"Couldn't you have come up from the other side? You scared all my fish away."
Qin Ze lifted his hand and put away his fishing rod.
Brother Devour glanced at the empty bucket and said disdainfully, "With skills like yours, you wouldn't catch a fish even if you fished for another year."
Qin Ze curled his lip. "I've been had. Who was it that told me there were topmouth culters in this lake?"
Bang!
Brother Devour tossed the sack onto the ground, then shook himself like a dog. He circulated his qi and blood once, and the water on his clothes instantly evaporated.
Qin Ze watched with envy.
"You guys can break through to level one without tempering your bones. Must be nice."
Brother Devour suspected he was being sarcastic. Several extra arms and legs promptly sprouted from his body.
"You can do it too, if you turn into this."
Although they hadn't tempered their bones, the unpurified Soul Orbs had mutated their cells.
All the cells in Brother Devour's and Dharma King's bodies had been transformed by Soul Orbs, allowing them to handle more qi and blood as well.
They were following the exact same evolutionary path as exotic beasts.
Dharma King and Brother Devour looked human in their daily lives, but when fighting at full power, they had trouble controlling their cellular mutations, giving them a rather unusual appearance.
"Untie the sack."
"The weather's so nice. Let Brother Biao come out and get some sun too."
Qin Ze tossed two handfuls of bait into the lake, setting up a fresh fishing spot.
Brother Devour opened the sack. Inside, Brother Biao's face was ashen, his lips were pale, and he looked half-dead.
Smack! Smack!
"Wake up."
Brother Devour slapped him twice, once on each cheek.
"Cough, cough..."
Brother Biao spat out two mouthfuls of water and slowly opened his eyes.
He stared at the two masked men in front of him, his brain frozen for quite a while.
"You're not with the Fairness Society?"
With his back to Brother Biao, Qin Ze cast his line and said calmly, "The Fairness Society hired us to rescue you, but once it was done, they tried to kill the donkey after it had finished turning the millstone."
The plan to snatch him that Qin Ze had worked out with a bunch of cobblers was simple.
Dharma King would lead a few cannon fodder in a high-profile frontal assault.
Then, after stuffing the man into a sack and taking him out, he would fly close to the lake's surface and quickly toss the sack into the water.
A clone that had already attached himself to Dharma King and was ready would crawl into a new sack and climb onto Dharma King's shoulder.
Brother Devour, who had been lying in wait underwater, would retrieve the sack from the lake and bring it to Qin Ze.
For the sake of the remaining payment, Qin Ze had intended to hand him over.
But the Fairness Society had tried to kill the donkey after it had finished turning the millstone. If Teacher Yao hadn't appeared out of nowhere, Dharma King would have been done for.
Qin Ze was furious.
Brother Biao grinned. "That certainly sounds like how the Fairness Society operates."
"So what are you planning to do with me?"
Qin Ze said in a low voice, "First, I have two questions for you. What kind of organization is the Fairness Society?"
Brother Biao froze. "You don't know about the Fairness Society?"
Brother Devour stood ramrod straight beside Qin Ze like a bodyguard. "Just answer what you're asked."
Brother Biao shook his head.
A tiger on the plains was bullied by dogs.
In the past, he wouldn't even have spared a Level One Martial Artist like Brother Devour a glance. He could have slapped him to death with one hand.
But now his own life was in the other man's hands.
"The Fairness Society strives to create a fair and just world where everyone is equal and there are no classes."
"Their slogan is 'Fight for fairness,' and their mission is to wipe out martial-artist tyranny. Freedom belongs to the people."
Qin Ze sneered. "A bunch of empty, grandiose nonsense."
Brother Biao said, "You think the Fairness Society is chasing a fool's dream too?"
Qin Ze reeled in his line. The fish had gotten away again.
"Where in the world is there absolute fairness? Even if the martial-artist class disappeared, a scholar class might take its place."
"I don't believe everyone in the Fairness Society is equal, or that they all have the same amount of power."
Hearing this, Brother Biao looked thoughtful.
"The conflict between the martial-artist class and ordinary people is real, and it's only getting worse."
"Although the Fairness Society is indeed hypocritical in a sense, whatever else you say about them, they do want to eliminate that conflict."
Qin Ze shook his head. "Doing that is pointless."
"You can't eliminate the conflict just by wiping out all martial artists. That treats the symptoms, not the root cause."
"Like you said, suppose the Fairness Society ultimately succeeds. How do you know it won't become the new martial-artist class?"
Brother Biao was speechless.
His CPU was overheating a little.
His brain couldn't make sense of so many things.
He only felt that what Qin Ze said made a lot of sense.
"Does that mean we do nothing?"
"Let the martial artists ride on everyone's heads and shit and piss on them?"
Brother Biao had finally thought of a rebuttal to Qin Ze.
"I'm just saying the Fairness Society is headed in the wrong direction."
"If all the martial artists die, who's going to fight the exotic beasts?"
"Just those rotten fish and shrimp in the Fairness Society?"
"This world is rotten at its roots. What it needs is a new order."
Brother Biao was clearly a warrior.
No matter how much Qin Ze talked to him about scholarly matters, his little brain wouldn't be able to understand.
"Anyway, you're with the Fairness Society too, so I can't be bothered arguing with you."
Brother Biao was silent for a long moment.
"Although there's a lot of what you said that I don't understand, I think it makes a lot of sense."
"Besides, I stopped being a member of the Fairness Society a long time ago."
Brother Biao sat up cross-legged.
"Those people are too rigid. Whatever you do, you have to obey orders."
"Just kill them and be done with it. They drag their feet and fuss over everything. It's annoying as hell."
Qin Ze nodded.
He really was a warrior.
"I disobeyed orders, so they kicked me out."
"But I still think 'Fight for fairness' is a pretty good slogan."
Qin Ze said, "I don't want to know about your tangled history with the Fairness Society."
"Now tell me what's going on with the key."
Brother Biao recalled, "About two months ago, I found an organization in neighboring Cloud City that trafficked people and sold organs. I followed the vines to find the melon, and eventually discovered that a few martial artists were behind it."
"It was pouring rain that night. I slaughtered every last one of them."
"Then I got the key."
With that, Brother Biao took off his shirt.
There was a small tree tattoo on his chest.
The tattoo was only ten centimeters long, but it was lifelike, practically alive.
"This is the key."
Qin Ze examined the tattoo but didn't find anything unusual about it.
"A key to open what?"
Brother Biao scratched his head. "I don't know."
"At the time, it was a little sapling about half the size of my palm, planted in a flowerpot."
"I heard them say it was a key to opening some new world."
"I couldn't be bothered listening to their bullshit. I raised my blade, brought it down, and killed them all."
Qin Ze said, "..."
Great.
His stereotype of brainless warriors had just grown even stronger.
"I touched the sapling with my hand, and then it turned into this."
"Later, I was caught by law enforcement. During a live news broadcast, I shouted at the camera that I'd give the key to whoever rescued me."
"Sure enough, the Fairness Society came."
Brother Biao looked smug, with an expression that said, "Come on, praise me."
"Law enforcement didn't notice the key?" Qin Ze asked.
Brother Biao scoffed. "If I didn't say anything, who'd know the key was a tattoo? Besides, isn't it perfectly reasonable to have a tree tattooed on your body?"
Qin Ze didn't know where to begin.
What normal person would get a tree tattooed on them? It didn't look cool at all.
Brother Biao said solemnly, "I, Wang Biao, keep my word. Every spit is a nail."
"Since you're the one who saved me, the key is yours now."