Archfiend

Chapter 122: Seven People

A raised hand collapsed and scattered the clouds in the sky, and a chopping hatchet appeared to crack through the entire earth. Oddly, there just wasn’t the hair of a tremor or even a crack to speak of. 

In this manner, the giant repeated this monotonous action. It was unknown how long he’d done so and moreover unknown if he was weary. Ax after ax like so, it seemed he could strike for an epoch. To and fro, he continued to hack in this manner. 

“Run!” the clan uncle said lowly and deeply, “Leave this place with me now!”

His expression was grave. There wasn’t a single person who objected. Their location was situated on a tall mountain. This mountain was the same as Danxia Temple, which was a thousand meters away; there wasn’t a plant’s stem, only gruesome and multicolored cliff rocks. However, just as they descended the mountain, the old man suddenly stopped.

“Uncle, what’s going on?” a youth questioned. 

The old man made a shushing gesture and looked uncertainly all around, bewildered. These young cultivators who had just started recently drawing qi into their bodies couldn’t sense it, but he could clearly hear… the bubbling sound of a stream. It happened to be echoing not too far away!

He followed the noise and looked. Over yonder, there was a cave, a dried-up cavern. Nobody had the peace of mind to probe how deep it was inside. However, the sound of water at this moment was drifting out from within!

His gaze tightly locked onto the cave. It could be nothing else. This place… was one of the Eight Great Deadlands! In the cultivation world, Longsu Province’s Danxia Temple Colonnades were terrible in might and awe-inspiring. Anything that happened here was no surprise at all. 

Craaaash… The sound of a river became louder and louder. Several minutes later, wide rivulets, no less than a few meters in width, slowly flowed out from the cave’s mouth. Moreover… these rivulets didn’t flow in a straight line. In the darkness, there appeared to be something in the gorge guiding them. These streams… were all flowing crookedly!

The old man was none the wiser, but at the same time, Danxia Temple’s surroundings were like this within an area of 500 kilometers! Altogether, 500 caverns madly sprayed out countless streams of water. Looking from the sky, these 500 places formed a strange tremendous pattern!

At the nexus of it was Longsu Province’s Danxia Temple Colonnades! It appeared… that there was someone smashing open the lock of one of China’s Eight Great Deadlands!

“This is?” The clan uncle’s eyes suddenly brightened. Not only him, all the youths gaped. They looked at the stream with great astonishment! 

Unique pure-white lotus petals followed the stream and surged out, but this wasn’t quite shocking. The crux of the matter was… that within these lotus petals, there was occasionally a man-sized azure scale!

“Go!” The old man’s voice was hoarse, his expression incredibly heavy. Bringing all the youths, he didn’t even turn his head back as he swiftly hurried down the mountain. “Clan Elder!” As he ran, he took out his cell phone and said heavily, “Please immediately notify the Featherwood Guard and the CSIB that at Longsu Province’s Danxia Temple Colonnades… something big has happened!”

All of this seemed to be an autumn leaf on the horizon. Far away in the north, Xu Yangyi was simply ignorant concerning the sudden change that emerged in China’s west. He was sitting on an airplane headed to the capital of the neighboring province, Shengjing City. Reportedly, the archaeologist was in Shengjing. As one of China’s ancient and time-honored cities, Shengjing truly attracted a great amount of experts to take up residence. 

After an hour, Xu Yangyi, Peony, and Li Zongyuan were standing in front of a villa. In this outing, Xu Yangyi had taken the Thousand Illusions. From here onwards, he was a middle-aged man around forty years old, roughly 1.75 meters in height, and in a well-ironed suit. With the addition of his calmness tempered from long seclusion, he played the role of a roughly forty-year-old man surnamed Gao. At the very least, there wasn’t the slightest misgiving in his outer appearance.

“Master, over there is Specialist Liu Shuren’s apartment building.” Li Zongyuan said respectfully, “Me and his son are familiar with each other. That’s how I found him.” 

