Who Let Him Cultivate?! (WX)-Chapter 51: Forgotten Something

Back when Qi Wu first found the old hunter, there were also a few households in the vicinity. They might have appeared normal, but in fact, they were all tiger-henchman ghosts in disguise.

After the tiger demons were brought to justice, the tiger-henchman ghosts were at a loss. Some suggested to leave the mountain, while others said to continue hiding in the mountains, but there was no consensus.

Just as they were about to break into an argument, Lu Yang’s group appeared and captured them all. Meng Jingzhou let out a sliver of Pure Yang energy, causing the tiger-henchman ghosts to squirm on the ground and wail in agony.

“We don’t have to leave so many alive. Only two will be enough to pose as diabolic cultivators,” Lu Yang stated coldly. There is no need to sympathize with these tiger-henchman ghosts who acted as accomplices to the tiger demons in their evil deeds. They became tiger-henchman ghosts only because they agreed to the tiger demon’s request.

They deserve to die.

Lu Yang tried a few times but was still unable to take in a ghost servant, so he could only let his soul leave his body.

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“Man Gu, we’re counting on you.”

Man Gu didn’t say anything, simply leaving behind two tiger-henchman ghosts who were originally travelers while killing the rest swiftly.

Using tiger-henchman ghosts transformed from hunters might raise the diabolic creed’s suspicion and cause them to guess that they had been obtained from the tiger demon after killing it. The risk would be much smaller with travelers.

“Return.”Man Gu absorbed one male and one female traveler tiger-henchman ghosts into his body.

This was also a part of ghost commanding techniques—absorbing the ghost into one’s body and summoning them again in battle.

When the three of them headed to Yanjiang County, they bumped into Qi Wu and the others. They were still going around in circles in the mountain forest. As it was still raining and they didn’t know the way, they naturally couldn’t find the path down the mountain.

“Benefactors!” Qi Wu and the rest were overjoyed to see the trio who they viewed as their lifeline.

“Benefactors, we won’t forget your great favor and kindness.”

“The Mountain God has shown their power!”

“We are forever indebted to you!

All of them showered words of gratitude at the trio with overflowing sincerity.

Seeing the people they had rescued and hearing their heartfelt gratitude, the gloomy haze in Lu Yang’s heart slowly dissipated. He stopped thinking about the bones and corpses in the caves.

“As cultivators, we ought to follow the righteous path. There’s no need for thanks,” Meng Jingzhou expressed his stance solemnly. It is only right for me to save people; I’m not doing it to receive others’ gratitude.

Man Gu observed Meng Jingzhou’s righteous visage. As expected of my role model—staying calm and collected in all situations; that’s not something I can achieve.

Even without looking at Meng Jingzhou, Lu Yang could tell that the latter was just pretending. There’s probably a flower blooming from joy in his heart right now.

And why did Lu Yang know that? It was because he, too, was wearing a righteous expression.

After sending the traveling merchants to Yanjiang County, the sky was already starting to turn bright. The tempest ravaging the whole night finally stopped, and a faint rainbow arched across the horizon.

“By the way, did we forget something?” Meng Jingzhou couldn’t brush off the feeling that he had forgotten something.

“Probably not?” Lu Yang counted the number of people. There’s three people; there’s three brains. We didn’t forget anything.

“I just keep feeling like we’re missing something...never mind, I shall not think about it anymore.”

~~~

In Qinghuai County, a carriage was parked in the backyard of an inn. An old horse was slowly nibbling on the feed left by Meng Jingzhou.

Why hasn’t that young fellow from the Meng Family come to fetch me? The feed won’t last more than a few days. What happened to finishing the mission in five to six days?!

As an aberrant demon beast, the old horse naturally couldn’t consume normal feed like ordinary horses. It always ate expensive feed bought by Meng Jingzhou since they were meticulously prepared and infused with spirit energy.

The old horse snorted and puckered its lips, feeling very bored. That was when it suddenly caught sight of a snow-white female horse next door.

~~~

After entering the city, the trio randomly chose a teahouse and ordered a pot of tea with a few plates of pastries as they planned their next move.

