The moment Ma the Fifth stepped out of the Jiqing Troupe, he was mugged.
He gathered some herbs freshly picked from the newland to treat his wounds. One had to admit that this young master of a wealthy house knew quite a lot, and Li Banfeng had picked up plenty of knowledge from him over this period.
Once his injuries had improved slightly, Ma the Fifth bowed deeply to Li Banfeng. "Brother Li, I don't know when I'll ever be able to repay what I owe you. After tonight, I'll be moving out. I can't let my family's troubles drag you down."
Li Banfeng raised his eyebrows. "We haven't made enough money yet. You're leaving already?"
Ma the Fifth smiled. "Once I shake off this mess of entanglements, I'll come back and do great things with you, Brother Li."
Li Banfeng nodded. "Fine, go if you must. Let's split the money we've earned these past days."
Ma the Fifth shook his head. "That's your money. I was working for you."
"Cut the nonsense. Making money in Lanyang Village was all thanks to your skills. You're getting every cent you're owed, not a penny less."
Ma the Fifth kept shaking his head. "Brother Li, there's no need to give me any of it—not a single cent. I won't be able to keep it anyway. It'll just be stolen sooner or later."
Li Banfeng frowned. "What is your family trying to do? Who's so ruthless that they won't even let you live?"
Ma the Fifth sighed. "It could be Fourth Brother, or maybe Eldest Sister or Second Sister. Even after living in the Ma family for more than twenty years, there are things I still can't see through."
Li Banfeng's brow furrowed tightly.
First he had provoked the Lu family, then he had gotten tangled up with the He family, and now he was on the verge of offending the Ma family too.
Well, an offense was an offense. When you were up to your neck in debt, another loan didn't matter. He needed to figure out what was actually going on first. Li Banfeng still had a feeling Ma the Fifth had things mixed up; this might not be the Ma family's doing after all.
"Tomorrow, I'm going with you to the Jiqing Troupe."
Ma the Fifth was taken aback. "What are you going to the Jiqing Troupe for?"
"To cultivate! It's such a great place—I should go and boost my abilities too."
***
In Puluo Province, places of pleasure came in many varieties. There was the Paramount, the Great World, and countless dance halls large and small.
Compared to such establishments, a troupe was an ancient existence—perhaps even older than Puluo Province itself.
At the Jiqing Troupe, you wouldn't find fashionable songstresses or dancing girls, only a dozen or so women who sang ballads to entertain guests. Yet this troupe had stood for generations, reputedly passing through dozens of troupe masters while keeping its signboard upright throughout.
Ma the Fifth went off to cultivate with a girl he knew well. Although he had crossed the first gate, his three daily sessions of basic cultivation could not be skipped. If he wanted to advance in tier, he needed five a day.
Li Banfeng also found himself a girl.
The Jiqing Troupe had no lavish Western-style houses or gardens, only a single row of one-story rooms. The girl led Li Banfeng into a chamber, first having him lie down on the bed so she could pound his back and knead his legs, before asking whether he wanted to listen to a song.
If not, they would get straight down to business. If he wanted songs, he had to offer a few extra tips.
Since he was already here, he naturally wanted to hear some music. Li Banfeng asked her to perform her best piece. Taking down her pipa, the girl began with "Full Moon and Blooming Flowers."
"Floating clouds disperse... the bright moon shines on all..."
Li Banfeng listened intently to the end, but found it mediocre. Compared to the wife, she wasn't even on the same level.
The girl set aside the pipa and prepared to attend to proper business. Li Banfeng said, "Sing 'Song of the Four Seasons.'"
The girl frowned. "More singing?"
Li Banfeng pulled out a hundred Huan Country notes and slapped them onto the table.
In the Jiqing Troupe, that was no small sum. Beaming with delight, the girl launched into "Song of the Four Seasons."
When she finished, Li Banfeng was even less satisfied.
"You're putting zero heart into this. Switch to 'Everlasting Longing.'"
The girl cleared her throat and forced herself through the first couple of lines: "A night of spring wind brings everlasting longing, oh that everlasting longing... deep from the veranda pouring my heart to you, that... that..."
"That what?!" Li Banfeng flared up. "You can't even remember the lyrics, so what business do you have singing?"
The girl stared blankly for a long moment. "Say, customer... did you really come here just to listen to songs?"
"What else would I come here for if not to listen? I'll sing a line, and you sing a line after me. Learn it properly!"
***
Two hours later, Ma the Fifth finished his cultivation and stepped out of his room.
An attendant came to pass the word, and Li Banfeng emerged as well.
The girl Ma the Fifth had chosen was called Xiaodie. Her face was brimming with tender affection as she saw him out. "Fifth Master, you have to come back tomorrow!"
"I will. I'll definitely come."
The girl Li Banfeng had chosen was called Xiaocui. Her face was utterly pale and green with exhaustion as she also saw him to the door. "Honored customer, if you come back tomorrow, please consider the other girls too."
Xiaodie noticed the state of her voice and asked, "Cui'er, why's your voice so hoarse? Just how wild did things get in there?"
