The heavy rain had just stopped, the wind blowing was still cool, but with the sun reappearing, the puddles would quickly evaporate.
By evening, it would be hot like a steamer here again.
“They just left like that?” one assassin said incredulously.
He wasn’t killed, he wasn’t tortured, he wasn’t even crippled.
Such a cunning and ruthless mysterious expert, a doctor with high medical skills who could even save people who committed suicide by poison, just let them go?
“This clearly means they want to see where we go, to track us.”
The other assassin said, panting heavily. He was the one who had taken poison earlier. Although he received timely treatment and his life was not in danger, the poison still caused some damage. He was weak all over, his vision blurry, his throat burning, and his stomach kept convulsing from vomiting.
The internal energy exerted by Meng Qi not only caused them unbearable pain but also stimulated the assassin’s spirit to some extent.
Now that the pain was gone and the person who made him fearful had left, the assassin began to feel dizzy.
“He wants to see us panic, to know if we… are telling the truth, wants to intimidate… can’t go back, can’t…”
The assassin’s voice became intermittent, gradually turning into gibberish.
The other person originally wanted to agree, but looking at his companion’s state, his expression became complex.
Being made an assassin, naturally, they were prepared to die. The sooner they died, the better. Being dragged on by interrogators was torture. Interrogators deliberately relaxing their vigilance, letting them escape, and then tracking them was also a common trick. Assassins wouldn’t be fooled. In fact, the moment they went out to execute the order, they would never return.
They were destined to be abandoned pawns.
Behind a big tree not far from the Earth Temple, Mo Li couldn’t help but ask, “What is he thinking?”
Meng Qi’s acupoint technique this time didn’t last long. Half a quarter of an hour ago, the people inside should have been able to move freely.
This Earth Temple was very simple, with no incense burner blocking the view in front of the door. Inside was the shrine dedicated to the Earth God. Although the temple was intact, the roof didn’t leak, and the walls didn’t let in wind, the offering table still had some dried-up offerings, but the incense was not prosperous.
So simple that Mo Li could see the people inside at a glance.
“It seems they don’t intend to leave.” Mo Li frowned.
Meng Qi circled around from the other side of the tree, holding the outer robe he had just taken off.
He was removing stitches.
The stitching on the robe was naturally very firm, twisted in two layers front and back, making it inconvenient to remove.
In summer, the clothes were thin. Now he was only wearing a white undergarment, Mo Li slightly turned his head away.
“Doctor, you don’t need to do this.” Meng Qi stretched his arms, indicating.
The undergarment was worn close to the body, and actually, there was nothing indecent about it. It usually had long sleeves and trousers, covering very tightly. Summer clothes were slightly shorter, exposing the lower half of the arms below the elbows. Strictly speaking, farmers wore less when working in the fields.
However, etiquette was such that one couldn’t be seen wearing only an undergarment.
Unless it was an extremely intimate relationship or family members, referring to those serving in the household like maids, servants, and the like.
Now… there was no problem with the relationship, but this was in broad daylight after all.
Mo Li wasn’t a pedantic gentleman who strictly adhered to etiquette, especially when he was busy treating and saving lives, but seeing Meng Qi always flitting about in front of him, he had an impulse to grab the sand rat, stuff it into a bamboo tube, and tuck it into his chest to make it behave.
—Stop always doing things that cause misunderstandings and frighten people.
The two death warriors just now almost had their eyeballs pop out when they saw Meng Qi calmly undress.
“Doctor?”
“…It’s nothing. Why don’t they leave?” Mo Li turned his head to look at the Earth God Temple.
“Whatever the interrogator can think of, they can too.” Meng Qi, unconcerned, continued to unravel the thread on his robe.
His movements were so skilled, it was as if he had disassembled clothes a hundred times. Mo Li couldn’t help but glance sideways.
“What are you doing?”
“Oh, people have a bad habit of writing secret messages on notes and then sewing them into the layers of clothes or shoe linings.” Meng Qi spread his hands, then quickly added, “Of course, you won’t find anything on a death warrior, usually. If there is something, it’s meant to mislead you.”
Mo Li had no intention of going back to the Earth God Temple to strip the clothes off those two death warriors. He just stared at Meng Qi and said, “So you’re saying you’re very familiar with the seams in clothes?”
“…”
Though he eagerly anticipated the doctor making clothes for him, he still had to explain.
