Elderly Martial Saint: Sixty Times the Cultivation Speed ​​at the Start

The lanterns at the back door of Fumanlou illuminated the street in front of the restaurant, where there were hardly any pedestrians left.

Yi Yang pushed open the door, tripped on the stone steps, bumped his shoulder against the door frame, and hummed an off-key tune.

The tune was out of tune, high notes followed by low notes, just like a drunken old man.

The smell of alcohol emanated from his collar as he walked on the bluestone slabs of West Street, his left foot stepping on the shadow of his right. His shoulders swayed like a mast on a ship, about to topple over. All the shops along the street were closed, and the street was as quiet as ever.

Despite appearing drunk, Yi Yang's internal organs were circulating qi and blood.

His internal organs were all heating up. His Qi and blood, which were at the Refining Realm, circulated evenly along his meridians. The half-jar of old yellow wine he had just drunk was mostly broken down after passing through his Qi and blood. The remaining alcohol was not even enough to make him burp.

Yi Yang hummed a tune as he walked slowly.

This was intentional; he was waiting.

Wait for the two tails to catch up.

As Yi Yang turned into the narrow alley in the west of the town, he stumbled and leaned against the wall to catch his breath.

In the short span of two breaths, his five senses, enhanced by the Refining Realm, naturally unfolded, and he did not turn around.

No need to look back.

After being enhanced to the Refining Realm, the range of the five senses covered is much wider than when it was at the fourth level.

His hearing, touch, and even the vibration frequency transmitted from the soles of his feet were all telling him the same thing.

There were two groups of footsteps about forty paces behind.

The heavy-looking guy on the left, his boots making a very slight clicking sound as they stepped on the roof tiles, with even intervals and a steady rhythm, was Cao Tie with his bushy beard. His physique and weight were impossible to hide, no matter what he stepped on.

The group on the right was much more agile, their breathing rapid and shallow, carrying the tension only seen before battle. Qian Jiu, with his hooked nose, was positioned five or six steps behind Cao Tie, close to the wall—a formation for coordinated ambushes.

The two men followed each other for almost two alleys, standing in the shadows of the eaves on either side, without making a move.

What are you waiting for?

Yi Yang's lips curved into a smile in the darkness. His right hand emerged from his sleeve, his fingertips resting on the hilt of the knife at his waist, his thumb against the guard, and his fingertips touching the cold iron edge.

Without speeding up or looking back, the drunkard simply walked wherever he wanted.

But my mind was searching for maps.

Not far ahead, we will pass by the abandoned granary in the west of the town.

The alley is lined with high walls on both sides without windows, and at the end, it's blocked off by a solid brick wall. Once inside, you're trapped like a turtle in a jar; there's nowhere to run.

The place Tang Hao chose to kill was most likely that place.

But Yi Yang wouldn't let him have his way.

His footing faltered, his body swayed, and he turned into the right fork in the road.

The side path was narrower, with broken bricks and tiles piled up at the base of the walls on both sides, but it was open at both ends. There was a way out.

Although he could easily handle the two behind him with his own abilities, he couldn't break a habit ingrained over decades—always leaving himself a way out, even if he never needed it.

After walking a short distance into the depths of the path, the sounds behind me changed.

The sound of shattering tiles exploded from the upper left.

Cao Tie couldn't wait any longer.

If the prey deviates from the planned route, the longer it drags on, the more variables there will be. A seasoned veteran's judgment is quick and accurate.

Using the momentum of its fall, the massive body wielded a short sword imbued with the full power of its perfected three levels of qi and blood, aiming a straight strike at the back of Yi Yang's neck.

The sound of a blade tearing through the air was sharp and piercing, amplified by the two walls in the narrow alley, not unlike someone scraping a metal plate with their fingernail.

This is meant to be a fatal blow.

With the speed and power of Qi and Blood Triple Level, one strike is enough to deal with an "old waste".

At least that's what Cao Tie thought.

Yi Yang didn't flinch, nor did he even stop walking.

His body turned slightly to the side by half an inch.

In that split second, he drew his sword with his right hand.

The sound of the knife being drawn from its sheath was extremely short, so short that it almost blended into the same syllable as the whistling sound of the blade cutting through the air.

The blade flashed in the moonlight, tracing a diagonal arc from bottom to top.

The fourth move of the Nine Peaks Saber.

Strange peaks.

Going against the tide, using speed to counter speed, and ruthlessness to counter ruthlessness.

There were no fancy moves or unnecessary actions; it was as clean as the countless pieces of firewood that had been chopped over the past sixty years. Identify the grain, and cut it cleanly at the root with one stroke.

The blade aimed straight for Cao Tie's throat, who was still in mid-air.

Cao Tie saw the flash of the blade.

