Your Turn!

"If you keep talking nonsense, believe it or not, I'll make you die in a 'mining accident,' just like Li Gang?"

Wang Ji threatened angrily.

"N-No, please don't!"

Qin Yao's expression tightened as he put on the look of someone scared out of his wits.

" Ding! Skill 'Acting' Proficiency +1 "

"I'll lead the way right now, right now. But you have to promise me that you'll let me leave afterward."

The youth gathered his courage and fought for himself.

"Of course."

Only then did Wang Ji release Qin Yao with satisfaction. He even put on airs and helped straighten his collar. "The more Doghead Gold you dig up for this manager, the more I, Wang Ji, will appreciate you!

"When you leave, I might even give you a share!"

"R-Really?!"

Qin Yao's eyes lit up, his face flushing red with excitement. "Good, good, good. Let's go this way."

" Ding! Skill 'Acting' Proficiency +1 "

Wang Ji took in Qin Yao's reaction and sneered inwardly. "Heh, you really think you'll get a share of the benefits from me? Dream on!

"Once I've found out every place that produces Doghead Gold, I'll kill this brat and silence him!"

Having decided this, he casually glanced at Liu Kuan, Baleful Intent churning in his eyes. "The fewer people who know this secret, the better.

"Even this bargain brother-in-law of mine will be killed without exception..."

He picked up the two iron pickaxes Li Gang had left behind and headed deeper into the mine.

At one point, Qin Yao suddenly stopped and looked around.

In truth, he had already scouted this place three days ago.

Yet now, holding a torch, he put on a show of feeling here and tapping there.

Wang Ji, who had secretly been watching his every move, saw it all and felt that this kid was genuinely quite professional.

"Are scholars all this uncanny? After only half a month in the mines, he's actually managed to figure out such a path to strike gold?

"And this is only a provincial examination top scorer, a 'Master Jieyuan,' who was demoted here.

"If it were an imperial examination top scorer, a 'Master Zhuangyuan,' wouldn't that be even more heaven-defying?!

"No wonder the Grand Empress Dowager granted amnesty throughout the realm for her hundredth birthday, specifically pardoning 'scholars.'

"I suppose that, aside from the fact that these 'frail scholars' posed no threat of force even if pardoned, making them easy to control...

"It was also because these people had sharp minds and could be put to use, wasn't it?"

At one point, Qin Yao's words pulled Wang Ji back from his wild thoughts. "It's here."

"Very good."

Wang Ji picked up an iron pickaxe, then instructed Liu Kuan, "Kuanzi, go keep watch at the bend thirty paces away."

"Yes!"

Liu Kuan accepted the order and left.

Over the past year or so, he had done plenty of standing watch for Wang Ji.

Moreover, he had willingly taken on Wang Ji's sister, whose bad reputation was known far and wide, and had long considered himself Wang Ji's trusted confidant.

If he learned that, in order to keep this unexpected windfall secret, Wang Ji had developed murderous intentions not only toward Qin Yao but even toward Liu Kuan, his own brother-in-law, what would he think?

After Liu Kuan left, Wang Ji called Qin Yao over again. "Other than this place, are there any more?"

"Yes, two more."

Qin Yao answered with an apparently honest and guileless look.

"I see..."

Wang Ji nodded, thinking to himself, "Looks like I can't finish this kid off just yet. Better give him a sweet date first."

So he stuck the torch into a wall peg and beckoned Qin Yao over. "Give me that arm."

"Huh? This..."

Qin Yao clutched his dislocated arm and looked at him nervously.

"What the hell are you afraid of?"

Wang Ji frowned and said bluntly, "Seeing that you've performed pretty well, I'm resetting your dislocated arm for you!"

"I see. Then I'll have to trouble Manager Wang."

Qin Yao put on an enlightened expression. Delighted yet somewhat uneasy, he held out his arm.

" Ding! Skill 'Acting' Proficiency +2 "

Wang Ji gripped Qin Yao's forearm with his left hand, felt for the shoulder joint with his right, found the proper angle, and gave it a light shove.

With a crack, it was set back in place.

"Try moving it?"

"Oh, okay."

Qin Yao first moved it slightly. Only after finding that it truly no longer hurt did he make a few larger movements, his face immediately lighting up with joy. "It's really healed! That's incredible!"

Wang Ji put on an authoritative air. "Mm. Serve me properly, and I'll treat you as one of my own. From now on, I naturally won't treat you poorly."

"Thank you, Steward Wang, thank you, Steward Wang. I definitely—"

"Alright, enough nonsense. Start digging!"

As he spoke, Wang Ji tossed one of the iron picks to him.

"Okay."

Before long, the depths of the mine tunnel rang with clanging blows.

For a time, shattered stones flew everywhere, casting wave after wave of flickering shadows in the swaying firelight.

"Hm? Why haven't we dug it out yet..."

After digging for only a short while, Wang Ji was already frowning impatiently.

Just then—clang!

Rumble, rumble, rumble!

Qin Yao's iron pick smashed into the rock wall, and a huge hole immediately collapsed inward.

The youth did not even have time to cry out before he was struck and buried beneath the fallen chunks of rock!

"Damn!"

After freezing for a moment, Wang Ji's face changed drastically.

He wanted Qin Yao dead, but not now!

There were still two hidden gold locations Qin Yao had yet to tell him about!

Now that the overseer of T-Shaped Pit No. 3 Tunnel was dead, Wang Ji, as the steward of Ding Mine Pit, could at most suppress the report for two hours.

If he delayed any longer, it would easily arouse the suspicion of the mining district's leaders!

Then it would not be so easy to embezzle the Doghead Gold without anyone knowing...

So he had to obtain the exact locations, quickly grab enough gold, find a place to hide it, and only then report the mining accident.

"Fuck, you'd better not die just like this! There's still a mountain of gold waiting to be had!"

Using both hands, Wang Ji hurriedly shoved aside the rocks pinning Qin Yao down.

When part of Qin Yao's body was exposed, Wang Ji strode forward and bent down, reaching out to help him up.

Qin Yao suddenly moved—he fiercely kicked out, driving his leg upward with the force of his waist and hips, unleashing the "Tiger Whirl" from the Tiger-Fighting Fist!

The youth turned his leg into a whip, sweeping it like a tiger's tail cleaving across the air as he viciously lashed at the back of Wang Ji's neck.

It sounded complicated, but it all happened in the blink of an eye.

Full of anxious impatience, Wang Ji was just about to pull someone from the pile of rubble.

By the time he heard the wind rise beside his ear, Qin Yao's toe had already struck his cervical vertebra squarely like a spike!

Bang!

Crack!

Just like Li Gang before him, Wang Ji's cervical vertebra was shattered by a single blow.

"So... it was you?!"

Wang Ji's eyes widened.

He desperately wanted to call for help, but with his neck broken, no matter how hard he tried, he could not make more than the faintest sound.

"That's right. It was me."

Qin Yao did not deny it. "Li Gang's debt has been paid in full!

"Now it's your turn.

"Do you still remember what you did when my grandfather gave you even the money he had saved for his coffin?"

The youth's gaze was icy, his bearing sharp as a blade.

Where was even a trace of that meek, groveling little mine slave?

"But... how is this possible?"

Wang Ji was consumed by hatred and unwillingness, yet he could only struggle out two sentences in an extremely weak voice. "I investigated you. You clearly weren't a martial artist..."

"You can take that question to the eighteenth level of hell and ask King Yama!"