You Xuehan, codename Tangyuan, was a Polymath—what Puluo Province referred to as a Literary Cultivator.
Under normal circumstances, Tangyuan would never participate in handling primitive anomalies of this sort. Such beasts could not understand human speech and had no grasp of human culture, rendering the vast majority of a Polymath's techniques utterly useless against them.
Yet this was an emergency, and aside from Zhong'er and Lightbulb, she was the fastest to arrive.
Confronting this silkworm, there were two most suitable techniques.
The first was text assault, known in Puluo Province as A Word Worth a Thousand Gold.
The "silkworm" was illiterate, but that did not diminish the technique's potency. It drew upon the power of written characters and the cultivator's own might to inflict catastrophic damage upon an adversary.
For example, inscribing the character "Shatter" onto the silkworm's body could, if backed by sufficient cultivation, cause the creature to fracture to pieces on the spot.
This was a Literary Cultivator's optimal choice against primitive anomalies. So why had Tangyuan not used it?
A Word Worth a Thousand Gold was a tier six technique, whereas Tangyuan possessed only tier four cultivation.
Even that tier four cultivation had been attained through drugs and training using technological methods from the Outer States; Tangyuan's actual combat experience was exceedingly limited.
The second option was text materialization, known in Puluo Province as Trace the Ink and Stride the Lines.
This was a tier four Literary Cultivator technique, well within Tangyuan's capacity to wield.
It likewise harnessed the power of words and the cultivator, giving physical form to written characters to do battle against the enemy.
Yet under the current circumstances, it was hardly a wise choice.
The materialized characters coalesced into hundreds of warriors that unleashed indiscriminate attacks upon everyone present.
The silkworm possessed thick skin and heavy flesh, allowing it to withstand the onslaught, but Lightbulb had no such durability. When the character "Blade" transformed into a flying short sword and darted toward him, Lightbulb's slick body allowed him to maneuver and stall for a moment.
Yet when the character "Fire" turned into a hurtling fireball, Lightbulb panicked. He instantly abandoned all thoughts of rescuing Qin Minghui and fled straight beyond the technique's boundary.
He had fled, but what was Qin Minghui to do?
And Qin Minghui was not even the worst off. The most pitiful were the two children, who lacked even the most rudimentary instinct for protective defense.
Tangyuan navigated between the lines and slipped free from the swarm of characters.
She had anticipated that others might get caught in the crossfire and thus held back her strength, yet now she was trapped in a dilemma.
Should she save Qin Minghui first, or the two children?
As she hesitated, Qin Minghui took advantage of the silkworm parrying the character strikes to break loose. He lunged toward the two children, shielding them beneath his own body.
Yet he had still not escaped the technique's area of effect.
Several lines of text encircled Qin Minghui and began battering him, leaving him battered and bruised all over.
Seeing this, Tangyuan hastily canceled the technique.
She had not anticipated that this, too, was a blunder.
Because she had held back earlier, the silkworm was not critically wounded. Now that the technique was dispelled, the furious creature lunged at Qin Minghui once more.
In that split second, Tangyuan could not devise any countermeasure.
At the critical juncture, Big Head burst into the workshop and knocked the silkworm flat with a single punch.
As the silkworm squirmed and writhed on the floor, struggling to rise, Big Head stepped in with a kick that snapped off its fangs.
Taking advantage of the creature's helplessness, Big Head detached a syringe from his waist, plunged it through its skin, and injected the serum.
After a few moments of thrashing, the silkworm lay motionless on the floor.
Tangyuan promptly summoned an ambulance and had Qin Minghui and the two children rushed to the hospital.
***
Qin Minghui had sustained substantial injuries, but fortunately none were life-threatening. Once his wounds were dressed and he was hooked up to a pain pump, he soon fell asleep.
The next morning, Big Head and Lightbulb returned to the bureau to draft their reports, while Tangyuan stayed behind at the hospital to look after Qin Minghui.
Chen Changrui arrived at the hospital, letting out a long breath of relief upon learning that Qin Minghui's condition was stable.
In accordance with bureau benefits, Qin Minghui was housed in a private room. Taking advantage of the empty room, Chen Changrui exchanged a few words with Tangyuan.
"Tangyuan, Zhong'er and Lightbulb are rookies, so I won't get on their cases. How many years have you been with the bureau?"
Tangyuan lowered her head. "Ten years."
"If memory serves, you became a dark energy user when you were eight."
Tangyuan nodded.
"I recall your father specifically arranged a master here at the bureau to instruct you in Polymath training methods. Your talent is genuinely remarkable too, reaching tier four at your age."
Tangyuan bit her lip in silence.
Chen Changrui looked toward Qin Minghui. "Zhong'er and Lightbulb are newcomers, so I won't blame them. But you've been at the bureau for ten years and hold tier four strength. How did this mission turn out like this?"
