CHAPTER 77: CHAPTER 76: YIN YIN YIN, CAN YOU STILL PLOT AGAINST ME EVEN AFTER DEATH!?

On top of the fortress battlements, Scarface wiped the sweat from his forehead. Even though his face looked exhausted, he still seemed pretty relaxed, "Thank God the Second Boss was willing to let us in to crash for the night, or else we’d have had to push on through the night back to Xuanzhu County."

Just like how Star Engraving County was the core of Chenfeng District, the heart of Dongyang District was Xuanzhu County, right next to the Seaport. Pretty much every wealthy and powerful family in Dongyang District was gathered in Xuanzhu County, and all the other towns in the district basically existed only to feed blood into Xuanzhu County.

Standing across from Scarface was the Second Boss, a tall, shadowy man with twin blades at his waist, staring coldly at the "new tea" being driven into the mine shafts inside the walled town, and asking, "Why the rush?"

Scarface instinctively wanted to hide the truth, but he noticed the Second Boss’s eyes had already landed on the white-haired young man with his hands raised, so he just said flat out, "Second Boss, you probably know— in our business, ’White Tea’ is a really rare and valuable commodity, so..."

"You’ve found plenty of valuable stuff every year, but this seems a bit too urgent." The Second Boss turned to stare at Scarface, "What are you so scared of?"

Scarface broke out in cold sweat instantly, because he knew all too well about this Second Boss’s history. The Silver Blood Association in Dongyang District was tightly wrapped up with the officials, merchants, soldiers, and all the family clans, hiring only their own, guarding against outsiders—yet this Second Boss had, in just a few years, climbed from ordinary laborer up to a high-ranking Silver Blood exec in charge of the mine, all thanks to his ruthlessness and those two blades of his!

The Nine Hills labor riot three years ago, rumor had it, happened because the Second Boss sold out the workers’ plan, collaborating with the outside army to completely crush and slaughter the workers. That night, the death toll was uncountable, blood ran like rivers, and folks say miners at Nine Hills still turned up battered skeletons now and then.

Word on the street was, the leader of that year’s worker uprising was actually his own blood brother, and to show where he stood, the Second Boss straight up beheaded his own brother, which earned him Silver Blood’s trust and respect!

From that point on, the Second Boss climbed up in Silver Blood, stamping out riots, collecting debt with violence, even murdering Imperial Court investigators—it’s what got him where he was today.

No matter how much trouble Scarface had caused himself, in front of him right now stood a stone-cold bastard with no ties, haunted by the dead and out for profit—there was no way he’d dare lie, so he just spilled exactly what Leyi had said.

"Black Robe Tower...Black-Robed Swordsman..." the Second Boss narrowed his eyes, "He just threw that out there and you guys just bought it?"

"There was all kinds of contraband in his bag," Scarface said quietly, "Swift Blade Boots, an unregistered light gun, military maps, a stack of IDs with different names...and his hair’s pure white too."

Normal people might have no idea what white hair meant, but Scarface and his knife-licking outlaw crew? Of course, they knew who you could screw with and who you couldn’t. Plus, the way the ’clients’ loved the white-haired ones—among folks like them, the existence of the Sword Concealer wasn’t even much of a secret.

These maniacs, willing to give up years off their life just to master the Hidden Sword Technique—if anyone said they didn’t have serious backing, they were lying to themselves.

"Hand over his bag, all of it."

"Huh?"

"Just call it your lodging fee for the night."

The Second Boss glanced at Scarface, and Scarface instantly shivered, hurriedly telling his men to bring the stuff over, cursing himself for running his mouth—the most valuable loot was now gone for good, no way to keep it.

Still, at least—contraband like the Swift Blade Boots fetched a great price on the black market, but it was still nothing compared to what the white-haired kid would go for. As long as they could get the white-haired one safely to Xuanzhu County, all the investment would come back with interest.

The Second Boss took the bag, checked through the contents, then after a moment suddenly said, "A few slaves died in the mine the past couple days, we’re a bit short on labor."

Scarface immediately got the hint, "Second Boss, you want to buy...? Whoever you want, just pick! The Jing Family’s our biggest client—if you ever need us, we’d never say no!"

Even though it killed him inside, Scarface still bowed and scraped, "It’s just, these new teas haven’t been ’boiled’ yet, a few of ’em are a little raw, so you might need to roast them yourself, Second Boss..."

"Don’t worry, the Jing Family will pay." The Second Boss said flatly, "And about the boiling and roasting, don’t lose sleep over it."

He stared at the fortified, brightly-lit mining fortress in front of him and said coldly,

"I don’t care if they’re iron-boned or copper-headed, once they step into this mine, they’re all gonna get ground into paste."

Scarface hurried to agree, "Of course, everybody knows how skilled you are, Second Boss—it’s why the Jing Family put this mine in your hands."

The Second Boss glanced at him and said, "You’re not leaving tomorrow."

Scarface froze, gulped hard, and with sweat streaming down, stammered, "W-why?"

