Chapter 128: Chapter 123: Musk and Pine Resin
"Zhou Pao, Brother Zhu, Drilling Mountain Leopard and his men are finished!"
"That’s right. Xu Mabang, Yin Hu, Wang Mazi, Song Heiqi... every last one of those bastards is dead."
Zhao Lin and Liang Song stood before the graves, offering incense, candles, paper money, grains, and fruits. They were sharing the good news with their two departed friends, to comfort their souls in the afterlife.
Now that there was no need to worry about bandits desecrating the graves, stone tablets had been erected, carved with their two names.
Zhao Lin felt a little dazed. The bandits he once saw as an unshakable force had crumbled in less than a year.
’If I hadn’t cultivated the martial path, I’d probably be a pile of bones by now.’
’Martial strength is the foundation of my survival in this world.’
After bowing a few more times, the two left in silence.
On the way back, Zhao Lin suddenly stopped and pointed northwest of Baitou Mountain. "Someone’s roasting meat over there."
"Someone’s roasting meat?"
Liang Song glanced in the direction he was pointing, his face full of doubt. "I don’t see any smoke. How do you know?"
Zhao Lin sniffed the air. Not knowing how to explain, he just skipped the question and said, "Let’s go take a look."
After more than ten days of adjustment, he had gradually adapted to the troubles brought by his sensitive sense of smell.
At first, the various smells in the air rushed into his nose, constantly stimulating his sense of smell, which he found incredibly annoying.
Every breath was a form of torture, and he couldn’t even sleep peacefully.
But the human body’s ability to adapt is astonishing. Zhao Lin soon learned to filter out smells irrelevant to him, just like the unimportant background noises one usually hears; unless something was out of the ordinary, it wouldn’t catch his attention.
’Roasting meat in the wilderness isn’t strange, but why is there no smoke?’
Zhao Lin knew that when armies marched in the wild, they would dig smokeless pits to cook in order to avoid being discovered by the enemy and revealing their position.
However, digging a smokeless pit was very troublesome. First, you had to dig a large pit, then a smaller pit inside the large one, and finally, you had to dig several long channels to disperse the smoke.
Hunters in the mountains usually took their game home to prepare. Even if they ate in the wild, there was no need to hide the smoke.
’Something so unusual must mean trouble. Who is roasting meat?’
Following the smoky, roasted scent, Zhao Lin quickened his pace.
Liang Song followed behind, his heart filled with growing doubt. ’We’ve walked for several miles and haven’t seen a soul. Where is this supposed roasted meat?’
But Zhao Lin grew more certain, as the smell of roasting grew stronger.
After walking another mile or so and crossing a hill, they finally saw two men in ragged clothes, their faces sallow and emaciated from hunger, tending a fire and roasting something. The sound of them slurping their saliva could be heard continuously.
There was a large pit in the ground, and inside it, a smaller cooking pit had been dug. A flat, cutting-board-like stone rested over the cooking pit, and on the stone were several skinned field mice.
The two men were standing in the large pit, adding firewood to the stove. The smoke from the fire flowed into three dispersal channels stuffed with dry grass and withered branches.
Liang Song gave Zhao Lin a silent look.
’He had heard from the older generation of hunters that fierce beasts in the mountains had powerful noses and could smell prey from miles away. How did Zhao Lin have this ability too?’
Zhao Lin looked down from the small hill, having already guessed the two men’s identities, and slowly drew his iron ruler.
The two men were completely unaware. One of them, a sallow-faced man, added firewood to the pit and said, "Smells good, but there’s just too damn little. It’s not even enough to get stuck in your teeth. If you ask me, we should just go into a village and grab a few chickens to satisfy our cravings."
The other man snorted. "Are you tired of living?! Chickens? Haven’t you seen the search parties combing the mountains these past few days? Let’s just hold out for a few more days until the heat dies down, then get the hell out of this godforsaken place!"
The sallow-faced man sighed. "When will these days ever end..."
"Don’t worry. Your days have ended."
A cold voice rang out.
Both men jumped, turning their heads, only to see, to their utter horror, the nightmarish figure appearing before them.
"Hero, spare—"
BANG! BANG!
Before the two could finish speaking, Zhao Lin struck them dead in the large pit.
...
Entering the city through the north gate, Zhao Lin bid farewell to Liang Song and returned to the Liuhe Sect to practice his martial arts.
With the bandits wiped out, there was no need to continue being a constable. Plus, breaking through the Yin Meridian acupoints was becoming increasingly difficult. Zhao Lin felt there wasn’t enough time in the day, so a couple of days ago he had submitted his resignation to the County Magistrate.
Magistrate Liu highly approved of Zhao Lin’s abilities. During Zhao Lin’s tenure, public order in the eastern city was stable, major cases were solved quickly, and the local gangs were remarkably well-behaved.
At the time, he had tried to persuade him, "Constable Zhao, you’re doing such a good job. Why the sudden desire to quit? Do you feel the reward this time wasn’t enough, or are you looking for a promotion?"
"You know that County Captain Li is a disciple of the Lingshan Sect and is in the prime of his life; I can’t move him from his position anytime soon. How about this: there’s an opening for a commander in the city guard. I can transfer you there to fill it."
Zhao Lin replied seriously, "Thank you, Your Honor. I am very satisfied with the position of constable. It’s just that I feel my martial arts have been neglected these past six months, and I wish to focus on my training."
Magistrate Liu nodded. He knew it was normal for someone as young as Zhao Lin to want to advance in their martial arts.
For martial artists, only when they no longer have ambitions on the martial path do they settle down and take up external affairs.
"Very well. In that case, I’ll trouble you to remain a constable for another half month while I find a replacement. Also, I have a small favor to ask."
"Please speak, Your Honor."
"After you leave your post, if the county yamen ever needs help, I hope you will still lend a hand."
Zhao Lin readily agreed.
In the six-plus months he’d been a constable, he had often taken leave or skipped work. Magistrate Liu knew about it but had turned a blind eye, which was quite considerate of him.
Lost in thought, Zhao Lin unknowingly arrived at a street corner on the south side of the Liuhe Sect. Suddenly, he caught a whiff of a strange Musk scent, mingled with a hint of pine resin.
’This scent... it’s very familiar!’
Zhao Lin was instantly on alert. He scanned his surroundings and found he had arrived near a side gate of the Liuhe Sect.
He rarely took this path; he was only passing by today because he had left the city to visit the graves.
He took a deep sniff, confirming that the Musk and pine resin scent was identical to the smell of the red medicinal powder he had encountered in the marten sheds at Fuli Valley!
He still remembered the words of the old man at the marten sheds: the red powder was for the leaders to consume.
’All the bandit leaders are dead. The only ones left alive are Chairman Li and Wang Cui!’
Zhao Lin immediately thought of these two names.
’What are they doing here?’
’Are they really trying to harm me, with just the two of them?’
Puzzled, Zhao Lin saw a gatekeeper standing just inside the side gate. He walked over and asked, "Who just left through here?"
The gatekeeper recognized Zhao Lin and knew he was Zhu Huaishan’s prized disciple. He answered respectfully, "The Old Madam just went out."
"The Old Madam?"
Zhao Lin was stunned for a moment, and then his heart sank.
Zhu Huaishan had an elderly wife. She was not a martial artist and rarely appeared in public, living in a small courtyard within the Liuhe Sect. She only came out to eat with everyone during the holidays.
’Don’t tell me they can’t deal with me, so they’re planning to use someone else as leverage?’