“Yanjiang Commandery is so big. How are we going to find this Qin Yuanhao? Do we get the local authorities to help?” Man Gu knitted his brow.

Yanjiang Commandery was not a major cultivation hub. Compared to other commanderies, its population was also ranked at the bottom, and it was inconspicuous on the map, even missing from less detailed maps. Nonetheless, it was still a commandery with a population of two million people. Finding someone was akin to searching for a needle in a haystack.

Lu Yang waved his hand. “Not a good idea. We don’t know how long the diabolic creed has hidden in this place, and there is likely a complex web of forces behind them, possibly including the local authorities.”

Man Gu didn’t understand what Lu Yang was getting at. “Doesn’t everyone want to exterminate the diabolic creeds? Why would the authorities help them?”

Lu Yang didn’t have to answer; Meng Jingzhou was most familiar in such aspects. “It’s precisely because everyone wants to exterminate them that the Great Xia Dynasty has added a key performance indicator: Slain Devil Count. Basically, the more devils one eradicates, the higher their cultivation and the better their political track record becomes.

“Think about it, diabolic creeds could simply strike a deal with the commandery governor—they would provide devils to the commandery governor regularly while the commandery governor would agree not to reveal the diabolic creed’s location.”

What Meng Jingzhou had shared was not just a story—they were facts that he had personally heard from the seniors who were officials in his family. Despite the Xia Emperor executing them batch after batch, there were still some who slipped through the net.

Some people in court had also proposed removing this performance metric, but it was stopped by the prime minister. With the performance indicator in place, most officials would assiduously eliminate those from the diabolic path, though a minority still colluded with the diabolic creeds. However, with the performance metric removed, it would be hard to determine how many officials would still be willing to invest the efforts in tracking down traces of the diabolic creeds.

All in all, this evaluation indicator did more good than harm.

Man Gu felt like Meng Jingzhou’s words had completely overturned his understanding of the world; he had never thought about such matters before.

Lu Yang chimed in, “The probability of the commandery governor being in league with the diabolic creed is low, but we should still prepare for the worst. If they are really in cahoots and we reveal our intentions in coming here, the commandery governor would hand over Qin Yuanhao to avoid detection. However, if the whole Yanjiang Branch gets wind of it, they would go into hiding, causing us to miss our chance to infiltrate the diabolic creed. That will be penny wise, pound foolish, and not at all ideal.

“Our best bet for now is to keep our identities hidden and search for Qin Yuanhao first. If we really can’t find him, it wouldn’t be too late to ask the authorities for help then.”

Man Gu nodded, feeling that both of them made sense. “How should we draw Qin Yuanhao out?” Many ideas flashed past Man Gu’s mind, but he found noticeable flaws in all of them.

Posting flyers or notices definitely won’t work; that’s too obvious.

Inquiring at the black market? If Qin Yuanhao learns that someone is looking into him, he’ll hide himself. Who knows if he’ll even lead the members of the diabolic creed to ambush us. We’ll be at their mercy then. That won’t work.

I wonder what brilliant ideas Brother Lu and Brother Meng have.

Lu Yang had already thought of a plan when they were on their way down the mountain. He laughed mischievously. “Do you know that unlike us righteous sects, these people who roam the jianghu care about their face the most, especially people from diabolic creeds. They see their face as their status. If someone causes a blow to their reputation, it’s even more unbearable than killing them.

“That’s why we must widely spread rumors that Qin Yuanhao is a kind person who doesn’t work but does good deeds. Once this spreads throughout the whole of Yanjiang Commandery, the members of the diabolic creed would think that Qin Yuanhao is a good guy. Qin Yuanhao will feel that he has lost face and won’t be able to resist coming out!

“And that would be our chance!”

Meng Jingzhou summarized it succinctly, “Basically, we make things up and spread rumors.”

Coincidentally, Meng Jingzhou was a natural in doing so.

Man Gu suddenly saw the light. This is a really good idea! If we can’t find Qin Yuanhao, we’ll just force him out.

But what did he mean by “unlike us righteous sects?”