When he heard what the other person said.
Hu Long's gaze flickered.
The reason he knew this person's real name
wasn't because he had used some computer technology to look it up.
He had previously found that the name listed in the other person's personal records was Liu.
And the reason he knew this so clearly
was the screen of light floating before his eyes.
[Target: Liu Lingge] [Skill One: Green Bag Fragment: Soul Guiding Chapter (Proficient) Size: 1 MB (Status: Available for Download)] ... [Skill Two: Sutra Chanting and Oral Transmission (Proficient)] [Size: 2 MB (Status: Not Available for Download)] [Description: Proficient in Buddhist and Taoist terminology, folk prophecies, and simple moral precepts, including chants, verses, and fragments of scripture. Can be used to heal the sick, pray for blessings, and avert misfortune in different situations.] ...
The instant he had touched the two of them just now,
their names and skills had appeared before his eyes.
The other person had also mastered the Green Bag Fragment skill, and had even reached a higher level in it than Xue Wu.
As for Xue Hai, who was standing to the side, he didn't have this skill. He had only an ordinary skill at the Proficient level,
called Observing Words and Expressions.
So Hu Long hadn't bothered with him. He had knocked him unconscious and focused all his attention on Liu Lingge.
The other person had two skills. The second wasn't particularly useful.
It was merely a standard skill for spirit mediums, a trick used to con people.
As for the first one—
Even a Proficient-level skill only takes one megabyte to download?
Hu Long was surprised.
As far as he could tell, even a purely knowledge-based skill at the Proficient level required at least two megabytes.
The amount shown here was clearly abnormally low.
But he soon understood.
Perhaps it was because he had downloaded Xue Wu's Beginner-level skill.
The two were originally the same skill.
It was like learning: one person had no foundation, while another already had one. All else being equal,
the latter would obviously find it easier to learn.
The same principle probably applied to downloading skills.
With that thought, Hu Long's mind stirred.
He downloaded it immediately.
In an instant, his mind gained even more knowledge about the Green Bag Fragment, and some of its more obscure contents became clearer.
Unfortunately, this Proficient-level skill contained nothing about the problem he had.
But he wasn't disappointed.
He gathered his thoughts and looked at Liu, whose expression had gone ashen.
In a way, this skill prompt could also help him verify someone's identity.
Hu Long had originally planned to use it to bluff the other person
before asking his next questions.
He hadn't expected things to turn out this way.
As for what the other person had said, she must have mistaken him for someone from another faction.
Seeing that she had misunderstood him,
Hu Long's eyes shifted.
He didn't explain or answer her question directly. Instead, he said something ambiguous.
"Good. You know what's going on. Tell me everything honestly, and perhaps I'll spare your life..."
"Spare me?"
Liu seemed to come to her senses.
"I stole the Green Bag Fragment from the Pure Fire Sect. You people are still going to let me go?"
She clearly didn't believe him.
"You have no choice."
Hu Long said coolly.
Suddenly, Liu stared fixedly at Hu Long, a smile appearing on her face.
"You're not from the Pure Fire Sect. You're lying to me! You don't even have a Sacred Mark."
She knew exactly what kind of lunatics the Pure Fire Sect members were. They had plenty of ways to force her to talk; there was no way they'd waste so much time talking to her.
The man before her had let too much slip.
Hu Long showed no particular reaction.
With her experience and the uneven distribution of information between them, it was only natural that she'd noticed a flaw.
But that didn't matter.
"So what? I can still kill you. You can scream and shout all you want, but afterward, I'll kill you."
"Now tell me where the Blue Bag Residual Scripture came from, and what the Pure Fire Sect is!"
Hu Long spoke calmly, as if stating a simple fact.
As he spoke, he casually mentioned some of the information recorded in the Green Bag Fragment.
That left Liu somewhat speechless.
For a moment, she couldn't be sure who he was.
The Green Bag Fragment was something that belonged to the Pure Fire Sect.
Only its core followers could know what it contained.
Yet the man before her clearly didn't even know what the Pure Fire Sect was. How could he know what was written in the Green Bag Fragment?
But she had no choice. One option meant certain death, while the other offered a chance to survive.