“No, I only know how to take them apart, never sewed them.” Meng Qi accurately picked out the seam thread and snapped it, his expression full of helplessness. “Like this.”
Whether as the national teacher after the establishment of the Chu Dynasty or leading troops in battle before its establishment, Meng Qi never needed to sew messages himself.
Mo Li didn’t relent, continuing to ask, “So you mean those two death warriors inside can sew clothes?”
“Possibly.” Meng Qi had a bad premonition.
He refused to wear clothes made by death warriors. What about the doctor’s promise to make them by hand?
“Doctor, this… I can try. As the saying goes, ‘Read a book a hundred times and its meaning will naturally appear.’ After unpicking so many threads, I’m familiar with these stitches and sewing techniques. Why don’t we figure it out together?” Meng Qi suggested enthusiastically.
Mo Li just looked at him, saying nothing.
Meng Qi’s heart tightened, and he secretly vowed to resolve the matter quickly.
“Fine, first we need to find the right thread.” Mo Li suggested calmly.
“We can buy more and practice on old clothes first.”
Meng Qi wanted to immediately take Mo Li away from there.
Forget the death warriors, let them fend for themselves in the Earth God Temple!
Meng Qi grabbed the cloth Mo Li was holding, folded the two pieces together, casually draped them over himself, and eagerly walked out.
A smile flickered in Mo Li’s eyes.
The sand rat was round, soft, and lovable, but there was no way a certain dragon vein could play dumb and take it easy without consequences!
Mo Li might not understand what the death warriors were up to, but he could see that Meng Qi was not in a hurry at all. Throwing those two out meant he really didn’t care, neither wanting to follow them nor to dig out more clues from them.
Or rather, the new clues should come from others.
The murder at the rice shop would soon spread throughout the small town.
Anyone who knew the details of the rice shop, or wanted to find out what was special about it, would dig three feet into the ground at the shop.
If those people ultimately found nothing, they would only turn their attention to them—the two who took away the rice shop murderer in full view of everyone.
Why did the rice shopkeeper die, and why did someone come to kill them? This secret was hard to hide, especially from Fengxing Pavilion; the assassins from Piaoping Pavilion wouldn’t be slow either. Even the local martial artists might be blinded by gold, and no one would easily give up.
A business deal with Piaoping Pavilion involved six hundred taels of gold. Other businesses weren’t as big, but they were definitely not small.
If one could grasp the transportation route of this mysterious assassin organization and intercept a shipment, they could disappear with the money without a trace, which was a very tempting prospect.
Although the risk was great, fortune favored the bold.
People like Elder Cai, who had seen and experienced a lot, now just wanted stability and could resist such temptations. But others might not be able to. The leader of the Changxin Gang couldn’t, and neither could the few Jinyiwei of the Qi Dynasty who had been disguising themselves as security guards for years.
Gold.
Whoever had gold could do many things they wanted.
Leave everything behind, enjoy fine wine and beautiful women, live incognito in another place as a wealthy man, or plot a rebellion like the Si family…
“This is a trap,” Mo Li suddenly said.
The Si family rice shop naturally reminded people of the Si family.
After the rice shopkeeper’s identity was exposed, some people’s attention would follow the six hundred taels of gold given by King Wu to the assassin organization, turning towards the mysterious channels of Piaoping Pavilion. Others would think of the Si family’s gold and wonder if part of it was hidden here.
Since the Si family wanted to rebel, they would always leave a way out.
Even if this was not the case, people would still think so.
Mo Li walked slower and slower, his expression becoming more severe. He suddenly turned back towards the Earth temple.
“Doctor?”
Meng Qi noticed the movement, immediately turned around, and then sighed.
In the Earth Temple, one of the two death warriors had already turned into a corpse, and the other was nowhere to be found.
Mo Li immediately saw that the corpse had been strangled, with purple handprints on the neck.
The corpse was still warm.
“He hasn’t gone far.” Mo Li immediately stood up to identify the tracks on the ground.
The footprints were not complicated. His and Meng Qi’s lightness skills were very high, so even on a muddy path soaked by heavy rain, they would only leave shallow traces. Although they had no intention of hiding their tracks, no one liked stepping into the mud, so the only visible footprints outside the Earth Temple were one set.
Very conspicuous.
The trees nearby did not offer much cover. Mo Li found a high vantage point and quickly spotted the stumbling figure.
