The tip of the Samsara Spear, like an awl, spun and shredded through the gray-hued palm of the hand, then, with almost undiminished speed, thwack, it pierced through Sima Qing’s chest, right where the heart lay! The gray halo coating Sima Qing’s body gradually dissipated.
“Hah!”
Teng Qingshan’s gaze was sharp as a blade; in an instant, he seized the base of the Samsara Spear’s shaft and yanked it back with force!
“Splat!”
Another gush of blood sprayed out. Sima Qing stared wide-eyed at Teng Qingshan, his gaze a complex mixture of terror, malice, and profound reluctance.
“I... I died at the hands of a seventeen-year-old youth?” Sima Qing felt his life rapidly draining away, yet his mind could still function. His dimming eyes were fixed upon the cold, god-of-slaughter figure above him. “I, Sima Qing, have fought my entire life, even Wei Wuya couldn't kill me. For this Black Fire Spirit Fruit, I only came to toy with things. Who would have thought I’d fall to a seventeen-year-old youth! Yes, this time, I was felled by hubris. Facing any Innate Expert, I always relied on a swift sneak attack; if the sneak attack failed, I would flee. Against a seventeen-year-old youth, I became complacent. Just one moment of arrogance, and I, ‘Ghost Fox’ Sima Qing, am dead!”
Sima Qing’s eyes completely dimmed, and his consciousness blurred.
After pulling out the spear, Teng Qingshan unexpectedly slammed a foot onto Sima Qing’s corpse to slow his downward rush, but Sima Qing’s body plummeted even faster!
Thud!
The corpse smashed violently onto the gravel ground below, blood splattering everywhere.
“Boom!” Teng Qingshan landed on the ground, letting out a low, heavy sound.
“About a hundred meters high, free-falling, purely relying on the body’s toughness to absorb the impact,” Teng Qingshan nodded internally. “If I used internal energy to lessen my body weight, the downward acceleration would be significantly smaller. If I further incorporated force-dissipating techniques, I could probably fall from three hundred meters without relying on external objects to cushion the blow!”
As his strength continually increased, it had been a long time since Teng Qingshan had tested the absolute limit of height he could endure during a fall.
To be safe, when jumping from ordinary mountains, Teng Qingshan always struck the mountain rocks or used his feet to press against stones to slow his descent.
But this free fall from a hundred meters just now proved that his body’s tolerance was indeed much stronger than it had been a few years ago.
...
On the sandy ground beside this sheer cliff, the gravel was stained crimson with blood. Sima Qing’s corpse was already mangled, and Teng Qingshan walked towards it.
“Ghost Fox, Sima Qing!” Teng Qingshan carefully examined Sima Qing’s entire body, his first focus being the gloves. “These gloves, put them on and you can touch weapons. Too bad... they’re ruined now!” Teng Qingshan reached out and ripped open the clothes on Sima Qing’s body.
Riiiip!
Beneath the clothes was a layer of black inner armor! The black inner armor also featured a large hole right in the chest area.
Whether it was the gloves or the inner armor, both were pierced with a massive hole by Teng Qingshan’s ultimate move, ‘Poison Dragon Drill.’ After all, when Teng Qingshan used the Tough Iron Spear when he was weaker, he could use this move to pierce the outer layer of scales on a flood dragon. Teng Qingshan was very confident now—
With his physical and internal energy powers fully unleashed, even a flood dragon would suffer damage against the strongest ‘Poison Dragon Drill’!
“This ruined inner armor and gloves are a waste. I have no interest in collecting junk,” Teng Qingshan reached into Sima Qing’s inner coat pocket and flipped everything out at once.
A few taels of loose silver! A damp silver banknote!
That transparent Black Fire Spirit Root emanating a strange luster! The root tendrils faintly glowed milky white.
And a small package wrapped tightly in parchment!
“To cross the deep pool and enter underground, the whole body will get soaked. But this Sima Qing is truly wealthy. A banknote worth a full hundred taels of silver, and he didn't even keep it inside the parchment wrapping. He truly is an Innate Expert, not caring about such petty cash. What is inside this package?”
Teng Qingshan tucked the Black Fire Spirit Root into his chest without a second thought. This was the most important item.
Then, Teng Qingshan opened the parchment package.
“Tsk, tsk!” Teng Qingshan’s eyes immediately widened into circles. “This old fellow is really quite rich!”
A thick stack of gleaming gold notes!
These were gold notes!
The script on them was all golden. The most startling thing was that only two notes were denominated at one hundred taels of gold; the majority were denominated at one thousand taels of gold, and at the very end, there were even a few notes denominated at ten thousand taels of gold! In total, there were seventy to eighty gold notes, a thick stack!
“Sixty-eight thousand-tael gold notes! Two hundred-tael notes, and eight ten-thousand-tael notes! Added up, that’s 148,200 taels of gold notes! Nearly one hundred and fifty thousand taels of gold,” Teng Qingshan gasped, drawing a sharp breath!
That was nearly fifteen million taels of silver!
No matter where it was placed, this was a massive fortune!
“Just this stack!” Teng Qingshan held the stack of gold notes as if he were gripping a stack of hundred-yuan RMB notes in his previous life, only this value was thousands of times higher. “Why would this old fellow carry such a massive fortune on his person?” Teng Qingshan understood immediately!
Teng Qingshan showed a faint smile: “This Sima Qing was substituting for ‘Wang Yun’! He might have been ready to run off at any moment, so of course, he wouldn't leave his money at Wang Yun’s residence!”