His pupils shrank to the size of pinpoints in that instant; his body's instincts acted faster than his brain.

He forcefully pulled the short sword back from the trajectory of the slash and held it horizontally in front of his chest to block, while at the same time he slammed his left fist into Yi Yang's shoulder, trying to use brute force to push the old man down.

The short sword struck Yi Yang's left shoulder first.

The moment the blade sliced ​​through the clothes and touched the flesh, Cao Tie's hand froze.

No, the feel is completely wrong.

It wasn't the soft resistance you'd expect when a knife cuts into flesh; it was the jarring, metallic clang of metal striking metal.

The blade was stuck in the ground before it could penetrate even halfway, and a violent tingling sensation shot through the tiger's mouth, shooting from the wrist all the way to the elbow joint, almost causing the short knife to fly out of the hand.

What kind of skin and flesh is this?

Only half a thought had time to pop into Cao Tie's mind.

Dirty Refining —

The last character, "境" (jing), was not shown.

Yi Yang's knife-making process has completed the entire oblique arc trajectory.

The blade entered from the left side of Cao Tie's lower jaw, cut diagonally across his throat and cervical vertebrae, and exited from behind his right ear.

A knife.

It was over before the blood droplets on the knife could even be flicked off.

It spun twice in the air, its lips still moving. Perhaps it wanted to shout something, perhaps it wanted to curse something, but its vocal cords had already broken, and air gushed out from the cut, bringing with it a puff of warm blood mist.

His head hit the bluestone slab, bounced, and rolled three feet away.

Those wide-open eyes reflected the upside-down moon and the image of his headless body falling to the ground.

Cao Tie, the leader of the Red Tiger Gang.

Qi and blood are perfectly balanced.

From the moment he leaped off the roof to the moment his head was severed from his body, only three breaths had passed. He couldn't even leave a wound on Yi Yang that was more than half an inch deep.

The headless corpse crashed to the ground, blood gushing from the severed neck, spreading into a large pool on the bluestone slab.

Yi Yang stood sideways at the edge of the pool of blood, his shoes clean.

He glanced down at Cao Tie's corpse, his gaze no different from that of someone looking at a rotten piece of firewood.

The shallow wound on his left shoulder from where the dagger had been embedded had stopped bleeding. His flesh and skin at the Refining Realm healed faster than he had expected.

At the other end of the alley.

Qian Jiu remained motionless in the shadows of the corner.

He saw it all.

Three breaths, a full three breaths.

Cao Tie—his brother who had fought alongside him for seven years, a well-known leader in the Red Tiger Gang, and a tough guy with perfected Qi and Blood—had his head chopped off by that white-haired old man with a single blow.

It's no different from killing a chicken.

No, you have to hold down a chicken's wings before killing it, but that old man didn't even stop walking.

Qian Jiu's molars were chattering, and the sound of his teeth hitting each other was amplified tenfold in his mind, each one sounding like a death knell.

It's not the second level of Qi and Blood, not the third level, and this level of strength isn't even the fourth level.

It is at least the fifth level of Qi and Blood Refining Realm.

They were deceived, Tang Hao was deceived, everyone was deceived.

The sixty-year-old man reviewing the case files put on a grand show for all of them. He performed from beginning to end, and no one noticed a flaw.

Qian Jiu made an instinctive choice.

run.

He turned and rushed towards the alley entrance. His legs were filled with the full power of his perfected third level of Qi and Blood, and he sprang up from the ground with his toes, his body flying along the wall at maximum speed.

Only one thought remained in his mind—to leave this alley, run back to the Red Tiger Gang, and survive.

He had barely taken ten steps when he heard footsteps behind him.

The footsteps were unhurried, almost like taking a walk.

But suddenly the footsteps behind me stopped.

The wind picked up.

Immediately afterwards, Qian Jiu lost feeling in both legs.

It's not numbness, it's disappearance.

The part below his knees no longer belonged to him.

He didn't even feel any pain, only that his body suddenly shrunk a bit, his center of gravity shifted, and the inertia pushed his upper body forward for a moment before he lost his support and fell face-first onto the bluestone slab.

His chin was bleeding from the impact, and two of his front teeth were broken, with fragments mixed with blood and foam dripping from the corner of his mouth.

A sharp pain followed, shooting upwards from his two broken legs, as if someone were stuffing burning hot charcoal into his bones.

Qian Jiu looked down.

Both lower legs were neatly positioned three feet behind them.

The cross-section is as smooth as a mirror.

The cut on the bone looked no different from tofu cut open with a sharp blade; the white bone fragments gleamed coldly in the moonlight, and the muscle fibers were still instinctively twitching and contracting.

A distorted roar escaped Qian Jiu's throat.

It wasn't calling for help; it was an uncontrollable physiological reaction after the pain reached its peak.

