Chapter 33: Chapter 33

“Boss Li… is an absolute beast.”

Yuan Hai’s face was pure shock.

He’d heard that Boss Li had held his own against Elder Qin at the docks. Now he realized — Boss Li had been holding back out of respect for gang rules. If he’d actually tried to kill Elder Qin, the old man’s fate would have been no better than these corpses.

At that moment—

CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK!

A rapid mechanical sound filled the room.

A small box — no larger than a palm — had appeared in Wen San’s hand. A torrent of needles, fine as hair, erupted from it in a lethal spray.

The needles were impossibly thin, but blindingly fast. Even the sixth-rank fighters couldn’t dodge them.

“AAAGH!”

“AAAGH!”

Screams tore through the room.

The five attackers who’d converged on Wen San crumpled to the floor, writhing.

“Poi… poison!”

“Anti… antidote!”

In the span of a few breaths, the Thirteen Fiends had been reduced to five. The music died.

Li Suifeng’s guard spiked.

Those five had included two sixth-rank fighters.

That tiny weapon had cut down two sixth-rank masters in the blink of an eye.

“Ox-Hair Drizzle Needles — lethal enough to cripple sixth-rank fighters.”

Yuan Hai, ever the font of jianghu knowledge, whispered at Li Suifeng’s side. “This weapon is a Tang family product — from the Tang clan of Shu Province. A single one costs ten thousand taels of silver.”

“And the poison on those needles — at least several hundred taels to compound.”

The toxin killed on contact with blood. Even sixth-rank fighters couldn’t withstand more than a few heartbeats. Truly terrifying.

CRASH!

The room’s main door exploded inward.

Wen San’s two bodyguards stormed through.

WHAM!

The Fiend guarding the door was swatted across the room. He slammed into a pillar, blood spraying from his mouth, and went still.

“Young Master — are you hurt?”

The two guards took one look at Wen San — uninjured — and exhaled with visible relief.

The Lakeheart Pavilion had been too noisy. Combined with the instruments masking the battle sounds inside the room, even these sixth-rank bodyguards hadn’t detected the fight until it was too late.

If the Young Master had been harmed, they’d have been finished.

The Fiends’ leader and Dragon Granny exchanged a glance. They struck simultaneously — twin palm blasts driving Liu Sanmao backward.

Liu Sanmao was fearless. Both palms blazed crimson as he met their combined force head-on.

BOOM!

“Go!”

Using the recoil from the exchange, both women launched themselves through the window and out into the night.

Liu Sanmao landed on the window ledge. He watched the two figures alight on a distant rooftop, frowned, and chose not to pursue.

As long as Wen San was safe, everything else was manageable. If he chased and fell for a diversion, leaving Wen San exposed — the consequences would be on his head.

“Boss!”

The remaining two Fiends stared in horror.

In the space of a dozen breaths, their leader and Dragon Granny had fled, and every other member of the Thirteen Fiends was dead.

What were they supposed to do now?

“Over here!”

“Move!”

Urgent voices and thundering footsteps approached. Over a dozen men in Canal Gang garb rushed toward the room, led by a sixth-rank fighter.

“Elder Liu!”

The moment he saw Liu Sanmao, he dropped to one knee.

“Lock down the city. Search for suspicious persons.” Liu Sanmao gave his orders.

As Nanzhou’s dominant faction, with the Canal Gang’s headquarters in Tianhe Prefecture, the city’s largest pleasure house naturally fell under the gang’s umbrella.

Every guard in the Lakeheart Pavilion answered to the Canal Gang.

“Yes, sir!”

The guard captain relayed the orders immediately.

Liu Sanmao waved him off.

“Clear out. Take the bodies.”

“Yes, sir!”

The captain and his men removed the corpses with practiced efficiency.

Liu Sanmao turned his gaze on Li Suifeng.

“Not bad, kid.”

