Chapter 7: Chapter 6 Overnight in an Inn
"Sigh," Qing Yu leaned against the inner wall of the bathing tub, savoring the rare leisure he had after a day of hustling. After giving away the last bit of money from his purse, Qing Yu managed to get the innkeeper to offer him a bath, and even that took quite some effort to haggle for. He was thankful for the harrowing job-hunting days after college, which had honed his ability to speak to all kinds of people, even though just thinking about that time often made his clothes soggy with tears.
After reflecting, Qing Yu took a short rest, experiencing the different atmosphere from the one up in the mountains. Beicang Mountain's air was fresh, rarely trodden by humans, making it a great place for a peaceful hermit life, where one could perhaps live happily ever after. But Qing Yu wasn't there to retire. Setting aside the fact that he wasn't old, a knife could fall on his head at any moment, leaving no room for a comfortable life.
Of course, after obtaining the villain's legacy system, Qing Yu had thought about nesting in the mountains for a decade or so. Once his Divine Skill had reached great success, he would emerge to overwhelm the world. After all, which distinguished villain wasn't invincible the moment they appeared, spreading bento boxes all over the world? Leveling up by fighting monsters was the main character's privilege, after all. Even though protagonists start as weaklings and wander everywhere, they always encounter benefactors who help them out, meeting the seemingly mad and always goofy old men of the human world over a meal. Qing Yu, on the other hand, had nothing but enemies from the entire True Martial Dao Sect—pots left behind by that deceased master.
So, Qing Yu's initial plan was to lay low in the mountains until he reached the level of the "Ten Miles Slope Sword God." Then, once his Divine Skill reached great success, he would step out of the mountains, proclaiming, "The human world has become filthy again," and proceed to flatten everything. Yes, Qing Yu's goal was to be like Emperor Qi Tian, Lord Qi, nicknamed the "Bento Emperor."
In Qing Yu's heart, Emperor Qi Tian was the epitome of villainy. He was full of style from beginning to end, and even his exit was done with grace—a far cry from other villains whose idea of an exit was to face-plant, making him the ceiling of all villains.
Regrettably, Qing Yu had no Divine Skill to practice, nor did he have the resources to speed up his training. Beicang Mountain was also a godforsaken place where no old man would fall from the sky to pass on his skills, let alone offer a beautiful granddaughter as a gift. Even though this type of event with an old man falling from the sky, severely injured and near death, usually happened in godforsaken places. ╮(─▽─)╭
Qing Yu gathered his thoughts, which had wandered far off, and began to think about how to complete the task given by the system—to gain the power to determine the future of Yang City within a year.
"Although Yang City no longer has the splendor it did three hundred years ago, with countless experts stationed in its military, only four squabbling small families remain. However, the Li and Sun families must have backers in the Daqian Military's upper echelons; otherwise, Yang City wouldn't be left without a single official from the court. Thus, overt displays of force or even slight indications of an attempt to take over the discourse in Yang City are out of the question. If these attempts are too slight, they won't shake the four families' rule over Yang City; if they're too ambitious, they might draw the attention of the powerful military backers. After all, it's been three hundred years—there must be a significant motive for those big shots to have supported the four families for so long."
"Therefore, I have to take an unconventional approach—that is, to tread a wild path."
"But, the most crucial thing right now is to improve my own martial strength. With my current weak arms and legs, even the simplest and crudest attempts at seizing power through force are delusional. In these three hundred years, the four families of Yang City have undoubtedly declined, but there must still be experts at the Innate Realm. More certainly, there are experts at the Postnatal Ninth Layer—and not just one. After all, the Postnatal Realm mainly involves cultivating one's Inner Strength, and with Yang City being a commercial hub connected to Qing Province, it's hard to believe they haven't stacked enough resources to produce several Postnatal Ninth Layer experts."
Qing Yu touched his smooth chin, silently contemplating.
