Chapter 122: Racing Against Time

On the 28th of the eighth lunar month in the 12th year of the Yuanping reign, Yan Liqiang, who was staying in Wuyang Village, woke up very early and started preparing for the busy day ahead of him.

Last time, he spent the day with Shi Dafeng. Both of them made plans to walk around Pingxi City for nearly the entire day. Since Yan Liqiang deliberately reported in at a different time than Shi Dafeng this time, both of them never met yesterday and they naturally didn’t end up as neighbors to each other. Shi Dafeng probably still lived near Three Yuan Street while Yan Liqiang lived in Wuyang Village which was outside the city. Therefore, today was completely free for Yan Liqiang. No one would come to disturb him. He had the entire day to himself today.

The first thing Yan Liqiang did when he woke up was practice his morning regime.

The so-called morning regime was the cultivation content that Yan Liqiang had set for himself from now on every time he woke up in the morning. For now, it included practicing one round of the eye technique, one round of the ear technique, and three rounds of Muscle Tendon Changing and Marrow Cleansing. He was to strictly adhere to this plan.

For the sake of progressing into a Martial Warrior in the shortest amount of time possible to possess powerful strength, Yan Liqiang had to speed up his Muscle Tendon Changing and Marrow Cleansing cultivation.

Muscle Tendon Changing and Marrow Cleansing cultivation didn’t have any requirements on the place and time; just a room of about two square meters would suffice. Yan Liqiang had already gotten used to discreetly practicing this secret technique in a dark room or his own room. Before every practice, he would first settle down in the room, shut his eyes, and take some time to carefully sense if anyone was spying on him through his spiritual perception. He would only begin practicing Muscle Tendon Changing and Marrow Cleansing after ensuring that was no one around.

Yan Liqiang’s past experience proved to him that his prudence was not superfluous; it was extremely essential. For an unknown youth who was never an apprentice to a master and had no expert guidance, he first saved a drowning person’s life in Huanglong County through a method unknown to anyone. He claimed that the saving method was imparted from a God in his dreams, and then he snatched the first position among top three in Qinghe County’s Martial Arts County Trial; such tale might not mean anything much in some people’s eyes. Even if they were a little suspicious, they couldn’t really do anything about it. However, such tale might spell trouble if it traveled to someone else’s ears.

There was another very important reason behind Wang Haofei from the Wang Clan of Huanglong County and Ye Xiao scheming against Yan Liqiang that time aside from Lu Beixin of the Lu Clan. The strength Yan Liqiang exhibited, which far exceeded his peers, had made both of them suspect if Yan Liqiang was cultivating some sort of secret manual. Hence, they attempted to unscrupulously get their hands on the said item from Yan Liqiang’s possession.

Judging from the current point of time, Wang Haofei definitely wasn’t aware of the relationship between Yan Liqiang and Lu Beixin yet.

The official opening of Pingxi Prefecture Martial Arts Academy was on the first day of the ninth lunar month, which was a few days from now. Lu Beixin had already been grounded by Old Master Lu back at home and was unable to contact Wang Haofei, so Wang Haofei still thought nothing was out of the ordinary. Even if he had heard of Yan Liqiang’s name in Huanglong County, he wouldn’t relate him to Lu Beixin in any way. Therefore, at this point in time, Yan Liqiang was nothing but a stranger to Wang Haofei, whom he had occasionally heard of.

Since Wang Haofei found trouble with him last time, Yan Liqiang would at least have to wait until the end of the tenth lunar month. Wang Haofei had only started to notice Yan Liqiang about a month after his arrival at the martial arts academy and after he received the information Lu Beixin that had secretly sent to him on Old Master Lu’s plan in pairing her up with Yan Liqiang. That was when he started assigning Qi Donglai as his lackey who would periodically report to him, which in turn led to a series of incidents afterwards.

Yan Liqiang carefully made a few conjectures. Had he not discovered the shady business between the Shatu people and Ye Clan that night, and had he not barged into the basement to rescue the girls, could his father and his tragic end be avoided?

All his conjectures pointed to the same final answer — No!

That was because the most important source of conflict between him and Ye Xiao was not the fact that he had discovered the shady business he had been doing in the basement; it was the fact that he wanted to get his hands on Lu Beixin so that he could use her as a cauldron in the Yin Yang and joyous secret technique he had been cultivating to establish his foundation. Therefore, Yan Liqiang was an obstacle to the Prefectural Governor’s young lord in his quest to obtain Lu Beixin. Not only that, this obstacle of all people might have some sort of attractive and drool-worthy divine secret manual in his possession. Regardless of Lu Beixin or the possible existence of secret manual or the secret technique Yan Liqiang had with him, there was no way that Prefectural Governor’s young lord would let him slip by. Yan Liqiang might be able to delay the explosion, but it would still eventually explode. Ye Xiao would still be able to use his position along with his authority and capabilities to easily crush an insignificant character like himself without much background and ruin his family.