“Your external hardening arts aren’t anything exotic, but to have cultivated them to this degree — that’s enough to make a name for yourself across Nanzhou’s martial world.”

Yuan Hai tugged discreetly at Li Suifeng’s sleeve.

Red Sand Divine Palm Liu Sanmao was a Canal Gang Elder — not a branch elder, but one of the four Grand Elders at headquarters. In the entire Canal Gang, the number of people who outranked him could be counted on one hand.

If Li Suifeng caught Liu Sanmao’s eye, his future was limitless.

Yuan Hai was old enough that personal advancement held no appeal. But Li Suifeng was young, and had just saved his life.

“Junior Li Suifeng, of the Canal Gang’s Nanyang Branch.”

Li Suifeng offered a slight bow. “I came to Tianhe Prefecture on the Helmsman’s orders, delivering our branch’s tribute to headquarters.”

“Oh?”

Interest kindled in Liu Sanmao’s eyes. He hadn’t expected this young man to be one of their own. He studied Li Suifeng with open curiosity.

“How would you feel about transferring to headquarters? Working under me?”

A smile bloomed on Yuan Hai’s face. Boss Li had finally hit the big time.

As long as his martial arts kept pace, a posting at headquarters under a Grand Elder’s patronage meant real prospects.

“I’m grateful for the Elder’s kindness, but I’d prefer to keep seasoning myself in Nanyang for a while longer.”

Li Suifeng bowed again.

Others might leap at headquarters. He wasn’t others.

Two unfinished tasks were still waiting back at the branch.

Two maxed-out martial arts.

The Dragon-Elephant Prajna Art, especially — he wasn’t about to let that slip away.

Yuan Hai stared, baffled.

An opportunity like this, and Boss Li turned it down?

Headquarters beat the branch in every conceivable way, especially with a Grand Elder as your backer.

Wen San, too, raised an eyebrow.

He couldn’t fathom why Li Suifeng would make such a choice.

Liu Sanmao, however, took it in stride. He unclipped a token from his belt and tossed it to Li Suifeng.

“If you ever run into trouble, come find me.”

He genuinely liked what he saw in this young man.

At his age, facing a performance that had nearly ensnared even Liu Sanmao himself, Li Suifeng had kept his head clear. That was worth investing in.

But a refusal was a refusal. He wouldn’t press.

“Thank you, Elder!”

Li Suifeng caught the token without hesitation.

Liu Sanmao nodded, then turned toward the Thirteen Fiends’ two survivors.

“Who ordered the hit on Young Master Wen?”

A thread of killing intent laced his voice.

It was fortunate that Wen San had suggested visiting the Lakeheart Pavilion on a whim tonight. Otherwise, even Liu Sanmao would have fallen under suspicion.

Wen San’s identity was no trifling matter. If anything had happened to him, the pressure would have been immense — even for someone of Liu Sanmao’s stature.

“Elder Liu — we really don’t know!”

“It’s always Chen Sanniang who takes the contracts. We just follow orders!”

“Elder Liu…”

Both men tripped over each other trying to talk.

From the moment Chen Sanniang and Dragon Granny had fled, they’d known they’d been abandoned.

The Thirteen Fiends had always revolved around those two. Everyone else was kept in the dark about the clients and the contracts.

Seeing that nothing useful would come from further questioning, Liu Sanmao’s face showed a flicker of impatience.

Wen San waved a hand.

“I have a rough idea who’s behind this. But… you should still have them properly interrogated.”

“Mm.” Liu Sanmao flicked two fingers. Twin bolts of finger force struck both men in the dantian.

“AAAGH!”

PFFT!

Screams, then silence. Both men collapsed, ashen-faced.

“You… destroyed our cultivation?”

They could feel it — the internal energy they’d painstakingly accumulated over decades of training had vanished without a trace. Their dantians were ruined. There was no coming back.

Liu Sanmao ignored them. He called toward the door:

“Take them. Full interrogation.”