章節 13: Capturing The Spy
Lin Mu had shaken the poor man to his core, yet there was no physical response from him. The other people had also tried on their own and tested the man as well but got no response.
"It's no use, lets go try the other houses." Lin Mu spoke.
Lin Mu then went to the next house and broke down the door as well. He walked inside the house and found its sleeping residents. The others followed him inside and watched as he tried to wake them up.
Lin Mu had checked that actually they were alive and not dead. They just seemed to be highly unconscious and unresponsive, while their breathing still continued.
"Why is this happening?" Yuan Tu spoke out loud.
Everyone heard his words and reciprocated with him, as they all were wondering about the reason for this phenomenon.
"We need to keep on checking the houses, there are bound to be more people that are not affected by this." Lin Mu spoke.
"Yes, this can't just happen to the entire district. We are still awake so there should be more people." The portly man affirmed.
The party of five went from house to house checking on people. At first, they would just break in through the front door but later understood that this was ineffective, as the people who were unconscious would not respond either way. In the end, they just decided to make as much noise as possible to alert anyone that was unaffected.
They had wanted to inform the guards outside the district about this occurrence, but then decided against it as they thought that staying together was the right decision at this time. Who knows what would happen if they were alone, thus they did not want to take the risk.
It took them over two hours before they were even able to find a person that was unaffected by it. They were at a rather small house, which looked old. Its paint had faded away and the wooden frames of the windows and door seemed to be pretty weathered as well.
As before, they knocked on the door hard and shortly got a response.
"Who the hell is disturbing my sleep at this time?!!" A person shouted from inside the house.
"Wake up! We have a huge problem. We are the people who are doing the night vigil." The portly man spoke.
Some incomprehensible grumbles could be heard coming from behind the door. The door soon opened and an old man appeared from behind it. The old man seemed to be at least eighty years old and had a face full of wrinkles.
"What do you want?" The old man groaned.
"We are the night vigil team. We found that people in the district are unconscious and unresponsive." The portly man spoke.
"Yes, we checked many houses and tried to wake people, but no one is responding. We even tried shaking them physically but they still did not respond, you're the first person we found that responded." Lin Mu explained.
By now the old man had become woken enough to understand the current predicament. He asked for them to show them the unconscious people, which they gladly did. After seeing the proof with his own eyes, the old man understood the graveness of the situation.
"What do we do now then?" The old man asked.
Everyone turned to look at Lin Mu subconsciously. Due to him taking the approach head-on, everyone had unknowingly accepted him as the leader. Although his surprising strength may have played a part in it as well, there weren't many people in the town who could just rip off doors that easily.
"I recommend we go and inform the guards at this point. This is much bigger at this point and we don't know the implications of this. We are definitely gonna need a lot of people if we want to check every house." Lin Mu ordered.
Everyone nodded without thinking much and started following Lin Mu. Half an hour later they had left the residential district and were at its exit. The guards should have been patrolling around here but they were nowhere to be found.
"Where are the guards?" The men questioned together.
'There seems to be more to this than we thought.' Xukong spoke.
"I'm going to go look for them and you guys try to see if the residents here can wake up." Lin Mu ordered.
All the men nodded in response and went ahead to do their tasks. Lin Mu decided to directly go towards the guard barracks, that way if he encountered any guard on the way he'll inform them as well.
Lin Mu started running at his full speed after he was at a sufficient distance from the men. He didn't want to reveal more of his capabilities than he had already done today. The streets were eerily silent and not even stray animals could be seen. Lin Mu was halfway to the barracks when he sensed some disturbance.
Lin Mu's spirit sense was already extended and he was completely alert, thus he was able to detect the presence that was hiding in the shadows hiding. Lin Mu probed the place with his spirit sense and found the person that was hiding there.
"Get ready" Xukong spoke.
Lin Mu instinctively withdrew the throwing daggers from his ring and threw two of them at the location he had detected the person at. A muffled grunt and clinking of metal could be heard after that.
"Come out now, I know you are there." Lin Mu called out.
Slowly a person came out of the darkness and revealed himself to Lin Mu. The person was dressed in dark blue clothes and was wearing a featureless mask with only two holes for eyes. He had a thin sword hung on his waist and was six feet tall.
Lin Mu used his spirit sense to gauge the man's strength and discovered that he was a cultivator too. The man was at the Early stage of the Qi refining realm and didn't seem to have refined his spirit sense yet.
When Lin Mu's spirit sense probed the masked man cultivation, he seemed to have detected it as he flinched for a moment and became tense.