Wang Haofei was definitely a key figure between Yan Liqiang and Ye Xiao.

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If it wasn’t for his dirty deed in supplying the information, it would be impossible for Ye Xiao to catch wind of him and Lu Beixin in such a short period time and he wouldn’t have put his attention on such an insignificant new student in the martial art academy like Yan Liqiang.

According to the original timeline, Yan Liqiang’s peaceful life in the martial arts academy would be shattered in two months. As a new student who had joined the prefecture’s martial arts academy with his status as the best among top three of Qinghe County, he might have seemed glorious on the outside with great future ahead of him. Yet, an imminent crisis was already brewing beneath the surface. In just a few weeks time, his clan could be ruined in the blink of an eye.

Yan Liqiang was currently racing against time, wishing to defer or even defy the crisis that would strike him in two months and the first step in achieving this was to eliminate Wang Haofei.

Qi Donglai was the easiest target to kill. However, he was merely a lackey. Killing Qi Donglai wouldn’t do any good for now as it would inadvertently alert the enemy instead. Since the conflict between him and Qi Donglai was publicly known, if Qi Donglai were suddenly murdered without rhyme and reason, Yan Liqiang would be the primary suspect.

Ye Xiao, Mo Leng, and that goddamned officer, Ye Tiancheng, deserved to be murdered the most, yet they were also the hardest targets to kill. Mo Leng was extremely powerful. On the other hand, the depth of Ye Tiancheng’s strength was obscure and unknown. Yan Liqiang would have to plan and prepare well to just kill Ye Xiao alone, as he was always surrounded by a bunch of guards. Even Mo Leng was always by Ye Xiao’s side. It was definitely not easy to find an opportunity to murder Ye Xiao.

Therefore, killing Wang Haofei was the most pressing matter on hand and a choice which had the highest possibility of success. If he could kill Wang Haofei, then he would be nothing but an insignificant stranger to Ye Xiao and the others behind him for a very long period of time. With this amount of time in his hands, he would be able to progress into a Martial Warrior, thus changing everything.

However, it wouldn’t be so easy to kill Wang Haofei. Putting aside his strength which was almost on par with Yan Liqiang, as the outstanding youth among the younger generation of the Wang Clan in Huanglong County, Wang Haofei was also always in the company of two guards. Under such circumstances, it wouldn’t be possible for Yan Liqiang to kill him if he openly rushed up to him with his weapon. Hence, he had no choice but to come up with an alternative method.

If he had the Horned Python Bow in his hands, murdering Wang Haofei who wasn’t even a Martial Warrior wouldn’t be too much of an issue. However, Wang Haofei was always in Pingxi City and the Horned Python Bow was too big. Bringing the bow out would be akin to carrying a flag — too eye-catching and impossible to conceal even if he wanted to. There was no way he could hide his activities in Pingxi City this way. Therefore, he still had to think about another method to use to kill Wang Haofei.

Coming up with an alternative method might be very difficult to others, yet for Yan Liqiang, it was not a challenge. If the Horned Python Bow was too eye-catching, then all he had to do was to replace it with another less eye-catching object.

After completing his morning regime, Yan Liqiang went out and descended the mountain. At a small noodle stall in Wuyang Village, near the public road at the foot of the mountain, Yan Liqiang ate a bowl of noodles and then bought six steamed buns. He brought the buns which were wrapped with paper and returned to the small courtyard he was staying at.

On his way out and back, Yan Liqiang met quite a number of villagers living in Wuyang Village. These villagers had already started their busy days. Most of them were headed off to the fields on either side of the hill with their farming tools. Some elderly men pulled their cows and shepherded their goats to graze at the plains. The small roads in the village were extremely narrow. At most places, if someone was pulling their cow or donkey along, the other person would have to give way by leaning to the side of the road.

The roads in the village were dirt roads paved with a lot of stones. They were bumpy with a lot of weeds and trees along the sides. Some families also plowed small patches of vegetable fields on the empty lands in front and behind their houses. Balls of goat manure and turds of cow dung could be seen everywhere along the roads. There were also a few stray dogs running along the roads. This place was filled with rustic charm.

When the villagers saw an outsider like Yan Liqiang on the road, some of them took an extra glance at him with curiosity. However, these people already knew his identity. After all, Wuyang Village wasn’t that huge. News about properties being rented or sold in the village traveled very fast among the villagers.

“Did you see that? That’s the new student from the martial arts academy who just moved into the village…” Yan Liqiang could hear quite a number of tongues wagging behind his back along his journey.

When Yan Liqiang returned to his courtyard, he put away the steamed buns which would be his lunch and dinner. He took out the pile of items he had bought while he was buying his daily necessities yesterday and started working on his murder weapon.

Yan Liqiang set a goal for himself— he’d send Wang Haofei to hell before the end of the ninth lunar month…