At this moment, Wang Ping knew he was dead meat.
Simultaneously, he cursed out all eighteen generations of his handler’s ancestors in his heart. Is this how you handle things? What happened to absolute secrecy?
Am I being tossed aside like a pawn?
Just as despair threatened to consume Wang Ping, Shou Chong did something that completely caught him off guard. Rather than decapitating him with a single stroke, the old man backed away.
Then, with a casual flick of his wrist, he tossed something.
Wang Ping instinctively reached out and caught the Lotus Blade—the very same blade that had obliterated the artificial rockery—as it fluttered lightly into his palm, radiating bone-chilling cold.
“Perfect timing. Since that’s the case, I’ll give it to you,” Shou Chong said cryptically. He grabbed Xie Shi by his side, and like a bolt of lightning, crashed straight through the roof and sped off into the distance.
Almost immediately, Wang Ping felt his scalp prickle violently.
This feeling… I’ve been locked onto!
For no apparent reason, a wave of realization washed over Wang Ping. And then, he heard a voice boom from outside the Daoist temple. “The one holding the Lotus Blade is the rebel leader of the White Lotus!”
“…Huh?”
Hearing this, Wang Ping felt as if he were holding a branding iron. He fiercely flung the Lotus Blade he had just caught from Xie Shi away.
“It’s a misunderstanding! A misunderstanding!”
Wang Ping shouted at the top of his lungs, “I am an undercover agent for the county yamen! I have performed meritorious deeds for the yamen! I demand to see the Head Constable. Someone in the yamen can prove my innocence…”
His answer was the whistle of an incoming arrow.
In that instant, Wang Ping felt an emptiness in his chest. He looked down and saw a hole the size of a bowl carved straight through him.
It was the mark left by an arrow piercing his chest.
His second life had ended just like that, completely unprepared… Sure enough, I shouldn’t have dreamed of rising above my status. I should have just stuck to farming honestly.
It’s just that he died so pointlessly.
Ultimately, why did the constables of the county yamen suddenly appear here? And since they were here, why didn’t his handler come with them?
He should have survived this…
Just as Wang Ping entertained these thoughts, a pair of black leather boots entered his fading vision. The owner of the boots seemed to be barking orders:
“Capture them! Don’t let them get away!”
“Take all those under house arrest in the main hall into custody… There are too few of them. Go grab more from Qian Village. We finally mobilized; we cannot return empty-handed.”
—This was his handler’s voice.
At that moment, another voice chimed in. “Lord Head Constable, one of the rebels just claimed to be an undercover agent for the county yamen…”
Yes, yes, yes! That’s me!
With the opportunity to clear his name and survive dangling right in front of him, Wang Ping’s desire to live surged wildly. However, the handler’s next words plunged him into an icy abyss.
“What undercover agent? The county yamen has never planted a mole in the White Lotus Cult. It’s just a rebel spouting nonsense to save his own life.”
At that moment, Wang Ping was driven beyond anger.
Based on his moral compass, he assumed the Imperial Court’s bottom line was simply denying his contributions and hoarding his bounty. But he had thought too highly of them.
They were burning the bridge after crossing the river!
Realizing this, all of Wang Ping’s fear, bewilderment, suffocation, and unwillingness coalesced into an indescribably monstrous fury.
However, much to his despair, there was nothing he could do.
He could only lie on the ground in rage.
The next second, Wang Ping’s vision plunged into fathomless darkness. In his daze, the sound of rustling pages echoed faintly in his ears.
…………
Qian Village.
Once upon a time, this was a tranquil village nestled in the countryside. Now, flames clawed at the sky, and shouts of slaughter filled the air.
“Lords! Lords, spare us!”
“Help!”
“Run! Run!”
The fiery glow, tinged with the color of blood, illuminated Chen Haoyan’s face. Despite standing amidst a sea of fire, the constables surrounding the Head Constable felt only bone-deep cold.
He stood quietly in the inner courtyard of the Daoist temple, scrutinizing the shrine sitting inside the house. He remained utterly unfazed by the pungent stench of blood wafting from the outer courtyard.
