Chapter 58: Copy (9)
58 – Copy (9)
“It’s for use during concerts,” Qi Yun said as he raised his glow sword and waved it a few times. “Just like this, for cheering. A gift from my fans. Since my work uses swords as a theme, the light sticks are also sword-shaped. I just released a new work recently called ‘Sheathe the Blade, Hang the Sword.'”
Officer Cao’s expression gradually grew puzzled.
Lin Xun struggled to keep himself from laughing out loud.
Quick thinking in a crisis, indeed.
In life-or-death situations, people truly can unleash limitless potential.
He felt he should applaud Qi Yun.
However, this explanation was obviously full of holes. As an experienced police officer, Officer Cao would not easily believe it.
Sure enough, Officer Cao said, “Hand it over for me to see.”
Qi Yun hesitated before handing the sword to Officer Cao.
Officer Cao weighed it in his hand. “So heavy. What’s it made of?”
Qi Yun: “I don’t know either. High-tech stuff, probably.”
After weighing the sword, Officer Cao held it horizontally and was about to touch the blade.
But Qi Yun’s intelligence remained online under sustained high pressure. From Lin Xun’s perspective, he saw Qi Yun release spiritual energy, or something like sword Qi, enveloping the blade.
—If sword Qi could gather into a thin edge to harm people, then naturally it could also evenly coat the blade, making it feel blunt to the touch.
Officer Cao ran his finger along the blade, and his finger remained completely unharmed.
Qi Yun visibly let out a sigh of relief.
But Officer Cao’s investigation did not end there.
Officer Cao: “Turn it off and let me see.”
Lin Xun: “Ahem… His thing is of poor quality. Once it lights up, it can’t be turned off. You have to wait until the battery runs out.”
Officer Cao was half-convinced, half-doubting.
Lin Xun opened a search engine, typed in “Qi Yun,” and showed it to Officer Cao. “Look, he really is a celebrity. All his songs are related to swords.”
Qi Yun chimed in agreement.
Officer Cao took the phone, browsed through it, and then reluctantly returned the glow stick to Qi Yun.
Qi Yun felt as if granted a reprieve. “Thank you, Officer.”
Officer Cao: “You said you’re very skilled in fighting, but all you pulled out was a glow stick?”
Qi Yun said seriously, “My sect’s rule is: where the person is, the sword is. Anything can become a sword. Although I’m holding a glow stick, I…”
Qi Yun faltered.
Lin Xun filled in: “But he can wield this glow stick with the power of a sword. The light can also dazzle the enemy’s eyes.”
Officer Cao: “I think you’re trying to fool me.”
At this point, his gaze shifted to Lin Xun. “That day, you were holding a red thing, and your accomplice had a big golden rod. I already thought there was something off about your group.”
Well, now they were a “group”—definitely not a neutral term.
Lin Xun took out his keyboard from his backpack, turned on the backlight, and defended himself: “This is just a keyboard.”
Perhaps goodwill played a role. Officer Cao examined his keyboard, snorted through his nose, then waved his hand, letting it go for the time being.
Qi Yun pointed to three of the windows. “These three rooms have been connected.”
Officer Cao looked at him. “Not bad, young man.”
Lin Xun: “We can go in right now.”
Officer Cao’s intention was to gather evidence on-site first and then call for backup, but Lin Xun felt that he and Qi Yun needed to go in. This place likely had demons.
Officer Cao said, “I’ll notify the officers waiting at the entrance to move in, then inform the residential complex security. You two stay safe—they’re bound to have controlled weapons.”
Qi Yun replied, “At most, they’d have watermelon knives.”
Officer Cao glared at him. “Young man, don’t underestimate the dangers. Our police force suffers casualties every year.”
Qi Yun was eager. “Slaying demons and vanquishing evil is the mission of my Sword Sect!”
Officer Cao asked, “Sword Sect?”
“I spoke too quickly,” Qi Yun said. “The Inkstone Sect. We often cheer for performers at concerts for payment, so I’ll be right there cheering for you officers too.”
In a flash, Officer Cao suddenly threw a punch straight at Qi Yun’s face!
Qi Yun swiftly dodged to the side, blocking Officer Cao’s right arm with his left.
Officer Cao withdrew his hand. “Not bad.”
Qi Yun said, “I think so too.”
In these brief five minutes, Qi Yun’s intelligence had undergone a qualitative leap—pressure truly was the best motivator.