Mo Li was about to give chase when a hand stretched out from the side, pulling him back.
Meng Qi shook his head at Mo Li. “He won’t go back to his master. He knows we might follow him.”
“Then what is he doing? And why did he kill his companion?” Mo Li asked, puzzled.
Meng Qi paused and then spoke softly, “For death warriors like him, even if you let them go, they will quickly commit suicide to keep secrets.”
“But he didn’t die?”
Instead, he killed his companion, and it wouldn’t have been due to a quarrel.
Mo Li saw clearly that there were no signs of a fight in front of the offering table, and the dead person had not resisted, as if killed in a coma.
Meng Qi’s voice echoed in his ears.
“They are not pure death warriors. Besides death and their mission, they have other thoughts. The forces that trained them taught them how to deceive and mislead others, and how to avoid the tortures of interrogators. This inevitably made the death warriors less pure, giving them their own ideas.”
Mo Li turned his head at the sound, looking at Meng Qi.
Meng Qi placed a comforting hand on Mo Li’s shoulder and asked, “How do you make these people willingly sacrifice their lives? There must be something that they consider more important than their lives.”
“Control with poison and antidotes?” Mo Li instinctively said.
This was the common influence of Qin Lu and Xue Ting, and it was the first answer Doctor Mo could think of.
“Close, but not reliable. Think again,” Meng Qi gently prompted, continuing to explain. “There are many desperados in the martial world. Sometimes, they don’t even care about their own lives. Even with an antidote, you might not control them.”
“Children, wives, relatives…” Mo Li muttered.
Meng Qi nodded and said solemnly, “Death warriors are often the slaves raised by their masters, loyal without question, and with a large family to serve their master. If they mess up, everyone in their family would be implicated. Martial world assassins might be orphans raised to be cold-blooded and ruthless, knowing nothing but killing. But death warriors raised by aristocratic or royal families are not like that. They are the kind of people whose deaths would bring greater benefits to their entire families.”
Mo Li’s throat moved, but he said nothing.
The death warriors he knew mostly appeared in the biographies of assassins.
They either avenged their masters or eradicated treacherous ministers and foolish kings for justice. In the Spring and Autumn period, there was an assassin from Jin who, deceived by his master to kill a good minister, realized his mistake and smashed his head against a tree in remorse.
Historical records might only remember loyalty and righteousness, but death warriors were just pawns raised by others.
Regardless of what kind of people these two death warriors were, they had walked this path and believed their lives belonged to their masters. Now it was said that they were willing to die not out of loyalty or gratitude but because their deaths would benefit their families more?
“By leaving, you gave them the opportunity to die.”
Mo Li had previously thought that death warriors sought death to keep secrets.
Without the threat, why would they seek death? To avoid being tracked, they could wander aimlessly.
Meng Qi shook his head. “No… I know one of them doesn’t want to die.”
“Because he failed to bite the poison capsule?” Mo Li frowned in disagreement. “He didn’t miss a step; he just happened to be seen by me.”
“No, it’s because when the account book was mentioned, he reacted the most,” Meng Qi said, adjusting the cloth wrapped around his arm before continuing leisurely. “He’s not afraid of death, but now he doesn’t need to die or betray his master. He might even track the gold with the account book. Most people would waver. We gave him this choice by leaving without killing him.”
“But… didn’t you completely intend not to chase him earlier?” Mo Li recalled that Meng Qi had genuinely intended to leave after taking the cloth and had even stopped him from pursuing just now.
Meng Qi sighed, spreading his hands. “Because he wants to use us. He knows there are too many forces investigating the account book, including the mysterious Piaoping Pavilion. He can’t handle it alone, so he hopes to rely on us. He might lead us to the account book and ask for a share of the money. He’s waiting for us to appear.”
Mo Li slowly understood.
Meng Qi coughed lightly, changing the subject.
“He overlooked one thing. Dragon veins are not interested in gold. We have as much as we need… By the way, are there gold mines under Qimao Mountain? Although there aren’t many gold mines in Shangyun Mountain, and they are deep, there are silver mines… More valuable are the numerous tombs in the mountain…”
Doctor Mo listened expressionlessly as the sand rat boasted about his wealth.
—Sorry, Qimao Mountain is too small, and there’s only one three-hundred-year-old ginseng.
Author’s note:
Fat Rat: My family is super rich, you know? You know? Tiptoeing and showing off.jpg