Tangyuan's face flushed crimson.
Chen Changrui sighed. "This isn't on you. It's on me. I haven't put you all through enough tempering.
"You're not the only one in our squad in this state. During the last mission, Glasses and Sugar Lump made an absolute mess of things too.
"Whenever we run into a mission that's slightly challenging, the ones who can actually fight hard battles are always Big Head and the few other veterans. If the day comes when those veterans can fight no longer, I honestly don't know what our Security Team will be good for."
As they spoke, Qin Minghui woke up.
"I'll go fetch some hot water." Utterly mortified, Tangyuan could bear sitting there no longer and made an excuse to slip out of the ward.
Chen Changrui looked at Qin Minghui. "Xiao Qin, well done. You didn't disgrace me. I'll put you in for a commendation at the bureau tomorrow."
Qin Minghui shook his head. "Captain, I heard what you just said. We didn't handle this mission well."
Chen Changrui smiled. "You did very well."
"Bad is bad, regardless of who it is. Looking back over the entire sequence of events, we made plenty of mistakes."
"Don't dwell on that. You're a newcomer. To manage this much the very first time you faced an anomaly is already commendable."
"What was that anomaly called?"
"Its name..." Chen Changrui pondered for a second. "By our conventions, it would be classified as a primitive lepidopteran mutant organism."
"What is it called in Puluo Province?"
"You know about Puluo Province too?"
"I heard you mention it before. You said that's where true capability is honed."
Chen Changrui smiled faintly. "In Puluo Province, that anomaly is simply called a silkworm."
"From the sound of the name, it doesn't seem very highly regarded."
"Highly regarded? How should I put it to you?" Chen Changrui said with a wry smile. "In Puluo Province, there is a special sort of territory known as the newland. Out there, any random hunter you call upon can easily fell a silkworm. It's just that there's nothing of value on its carcass, so hunters don't even bother with them."
Qin Minghui listened with rapt attention. "In that case, isn't Puluo Province exceedingly powerful?"
Chen Changrui shook his head. "The people of Puluo Province are formidable, but Puluo Province itself is not powerful. Once you have been there, you will understand."
***
Ma the Fifth stared into Ah Qin's eyes for a long time.
Yesterday, after extracting the emotion root from Huo Ling's eye, Huo Ling had swiftly returned to normal.
Yet this emotion root in Ah Qin's eye refused to come out no matter what, behaving like a soft barb that offered no purchase when he tried to apply force.
Fortunately, Ah Qin had regained some clarity. When Ma the Fifth told her to stop watching the film, Ah Qin obeyed him obediently, spending the night quietly at the newspaper office.
By the next morning, when he checked again, the emotion root in Ah Qin's eye had vanished.
When asked again about the film Bloodblade Detective, Ah Qin felt nothing unusual about it.
"It was just something novel to watch. As for being remarkably good, not really."
Huo Ling agreed. "When I watch a film, I just look for excitement and commotion. That show wasn't particularly lively, though it preached plenty of grand principles."
Ma the Fifth found it all the stranger.
Could he truly have been overthinking things?
Had the two women genuinely just been seeking novelty?
He had Bai Qiusheng arrange a travel permit and purchase a train ticket, intending to make a trip to Kudaikan.
Huo Ling pouted in displeasure. "Fifth Brother, what are you going there for? Aren't the two of us enough for you?"
Ah Qin urged him from the side as well. "You've only just advanced. You must maintain some moderation."
Ma the Fifth looked at the bloodstains on the handkerchief—left behind by Huo Ling.
Was this truly an emotion root?
Perhaps only she could verify it.
***
At the Yaowanggou Station, Li Banfeng stepped off the train and inquired around the station square for the rickshaw puller with the fire wheels.
It wasn't often he made the trip here. If he could cross paths with him, it would be best if he could ask about the tier seven technique.
A veteran puller who knew the rickshaw puller with the fire wheels well said, "That brother went home yesterday afternoon. Said he had to dodge a disaster, and even told me to head home and lay low too.
"How could I lay low? If I miss a single day of work, life falls apart. My whole family is waiting on me to put food on the table."
Dodging a disaster?
That puller was an eminent figure among journey cultivators, and his knack for pursuing fortune and averting disaster was not to be underestimated. If he claimed he was dodging a disaster, something was definitely brewing.
What could it be?
Li Banfeng heightened his guard. Foregoing a rickshaw, he walked directly toward Ligou.
Ligou felt remarkably welcoming and familiar. This had been Li Banfeng's first stop in Puluo Province, particularly Paifang Street, where every storefront was thoroughly familiar to him—including the Xianle Dance Hall he had blown up.
The dance hall had been rebuilt, its front entrance appearing much as it had before. He had heard it was still a business under the Jiangxiang Gang.
