed.
He hurried over to support him.
But he stopped halfway through his question. After all, the other man had broken through again and again in less than a month, stepping straight into Second Refining. There had to be something going on behind the scenes, and it wasn't appropriate to press him further.
Thinking it over, he helped Qin Jiu to the pavilion, then hurried out of the East Wing.
Before long,
he returned with the pills.
Qin Jiu tipped one into his mouth and activated Withered Wood Meets Spring. A flush quickly rose to his face.
"These pills, and even spirit beasts..."
"They can all replenish my qi and blood."
"Sure enough, I shouldn't treat Blood Sha like a raging flood or ferocious beast. With pills to aid me, I can refine my qi and blood, and its baleful yin can raise my combat strength. As long as I don't use this talent to commit evil, who would dare say I'm not on the righteous path?"
At that thought,
Qin Jiu felt the gloom lift.
Then he glanced at Wang Yue, who had his eyes lowered and wore none of the earlier look of suspicion.
"Young Master, word has come back from the Demon Suppression Bureau."
"Oh?"
Qin Jiu raised an eyebrow.
Wang Yue lowered his voice. "Those three have all joined the Demon Suppression Bureau. And there's an unexpected bonus regarding the exemption from conscription that you wanted to negotiate for earlier. To reward the Qin Family, the County Magistrate has exempted the family from all future conscription."
"The Qin Family can now decide for itself."
"If anyone wants to join the Demon Suppression Bureau, they can sign up directly. If they don't, no one will come to conscript them again."
"That really is an unexpected bonus."
Qin Jiu looked delighted.
Originally, his plan had been to have Fu Hanchuan conscript Qin Jingming and the other two in exchange for a few exemptions from future conscription.
He hadn't expected things to turn out so unexpectedly.
"Will this make those three resent us?" Wang Yue asked hesitantly.
Qin Jiu sneered. "That can't be avoided. But they don't have time to resent anyone now."
It wasn't as if the three of them could just walk away from the Qin Family whenever they pleased.
They had benefited from the Qin Family for many years.
Now that they were cutting ties,
they would have to settle their accounts and repay everything they owed.
As for resentment...
Qin Jiu wasn't worried.
First, Wang Yue was still there to guard the Qin Family. Second, given a little more time, he was confident he could stand against a Three Refinements martial artist. There was no need to worry.
"There's one more thing."
At that moment,
Wang Yue spoke again. "These past few days, the Qian Family's experts have all been taken away because of the conscription. Other factions have carved up all their assets, and the Fisher Gang and Chai Gang were involved, too."
"Them?"
Qin Jiu furrowed his brow slightly.
As for the people behind the Fisher Gang and Chai Gang,
he still couldn't identify them. But that day, under Ghost Illumination, neither the County Magistrate nor Fu Hanchuan had shown any hostility toward the Qin Family. That suggested they might not be the ones pulling the strings.
Time rolled on.
In the blink of an eye, another five days passed.
These past few days, the Outer City had been filled with wails and misery. Demons had poured in without end, like weeds that could never be burned away.
The Demon Suppression Bureau was stretched too thin.
It could only keep conscripting people from the major factions to cope.
Every family was suffering.
On this day,
Qin Jiu was practicing in the courtyard.
Wang Yue, worry etched between his brows, hurried to the East Wing to report.
"Young Master, someone from the County Office has come with a message."
"They want you to go to the Demon Suppression Bureau right away."
"Right now?"
Qin Jiu frowned.
By rights,
the County Magistrate had exempted the Qin Family from conscription. If the Demon Suppression Bureau had nothing going on, there was no way they would ask him to come over. But if something had happened...
"Could they be conscripting people from the Qin Family again?"
His heart sank at once.
But after bringing Wang Yue to the Demon Suppression Bureau,
Qin Jiu was stunned to discover
that the Internal Strengthening martial artists of Songshan County—Han Zheng, Nan Zhenxiong, Tang Yu, and the others—had all gathered in the main hall of the Demon Suppression Bureau.
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