Lin Xun opened his eyes, snapping back to attention. He had been scanning the surroundings.
“There are small cameras installed around here. I spotted three of the same model—likely placed by them,” Lin Xun spoke rapidly. “We might have been noticed.”
Officer Cao made a decisive call. “Head to the entrance first.”
They quickly rounded the building, arriving at the front. This was Unit C of Building 6. The basement entrance was dark and deep. Inside, two branching paths led left and right. According to Qi Yun’s sound-based deduction, the three suspicious basement rooms were the farthest to the right.
Officer Cao said, “Leave one person to guard the stairwell entrance and wait for backup.”
Qi Yun suggested, “Lin Suan can stay here.”
Lin Xun objected, “Why don’t you stay here?”
Qi Yun replied, “I can provide light.”
Lin Xun remarked, “You truly are the pride of the Sword Sect.”
Qi Yun muttered, “…Damn you.”
After a brief exchange, Qi Yun whistled casually, swinging his glow stick nonchalantly with one hand as he followed Officer Cao downstairs.
Lin Xun set down his backpack, clutching his keyboard in full alert. He understood Officer Cao’s reason for leaving someone to guard the entrance—the three basement rooms corresponded to three households upstairs. If the basements were suspicious, the residents were certainly no good… though it was unclear whether they were connected to the old lady’s family.
And if someone was constantly monitoring those three cameras, their movements had undoubtedly alerted this group.
Officer Cao, blinded by goodwill, had gone down—which was just as well. If any demonic creatures attacked and were seen by a large number of other officers, he really wouldn’t know how to explain it.
His gaze fixed upward on the stairwell, ready for anyone or anything to charge down at any moment.
Just then, noises erupted from below—sounding like Qi Yun forcing open a metal security door.
The hum of machinery suddenly amplified, accompanied by a clattering of collisions, as if a fight had broken out.
As he listened intently, he suddenly heard Qi Yun shout, “Lin Suan, watch out!”
The next second, a fierce gust of wind rushed toward his face. Three dark shadows skimmed the ground rapidly, leaping up abruptly about half a meter away—three shadows pouncing at him from three different directions!
The firewall activated spontaneously, barely blocking this strike. Three dark shadows were repelled, and then one of them—a slender, black silhouette—let out a sharp shriek and lunged at him again!
This was no ordinary demon seed but a fully formed demonic entity with its own defenses. Lin Xun couldn’t implant the virus immediately and could only raise his keyboard to block!
A tremendous impact erupted from the collision between the shadow and the keyboard. The shadow felt ethereal yet powerful, like a wall of air.
Thanks to the block, its speed slowed slightly, but the other two shadows simultaneously darted forward, gathering strength for a strike!
In that instant, time seemed to stretch. A sword light, white as a rainbow, flashed brightly, its sharp Qi sealing the paths of the two shadows. Qi Yun had caught up from the basement corridor.
Qi Yun shouted, “Why are they after you—?!”
Lin Xun leaped into the air, using the Light Body Technique and his keyboard to engage the shadow in close combat. “I don’t know either.”
The demon seeds targeted him, the eerie shadow in the child’s bathroom last night targeted him, and now these three entities were no exception.
He had already reached the Foundation Establishment stage. In theory, his body now contained Spiritual Power, though he didn’t know how to wield it. Still, even with simple physical attacks, he could inflict some damage on the shadows. With the help of a fellow Foundation Establishment cultivator—a particularly skilled swordsman—the two of them managed to hold their own against the three shadows.
Officer Cao rushed out from the underground passage, electric baton in hand. Seeing the chaos above, he stood bewildered, baton raised, unsure where to turn.
Lin Xun caught sight of him from the corner of his eye, sidestepping a shadow’s attack as he called out, “There’s a mirror in my backpack!”
Officer Cao understood immediately, quickly retrieving the Tai Chi Eight Trigrams bronze mirror. “This?”
Lin Xun replied, “Shine it on them.”
Unfazed by the danger, Officer Cao lifted the mirror and aimed it directly at one of the shadows. Suppressed by the Taoist artifact, the shadow froze abruptly, its defenses no longer flawless!
Lin Xun seized the opportunity to send it a virus file.
Officer Cao grasped the mirror’s function and began shining it on the three demonic entities in turn.
The demons shrieked, their bodies elongating as they circled in mid-air, preparing to flee. Recalling how Old Man Huo had subdued a demon yesterday, Lin Xun shouted to Qi Yun, “Use Spiritual Power to suppress them!”