Determined on his next steps, Qing Yu relaxed his body and thoroughly enjoyed this rare bathing experience, something he couldn't have on Beicang Mountain, where a shower was the norm.
After soaking for quite some time and the bath water starting to cool, devoid of comfort, Qing Yu finally stood up, dried off his body, put on clean clothes, and opened the door to call for the attendants to take away the bathing tub.
Two attendants, hearing the call, came upstairs and entered the room to remove the tub.
Qing Yu took out Ping Yizhi's Medical Book from his bundle and started to study it carefully under the dim candlelight. In martial arts, medicine was not separated from the practice, understanding medical skills not only allowed for timely treatment after injuries but also acquainted a person with the meridian acupoints and the functioning of various organs of the body, thereby bettering their martial arts training. Any expert would have self-awareness not inferior to some physicians.
Moreover, Ping Yizhi was involved in the underworld, and naturally, he wasn't a rule-abiding good person to have earned the moniker "Murder Doctor." For his research into medical texts, Ping Yizhi sometimes resorted to stealing corpses and exhuming them for dissection and the study of the human body.
One should know that the rapid development of Western medicine in the last few centuries, to the extent of its current widespread acceptance over Chinese medicine, owed much to anatomy.
And these very human experiment data were all recorded in Ping Yizhi's Medical Book.
Qing Yu, who came from an era of information explosion in his previous life, naturally wouldn't consider corpse dissection as something wicked, and besides, he wasn't much of a good person himself. Although the medical book's descriptions of human dissection were quite nauseating, to become stronger, Qing Yu felt this was all bearable.
In the blink of an eye, four hours had passed. Qing Yu set down the medical book and rubbed his aching brow. Although Ping Yizhi's book was very detailed in its descriptions, Qing Yu came from an unschooled background. Having relied solely on self-study over the past three years and even considering his past life's exposure to medicine, it was quite straining to read such a lofty medical text.
After summarizing the gains of the past four hours, Qing Yu recorded his own understanding into another notebook, his study notes.
After finishing his entry, Qing Yu slipped off his boots, crossed his legs on the bed, and after circulating the Quanzhen Heart Method for one Grand Circulation, he lay down and fell asleep. The Quanzhen Heart Method continued to operate slowly in his sleep—it was the beauty of this mental method. As long as one maintained tranquility, the method could be practiced while walking or during other activities, and though the progress was slower compared to active cultivation, it would accumulate over time into something substantial. Unfortunately, Wang Chongyang and the others, including the Quanzhen Seven Sons, had turned to the Dao halfway through their lives. With their temperamental nature, despite forcibly advancing through years of Daoist Skill, their innate characteristics barely changed, rendering the subtle improvements of this method nearly non-existent. Of the two most outstanding disciples that followed, Dragon Knight and Zhao Zhijing, one was filled with infatuated thoughts, and the other was downright crafty; it would be a surprise if they could keep their minds undisturbed.
As midnight approached, a soft sound came from the roof of the room where Qing Yu was staying. He immediately got up and listened intently.
"Can it be, is this some rapist's tactic? This familiar feeling, could it be I'm not the villain, but the protagonist, and the villainous legacy system got the wrong person?" Qing Yu silently ridiculed in his mind. (System: You chose your own path.)
The person who had passed over Qing Yu's roof didn't excel in Qinggong, causing the noise, and since Qing Yu's state of tranquil sleep made him even more sensitive to external disturbances, he woke up immediately at the sound.
However, with such low-level Qinggong, attempting to commit a burglary could get one beaten to death.
As Qing Yu hesitated over whether to chase after them and confirm whether he was the protagonist, footsteps were heard on the street outside the inn. Qing Yu cracked the window slightly and saw several dark figures dashing westward.
Qing Yu hesitated even more. After a while, a few more shadows came down the street. They seemed to be talking, not in the hurried pace of the previous group. Qing Yu strained his ears and faintly thought he could hear words like "market" and "purchase."
"There's something going on." Without further hesitation and dressed in the new black clothes he had just changed into, Qing Yu climbed out of the window and followed the figures heading west.