"He's dressed differently. Does he belong to the same group of people or not?" Lin Mu wondered.
"You can find that out soon enough. For now, you just need to get the information out of him, either by hook or by crook." Xukong replied.
Lin Mu then drew the short sword from its sheath and pointed it at the masked man before speaking,
"Who are you and why have you been following me?"
The Masked Man didn't speak but instead drew his own sword in response.
"So you're not going to take the easy route." Said Lin Mu with a sharp tone.
The man advanced first and slashed, which Lin Mu easily dodged by sidestepping and responded with an attack of his own.
~shing~
The masked man was able to block it but felt the weight of the strike on his blade. He instantly understood the difference between their strengths. He was already shocked when he felt a spirit sense probe on him but when he actually felt the force of Lin Mu's attack, his suspicions were confirmed.
The masked man was not one to give up easily though, he attacked again and missed. Lin Mu had an advantage in speed as well as strength. If he wanted to, he could have ended this fight instantly but he instead wanted to get the information out of the man first.
Both of them exchanged blows one after the other. While all of the masked man's attacks missed, it was not the same for Lin Mu. Most of his attacks were blocked but some had nicked the masked man. He had multiple smaller cuts on his body; some on his hands, some on his torso, and some on his legs.
After fighting for five minutes, Lin Mu decide that it was enough.
"That's it, surrender now or I'll end you right now. You know that you have no chance against me." Lin Mu sternly spoke.
The man did not heed Lin Mu's words and instead attacked again. Seeing that the man was uncooperative, Lin Mu decided to end it quickly.
He channeled wisps of spirit qi into his short sword and slashed at the masked man. The man tried to block it in turn but was unsuccessful as Lin Mu's blade just cut through his own sword effortlessly. The blade was just about to reach his neck when Lin Mu paused for a moment and punched with his other hand.
The strengthened fist landed on the masked man's face and knocked him down to the ground. Lin Mu had not used his entire strength as he did not want to kill the man right away.
Even if he wanted to kill the man, he would avoid attacking the face, as it would just end up crushing the man's skull and disfiguring him. Lin Mu would not be able to identify the man then and it would become difficult for him to further investigate.
After being knocked on the ground the man became disoriented and could not respond. Lin Mu then placed the point of his short sword at the masked man's neck.
"Surrender." Lin Mu ordered.
Finding himself unarmed and at the edge of death, the man finally gave up.
"Okay! I surrender."
章節 14: The Spy's Perspective
Three hours ago in the residential district of the Northern town.
A man dressed in dark blue clothes and a featureless mask was hiding over the roof of a house and looking at a courtyard. He had been in that position for many hours now, but was still not bothered. He had stayed there all this time, unmoving and nearly invisible.
Eventually, he saw an average-looking man approach the courtyard and then knock on its gates. A minute later, he saw the door of the house inside the courtyard open. A Shorthaired boy around the age of fifteen walked out and opened the gate.
Both of them talked for a couple of minutes before walking away. The man was leading while the boy followed behind him.
Seeing that his target was moving, the masked man finally got a chance to stretch his tensed body. While it was normal for him to hide like this for an extended period of time, as it was part of his job, it still tired him out every time. He was a cultivator sure, but he was only at the early stage of the Qi refining realm and was not like the tireless core condensation experts who could work tirelessly for weeks.
The masked man followed the pair until they reached the square that was located in the center of the residential district. He then saw them talk amongst themselves about the night vigil. They talked for about five minutes before they separated again and went in different directions.
The masked man followed the boy towards the northern direction, which was the same way they originally came from. He saw the boy look a little lost in his thoughts while patrolling the streets. The expression on the boy's face actually reminded himself of his own situation many years ago.
He too was once lost in the world and didn't know what to do. That was until he met his lord, who gave him the opportunity to become a cultivator. For this grace that his lord had bestowed upon him, he had chosen to serve him till his death.
He would jump into the inferno of hell if his lord so asked him to do. He was his lord's blade, and such was his duty. He along with his fellow comrades all worked for the glory of his lord. They were all useless before; it was their fortune that they met their lord who had allowed them to become worthy.
Unknowingly more time passed, and an hour had gone by. The masked man had seen the boy mutter something to himself multiple times over the time period. He had found this a little strange, but had just attributed this to the boy's eccentricities. He did not know why he had been ordered by his lord to watch this boy, but knew that all he had to do was to follow his orders.
The masked man had observed the boy for over a week and had found out that the boy was much stronger than he looked. To him, if he was not informed beforehand, he would only think that the boy was an average Body Tempering realm expert. But beneath that facade of naivety, it hid a full-fledged Qi cultivator.