Yi Yang sheathed his sword, the blood on the blade gleaming a dark red in the moonlight. He tore a piece of clothing from Cao Tie's corpse and slowly wiped the blade, front and back.

He walked unhurriedly toward Qian Jiu, who was lying on the ground.

The soles of the boots stomped over the pool of blood, making a sticky sound.

Qian Jiu tried desperately to climb. Blood gushed from his broken leg, and his strength was draining away ten times faster than he had imagined. He dragged his ten fingers forward, digging into the cracks in the stone slabs, his nails peeling off and his fingertips a bloody mess, but he couldn't move an inch.

Yi Yang walked to his side and squatted down.

He held the knife across his knee with one hand, and patted Qian Jiu's back with the other. The force wasn't heavy, but it felt like the sky had fallen on Qian Jiu.

"Qian Jiu, right?"

Yi Yang's voice was hoarse and flat, exactly the same as when he was toasting and clinking bowls in the restaurant.

"Why are you running away? What's wrong? You haven't finished your drink yet? Want to have a few more drinks with this old man?"

Qian Jiu lay prone on the ground, his face pressed against the cold stone slab, half of his face soaked in blood. His lips trembled so much he couldn't speak, fear had turned his thoughts into a jumbled mess, but a sliver of reason remained—to tell him: You are already dead, you just haven't breathed your last yet.

He opened his mouth, and the sound squeezed out from his throat, breaking into fragments.

"Spare me...spare me...I'll talk...I'll tell you everything..."

Qian Jiu's eyes darted around, and his unfocused pupils reflected the expressionless old face squatting in front of him.

"It was Tang Hao... Tang Hao instructed... the county magistrate... the county magistrate wanted a booklet..."

Yi Yang listened.

His expression remained completely calm.

He knew all this information. He had heard it from Zhao Gang and deduced it from Luneng's behavior before his death.

He had even mastered the basics of the "Five Internal Organs Refining Strength" manual that the county magistrate had requested.

Qian Jiu was still pouring out the contents, his voice growing softer and softer.

"Tang Hao said...after it's done...the gold is ours...the register is for the county magistrate...I beg you...give me a quick death..."

Yi Yang stood up and looked down at the person on the ground.

The pool of blood grew larger and larger. Qian Jiu's face was as white as paper, his lips were blue, and his pupils were mostly dilated. He had lost too much blood and wouldn't last much longer.

"Anything else?"

Qian Jiu's lips trembled, and tears welled up in her eyes. It wasn't regret, but pure, naked despair.

"Please... just give me a quick death..."

Yi Yang didn't hesitate.

The knife rises, the knife falls.

Clean and efficient.

Qian Jiu's body trembled, then he became completely still.

Two skilled members of the Red Tiger Gang, both at the peak of the third level of Qi and Blood cultivation, died in the same alley within thirty breaths of each other.

Yi Yang crouched down and turned the body over.

Cao Tie pulled out twelve taels of silver, a decent-quality short knife, and a Red Tiger Gang badge. Qian Jiu was even more destitute, with only eight taels of silver and a few copper coins.

The two of them together had less than twenty-five taels.

Yi Yang stuffed the silver into his pocket, too lazy to take the copper coins. He left the waist token next to the corpse untouched.

Twenty-five taels.

Last time, killing Fang Yu only yielded three taels of silver. This time, although it's better, the difference is still limited. For two Red Tiger Gang henchmen to end up like this is quite an achievement.

He dragged the two bodies to a culvert cover deep in the alley. The culvert was deep enough that once the cover was closed, nothing seemed amiss from the outside. His movements were so practiced it was heartbreaking; after all, it wasn't his first time doing this kind of work.

After cleaning up the scene, Yi Yang leaned against the alley wall.

He examined the shallow wound on his left shoulder. It had scabbed over, and the scar was barely noticeable. For a cultivator at the Refining Realm, the self-healing power was like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut when faced with such a minor injury.

Yi Yang took out the two small yellow croakers from his pocket and weighed them in his palm.

Ten taels of gold.

Originally, Tang Hao used it as bait, but now he has gotten back his principal and interest, and even made an extra twenty-five taels of silver and a short knife.

"This deal is a good one."

Yi Yang carefully put the gold bars away from his body, then went around to the other end of the alley and walked along the shadows of the back street towards the restaurant.

The night breeze carried away the lingering smell of blood.

Yi Yang certainly hadn't forgotten that Tang Hao was still alive. Based on his guess, Tang Hao should be staying at the Tianzi Room on the third floor of Fumanlou tonight to provide an alibi.

The snake will wait until dawn, and if it doesn't receive a reply from Cao Tie and Qian Jiu, it will know that things have gone wrong.

Therefore, Yi Yang did not intend to keep him until dawn.