"Tomorrow’s the monthly inspection. The Young Lord’s coming. Since you’ve got such rare goods on hand, he needs to see it first. If he likes it, maybe he’ll buy it right away." The Second Boss’s voice went cold, "What, didn’t you just say this was too hot to handle? Or do you think the Jing Family would screw you over?"

"I don’t know if you’d screw me over—but I do know the dozens of guns aimed my way can’t fucking wait to say hello..." Scarface shook with rage, sweating cold in the summer heat, hands and feet ice cold. He’d thought with his ties to the Jing Family, spending a night here would be hassle-free—who knew they’d just outright extort him!

"It ain’t easy being a slaver, but everywhere you go, someone’s stepping on your throat. When the hell can we ever stand tall for real!?"

"A-all right." Scarface agreed, tears in his eyes.

...

...

Shut up in the mine’s prison cell, Leyi glanced at the rat-shit-littered straw and wasn’t picky at all, just sat right down.

Xu Song’an still wore his muzzle, sitting silent in the corner. The teenage boy, Fengzhen, was already so hungry he could hardly move; his eyes were red from crying, and he just found a clean spot and plopped down. Even Luo Jue, usually such a chatterbox, was too tired to talk, just staring blankly at the ceiling.

The other cells nearby were full of people like them, all snatched up, but it was dead quiet—nobody had the energy to make a fuss. Two days in a daze without a single grain of food had already broken most people’s spirit. Leyi looked around and saw most were young or able-bodied, a few women and children too, but no old folks at all. "Did the old people not take the ride, or did they just get dealt with somewhere else?"

There seemed to be someone guarding the hall outside the cell. When Leyi passed through the main mining hall, he glanced in and saw that even in the dead of night, plenty of half-naked men were still swinging pickaxes, while the corridors swarmed with fully armed guards.

Trouble.

"Leyi really hadn’t expected the slavers to dump them into a fortress like this, nearly impossible to break into or out of. If it was just the few dozen slavers, he’d be confident enough to kill them one by one. But now they were locked in a militarized fortress, and the whole place was clearly designed for putting down inside rebellions. Leyi figured he wouldn’t even knock off a few guys before the guards arrived with rifles and blew him away."

"Dying wasn’t the problem. If Leyi dared to unleash, he could die, keep killing, kill, get killed, over and over and over again."

"As long as he was willing, he could reincarnate endlessly until he was the last one left alive in the whole fortress."

"But Leyi hoped to get the best result with the least deaths. Besides, every time he reincarnated, he picked up memories. Sure, the memories from Qian Yuliu and Yinyin Yin never corrupted his own will, but Qian Yuliu was a cold-blooded machine, Yinyin Yin was a quiet assassin obsessed with ’common sense’—just because Leyi had managed to handle their memories didn’t mean he’d be so lucky with the next reincarnation."

"Leyi always reminded himself he was just a regular guy, not some thousand-year-old monster; twenty-odd years of will wasn’t worth much. If he kept pushing it with non-stop reincarnation, he really wondered if he’d end up with split personalities."

"Actually, Leyi figured he already had a few symptoms of that—he kept feeling like Yinyin Yin was out in the open openly judging him: ’Getting nabbed by slavers, huh? I really think you need a remedial dose of common sense. This time won’t be free.’"

Just as Leyi was debating the next move, someone suddenly came into the cell, and voices sounded from outside.

"Second Boss come to pick out people? Boss said you could have whoever you want, pick away, pick away."

The Second Boss, shadow-faced and strapped with twin blades, strode into the cell. Behind him trailed the slaver crew and a bunch of fully-armed mine guards. Everyone stared at them; nobody dared say a word.

The Second Boss stopped in front of one cell, glanced inside at a man, and pointed, saying, "Him."

The guards popped the cell door and dragged the man out. The guy seemed to know exactly what was coming, and started wailing, but a blow from the guard’s gun handle knocked him right out.

"Him."

"Him."

The Second Boss picked people like he was ordering dim sum, stopping at each cell and calling out a name, then sending guards in to drag them out. Sure, a few tried to fight back, but facing gun-toting, armored guards after two days with no food and drugged water, even the guards joked, "My wife’s got a stronger grip than you do."

Soon, the Second Boss reached Leyi’s cell. He paused, and all four inside stared at him, tense.

The Second Boss glanced first at Xu Song’an with his muzzle, "Him."

The guard opened the cell, went right in and hauled Xu Song’an out.

"And..."

The Second Boss raised his hand, and slowly pointed at Leyi, sitting on the ground with an innocent face, "Him."

One of the slavers blurted out, shocked, "Second Boss, that’s one of our most valuable goods, you can’t..."

"Second Boss, you into white-haired ones too?!"

The Second Boss played it cool, just said, "I’ll have him back to you tomorrow, just need him for one night."

Leyi was the only one still lost as hell.

"Into white-haired ones...?"

"Just need him for a night...?"

"Wait—Yinyin Yin, you seriously managed to screw me over even after you died?!"