The masked man could not figure out how the boy became a cultivator at such a young age. Even for him who had above average talent, it took him over a decade to be able to become a cultivator. It was a little shocking for him to see such a young cultivator in a small town like this.
While there were Young cultivators like this in Wu Lim city as well, they all belonged to influential families and clans. For an orphan boy with an insignificant background like his, it should have been nearly impossible, but here he was existing and defying the odds.
The masked man snapped out of his thoughts upon seeing that the boy was returning to the square. A few minutes later they reached the square, and he saw the boy talk with the three men standing there. One of the men was missing, and they seemed to be waiting for him.
After a while they started getting impatient, only to hear the boy speak out loud. The missing man had returned, but not without a pack of stray dogs chasing him. It was at this time that things started going haywire.
The masked man saw that the chasing dogs were not barking. This was probably the most abnormal thing, as dogs always barked while chasing their prey. Yes prey, he had seen the look in the stray dog's eyes. They were fueled with blood lust and wanted to kill.
The masked man suddenly realized the reason for the silent but murderous dogs. They had been poisoned with Beast Inciting powder. The Beast Inciting powder was used to provoke beasts and create a rampage. It was outlawed in the Shuang Qian kingdom, and its possession was punishable by death.
The masked man could only think of a few people or organizations that could have access to it. The Beast Inciting powder was not only expensive but also difficult to create. To use them on normal animals such as these stray dogs was only a waste.
Then in the next moment, he saw something which he could not explain. The stray dogs halted before the five people and growled for a bit before yelping out as if they were scared by the most dangerous of predators.
He had never seen this before, as no beast affected by the beast inciting powder would ever flinch. They would mindlessly chase down their prey and tear them to shreds. The occurrence in front of him was simply unscientific.
Though this was not the end of the bizarre situation. The men soon talked amongst themselves and figured out the strangeness of the current scenario. Then the masked man heard something which made him realize that in all this mess, he had failed to recognize a huge thing.
While the stray dogs were barking and the man being chased was crying out for help, no one heard it. This was even more unusual than normal as all the residents of the town were rather anxious due to the recent string of disappearances and the spirit beast attacks.
They should have woken up rather easily, but even in all this hullabaloo, no one responded. The masked man then saw the men trying to alert the residents but to no avail. He even saw his 'target' the boy pull out a door from its hinges without any hesitation revealing a part of his strength.
Thirty more minutes passed by as the masked man saw the party of five people getting more and more anxious. They were searching for any resident that could be awakened. Even the masked man himself was worried because of this development.
The masked man knew that he would have to inform his lord about this phenomenon. It was not easy to incapacitate so many people without leaving a witness, thus he knew that someone big was behind this act. His lord had many plans and liked to know everything that happened around, hence this was definitely something that he needed to inform his lord about.
The masked man could not see what happened inside the house but could guess, and after hearing the conversation of the men he confirmed it. The people inside were alive but unconscious. Not just that house, but every house that the party of five men visited.
The masked man knew about some substances and techniques that could be used to put someone in a deep sleep like this, but not on an extensive scale such as this. Doing it at such a large scale would require a large retinue of people, and to do it covertly would require even more immense influence and power.
The masked man had thought that every person in the district was affected except for the five men, but he was soon proved wrong when they found another person. This person was an old man with a wrinkled face.
The masked man was a little surprised by this, but soon discovered the reason. That old man was a warrior. While it may not be apparent to most people, he had grown up seeing warriors fight and had even joined an organization that vetted out people through combat. He was able to sense the faint aura of a warrior on the old man.
As the man was very old, the aura had faded away yet even now he had the disposition of a warrior; his gait was still there when he walked without any support. The masked man guessed that the old man was at the tenth stage of the body tempering realm at the very least. He judged that the old man must have fought in the war that happened a long time ago and was now disabled and weak.
Because there was no other reason why there would not be a record of a tenth stage body tempering expert, as they were rather rare. Even the masked man himself was only at the eight stage of the body tempering realm. He knew how difficult it was to progress after that.
But now that he knew that whatever that was affecting the residents did not affect people of that level, he could narrow down the suspects. He still didn't know why the five people of the night vigil were not affected though.
After informing the old man, the party decided to go and inform the guards, but even that seemed to be unsuccessful as all the guards were absent. The masked man narrowed his brows and started to get a little nervous himself.
He then saw his target separating himself from the party and going in the other direction. The masked man shifted in the shadows and continued stalking his target, completely unknown to the fact that he was soon about to be caught.
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