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

Time passed by, and the neighbors in the courtyard had long since turned off their lights, plunging the entire courtyard into a thick darkness.

Occasionally, a sporadic gunshot could be heard in the distance, then silence would return.

Bai Ling wanted to stay awake, but physical exhaustion and the drowsiness accumulated during the day overwhelmed her alertness.

Three hours later, she had already drifted off to sleep.

Just then, Xu Jiande gently nudged her shoulder.

Bai Ling opened her eyes and saw Xu Jiande approaching in the darkness. She immediately woke up and asked, "Is it time?"

Xu Jiande nodded and said, "I'm getting ready to go out."

Bai Ling rolled out of bed, her movements a little more agile than before she went to sleep.

After two treatments, her injury has indeed improved a lot. Although it still hurts, it no longer affects her basic mobility.

Xu Jiande had already put on his clothes and was holding four hand grenades in his hand.

We had seized a total of eight grenades, two of which were detonated in the afternoon, leaving six remaining.

Xu Jiande took four, and placed the other two in Bai Ling's hand, saying, "You keep these two. Use them for self-defense if the Japanese find them."

Bai Ling looked down at the two grenades in her hand and said, "Okay, I understand."

She was prepared to use it as a grenade.

Xu Jiande walked to the door and gently pulled the bolt. The sound of the bolt sliding in the wooden groove was very soft, but in the dead of night, it still sounded like someone was filing something against his ear.

Simply put, some people can still hear it.

The door opened a crack, and Xu Jiande slipped out through it.

Bai Ling followed him to the door, quickly closed it, returned to the bedside, lay down, but could no longer fall asleep.

She lay there with her eyes open in the darkness, a series of images flashing through her mind.

Then it turned over, but its ears remained perked up, listening to the sounds coming from the yard.

When Xu Jiande came out of the house, it was already past midnight, almost 1 a.m.

The crescent moon hung in the sky, its light faint, like a lamp in the heavens that was about to run out of oil.

The pale silver light spilled onto the bluestone slabs of the courtyard, casting a blurry outline over everything in the yard.

Things get blurry when you're a little further away; the clutter in the corners just turns into dark, indistinct shadows.

Xu Jiande didn't use the main entrance, which would make him easily noticeable.

He looked around near the wall surrounding his house, then took a few steps back before accelerating his run-up.

As he approached the wall, Xu Jiande suddenly pushed off the ground, leaping into the air. He used his right foot to push off the wall for leverage and grabbed the top of the more than three-meter-high wall with his left hand.

Using his core strength and pulling with his arms, he flipped over the wall. The whole process took less than two seconds and was almost completely silent.

Xu Jiande squatted on the wall for a moment, his gaze sweeping across the alley outside.

The alley was deserted, and the moonlight cast a faint white glow on the bluestone pavement.

A stray cat was perched on the wall in the distance. It glanced at him with its green eyes, then silently jumped down and ran away.

Xu Jiande jumped down from the wall and landed in the alley.

The sound of my foot landing on the bluestone slab was extremely soft, as soft as a cat jumping down from a height.

He stood up, dusted off his hands, and started walking north along the alley.

His goal for tonight was clear: during the day, when he went to the main store to transport grain, he noted down all the Japanese sentry posts and patrol routes along the way.

There was a fixed checkpoint at the intersection of Dongsi Street, where at least two squads of Japanese soldiers were on duty at night.

There was a temporary barracks near Beixinqiao, housing about a platoon of Japanese soldiers.

There are too many others to remember.

But no rush, let's start with these two places.

Xu Jiande walked along the base of the wall, his body pressed against the shadow of the wall, his steps quick and light.

On his way to the main store to transport grain during the day, he had already memorized the layout of the alleyways in the area.

I could walk with my eyes closed right now.

Of course, this is also related to his practice of demonic arts, which makes him see things at night much better than ordinary people, and his eyes are somewhat like cat eyes.

Xu Jiande circulated his demonic energy as he walked.

The heat in the dantian spreads along the meridians to the limbs and bones, and the meridians are like oiled gears, turning quickly and smoothly.

Killing those Japanese soldiers in the afternoon made his mind much clearer, his demonic energy circulated at least 20% faster than before, and his perception became more acute.

