A month passed in the blink of an eye.
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For the crumbling Great Gan Dynasty, plenty of major events had taken place over the past month.
The emperor's illness seemed to have worsened again, factional struggles at court had grown fiercer, and unrest within Great Gan was on the rise.
It was said that not long ago, small-scale peasant uprisings had broken out in several provinces because of famine.
But none of that had anything to do with Lin Hanzhou.
At present, he was only at the second tier of cultivation. He still couldn't shake the world.
He rode in a carriage south, crossing two great provinces before finally reaching his destination: Qing Prefecture.
Qing Prefecture lay in the southern part of the Great Gan Dynasty, far from the border wars in the north and not at the center of the court's power struggles.
On top of that, it was remote and mountainous, with little arable land. Even the three great sects rarely ventured there.
This was the perfect place Lin Hanzhou had chosen to grow in peace.
Along the way, he could feel the threat from the Cloud Glow Sect growing ever more distant.
Here, he couldn't even find a single wanted poster bearing his name.
That was right. Lin Hanzhou was wanted.
It had happened three weeks earlier.
At the time, he had just left Qing Province and crossed into neighboring Yu Province.
In a middling-sized city, he spotted the most conspicuous bounty notice at the city gate at a glance.
The notice had no portrait and no name.
The charges read: cruelly murdering a core disciple of the Cloud Glow Sect and over a hundred villagers in Zhang Family Village, Qing Province.
Suspect information: entirely unknown.
Assessment of strength: at least the combat ability of an experienced Martial Master, possibly approaching Grandmaster.
Reward: a thousand taels of gold for anyone who provided useful information.
Whoever killed or captured the fiend alive would receive a Grandmaster-level cultivation manual from the Cloud Glow Sect in gratitude.
When Lin Hanzhou first saw the notice, he hadn't even thought it was about him.
After all, he hadn't killed that many people. He'd only killed Zhou Fengyu.
But when he saw the place name "Zhang Family Village, Qing Province" and the date the notice had been issued, he knew there was no way it could be a coincidence.
The claim that he had killed over a hundred villagers was nothing but slander from the Cloud Glow Sect, meant to smear him as the culprit.
After all, in the Cloud Glow Sect's eyes, he had to be the one who massacred Zhang Family Village, not Zhou Fengyu.
Even if the dead Zhou Fengyu stood up and confessed, the Cloud Glow Sect would still pin the blame on him.
Only then could they establish their sect's authority while earning a reputation for punishing evil and upholding justice.
To great sects like these, reputation mattered more than anything.
But Lin Hanzhou wasn't angry about it. If anything, he found it a little funny.
This misunderstanding was actually a good thing for him.
What pleased him even more was the description on the notice: "Suspect information entirely unknown."
That was proof enough of how right he'd been to burn Zhang Family Village to the ground and erase every trace.
No portrait, no name, no distinguishing features—just a rough estimate of his strength and the place where he'd appeared.
They thought they could find him with that? It was like searching for a needle in the ocean!
The threat from the Cloud Glow Sect had been dealt with, at least for the time being.
As long as he wasn't stupid enough to go running into Cloud Glow Sect territory, he would basically be safe.
So he continued his journey south with a clear conscience.
By now, he had reached Qing Prefecture, at a remote little town called Peace Town.
He'd chosen this place for no particular reason beyond its remoteness.
Staying here would surely let him lie low in peace for a few years and focus on cultivation.
After successfully entering the town, Lin Hanzhou had planned to buy a quiet courtyard and live in seclusion while he cultivated.
But when he patted his nearly empty money pouch, he awkwardly realized he had barely any silver left.
"Alas, even a hero can be stumped by a single coin."
Lin Hanzhou sighed helplessly.
He couldn't exactly rob people, could he? He wasn't that desperate yet.
After thinking it over carefully, he decided to take a government job.
With his cultivation, it wouldn't be hard to disguise himself and get in.
He went to the government office in Peace Town.
The man in charge of recruiting patrol officers was an old constable who looked listless.
Though the man's face was aged and his temples had gone gray, his vitality was clearly stronger than an ordinary person's. He was obviously a martial artist.
When he saw Lin Hanzhou, a youngster who hadn't even grown his full crop of hair, applying for the job, he wanted to send him away on the spot.
In his eyes, someone that age probably hadn't even reached the threshold of the third-rate level, let alone qualified to apply as a patrol officer.
Lin Hanzhou wasn't the least bit offended by the man's cold attitude.
He'd always preferred to win people over with reason, using logic to enlighten them.
With a faint smile, Lin Hanzhou released a trace of the aura belonging to a second-rate martial artist.
The moment the old constable felt that aura, his expression changed!
A second-rate martial artist?!
Across the whole Great Gan, that cultivation level wasn't anything special. You could find them everywhere.
But in a little place like Peace Town, a second-rate martial artist counted as an expert.
The highest-ranked person in town, the mayor, was only at the peak of the first-rate level.
And a second-rate martial artist as young as Lin Hanzhou? You couldn't find another one even with a lantern.
"I've long heard of you, young brother. Now that I've met you, I see you're every bit as extraordinary as they say—a dragon among men. Please, come inside."
The old constable changed his tune and ushered Lin Hanzhou indoors with a broad smile.
His attitude had sunk about as low as it could go. He was practically ready to put Lin Hanzhou on a pedestal.
That was a textbook example of how someone could change their face faster than a page turned.
For him, bringing a second-rate martial artist like this into the patrol would be a major achievement.
Compared to that, a little loss of face meant nothing.
In response to the old constable's complete change of attitude, Lin Hanzhou gave a light nod and went inside.
Clearly, he was quite pleased by the old constable's change of heart. It proved his reasoning was perfectly reasonable.
And if reasoning didn't work, he'd already thought of another approach: he could use physical reasoning.
Anyone who'd experienced his physical reasoning never said another word. They were all utterly convinced by his knowledge of physics.
Zhou Fengyu, for instance, had clearly been convinced from head to toe. He hadn't managed a single word in rebuttal.
Before long, thanks to Lin Hanzhou's little display, he successfully joined the patrol and was given an important position.
Once he completed his six-month "probation," he'd officially become a proud patrol officer of the town.
The government even assigned him a house with a small courtyard on the eastern side of town.
And so, Lin Hanzhou settled into a leisurely life in this remote little town.
He spent most of his time at the house the government had given him, devoting himself to cultivation.
Every now and then, he'd go out on patrol, mostly for show.
Patrolling meant strolling around town at night, keeping watch and making sure no foolish wild beasts wandered in.
As for the job, Lin Hanzhou had to say he was very satisfied.
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