Ghost Fox, ‘Sima Qing,’ the moment his tracks were exposed, would have to flee for his life!
His wealth would naturally be kept close!
As an Innate Expert, Ghost Fox ‘Sima Qing’ was renowned for his cunning; it was easy for an Innate Expert to amass wealth. How could ‘Sima Qing,’ who was over a hundred years old, not have accumulated an astonishing amount of wealth over the years? Given his character, he trusted no one.
Keep the money close, and if he was killed, then the wealth would be taken. But once dead, the gold and silver meant nothing to him.
As long as he lived, with his Innate Expert abilities, could anyone steal from his bosom? Therefore, his chest was the safest place to hide his money.
“So many gold notes, probably accumulated over a lifetime. I’ll take them!” Although this enormous fortune made Teng Qingshan inwardly astonished, it only brought him pleasure. After all, for a supreme expert, accumulating wealth was a simple matter. Ghost Fox ‘Sima Qing’ probably only completed a few major jobs before stopping.
Even outright robbery!
Slamming a major salt merchant and seizing millions of taels of silver would be effortless for an Innate Expert.
However, for Innate Experts, gold and silver held little meaning anymore.
“Wealth, when too much, is just a number. But... without money, things become very troublesome,” Teng Qingshan knew clearly that this sum of money could bring about a better life for his parents and his clansmen. “Hmm, let me see if there’s anything else. Why aren't there any secret manuals! This ‘Sima Qing’ could change his appearance to match Wang Yun’s, so he must have some unique method for disguise. Moreover, his small-scale evasive maneuvers were more agile than mine. He should possess a top-tier close-quarters movement technique manual.”
Teng Qingshan had originally expected the thick package to contain a manual.
Unfortunately, the package was thick mainly because of the gold notes; there were no manuals at all!
Teng Qingshan had desperately wanted a close-quarters movement manual, since Journey’s End was only a long-distance, straight-line lightness skill manual, not one for dodging and weaving in small spaces!
“There are some strange things, though,” Teng Qingshan found that inside the package, besides the gold notes, there were various messy items, such as silver needles, Lan Yun Beads—essentials for roaming the world—and a small porcelain vial. Besides these, there were also two...
“Masks?” Teng Qingshan picked up the two flesh-colored human faces in surprise. “Could these be human-skin masks?”
Teng Qingshan examined them closely. One was the face of a seemingly ordinary youth; the other was the face of a middle-aged man with a scar. The craftsmanship was incredibly exquisite. When Teng Qingshan touched the human-skin masks, they felt ice-cold. They were lighter than air.
“Huh? Then what about Sima Qing’s face...” Teng Qingshan carefully probed around Sima Qing’s jawline and temples, and with one forceful pull, he peeled off a human-skin mask.
Beneath the human-skin mask was Sima Qing’s true face.
This Sima Qing had very thin lips and narrow eyes; his entire visage suggested a sharp and severe nature.
“This Sima Qing was truly formidable at transformation. The craftsmanship of this human-skin mask rivals that of the top disguise masters of later eras,” Teng Qingshan knew immediately that this mask must be made from special materials. “With this human-skin mask, acting in the future will be much more convenient for me!”
Teng Qingshan could control his body’s bones, muscles, and tendons to make himself taller or shorter, bulkier or thinner, but his facial features were difficult to alter.
In his previous life, when Teng Qingshan worked as an assassin, he had also learned disguise and camouflage.
However, that required certain materials, whereas this human-skin mask was simple to use!
“Although I didn't get the manual I wanted most, this is not bad either. I’ll let you rest in peace,” Teng Qingshan suddenly vibrated the Samsara Spear in his hand. The spear plunged into the sand and gravel ahead, and a visible swirling current of energy emanated from the tip.
Explode!
BOOM! With a deafening sound, as if explosives were buried underground, a massive pit, over ten feet wide and nearly ten feet deep, was blasted into the sand and gravel ahead.
Blazing Fire Five Forms—Fire Ends, Fuel Continues!
Teng Qingshan expended only a small amount of internal energy to effortlessly blast out the huge pit, then kicked the corpse into it. Teng Qingshan then pushed the surrounding sand and gravel into the pit, completely burying the body. The Innate Expert, ‘Sima Qing,’ was thus silently interred in the Flaming Mountain.
No one knew, except Teng Qingshan.
“Hoo!” Teng Qingshan swiftly rushed to a mountain stream beside a nearby bamboo grove.
After this battle, Teng Qingshan’s face and hands were covered in dust. After a quick wash, Teng Qingshan also cleaned the ‘Wang Yun’ mask: “This mask belongs to the old man; if I wear it, I’ll probably need to dye my hair, which is too much trouble. The other two suits me better!”
Teng Qingshan put on the human-skin mask of the scarred middle-aged man.
Teng Qingshan felt a chill where the human-skin mask met his skin, and the mask automatically adhered to his skin. It felt comfortable; Teng Qingshan did not feel the slightest discomfort. “This Sima Qing’s offensive methods were average, but his ability to craft human-skin masks is truly powerful.”
He glanced at his reflection in the stream; what stared back was the countenance of a fierce, middle-aged man.
“If I alter my physique further, even my mother and father wouldn’t recognize me.” Teng Qingshan immediately rewrapped the mask and the gold notes inside the parchment, then hid them within the inner lining layer between his cold-iron inner armor and underclothes. It wasn't that Teng Qingshan didn’t want to put them in his outer coat pocket; it was that the outer coat was completely shredded.
“Now, it’s time to eat this little thing!”
Teng Qingshan held the Black Fire Spirit Root!