Xiaocui didn't know how to explain. "Wild beyond belief... I didn't stop for a single second."
Ma the Fifth glanced back and asked Li Banfeng, "How was that girl, Xiaocui?"
Li Banfeng shook his head. "Not even close. Needs a lot more polishing."
Curious, Ma the Fifth asked, "When you say polishing, Brother Li, where exactly is she lacking?"
"Her throat."
Ma the Fifth became even more curious. "Her throat is the key?"
Li Banfeng was equally puzzled. "If the throat isn't the key, what is?"
Ma the Fifth nodded. "I see Brother Li has rather particular tastes."
They chatted as they walked. When they were about two hundred meters from their wooden cabin, Li Banfeng suddenly halted and ducked out of the line of sight of the cabin's windows.
He sensed danger.
Ma the Fifth blinked, then asked, "Is something wrong back home?"
Li Banfeng signaled for him to keep quiet. Pressing his earring to his ear, he listened intently to the sounds inside the house.
There were many houses nearby. Had he been using an ordinary sentient weapon, it might have picked up all sorts of ambient noise. But a Dharma treasure was different—she knew what Li Banfeng wanted to hear.
There was breathing.
There was conversation.
And there were footsteps.
One person was by the door.
Two were on the second floor.
And another was in the main hall.
Their cultivation tiers weren't very high, and their malice was blatant.
Of course, dealing with the current Ma the Fifth didn't require top experts anyway.
Those bastards hadn't stirred up trouble at the Jiqing Troupe, nor had they staged an ambush along the road. Instead, they had come straight to the cabin to stake it out.
They had scouted the location accurately. How had they found out where Ma the Fifth lived?
Li Banfeng said, "Brother Ma, don't go inside yet. I'll go in and take care of a few things."
Ma the Fifth grabbed him to stop him. "Did people from my family come? Brother Li, I can't let this drag you down. I'll just go face them myself."
With that, Ma the Fifth was about to charge toward the house, but Li Banfeng pulled out a pair of overshoes. "Do you have these?"
The soles of the overshoes were fitted with iron plates.
"Without these, you can't step foot inside."
Ma the Fifth immediately understood what he meant: Li Banfeng intended to use bonding mud.
Slipping on the overshoes, Li Banfeng whispered to him, "Find somewhere to hide first."
This was what Li Banfeng required of Ma the Fifth. Ma had to protect himself and not become a burden. If Ma the Fifth hid somewhere safe and still got discovered, what then? Then there was nothing to be done. To put it bluntly, even if Ma the Fifth had to die, he needed to die far away so he wouldn't distract Li Banfeng.
Ma the Fifth slipped straight into the noodle shop. That was the smart move. A deserted alley wasn't necessarily safe, but in a crowded place, the enemy wouldn't dare strike openly.
Li Banfeng didn't rush toward the house. He first entered the Portable Abode, then tossed the key near the cabin.
Up on the second floor of the cabin, the two men keeping watch were chatting. One of them, dressed in a blue cloth jacket, said, "Take it easy on him later. Don't go killing him. You can never tell where you stand with these wealthy families."
The man in the teal cloth vest replied, "Whether we kill him or not depends on whether the brat knows what's good for him. We searched this room up and down and didn't find a single valuable thing. If he doesn't hand over his treasures, how are we supposed to report back?"
"Reporting back is the boss's problem. Why are we worrying about that? You'd better watch out for his revenge. He's still the Fifth Young Master, after all."
"Revenge my ass! When I beat him up last time, I laid it on thick, and he didn't even dare look me in the eye. Let me tell you, he's basically a dog right now. If you don't enjoy kicking him around while you can, when are you going to..."
*Clink—*
A faint noise came from outside.
The teal vest poked his head out the window to look. "Did you hear a clinking sound just now?"
"What clink?"
"Right outside the window. I heard it plain as day..."
"Who'd be outside the window? Pull your head back in and stay clear of the sill. Do you know how an ambush works? What are you sticking your neck out for?"
Li Banfeng silently stepped out of the Portable Abode. Leveraging the strengths of a journey cultivator, he scaled the wall and climbed onto the roof.
This time, the teal vest definitely caught a noise. Once again, he stuck his head out the window.
The blue jacket grew irritated. "What is your problem? I told you to stop poking your head out! Don't let yourself get spotted!"
"There really is movement up there, I swear, right above..." The teal vest abruptly fell silent.
He had leaned out of the window, face turned up toward the sky with his mouth agape. The angle was simply too perfect.
Hanging upside down from the roof, Li Banfeng drove his scythe straight into the man's mouth. Following the roof of the palate, the blade hooked deep into his brain.
The blue jacket was struck with horror. Just as he went to draw his blade, the Tang dao cleared its scabbard a step faster, severing half his neck in a single stroke.
The blue jacket collapsed to the floor, unable to make a sound. With his dying strength, he pounded the floorboards—three long beats and two short. It was a signal to the two men downstairs.