Qi Yun retorted, “Swordsmen don’t have Spiritual Power.”
Lin Xun shot back, “What about your ‘Swordsmen existed before the heavens’?”
“Damn,” Qi Yun muttered, “I don’t want to unleash a big move with a glow stick!”
Lin Xun kicked away a shadow’s skull. “Figure it out!”
A swordsman’s combat prowess was the bug of the cultivation world. A Foundation Establishment swordsman should possess the strength of a Golden Core cultivator to be considered normal, especially since this Qi Yun was the head disciple of the swordsmen.
“Swordsmen existed before the heavens!” In the blink of an eye, Qi Yun landed gracefully, sword in hand. He closed his eyes, pressed his index and middle fingers together, and drew them across the blade before pointing the sword skyward.
But Qi Yun didn’t stop there. The blade pierced his finger, and drops of crimson blood fell onto the sword, absorbed by the metal.
“Ruthless… Sword Intent—Heavenly Sun!”
Qi Yun’s eyes snapped open, and a brilliant sword light erupted!
For a moment, the air fell silent, then was abruptly engulfed in a biting chill!
In an instant, the surroundings transformed into a harsh winter, and a single snowflake drifted down.
Qi Yun pointed his sword at the shadowy figures, while Lin Xun twisted his body and drifted to the side.
Everything happened in the blink of an eye. Qi Yun lunged forward with lightning speed, and a chilling sword light suddenly streaked across Lin Xun’s vision, like a white rainbow piercing the sun, skewering the three shadowy figures like candied haws on a stick.
The shadows shrieked, the black Qi around them dissipating strand by strand. When they were sufficiently weakened, Lin Xun grabbed the mirror and trapped them one by one.
Lin Xun asked, “What is the Ruthless Sword Intent?”
Qi Yun replied, “Sword intent.”
Lin Xun: “Does it mean being cold and ruthless?”
Qi Yun: “For aesthetics and rhyme, you know—I’m a rapper.”
Footsteps echoed from the distance—reinforcements had arrived.
But it was already over.
Lin Xun wasn’t someone who exercised regularly, and the intense movement had left him slightly breathless. Still, he took a few deep breaths and approached Officer Cao: “Officer, this is our exclusive technique. You must keep it confidential.”
Qi Yun glanced at Officer Cao’s expression and quietly sheathed his sword.
Three people lay unconscious in the basement. After restraining them, the officers, with the help of security guards, located the three corresponding households based on the basement door numbers and apprehended them one by one.
One of them looked very familiar to Lin Xun.
It was a woman in red clothes, with extremely short yellow hair and a lip piercing—even more street-smart than Qi Yun. She was the child’s mother.
Standing beside her was a burly man with tattooed arms. The two of them together actually bore some resemblance to a married couple.
According to the records, however, they were not husband and wife. The woman in red was married to someone else, but her husband’s whereabouts were unknown.
The rest of the evidence was still being collected and investigated, but Lin Xun felt the truth was almost fully revealed.
The mother had hooked up with the tattooed man, who was involved in shady dealings—running a small-scale soft drug operation in the basement. The child’s father might have discovered he was being cheated on, or that his wife was involved in illegal activities—or more likely, both. He had likely tried to report it.
His attempt to report it failed, and he was killed in the bathroom instead.
The shadowy figure in the bathroom, the emergency call at midnight—perhaps they were all him.
Lin Xun and Qi Yun were taken in for questioning. After all the commotion, it was late again.
On the bus, Qi Yun hummed with his headphones on—out of tune, so Lin Xun ignored him. He closed his eyes and entered the System Space.
When they left the police station, the system had notified him that the mission was complete—and, of course, Officer Cao’s favorability had risen another notch.
Among the system rewards this time was a Chaos Treasure Box, which could randomly yield items and increase his number of skills.
In fact, throughout the evening, Lin Xun had been thinking that his proficiency in cultivation was still lacking. So far, he could only rely on virus attacks and firewall defenses—which felt rather underhanded. It was like others fought with real swords and spears, their victories depending entirely on skill, while he had to find opportunities to sprinkle poison powder on his enemies to prevail. At the same time, others had their own defensive techniques, while he wore something impenetrable under his clothes.
This didn’t align with the aesthetics of cultivation.
So, when it came to cultivation, there must be some key principle he hadn’t yet grasped.
He placed his hand on the Chaos Treasure Box.