Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales
Edited by Aelryinth
A cubic foot of spiritual jade was worth at least a billion purple crystal points!
Huang Juyun felt his heart racing. Fortunately he was a beastmaster. Given his age, it would have been problematic if he was an ordinary person.
After some time, Huang Juyun finally sighed, at a loss for words, “Tsk, tsk. Your luck is really…”
All the spiritual crystals spread across the various factions on Mercury only totalled about this much. Of course, the difference wouldn’t be big even if there were more.
After all, these were not ordinary minerals. Spiritual jade was already something very hard to come by, let alone spiritual crystals that were ten times more precious!
After a short pause, Huang Juyun smiled and said very grandly, “With this, we can quicken the expansion of the herbal field. In a few months’ time, the herbal field’s scale will definitely expand by more than five times. At that time, the production of spiritual honey would naturally increase greatly.”
Zhang Che was speechless after hearing that.
-Does father-in-law think I really don’t have to do anything and will only focus on digging up spiritual herbs in the beast worlds?-
Of course, him having control of a secret plane was a secret he would never spill.
Huang Juyun seemed to have seen through what Zhang Che was thinking and chuckled at him, “What, you’re scared? Don’t worry; how many herbs can you dig if you go by yourself? It’s not enough even if you have a pet that can sense spiritual herbs.”
“My idea is that since the new body tempering pill’s production rate has reached a certain size, given its high profitability, I’m thinking of procuring spiritual herbs from the market. Although their prices might be a little high, once they are planted in the herbal field and enter their flowering period, all the investments would pay off quickly.”
“This is a good idea! Uncle Huang has thought through things clearly!” Zhang Che nodded. Not everyone had a factory or something to produce medicine. Most beastmasters would sell the spiritual herbs they found in the beast worlds to the market.
Although many spiritual herbs would die due to improper storage, given how big the market was, they’d be able to buy enough!
As for the matter about this move spending a huge amount of purple crystal points, neither Zhang Che or Huang Juyun cared at all.
The new body tempering pill was an incredibly hot product in the market. Huge amounts of purple crystal points flooded into their bank account everyday. They really weren’t lacking that bit of money.
Even if they had insufficient funds, at the most they’d just sell a small portion of the spiritual jades they’d accumulated.
Now that they had spiritual crystals, which boasted better effects in a greater area, selling some of it wouldn’t affect them much. Nothing was a problem as long as they could get more spiritual herbs!
The two quickly discussed their next moves at the dinner table. There would naturally be people to put their words into action for them.
After dinner, Zhang Che took a walk with Huang Juyun outside and talked about the things that had happened during the past few days. Soon, he returned to rest.
——
The next day, Zhang Che originally wanted to look for Huang Juyun to talk about the matter of raiding evil cults, but Huang Tielan had taken three days’ leave and needed to report back to school. As such, he took Dijiang-hao and brought her back first.
After bidding farewell to Huang Tielan and sending her off with his gaze as she left aboard the beastly car under Liu Gang’s escort, Dijiang-hao rose to the skies again and directly flew back south.
——
By the time Zhang Che returned to Xinjing City from the back and forth trip, it was already past six in the evening.
The two had their dinner at the military canteen again, discussing the matter of raiding evil cults.
“Over here at Xinjing City, we discovered a total of five evil cult branches, but their strengths were nothing noteworthy. They fell easily to our forces, and were all destroyed in less than a day.” Huang Juyun was helping himself to a lobster as thick as a human thigh as he continued, “The Freemasons had the most members. I looked through the military’s intelligence. In all of Hua Xia, with the exception of some areas in the north, the Freemasons held the most power.
“Also, these evil cult organizations have one thing in common: the middle and lower level members know very little, and even if some of the higher level members are arrested, we weren’t able to find out anything useful from them. I even used the Psychedelic Ghost-Patterned Butterfly, but it turned out to be fruitless, too. It was like a restriction had been set upon their very being. Once the Psychedelic Ghost-Patterned Butterfly’s skill was used on them, they’d immediately bleed out from their seven orifices and die, not speaking a single word.”