Chapter 8: Chapter 7 Shadow Market
Golden Wild Goose Skill activated, Qing Yu landed softly on the street in front of the inn. To verify his previous suspicion, Qing Yu did not try to conceal his movements.
Someone among the few people ahead looked back and, faintly seeing a black figure emerging, he said something nonchalantly to his companion and then disregarded Qing Yu, continuing to walk westward.
"Indeed, there must be a market similar to a black market, and I've chanced upon it."
Qing Yu confirmed his suspicion and silently followed the group from a distance as they headed west along the street.
The group reached the western part of the city, an area completely uninhabited with only the mountain wall in front.
As a border of Daqian and built three hundred years ago, Yang City was not a fortress surrounded by wilderness. Otherwise, the enemies could have simply bypassed Yang City and entered Daqian from other places, making this border defense meaningless.
Yang City was built against the mountains, flanked on both the east and west by the Lianduan Mountain range that separated Daqian and the Southern Border. The Lianduan Mountains stretched from east to west, forming a major natural barrier against the South. It was said that many years ago, the site of Yang City was just a narrow valley path, barely wide enough for three people to walk abreast. Then for some unknown reason, on a certain day, there was a cataclysmic landslide. After everything settled, the narrow valley path had been incredibly widened, much broader than a hundred Great Dao highways, and the natural barrier against the Southern Border was breached with a big hole.
The Court of Great Zhou of that time mobilized a huge army and fought against the Southern Border for ten years, forcefully seizing this gap from the hands of the South.
Subsequently, they built Yang City as a border garrison and expanded and reconstructed it multiple times to become the current Yang City.
Qing Yu saw the black-clothed figures ahead feeling along the mountain wall for about a hundred meters; it seemed they found something like a rope and climbed up. Looking up, faint lights shone from dozens of meters up on the mountain wall.
But Qing Yu did not follow; instead, he remained hidden in the shadows and watched.
It was close to the end of the month, and only several incense sticks' worth of time remained until the beginning of the next month. With the new moon in the sky providing no light, Qing Yu, clad all in black, crouched down; even if someone passed by, they might not notice him.
After waiting for a while, several more groups of people arrived and climbed up using the ropes. However, Qing Yu still could not confirm whether there was indeed something like a black market above. If it turned out to be a blunder and he intruded into a hideout of some underground organization, he might as well declare an endgame.
At this moment, from afar, a conversation could faintly be heard, growing louder and approaching Qing Yu's location.
Qing Yu hastened to find a blind spot, crouched low, and even held his breath.
"Uncle, what do they sell at this Shadow Market? It's all so secretive; it's just a black market, isn't it?" The voice sounded young, but exactly how young, Qing Yu didn't have the skill to determine.
An experienced voice answered, "Don't compare those mediocre black markets with the Shadow Market. Do you know why it's called the Shadow Market and not the Ghost Market or Night Market? In this world, where there's light, there are shadows. The Shadow Market can be said to be the flip side of a regular market. As long as it's not some desolate place in Daqian, in that shadow, there's a Shadow Market—a Daqian within the shadows. What you can't find in a regular market, what they dare not sell, the Shadow Market will have. They sell everything, even military crossbows and deep secret books from various factions. As long as you want to buy, someone in the Shadow Market will dare to sell."
"Sss, they dare to sell contraband like military crossbows?"
"Sell, why not sell, as long as you can pay for it. However, these are only available at the auction that takes place once every three months. This time I've brought you here to broaden your horizons. The world is a big place."
"Yes, yes, thank you, Uncle."
"You little rascal..." The uncle laughed and scolded him.
The two walked past not far from Qing Yu.
Qing Yu dared not make any rash movements and even entered a meditative state similar to the turtle breathing of the Quanzhen Heart Method until the two had gone far away before he exhaled.
Midnight arrived, marking the beginning of a new month.
