The Little Demonic Cultivator in the Courtyard: Borrowing 100,000 Japanese Pirates to Heal

The two corpses, one an elderly man with gray hair and the other a teenager, lay in the middle of the courtyard, the bluestone slab beneath them soaked in blood.

A woman sat slumped beside the boy's corpse, her voice hoarse from crying. Two Japanese soldiers held her at bayonet point, preventing her from moving. She could only cover her mouth with her hand, her shoulders convulsing violently.

The courtyard was deathly silent, save for the woman's muffled sobs echoing through the air.

Wang Xiaoyong glanced at it once and then looked away.

He's used to it.

This morning, he had already followed the Japanese soldiers through three courtyards, and the same routine was used in each one.

Assembly, investigation, killing, reprimand.

Some killed because not all the people were present, some because the other person had a buzz cut, and some for no reason at all—the Japanese just wanted to kill people to establish their authority.

This was not a spur-of-the-moment decision; the Japanese did it on purpose. From the very beginning, they instilled extreme fear and awe in all the residents of Beijing, so that they dared not resist.

This is the experience they summarized from the three northern provinces.

Knowing that many members of the Da Xia people were fearless and undaunted by death, it was necessary to resort to extreme violence from the outset to achieve a strong deterrent effect.

Wang Xiaoyong walked up to the sergeant, took off his hat, bent down slightly, put on a smile, and said a few words in a low voice.

The sergeant listened, nodding, a hint of satisfaction in his eyes.

"Wang Xiaoyong, you did a great job, very good."

Wang Xiaoyong's face showed a flattered expression. He bowed even lower and said in a fawning voice, "It is my honor to serve the Imperial Army."

The sergeant nodded again, took a folder from his waist, opened it, and tapped on it with his finger.

It was a map showing the distribution of rice shops in the upper district, marking the location of all the rice shops in the area and the names of the shop owners.

There are a total of thirty-three rice shops.

"Very good, you will be in charge of supervising all rice shops in the Upper District."

The sergeant shifted his gaze from the map to Wang Xiaoyong's face, a slight smile playing on his lips, and said, "I believe we can definitely catch a big fish here."

Wang Xiaoyong nodded and said with a smile, "It definitely will."

The Japanese had long coveted Great Xia.

It has been more than forty years since the year of Jiawu.

Over the past forty years, they have sent countless people to Great Xia, posing as merchants, scholars, and doctors; all of them have been doing the same thing: gathering intelligence.

Specifically in Beijing, they knew exactly how wide each alley was, how many people could pass through, what kind of vehicles could drive through it, how high the city walls were, which part of the crenellations was the thinnest, where it was suitable to set up machine guns, and where it was suitable to hide people.

Furthermore, he even knew some of the underground passages in Beijing.

After all, during the Eight-Nation Alliance era, there was a period of war and chaos, and many officials and wealthy families built underground tunnels.

This information had already been compiled into thick archives before the war even began.

Among these, rice shops and pharmacies are the most important places for intelligence gathering.

The reason is simple. These two types of places are always in high demand, especially during times of war.

In addition, rice shops and pharmacies were places that resistance fighters, especially underground party members, liked to hide in.

Suzuki was in charge of the rice shop business.

There are a total of 33 rice shops in the Shangcheng District.

There are three shops near Nanluoguxiang, one of which is Xu Ji Rice Shop.

Xu Jiande's name was already written in the file in Suzuki's hands.

Of course, the monitoring at the pharmacy will be handled by someone else.

The sergeant named Suzuki was not actually a sergeant, but a major.

They were elites of the Japanese Special Higher Police.

This is using the identity of a sergeant to conceal his true identity; it's extremely insidious.

At this time, Yi Zhonghai, Liu Haizhong, and others went out of the courtyard and went to Lou's Steel Rolling Mill.

After having breakfast, Wang Xiaoyong locked the door, walked out of the courtyard, went to the alley outside, and headed towards his rice shop.

Although the cannon fire at Lugou Bridge had stopped, a strong atmosphere of tension still lingered in Beijing.

There were far fewer people on the street than usual. Occasionally, a few people would hurry by, their faces tense, as if they were on guard against something.