Huang Juyun felt helpless as he finished. With the interrogation on the captives yielding zero results, it was truly too difficult to find and destroy the nest of the evil cults.
Moreover, under the current circumstances, all the evil cults would be hesitant to act, limiting their activities, which further increased the difficulty of finding their organizations.
“I understand how you feel. You want to seek revenge on the Freemasons, but so do I. They actually dared to extend their claws to my Huang family. How can I vent my anger if I don’t rip them out by the root?”
However, Huang Juyun didn’t suggest that Zhang Che join in on the search for the evil cult’s headquarters. Both the government and the military were already mobilized, and yet they didn’t find out much. Letting him join in would only be a waste of his time.
Only three years remained until the fifth beast swarm struck. What Zhang Che needed to do right now was to focus on hunting exotic beasts and raising his strength quickly.
“However, it’s useless even if we invest great effort into this matter. It’s better if you continue accumulating strength and wait until we’ve found some clues. At that time, naturally there’ll be areas where we’ll need your strength.”
Zhang Che fell silent for a moment, then suddenly asked, “Uncle Huang, did you arrest any mid-level and above Freemason members?”
Huang Juyun didn’t understand what his intent was, but he nodded regardless and said, “We did arrest a few, but we didn’t manage to find out much from them. Why, do you want to personally interrogate them?”
Zhang Che smiled, “No, I’ll definitely not be able to find out anything by interrogating them, but I have another idea I want to try it out. See if you can hand one of them to me; that shouldn’t violate the rules, right?”
“It doesn’t. Since you have an idea, I’ll support you. Come with me to the military prison tomorrow; I’ll let you take one person with you.”
Huang Juyun didn’t ask what Zhang Che was going to do. Since he had already put things that way, surely he had his own methods. As the senior, he’d just do his best to support him.
——
The next day, Zhang Che went to the military division’s prison with Huang Juyun. Afterwards, he left with a captive who was about thirty years old, of ordinary appearance.
That man was called Zheng Huawei, a local of Xinjing City. He was a Tier Four beastmaster, and was considered someone with a tiny bit of authority in the Freemasons’ Xinjing City branch. During the interrogation he had gone through previously, although he spilled some information, there was nothing helpful with regards to finding the cult’s nest.
At present, Zheng Huawei was suddenly brought out by Zhang Che, driving a car directly to the suburbs. Zheng Huawei was feeling extremely uneasy.
-Damn, he’s not going to silence me, is he? Probably not, right? I’ve already spilled everything I know, and I’ve not done anything major. At the most they’ll lock me up for some time. It won’t go to the extent of killing me, right?-
Zhang Che drove silently, showing no intention of engaging Zheng Huawei in any way. In any case, he learned everything he should know from the files, including that this guy couldn’t tell him what he wanted to know, either.
The car drove out of Xinjing City very soon, and turned into a remote path.
Zheng Huawei grew even more scared. -Is he really going to kill me? Or perhaps this guy brought me to this remote area to violate my chrysanthemum?-
{TLN: Bum hole.}
-But I look so ordinary! Usually the women won’t even look at me for a second!-
Obviously Zhang Che didn’t know what Zheng Huawei was thinking. If he knew, he’d probably smack him to death and go back to the military camp to get another person.
After driving the car to somewhere isolated, Zhang Che turned off the engine and said evenly, “Get out. Do I have to invite you?”
-I’m finished. I’m finished. He’s really going to kill me!-
Zheng Huawei’s back was soaked in sweat. However, he couldn’t put up any resistance, and could only push the door open and get out of the car. He was like a criminal waiting for execution, his expression extremely complicated.
Even so, Zhang Che paid no heed to him. After alighting the car, he waved his hand, and a dark golden light shone, turning into a huge butterfly.
Although Zhang Che didn’t know whether the Freemasons had set a restriction on Zheng Huawei, he still wanted to interrogate him once more. That way he’d be able to grasp some key information.
Of course, this type of small figurehead couldn’t have seen the higher-ups of the Freemasons. There shouldn’t be a restriction on him.
While Zheng Huawei was looking at the Psychedelic Ghost-Patterned Butterfly in confusion, his eyes showing hints of fear, the butterfly suddenly activated its skill, and his eyes quickly lost focus. His mouth opened slightly, like a person who was mentally challenged.