Li Banfeng vaulted into the room, opened the Portable Abode, and threw both the blue jacket and teal vest inside. Then he waited quietly by the bedroom doorway.
In truth, he could have handled things far more cleanly.
He could have prevented the blue jacket from making any noise at all.
Yet he had deliberately allowed the man to make a sound, purely so the two downstairs would hear it.
Footsteps sounded from the stairs. Li Banfeng opened an iron tin, poured some bonding mud near the doorway, then leaped out the window and climbed back onto the roof.
This was his first time using bonding mud in actual combat, and he wasn't entirely confident about its area of effect or reliability.
Nearly a minute later, the bedroom door was pushed open. Two men stood at the threshold, warily looking inside.
The window was open. There were bloodstains on the windowsill and bloodstains on the floor, yet their two companions were nowhere to be seen. Both men grew extremely tense.
The four of them had come together with the simple goal of beating Ma the Fifth to a pulp and robbing him of his money. Ma the Fifth was merely a first-tier Joy Cultivator—taking him down was child's play for them. None of them had ever expected this job to turn lethal!
After observing for a while, they saw not a single soul in the room.
Where was the person hiding?
Under the bed?
The two cautiously stepped into the room, each gripping a dagger, covering one another.
One step. Two steps. On the third step, the sound of their footfalls cut off abruptly.
They were stuck fast.
Both men were terrified. The one in the purple cloth shirt cried out, "Boss, what's going on?"
The other man, dressed in a dark gray Zhongshan suit, snapped, "Don't move! It's bonding mud!"
This man in the Zhongshan suit was the boss. Clearly, among the four, he had seen the most and possessed the greatest experience.
Li Banfeng needed to eliminate him first.
He pulled out the Python revolver Yu Nan had given him, thumbed off the safety, leaned down from the roof, aimed at the man in gray, and fired six shots in rapid succession.
Li Banfeng's luck was pretty good. Three of the six shots hit their mark, and the man in the purple shirt dropped dead on the spot.
The Tang dao praised, "Fine shooting!"
Li Banfeng was rather surprised himself. He had aimed at the man in gray, yet all three hits had landed on the purple-shirted man instead.
The gray-suited man glared at Li Banfeng, seemingly preparing to execute an art. Li Banfeng hoisted himself up and retreated back onto the roof.
The man in gray was left speechless. Li Banfeng wouldn't engage him at all.
What was he supposed to do? Refuse to fight Li Banfeng in return?
That certainly wasn't an option.
Li Banfeng was currently reloading on the roof. What would happen when he swung back down to shoot again?
The gray-suited man was only at the second tier of cultivation. Standing rooted to the spot and dodging bullets was simply beyond his ability.
Before long, Li Banfeng leaned down again, preparing to fire. The man in gray yelled desperately, "Friend, spare my life! We were sent by Eldest Miss Ma to look for the Fifth Young Master! Ask me anything and I'll tell you! Just leave me alive!"
Li Banfeng asked, "Why is Eldest Miss Ma tormenting Ma the Fifth like this?"
The gray-suited man said, "We don't know the reason! We just take the money and do the job!"
Hearing this, Li Banfeng gave a satisfied nod. "If you don't know anything, what's the use of keeping you alive?"
With that, he was about to pull the trigger again, but the gray-suited man shouted in panic, "Wait! There's one more thing I haven't mentioned! Before we came, Eldest Miss Ma instructed us to give the Fifth Young Master a beating, take his money, and tell him that the old grudge is settled!"
Li Banfeng frowned. "What old grudge is settled?"
The gray-suited man said, "Friend, put the gun down first! We can talk this over! Young Master Ma definitely has a feud with the Eldest Miss. I've heard some rumors, but I don't know what's true and what's false. How about you bring Young Master Ma here, and we can verify it to his face?"
Li Banfeng nodded. "That makes sense."
He hopped through the window into the room, spread a piece of cloth on the floor, and said to the gray-suited man, "Take off your shoes. Step onto this cloth and walk forward. I'll take you to see Young Master Ma."
"Thank you, warrior! Thank you!" Overwhelmed with gratitude, the gray-suited man hurriedly kicked off his shoes and carefully stepped onto the cloth.
Inwardly, he was ecstatic. He had managed to salvage his life after all.
What he had to do next was wait until Li Banfeng wasn't paying attention, find an opening, and kill this lunatic.
"Warrior, are we going to find the Fifth Young Master right now?"
"Yes, right now." Li Banfeng turned his back, twisted the key, and opened the Portable Abode.
The gray-suited man was overjoyed.
He had never expected Li Banfeng to be so gullible—he actually dared to turn his back on him.
Raising his dagger, he lunged straight for the center of Li Banfeng's back.
Li Banfeng dodged aside in a flash and followed through with a kick, sending the gray-suited man flying headlong into the Portable Abode.
You had to hand it to the boss—he certainly did things conscientiously.
Aside from a pair of leather shoes, he hadn't left behind a single trace, sparing Li Banfeng the trouble of cleaning up.
Chapter 105