The system's prompt also timely sounded, "A new month has arrived, hosting one Character Card draw for the host. Would you like to draw now?"
"Go ahead, let's see what luck this month brings."
"Drawing starts. Ding, congratulations to the host. You obtained a One-star Character Card — Feng Buping.
Name: Feng Buping
Realm: Postnatal Sixth Realm
Item: None
Martial Arts: "Hua Mountain Swordsmanship," "Hua Mountain Heart Method," "Life-taking Continuous Three Immortal Swords," "Gale Swift Sword"
Evaluation: A bit player with not much screen time, not worth evaluating."
It was the first time the system gave such a lackluster evaluation of a character. No way around it, Feng Buping was essentially a transitional character who, after not much exposure, got beaten so badly that he questioned his life and had no choice but to retire. Just by the name of his swordsmanship, "Gale Swift Sword," it's clear that it's of the same style as Tian Boguang's Gale Blade. The defeat of Lao Yue, who still considered himself a man, served to introduce Ling Huchong's swordsmanship and to fuel Lao Yue's doubts, as well as to become one of the catalysts for Lao Yue's decision to stop living as a man. So, after the fight at the dilapidated temple, he just went straight home.
Actually, Feng Buping wasn't too bad; at least, if Qing Yu received his inheritance, he could have a respectable swordsmanship technique. Quanzhen Swordsmanship is decent, but to truly exert its power, one needs profound Inner Strength, or a girl to practice "Jade Maiden Swordsmanship" for some double cultivation. Alternatively, you could practice the "Heavenly Gang Beidou Formation" with six buddies, or even the "Big Beidou Formation" with more friends — the more, the merrier.
Since luck was on his side, Qing Yu decided to check out the Shadow Market. That's right, the reason for the draw was to gauge his luck for the day. If he felt out of luck, the superstitious Qing Yu would turn around and leave, even the previous small-time thugs knew the art of preserving oneself; Qing Yu would be even more keen on it.
He pulled out a piece of cloth from his chest and tied it around his face. Qing Yu had torn it from some old clothes before leaving the inn; how could one lack this nighttime accessory when going out in the evening? If he were like the heroes in dramas who simply tear the hem of their clothes, it would be embarrassing for someone to notice a large piece missing from the bottom. He prided himself on being at least somewhat dignified.
"Breathing is a bit difficult, no wonder stylish bosses all wear masks; the comfort level is definitely several notches higher."
Qing Yu approached the cliff with ropes hanging from it, looked at the uneven surface filled with handholds and footholds, and immediately leaped upward, stepping on several indents for leverage to reach a platform.
"The only worthwhile thing from the Quanzhen Sect is the Golden Wild Goose Skill," Qing Yu dusted his hands off, taking the opportunity to belittle the Quanzhen Martial Arts, which were nearly impossible to obtain.
The platform was about ten square meters in size, with a smooth surface, as if carved out by a single knife. At the other end of the platform, a large cave about six meters wide and seven meters tall loomed, with two holes on either side, each housing a blazing fire basin.
Qing Yu walked into the cave. Inside, it was pitch dark. With his right hand against the cave's wall, he walked about ten steps before reaching a dead end. Feeling around for a moment, he turned left, took two or three steps, then turned right, and saw light ahead. After a few more steps, he stepped out of the cave mouth.
Suddenly, the space opened up before him — a large area had been hollowed out to form a spacious plaza, with the entire space arranged in a circular fashion, much like the cave entrance, with holes carved out on the walls housing fire basins.
Under the dim lights, figures clad in black, some wearing masks, others draped in cloaks, hid their identities.
In the plaza, some set up stalls, others haggled over prices, much like an ordinary vegetable market. However, nobody here wanted to attract attention; hence, they kept their voices down. The whispering merged into a murmur, which to Qing Yu sounded like countless eerie murmurs.
Qing Yu watched the scene, which appeared ordinary yet mysteriously odd.
"This is the Shadow Market?!"
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
200+ Power
Ranking 
9 Power
stone 
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