"Fine. I can tell you, but I hope you'll keep your promise and let us go."
After a moment's silence, Liu spoke hoarsely.
"The Pure Fire Sect dates back two hundred years..."
Soon,
as she told her story,
Hu Long pieced together the basic outline.
The name Pure Fire Sect sounded fairly ordinary.
But in reality, groups with names like that were rarely anything good.
And that was indeed the case.
Its origins could be traced back more than two hundred years.
At the time, the dynasty was nearing its end. The land was in turmoil, the people were starving and freezing, and war raged without end.
Rebel armies sprang up everywhere, and heretical sects proliferated. They all hoped to take advantage of the chaos to overthrow the rotten old dynasty.
The Pure Fire Sect was one of the strongest among them.
Its doctrine claimed that everyone lived in a filthy, wicked world and that both body and mind were tainted. Only by using "pure fire" to burn away all the world's sins could one attain purity.
The sect had a few strange methods, and joining it meant having enough to eat. It quickly grew.
But times changed.
The land gradually grew more stable, and the Yu State was established.
The state launched a forceful campaign against heretical sects that had brought chaos to the people, as well as mountain bandits.
After more than a hundred years of growth, the Pure Fire Sect had a huge number of followers, making it one of the main targets of the crackdown.
The Yu State showed no mercy to those who resisted, and countless followers died under its firepower.
The woman before him, Liu Lingge,
was one of the Pure Fire Sect's followers.
She had infiltrated the sect's inner sanctum during the chaos, stolen part of the Green Bag Fragment, and escaped.
However, the Pure Fire Sect hadn't been completely destroyed. Some of its followers had escaped by scattering and going underground.
To avoid revenge from the sect's remaining followers,
Liu Lingge had ultimately been forced to conceal her identity and live in Wu Mountain. She changed her name to Liu, married Xue Hai, and had a child with him.
Then,
Liu opened a hidden compartment beneath the bed, built from bricks and stones.
Inside lay a rolled-up yellow sheepskin scroll.
"This is the Green Bag Fragment!"
Liu said.
Hu Long reached out with his gloved hand and picked it up.
The unrolled scroll was covered in tiny writing, written in the language of the previous dynasty. It was quite obscure to read, and a few simple diagrams resembling human bodies were interspersed throughout.
Even an ordinary person who obtained it would probably struggle to understand it.
But Hu Long had already downloaded the skill, so reading it posed no real obstacle. Some passages were still difficult to make sense of, but he could understand most of them.
After comparing it with what he knew, he confirmed that this was indeed the Green Bag Fragment, though its contents were indeed quite incomplete.
But that wasn't what concerned him. Something else did.
Thinking of it, he looked toward one corner of the scroll.
[Curse: Blood Soul Guide] [Materials: Take an unmarried young woman who died with her resentment unresolved for three years, and burn her bones to ash. Then take ten newborn infants who have yet to cry, and draw three drops of blood from the tip of each heart. Collect the blood in a bronze vessel. To perform this spell, one must choose the night of a full moon. Take a lock of hair from the enemy's temple, and grind it to dust beneath the moon with a stone pestle. Put it into the vessel with the bone ash and blood dew, and stir with a willow branch. This creates the "Blood Soul Guide." The victim's spirit will gradually be eroded, and a vengeful ghost will haunt them. They will surely die within five years, and no medicine or treatment will help.] [Note: This spell is sinister and shortens the caster's life.]
This was the only complete curse recorded in the scroll.
Judging by its features, it wasn't hard to guess that Hu Long had been afflicted with this spell.
"...I've handed over the Green Bag Fragment. I hope you'll keep your promise."
As she watched Hu Long pick up the scroll, a hint of reluctance flashed in Liu's eyes.
But she still spoke.
Hu Long glanced at her.
He put the scroll away in his backpack.
"Of course. But I have one last question: how can the Blood Soul Curse be broken?"
Liu froze.
She looked him up and down.
But since he was wearing makeup and had altered his appearance,
she couldn't tell.
She shook her head.
"There's no cure for this spell. Anyone afflicted with it is doomed to die."