He could smell the gunpowder smoke, coal ash, and the distant stench of blood carried on the night wind.

This stench of blood... I wonder which family in the Great Xia Dynasty has suffered this calamity.

Xu Jiande didn't stop walking. He found a stone the size of a goose egg and held it in his hand, intending to use it as a hidden weapon.

He originally intended to go to the intersection of Dongsi Street, where there was a fixed checkpoint.

He made a point of noting the location when he passed by during the day: a bunker made of two sandbags, a Type 96 machine gun, and at least a squad of Japanese soldiers on guard duty at night.

They had only walked less than half a mile when they heard a woman crying coming from a courtyard house by the roadside.

The crying was very low and intermittent, as if someone had covered the mouth and the sound was leaking out through the fingers.

Mixed in with the crying was a man's arrogant laughter, a laugh full of pride, tinged with drunkenness and unbridled joy.

Xu Jiande stopped.

He listened intently for a moment and determined that the sound was coming from the backyard of the courtyard house on his left.

He vaguely remembered this courtyard; he had passed by it during the day when he went to the main store to transport grain. The courtyard wall wasn't high, and it had blue bricks and gray tiles. The layout was similar to the one he lived in.

The crying started again, this time more urgent, followed by a muffled thud, as if something had been thrown to the ground.

Xu Jiande did not use the main entrance.

He went around to the side of the yard, took a few steps back, ran up, pushed off the ground, and jumped over the wall.

The sound of landing was very soft; my feet barely made a sound as they stepped on the loose soil in the yard.

The residents in the courtyard had long since turned off their lights and closed their doors and windows; it was unclear whether they were fast asleep or too afraid to come out.

He followed the sound to the backyard and stopped in front of a house where a kerosene lamp was still lit.

The newspaper pasted on the window let in a dim yellow light, and there were shadowy figures moving inside.

The woman's crying had turned into suppressed sobs, and the man's laughter had stopped, replaced by indistinct mutterings.

Xu Jiande knocked on the door.

"Who is it?" The person inside asked in Chinese, with a hint of impatience and wariness.

Xu Jiande deliberately raised his voice and replied in a mumbled Japanese accent, "Open the door."

There was a moment of silence inside, followed by the sound of footsteps.

The bolt was pulled open, and the door opened a crack, revealing a face full of bulging muscles. It was a puppet soldier, wearing trousers, his clothes not fully on, his chest exposed, revealing a patch of dark chest hair.

He squinted at the outside, muttering, "Who is it in the middle of the night?"

He hadn't finished speaking.

Xu Jiande's fist had already smashed into his temple.

This punch was delivered without restraint; demonic energy flowed into his arm, and the fist carried an invisible, hidden force.

The moment the blow landed, the puppet soldier's eyes bulged outwards, his pupils dilated sharply and then froze, and he fell straight backward like a wall that had been pushed down.

As he fell, blood and foam began to ooze from the corner of his mouth. Xu Jiande caught him, preventing him from collapsing directly to the ground.

It didn't make a loud noise at first, then its body twitched twice and then stopped moving.

Xu Jiande stepped over the threshold and closed the door.

A kerosene lamp was lit in the room, its wick set low, casting a dim light.

A woman was huddled on the kang (a heated brick bed), her clothes torn in several places, revealing bruised and purple skin.

She huddled in the corner, wrapped in a tattered blanket, her shoulders trembling violently, her face streaked with tears, and a bloodstain at the corner of her mouth, looking as if she had been beaten.

Xu Jiande crouched down, trying to make his voice sound less frightening: "Don't be afraid, I'm not a bad person. What's going on?"

The woman didn't speak, but after learning that the puppet soldier had been knocked unconscious, tears welled up in her eyes, and she cried again.

Xu Jiande whispered reassuringly, "Tell me slowly, what happened?"

The woman spoke haltingly as she cried.

This puppet soldier, named Da Huang, was a notorious local ruffian. He had long coveted her and had been beaten by her husband several times, harboring a deep grudge ever since. Now that the Japanese had entered the city, Da Huang immediately ran to join them, donned this dog skin, and became a puppet soldier.

"Yesterday, that bastard led the Japanese soldiers into my house, said my husband was a resistance fighter, and killed him on the spot."

At this point, the woman broke down in tears.