Xu Yangyi’s brows formed a faint crease, and he looked at the apartment building for a long time. He suddenly said, “Does he know about your identity?”

“No,” Li Zongyuan answered suspiciously. He didn’t understand why Xu Yangyi had asked this.

Xu Yangyi’s countenance was motionless as he observed the villa, and the crook of his mouth curved upwards. “Interesting.” 

His spiritual sense was much, much sharper than others. Even if he was separated by the villa, he could still sense that there weren’t just two or three people inside. Rather, there were a full ten people! More importantly, they had guns, and there were also bullets inside these guns. 

“Wait for me outside.” Xu Yangyi turned his head back and said, raising his leg and advancing inside.

“Captain, they’re coming!” Meanwhile, in a room on the second story, a man wearing a police uniform softly let go of shutter blind. He said into his microphone, “The one coming this time looks like a ringleader-level character from the relic thieves.”

“We need to strike if prompted,” a man’s voice could be heard from the transceiver. 

“Roger!”

Xu Yangyi didn’t pay any heed to the building. A gun? What was that? Could it be eaten?

“Mr. Liu.” On the second floor, a police officer nodded towards a man. “I’m handing things over to you. I’ve already started the recorder. Once you’ve got him to spit things out, we’ll carry out the arrest immediately.”

“Captain Wang,” Liu Shuren sighed. “They handed over this box to me over a year ago. There wasn’t anything else. You also can’t say this is certainly a…”

“Whether it is or isn’t, won’t you know once you ask?” Captain Wang snorted coldly. “Privately concealing a historical relic, covering it up, and not declaring it. Based on just this, he’s going to the police station for a trip!”

“Is it really such a big deal?” In a secret location, a policeman whispered and asked. 

“Hush…” A person at his side glared at him. “Why are you talking so much? I heard that someone took a liking to this box this time. They asked our squad to make a round.”

Step by step, Xu Yangyi unhurriedly walked up stairs as if he was unaware that there were seven other people in the room.

“Mr. Liu.” He sat down on the sofa. In front of him, a cup of fragrant tea had been earlier arranged. “How’s my item?”

“It’s already finished.” Liu Shuren’s smile was exceptionally awkward. The scholar had been made to practice it, but it truly was somewhat forced. He inwardly gritted his teeth. “However… there are a few matters that I still must ask Mr. Gao to reveal.” Obtaining Xu Yangyi’s nod of approval, he deliberated and said, “I still don’t know… the origin of this half-box. I also have some confusion that require knowing its history. In these two years, I’ve only met Mr. Gao once. I honestly had no way of posing the question.”

In his heart, Xu Yangyi found it to be ridiculous. It was the start of a great gag. He sat on the sofa and beckoned with a hooked finger, Liu Shuren moving closer as if through magic. He chuckled quietly and murmured at the side of the specialist’s ear, “Of course… I dug it out from underground.”

Without a moment’s delay, Liu Shuren was so frightened that his complexion whitened, and his body shrunk back like a spring. This seemed to remind him of his objective, and he covered his chest and gasped. He shivered faintly, his words failing to connect. “Y-Y-You g-guys are tomb raiders?!”

“Guessed it?” Xu Yangyi smiled as his ten fingers crossed in front of his chest, his laughter incomparably natural. “This is a good item, eh…”

The police… It’s really been quite a long time since our last run-in...

Xu Yangyi faintly recalled his colleagues from Sanshui City. Five years ago in 2016, they could barely be considered cute.

Liu Shuren’s complexion was somewhat deathly white. This wasn’t his first time meeting a tomb raider, but this was the first time he’d laid eyes on such an unbridled Tu Xingsun! [1]

Furthermore… he didn’t know why—perhaps it was something considered human intuition—but he didn’t want to get near this man. His sixth sense was telling him not to get close, not to approach at all costs! This person was extremely dangerous!

