"The Great River Gang is conducting business! Idlers, clear out!"
A harsh shout ripped through the night air.
Luo Chen started, then was overcome with joy.
*Yes, yes, yes!*
*I'm an idler!*
Shouldering his sack, he could not wait to slip toward the dark alley nearby.
He backed away step by step.
His eyes remained fixed on the four figures, dreading that one of them might flick an attack his way on a whim.
As he watched, he realized the four were not on the same side.
Clearly, three cultivators had loosely surrounded the man closest to him.
Between the cover of night and the man having his back turned, Luo Chen couldn't tell what expression he wore.
Yet once the man spoke, he could roughly guess the look on his face.
For the man cornered in the center was someone he knew well.
Wang Yuan!
"Li Zixiong, you know what I do. Are you sure you want to get in my way?"
"Get in your way? I'm here to kill you! You're nothing more than a piece of scum who disposes of dirty goods for the Mountain Breaker Gang, Wang Yuan. You didn't actually think anyone was afraid of you, did you?!"
"Kill me? With just you and these two fifth-layer Qi Refinement runts?"
"Enough talk, strike!"
With a roar, the fight erupted in an instant.
Meanwhile, a certain idler had already backed safely into the murky alleyway.
Luo Chen's heart thudded violently against his ribs, his face flushed—anyone seeing him might have thought he was the one in the middle of a battle.
In truth, having rarely witnessed an all-out brawl between cultivators, he was simply wound up with nervous excitement.
The Great River Gang and the Mountain Breaker Gang—he knew of both factions.
Dahe Market had been established by the Jade Cauldron Sword Sect, and its primary managers were experts from the sect.
Beyond the Sword Sect's own establishments, the various businesses within were held by the other five exalted sects of the Far East Six Domains.
Yet a massive market teeming with over ten thousand loose cultivators was bound to have an extraordinarily convoluted web of interests.
In particular, the adjacent Million Mountains of the Eastern Wilderness held riches so abundant they drove men mad with envy; scraping up mere scraps from its fringes was enough for loose cultivators to live in relative comfort.
Consequently, over many years of operation, Dahe Market had fostered three additional factions that could not be overlooked.
Setting aside the external Lianyun Merchant Alliance, there was the Mountain Breaker Gang, who lived off the mountains. Nearly all loose cultivators entering the peaks to hunt joined their ranks.
They huddled together for warmth, teamed up to hunt monsters, and when encountering isolated loose cultivators, they weren't above murder and pillage either.
And then there was the Great River Gang, which made its living off the Lancang River. The profits yielded by that vast waterway were, in some respects, not inferior to the Mountain Breaker Gang's domain at all.
The two gangs appeared to mind their own business and keep their distance.
Yet wherever people gathered, conflict followed.
Clashes and violent skirmishes were hardly uncommon between them.
And now, Luo Chen was witnessing one with his own eyes.
Of course, between the daylight friction and the exchange he had just overheard, Luo Chen could piece together part of the truth.
While rooted in the long-standing animosity between the two gangs, this fight likely had far more to do with the artifacts Wang Yuan had been peddling.
If he guessed correctly, the original owners of those bloodstained artifacts had belonged to the Great River Gang—very possibly Li Zixiong's kin or close friends.
Huddled in the alley, Luo Chen held his breath and focused his senses.
He felt a lingering curiosity to peek at the clash outside, but after a moment's thought, he decisively turned toward another path leading home.
A fight of that caliber was nothing he could get involved in.
Lurking around just to gawk at a spectacle was an easy way to lose one's life.
*It just feels a little wrong toward Brother Wang after he did me the favor of lending that book today.*
Luo Chen was no ingrate, but with his meager cultivation at the third layer of Qi Refinement, risking his neck would only get in the way.
Therefore, slipping away was the best policy!
A few minutes later, Luo Chen ducked into another alleyway.
If memory served, beyond this alley lay a small copse of woods; once through those trees, he would be very close to home.
Just as he prepared to quicken his pace, the whistling whip of wind sounded behind him.
Luo Chen whipped his head around. Catching sight of an approaching figure in the moonlight, he darted behind a corner of the alley to conceal himself.
It was one of the two fifth-layer Qi Refinement cultivators.