On the wall at the entrance of the alley was a notice with black characters on white paper. It was the martial law order issued by the Japanese. It listed a lot of prohibitions, from curfew to assembly to carrying weapons, and each one was followed by the words "kill without mercy".

Of course, you can also see Japanese soldiers on the road, in twos and threes, not many, distributed in a net-like pattern.

After turning a corner, you can see the sign for Xu's Rice Shop in the distance.

Fortunately, despite the riots, his rice shop was not vandalized.

To his surprise, a young man was standing at the entrance of the rice shop.

The man looked to be in his early twenties, of medium height, wearing a faded blue cloth shirt and black cloth shoes with patches on the surface, the stitches very fine, indicating they were carefully sewn by a hand.

He stood at the entrance of the rice shop, not looking around, appearing very proper and orderly.

Xu Jiande moved closer and glanced at him. He had never seen him before. This face wasn't in the original owner's memories either.

The man's gaze lingered on Xu Jiande for a moment. Seeing Xu Jiande take out his key to open the door, he smiled slightly and asked, "Are you Mr. Xu Jiande?"

Xu Jiande nodded, recalling what Wang Xiaoyong had just told him, and asked, "Are you Aji?"

"Yes, Mr. Xu," Aji replied crisply.

Xu Jiande glanced at him again and opened the door of the rice shop.

When the door was pushed open, a fine cloud of dust rose up, which floated in the morning light for a while before slowly settling.

There wasn't much left in the rice shop.

The rice bin was mostly empty, and a few bags of cornmeal and some coarse grains were sparsely placed on the shelf.

The original owner had sent most of the rice and flour to the front lines; the remaining amount probably wouldn't last more than a few days, and he didn't even want to sell rice anymore. He planned to find an opportunity to find another job that would be more suitable for his infiltration, something better suited for him to work against the Japanese.

Xu Jiande walked into the shop, wiped the dust off the table with a rag, and said to Aji, "Come in."

Aji followed him in, glanced around the shop, and didn't ask any questions.

Xu Jiande sat down at the table and gestured for Aji to sit down as well.

The two sat facing each other, separated by a table with a missing leg, supported by a brick.

"How old are you?" Xu Jiande asked.

"Twenty-two."

"What have you done before?"

"I worked as a clerk in a grain store for two years. After the grain store closed down, I did odd jobs on the street. I've done all sorts of things."

Xu Jiande nodded.

That makes sense. Although Wang Xiaoyong was working for the Japanese, the people he introduced couldn't be completely incompetent.

The two chatted briefly. Aji spoke fluently and confidently, without any hesitation.

The more Xu Jiande looked at this man, the more he felt that he was not simple, but he did not show it on his face.

"Don't call me boss anymore," Xu Jiande said. "I'm only nineteen. Just call me manager, or you can call me Brother Xu."

Aji didn't refuse; he nodded and naturally called out, "Brother Xu."

Xu Jiande was stunned for a moment.

The speed at which they changed their tune was truly astounding.

Most people would politely decline if their new or old boss asked them to change how they address each other.

This is a custom of the Bactrian people, a etiquette ingrained in their very bones.

But Aji didn't. It was as if he had been waiting for those words from the beginning, and as soon as Xu Jiande said them, he immediately took the opportunity to come down the ladder.

Xu Jiande immediately became more cautious.

He didn't show anything on his face, just nodded, stood up and walked behind the counter, flipping through the account books.

Then, with a slight headache, he said, "In this chaotic situation, I don't know if we'll still be able to get rice."

Aji immediately said, "Then Brother Xu, you should go and ask him right away."

Xu Jiande thought about it and agreed, so he said, "Then I'll go to the main store to take a look."

Xu's Rice Shop was just a small rice shop, so it must have gotten its grain from the main store. But with all this war and chaos, it's hard to say whether the main store even had any rice left.

Perhaps the Japanese devils have already taken them all.

The two chatted for a while, then Xu Jiande told Aji to stay at the shop while he went to check on the main store.

Five minutes later, Xu Jiande headed towards Dafu Rice Shop in the Upper District.

After walking for a while, Xu Jiande noticed that someone was secretly following him.