Xu Yangyi peacefully lit a cigarette and said in amusement, “It’s just a joke, nothing else. This thing was passed down from my ancestors. I’ve always kept it on me since I was a child. I learned by chance that this chest has some other significance, though.”

Behind the tightly shut door, everyone in the police squad that were involved looked at each other in dismay. 

“Captain… should we make the arrest?” a policeman asked for instruction. “This item… was passed down from that guy’s ancestors…”

“Passed down from my ancestors, my ass!” Captain Wang coldly snorted. “He robbed it from a grave, so he’s just saying it was passed down from his ancestors! I’ve seen a lot of tricks like this!”

“But…”

“No buts!” The other vice captain opened his mouth, his face heavy like water. “Everyone, me and Captain Wang know a bit more about this business. You guys talk less. All you need to know is that if we don’t go back with this item, don’t even dream of screwin’ around in Shengjing City.”

No one spoke again.

“But it’ll be really no good to arrest someone like this…” the vice captain muttered to himself for a brief moment and looked at Captain Wang. “Old Wang, we can’t take part in this business. If something really happens, then we’ll be the ones taking the blame. We’ll just bring him over there, hand him straight over, and be on our way.”

“That’s easy to say.” Captain Wang’s face also revealed distress. “If he screams along the entire way, will we still want our reputation as police? You think this is gonna be a hit on the internet?”

Chink. A soft sound echoed, and the vice captain pulled on his handgun safety, the corner of his mouth slightly perking up. “A tranquilizer dart is a nice thing.”

Outside the door, Xu Yangyi and Liu Shuren’s conversation had already entered the main topic. A pitch-black tranquilizer gun was already aimed at Xu Yangyi’s left shoulder. The muscle there was plentiful, so the dart’s breach wouldn’t cause injury to the body. At such a close distance, there moreover wasn’t a possibility of missing. 

“So, Mr. Liu, wouldn’t it be better if we go talk in your study about the specifics?” Everything within the apartment had been taken in by Xu Yangyi’s spiritual sense. He originally had the mind to joke, but even now a wisp of killing intent had emerged.

To him, a gun wasn’t any threat whatsoever. Yet to use a gun against him could be regarded as a threat. Of course, it couldn’t be considered one, either. It was the mere difference of a single word: tranquilizer. This difference lay within whether or not there would be people alive after five seconds. 

Xu Yangyi was by no means bloodthirsty. He ultimately decided to ask some questions, settle this matter, and then leave.

“Oh?” Liu Shuren didn’t realize why Xu Yangyi had suddenly put forth this request and said in surprise, “Isn’t it the same here?”

“It’s not…” Xu Yangyi smiled as he snapped his finger. “There are too many people. It’ll be no good if they listen.” This remark caused everyone’s eyes besides his to sharpen at once!

He knows! How could he possibly know?! 

This didn’t make sense! This wasn’t realistic! They had been waiting here for several days! In these past couple days, none of them had left through the door! It was impossible that someone was keeping tabs on them!

Bang! Without any unnecessary words, a spark instantly exploded from the gun in the vice captain’s hand.

Xu Yangyi faintly sighed. This really wasn’t his original intention… His current speed still truly was no faster than a bullet’s. Nonetheless, it wasn’t like he didn’t want to avoid this kind of scenario.

1. There are two things going on this sentence that I want to point out. The word that the author uses for “tomb raider/grave thief/etc/” comes from a popular work of fiction in China that’s name in english is “Ghost Blows Out the Light”. It is/was EXTREMELY popular. The book is about a group of grave robbers stealing from tombs. Second, Tu Xingsun is a character from the opera The Three-Mountain Pass. He is a dwarf with the power to go into the earth. In opera, he is represented with a yellow mask, which indicates a couple things, mainly that the character is sturdy/brave/fierce/ambitious, but also cruel/short/tempered/sly.