Free Web NovelChapter 947: Chapter 672: Faith_2
Yang Xiao deeply resonated with this, "I agree with this point, everyone in Rongcheng knows that Director Nalan of Lin’an Patrol Office and Chief Huang Guozhao of City Center Official Residence have always been at odds. However, when Lin’an Patrol Office was in peril, Chief Huang did not stand idly by. Instead, he was the first to lead his team to our aid, ensuring that no outsiders would laugh at our Lin’an Patrol Office’s misfortune."
"He did it not for Director Nalan or for me, but for the dignity of the Patrol Defense Office. These three words must not be disgraced."
"We are all people of the Patrol Defense Office, sharing in glory and disgrace alike. Brothers may fight against each other within the walls, but they must stand united against outside contempt. Behind closed doors, we can fight amongst ourselves as much as we want, but if outsiders dare to attack us, we must fight them to death, teach them a lesson, and show them we are not to be trifariously. "
Fu Qingzhu nodded in agreement and sighed, "That’s right, it’s just this simple principle, yet so many people don’t understand it."
"It’s not that they don’t understand, but that they don’t want to understand, nor do they wish to. Each person is fixated on their immediate gains, a mere scattering of sand, hard-pressed to accomplish anything great. Should they encounter a formidable enemy, they would crumble instantly, left to be slaughtered at will," Yang Xiao similarly sighed.
As time ticked by, after entertaining Fu Qingzhu with a sumptuous dinner, it was soon half-past ten. The two changed their clothes, dressed up in disguise, and both donned the You Character Mask.
"This mask was given to me after I became Pingxi Marquis, you can keep your mask for yourself, there’s no need to return it," Yang Xiao generously gave away the You Character Mask which was left by the past Pingxi Marquis, a favor given with smooth facilitation.
"Then I will respectfully accept it." This mask was a rare treasure, and even with Fu Qingzhu’s position as the deputy head of the United Federation, it would be difficult to obtain.
The two took advantage of the cover of night and exited the door. To avoid unforeseen complications, Yang Xiao used the power of the Soul-Capturing Mirror to shuttle alongside Fu Qingzhu. In just a few blinks of an eye, they appeared outside the side entrance of the hotel.
Despite not being his first time witnessing it, Fu Qingzhu was still astonished by Yang Xiao’s mirror; he remembered the last time he saw Yang Xiao use it, it wasn’t so proficient, and the distance of teleportation wasn’t as far.
After giving the secret signal, the two entered the hotel one after the other through two different side doors, guided by the white lanterns. Following the path, Yang Xiao arrived at a room located on the underground level, where the corridor was eerily quiet.
Standing outside the door, looking at the doorplate marked with the third-class You Character, Yang Xiao confirmed that this was the place. Third-class, or the lowest class, which implied that the authority granted by the mask he wore on his face was the lowest among the You Character Masks.
To the right of the door was a half-human-height wooden cabinet with the word "Deposit" written on it. Not his first visit, Yang Xiao skillfully opened his backpack, took out three Resentful Eyes wrapped in silver metallic foil, carefully removed the valuable silver metallic foil, and placed the three Resentful Eyes in the wooden cabinet.
These three Resentful Eyes were obtained by Yang Xiao on the night he killed Pingxi Marquis after first eliminating three of Pingxi Marquis’ Apostles outside— one Fierce Level Apostle and two Resentment Level Apostles—as his spoils of war.
If converted into money, these three Resentful Eyes would undoubtedly be extremely valuable, and these were the chips he was prepared to offer today.
After completing all these preparations and steadying his mind, he reached out his hand and gently pushed the wooden door. The next second, the door sprang open, and Yang Xiao walked in. Inside was a room decorated with an ancient charm.
The air was filled with a pleasant aromatic fragrance, refreshing and invigorating. Yang Xiao located a black wooden box embedded into the wall on the right side. It was somewhat similar to an old-style mechanical password box in its heavy-duty style, and on the box door was also written a You Character.
He found paper and pen on a nearby table, and Yang Xiao wrote down his question. For his first question, he wanted to inquire about the whereabouts of Big Brother Sui.
After inserting the question into the wooden box, Yang Xiao entered a long wait. An hour later, accompanied by a clinking sound, he swiftly approached the box, retrieved the response bamboo tube from the groove below it.