He seemed to be searching for something, riding the wind two or three meters off the ground while looking left and right.
The night breeze sweeping in from outside the alley carried a faint stench of blood.
*This man is wounded!*
*His breathing is heavy. He's badly hurt.*
*Judging by how he's searching, Brother Wang must have broken through their ambush.*
*As expected of someone who licks blood off a blade every day—taking on three opponents, heavily wounding an enemy, and still getting away cleanly.*
With a thousand thoughts tumbling through his mind, Luo Chen only prayed the man would move on quickly.
Yet things rarely went as one wished.
"You bastard dog. Told you to piss off, and yet you walk right into my hands."
Before the words finished falling—
*Whoosh!*
Beneath the moonlight, a dark shadow shot forward like lightning.
"If I can't kill Wang Yuan, you'll be the one venting this rage for me!"
The shadow came too swiftly and furiously; Luo Chen had no time to react.
In haste, he activated the protective barrier of his battered robe, barely managing to bring his low-grade dharma sword to bear.
*Clang!*
*Chii!*
The sword snapped, the light barrier shattered, and the dark shadow plunged into his body in an instant!
Chen Xiao dispelled his Wind Riding Technique and landed on the ground, stumbling slightly.
A gaping wound tore across his shoulder, bleeding so profusely that he could not even conceal the stench of blood.
Upon flying this far, he realized he was in no condition to keep pursuing Wang Yuan.
Conveniently, there was a third-layer Qi Refinement cultivator hiding nearby who, given Chen Xiao's severe injuries, might very well pose a threat to his safety.
Thus, the ever-ruthless Chen Xiao had struck decisively and viciously, allowing his target no time to respond.
And the result was just as he anticipated.
"Even Wang Yuan couldn't block my Soul Breaking Nail. For a mere third-layer Qi Refinement insect like you to die by it, you've gotten your money's worth."
*Pfft!*
Having spoken, he could not stop himself from coughing up a mouthful of bloody foam.
*This is no place to linger. Search him for spoils and leave immediately!*
Just as that thought flashed through his mind, a blaze of fire caught his eye.
"Not dead?"
*Bang!*
His reflexes were swift, instantly activating the barrier of his dharma robe.
Yet right as the blaze detonated, another massive fireball slammed into him.
It wasn't just a single fireball. Almost the moment it exploded, an unbroken barrage of fireballs followed close behind, driving him to near despair.
"How is this possible?!"
*Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!*
...
It was too fast, leaving no room to breathe.
With virtually no pause, twenty consecutive fireballs blasted out wildly like cannon shells.
Chen Xiao was at the fifth layer of Qi Refinement, and the robe he wore was merely Tier 1 mid-grade.
Its defensive strength was decent enough, but during Wang Yuan's breakout earlier, it had already been slashed open by a blade strike.
Now, caught off guard and bombarded by twenty fireballs in succession, it couldn't even withstand the third blast before shattering completely.
By the end, what the fireballs were pounding was no longer a person, but a charred lump of coal.
Luo Chen leaned his back against the wall, his face deathly pale, his entire body trembling.
*A man has no wish to harm the tiger, yet the tiger harbors intent to devour the man.*
He hadn't wanted any conflict, yet the man had tried to take his life!
Had the enemy not been nearly drained of magic power and in terrible shape,
had he not remained cautious enough to block the initial dark shadow with his sword and robe in the nick of time,
he would already be dead.
"You deserve to die! You truly deserve to die!"
Gritting his teeth, Luo Chen forced himself upright.
In his abdomen was a deep wound the width of a finger.
He could feel something like a nail lodged inside him, inflicting agonizing pain.
Enduring the torment, Luo Chen walked up to the charred heap.
The corpse was burned straight through, and the mid-grade robe was torn to shreds, stripped of any radiance it had held by day.
Nudging the remains with his broken sword, Luo Chen's eyes lit up.
"At least you left behind some inheritance."
A pitch-black storage bag lay hidden beneath the tattered robe.
He had just picked up the storage bag when, before he could celebrate, the crackling rush of displaced air sounded from the rooftops.
Looking up under the moonlight, he saw a burly man clutching a broadsword, swooping down like an eagle while holding two severed heads.
Chapter 16