Blow it up once more?
Another day, perhaps.
First, go find Shopkeeper Feng.
Li Banfeng arrived at Feng's Grocery Store, only to find its main doors shut fast.
Where had he run off to make merry? Was Chunsheng absent too?
The neighboring Yu Family Cloth Shop was likewise closed.
What was going on?
Just as Li Banfeng was about to find someone to ask, he sensed someone approaching from behind.
Whirling around, he saw a tall, slender silhouette calling out to him, "Back and didn't even drop a word?"
Running into him on the street filled Qiu Zhiheng with pleasant surprise.
Perhaps accustomed to their mutual understanding, Li Banfeng said little, and Qiu Zhiheng asked nothing. He led Li Banfeng straight toward Qiu's Medicine Shop. "Come, let's head home for a meal."
Upon reaching the medicine shop, introduced by Qiu Zhiheng, his wife learned that this guest was Li the Seventh.
His wife was delighted as well, bustling into the kitchen to cook for them personally.
The medicine shop was doing booming business. Having struggled through hardships for years, Qiu Zhiheng finally possessed a business of his own and managed it with exceptional devotion.
His wife laid out a table of food and wine. After downing a few cups together, Qiu Zhiheng said, "In a bit, take a look over the ledgers and calculate your dividend."
It had been agreed from the start: Li Banfeng provided the capital while Qiu Zhiheng provided the labor, splitting the profits fifty-fifty. When time came to divvy the money, Qiu Zhiheng certainly would not let Li Banfeng lose out.
Li Banfeng waved his hand. "Hold on to my share of the dividend for now and put it to use. Let's expand our enterprise.
"I came this time to find Shopkeeper Feng of Feng's Grocery Store. Do you know where he went?"
Qiu Zhiheng's wife piped up from the side, "He said he was off to dodge a disaster, and warned us that we'd best suspend business for the next couple of days."
Why was Shopkeeper Feng dodging a disaster as well?
What was the situation?
Qiu Zhiheng remarked, "Our shop has only just opened. How can we shutter at the drop of a hat? I reckon the Jiangxiang Gang might be coming to stir up trouble. I'd like to see what tricks they can pull in my establishment."
Was it truly the Jiangxiang Gang?
For Shopkeeper Feng to avoid the Jiangxiang Gang made sense.
Why would the rickshaw puller need to dodge the Jiangxiang Gang?
Could something else be at play?
As he pondered, Qiu Zhiheng's son dashed in, grinning with flushed cheeks. "Sister Caoye is here!"
Caoye?
Which Caoye?
Li Banfeng stepped outside to look, and sure enough, it was the very Caoye he had met on Bitter Mist Mountain.
With reddened eyes, Caoye stood before the medicine shop's entrance, a horse cart parked behind her.
Beside the cart stood a man around sixty years of age, dressed in a short jacket with hair parted down the middle. Bearing a profound smirk, he addressed Caoye in the tone of an elder:
"Let me say a few words, even if you won't like hearing them: what is the use of this line of work you do? How much coin can a single shipment of medicinal herbs fetch?
"You want to open a medicine shop? You want to run a major business? Look at yourself—are you cut from that cloth? Ask yourself if you even possess such a destiny!"
At his words, Caoye began to sob.
Surely it wasn't that severe.
Back on Bitter Mist Mountain, Caoye had put her life on the line; she wouldn't break into tears over a few barbs from this old bastard, would she?
What relation was this old man to her?
While Li Banfeng was still observing the situation, Qiu Zhiheng's wife darted outside, grabbed Caoye, and pulled her into the shop.
Qiu Zhiheng called out to the patrons inside, "Our apologies, everyone. The shop is closing for the day. Please come back another time."
The customers were thoroughly displeased. What hour was it? How could they simply close up out of nowhere?
Qiu Zhiheng offered no explanation, ushering all the patrons out and promptly shutting the doors.
Li Banfeng asked, "Brother Qiu, what has happened?"
Qiu Zhiheng furrowed his brow deeply. "Being away from Yaowanggou for so long, my news has grown stale."
His wife snapped from beside him, "Nonsense! Shopkeeper Feng told you to go dodge the disaster, and you wouldn't listen!"
Qiu Zhiheng was utterly vexed. "He didn't explain clearly! I assumed some personal enemy of his had come calling. Who could have known this thing would arrive!"
Even as they spoke, the old man outside yelled through the door, "What is the meaning of this? You shutter your doors the moment I arrive? Is this how one runs a business?
"Mark my words, even if you don't like hearing them: treating patrons like this, this medicine shop of yours will never come to any good in the future!"
Qiu Zhiheng ground his teeth. "Foul curse!"
Li Banfeng asked, "What does this person actually do?"
"He's a Mourning Cultivator!"
Chapter 335