Unable to wait any longer, he found a rolled-up small note from within the bamboo tube. When he unfurled it, it read that the remuneration for this time was a magic artifact of Fierce Grade caliber. freewёbnoνel.com
This was indeed a lion’s demand; one piece of information to be exchanged for a Fierce Grade magic artifact. However, Yang Xiao was no longer in a mood to quibble. He checked the box after the listed remuneration to agree to the transaction.
The reply came quickly. Calming his excited heart, Yang Xiao silently prayed for Buddha’s blessing before slowly unrolling the note. However, the content left him confused for a moment. After the hotel’s verification, none of the three magic artifacts he had brought met the hotel’s standards, and even together they were insufficient.
This posed a problem for Yang Xiao. He had no spare magic artifacts at hand. To guard against the Mirror Ghost, he had entrusted Tong Han with several of the better artifacts. Now, all he had were cash and gold bars.
But the hotel did not accept these items. Some critical intelligence could only be traded with a Resentful Eye. Without a Resentful Eye, Yang Xiao was effectively forfeiting the transaction.
Yang Xiao was anxious but helpless. Moving on to the next step, he took out the half-book from his bosom, placed it into a black wooden box, and then added a note inside before closing the lid of the box. He requested the hotel to translate the contents of the book.
This time, the wait for Yang Xiao was even longer, nearly two hours, until at last, the reply arrived. The hotel’s asking price was astonishing. They demanded a Resentful Eye as compensation, and any single piece of the three he had brought would suffice.
Just to translate half of a damaged book and they required a Resentful Eye in return; it was an outrageous demand, an utter rip-off. But to uncover the secrets within the book, Yang Xiao held his nose and accepted the deal. After confirming the transaction, he received two pieces of paper.
He unfolded them, and they were roughly the size of typical A4 sheets with writing on both sides. As Yang Xiao had guessed, this indeed was a local chronicle, from a place called Sheng County. According to the description, it was a small county town by the water where most people earned their living through fishing and hunting. The latter half of the book recounted the local customs of Sheng County and some unusual tales, one of which dedicated a large section to a peculiar event named the stone meat Buddha.
As the book stated, there lies a tomb hidden in the deep mountains not far from the northwest of Sheng County. It is said that the tomb’s owner was a monk in life, but unlike other monks who kept vegetarian diets and chanted sutras, this individual was a demon monk adept in evil techniques. After his death, he became a fierce ghost guarding his tomb, so people from the county town never dared to venture deep into the mountains for fear of disturbing the demon monk’s spirit.
But there was a year of severe drought; the land cracked, and Sheng County’s people had no means of subsistence. Some villagers who were at their wits’ end gathered together, armed with fishing and hunting tools and weapons, and plunged into the deep mountains under the cover of night.
They had a simple idea: to dig up the so-called Devil Monk’s Tomb and take some gold and silver treasures to tide over the natural disaster.
However, they vanished without a trace, alive they were seen not, dead they were found not, until seven days later, when a person was found unconscious at the village entrance by someone who woke up early. This individual’s clothes were torn and tattered, covered in blood, and terrifyingly, parts of his body beneath the clothes had turned to grey stone and could crumble with simple pressure. Upon recognition, he was confirmed to be one of the villagers who had gone tomb raiding.
It took great effort to revive the person. Holding on to his last breath, he vaguely told a horrific story to everyone. They indeed found the Devil Monk’s Tomb, but a disaster struck as soon as they entered it.
One by one, they walked along the dark and gloomy tunnel, for a very long time without reaching the end. The people in the troupe started becoming suspicious and paranoid, all claiming they heard the sound of a monk chanting sutras.
The man heard it too, and they quickened their pace until they all began to run, panicked, as if afraid of being a step behind, others would take the treasures inside the tomb. The man, not as physically strong as the others, was knocked down and hit his head against something hard, knocking him unconscious.
He didn’t know how long it had been by the time he regained consciousness, but the sight before him nearly sent his soul flying out in fright. He saw about a dozen bodies scattered haphazardly around the dug-up entrance of the burial tunnel, already dead.
What was even more terrifying was that these corpses had all been petrified to various extents. The worst had turned into a stone Buddha, clusters of stone flakes were emerging like skin lesions from the depths of the flesh, a sight too appalling to behold.