Afterwards, Zhang Che guided Zheng Huawei in talking about the situation in the Freemason branch in detail, especially the higher level members in the Xinjing branch. He asked for information on their names, appearances, mannerisms, habits, and so forth.
“Hah, this guy’s not bad. He actually knows some things. Although it’s useless for further investigation, it’s different when this information is in my hands.”
After Zhang Che was done interrogating him, he waited for the Psychedelic Ghost-Patterned Butterfly’s skill effects to wear off, then chatted with Zheng Huawei. It wasn’t an interrogation, but a plain conversation, talking about anything under the sky.
Although Zheng Huawei didn’t understand Zhang Che’s intentions, it didn’t seem like he was going to kill him.
-That’s great! As long as I get to live, let alone chatting with him, I’ll even sleep with him!-
——
Their conversation went on for about an hour. Without revealing any hints or signs, Zhang Che memorized Zheng Huawei’s speech patterns and mannerisms. When he felt like he had pretty much grasped all that he needed, ignoring Zheng Huawei’s shocked gaze, Zhang Che directly chopped at his neck.
Even in his last moments, Zheng Huawei didn’t understand why this man would suddenly kill him when they were still talking nicely.
-This is truly too wrong of a death. Since you were going to kill me, why didn’t you just kill me earlier and spend so much time talking? Isn’t this a waste of my feelings?-
—
Zhang Che went through a seemingly useless interrogation, and chatted with Zheng Huangwei for so long, it wasn’t for naught. He was actually making preparations for his upcoming operation.
He summoned out the Purple Crystal Tortoise and had it dig out a hole to bury Zheng Huawei’s corpse, then got rid of the traces, and called Huang Juyun.
“Uncle Huang, I need to ask you for a favor. Can you release some of the arrested evil cult members without raising any suspicion? It’ll be best if it made them feel like they found a chance to escape on their own.”
“Mmm. I have a plan, but this part is required. I hope to have your support.”
“Right. I want to follow some of them and see if they’ll contact the evil cult afterwards and hopefully find out some things from there.”
After explaining things to Huang Juyun, he also mentioned that he had released Zheng Huawei and was starting to act on his plans.
—
After ending his call with Huang Juyun, Zhang Che’s appearance quickly changed. In just two breaths’ time, he disguised himself as Zheng Huawei perfectly. Not even his hair was different in any way.
“With this, there’ll be a chance to get inside the enemies’ quarters, right?”
Zhang Che opened his mouth and started mumbling to himself. Soon, even his voice became almost identical to Zheng Huawei’s. Not only that, Zhang Che was imitating tiny details like his bearing and manners exceptionally well.
He believed that with this move, there was a very high chance of finding the evil cult members of the Xinjing branch who weren’t arrested. Afterwards, he’d think of a way to go to their headquarters.
—
At the same time, at the Xinjing City military division prison, during the prisoners’ yard time, some of the evil cult members took the chance when security was lax and suddenly made their escape. In the end, some of them actually managed to get away.
The soldiers were furious. They immediately gathered all the soldiers at once and launched a large scale search and pursuit together with the Xinjing City government office. In the end, they managed to recapture some of the escapees. After counting them, only four of them successfully escaped in the end.
—
Over the next few days, the military and public servants could be seen at all times in Xinjing City’s streets and alleys, searching the whole city.
After transforming into Zheng Huawei, Zhang Che carefully snuck his way towards the city, nimbly avoiding several search teams, then came to a complicated housing district in the southern area of Xinjing City.
This place was an extremely well-hidden nest of Zheng Huawei’s. No one knew about this other than him. He had not spoken a word about it when he was being interrogated by the military.
If Zhang Che hadn’t enchanted him with the Psychedelic Ghost-Patterned Butterfly, he wouldn’t have learned this information.
-Mmm. I’ll stay here for the next few days and just wait patiently. If this doesn’t work, then I’ll think of another plan,- Zhang Che thought. He settled down in an apartment in a small district, patiently waiting for the evil cult’s escapees to find their way there.