Even though those who died weren’t White Lotus Cult members but merely a bunch of village children, he didn’t care in the slightest.
At this moment, a travel-worn constable approached him.
If Wang Ping were here, he would undoubtedly recognize this man. It was none other than the neighborhood tyrant known as Master Liu, who had been aggressively collecting protection fees all over the grass market outside the city.
“Lord Head Constable, we’ve swept the area.”
“Although this is the White Lotus Cult’s lair, not many villagers actually joined them. There are about a dozen, and we have detained them all.”
“My Lord, should we bring them back for questioning one by one?”
Chen Haoyan turned around, his gaze tranquil.
“Questioning? Liu Ye, it seems you’ve spent too much time in the grass market. Harboring rebels is a crime equal to rebellion itself. Do I need to teach you such a simple principle?”
Liu Ye froze upon hearing this.
“My Lord, you mean…”
“Kill them all.”
These three light words hit the constable like a massive mountain. He subconsciously cast a glance around the Daoist temple.
Corpses littered the ground, limbs were severed, and blood flowed like a river. Yet, not a single one was armed. Based on the calluses on their hands and feet, they had only learned minor tricks to strengthen their bodies. There wasn’t even one person who genuinely knew martial arts; otherwise, this encirclement wouldn’t have gone so smoothly.
Any fool could tell they couldn’t be rebels.
Yet, they still died.
Thinking of this, Liu Ye opened his mouth out of empathy but swallowed all his words back down out of reason. In the end, he could only squeeze out, “This humble subordinate understands…”
“Wait!”
Suddenly, a young constable stepped forward, his face flushed with righteous indignation. “Please forgive this humble subordinate, but I cannot condone this method!”
Liu Ye turned his head and saw that the speaker was Lin Sheng. Lin Sheng’s family had served the yamen for three generations, and he had learned an excellent set of martial arts at a young age. This earned him a spot as a constable before he was even twenty. Stepping out now, his youthful bravado was evident between his brows.
“My Lord, we received an Imperial Decree to suppress the rebels. We are suppressing rebels, not civilians!”
The young constable declared vehemently.
“These people were merely deceived by the White Lotus Cult and are unaware of the truth. They are not true rebels. If we slaughter them so readily, how can the Imperial Court ever win the people’s trust in the future?”
“…People?”
After hearing Lin Sheng out, Chen Haoyan’s expression remained completely unbothered. He merely twitched the corners of his mouth as if he had just heard a rather absurd joke.
Bang!
The next second, Lin Sheng, who had actively stepped forward, felt as though a massive sledgehammer slammed into his chest. His entire body convulsed violently as he spat out a mouthful of hot blood.
Immediately following that, Chen Haoyan’s voice rang in his ears.
“Offending a superior. Consider this a minor punishment as a major warning.”
“As for your question… It doesn’t matter. Since you have joined my county yamen, you are now one of my own. We are brothers, so I will give you a reasonable explanation.”
Chen Haoyan seemingly mustered some patience and chuckled softly. “We who work in the yamen certainly have many rules to follow. But ultimately, it boils down to two things: public duty and personal interest. Whatever we do, we must balance public duty and personal interest. Only then can we stand firm.”
“Take this matter, for instance.”
“What is the public duty in this matter, and what is the personal interest?”
After Chen Haoyan finished speaking, Lin Sheng was actually taken aback. However, he quickly rallied himself and answered, “The public duty is to suppress the rebels, and the personal interest is the gold and silver bounty…”
The county yamen also received bounties for exterminating rebels.
This was especially true for the rebel leader of the White Lotus Cult, that old fogey named ‘Shou Chong’, whose bounty was a staggering five hundred taels of silver—a massive sum even for a Head Constable.
Chen Haoyan nodded. “Since that is the case, you should understand.”
“If we brothers come out here and fail to kill a single White Lotus rebel, this trip will have been for nothing, and there will be no bounty for us to claim.”
Lin Sheng was stunned. “But, but we really haven’t found any White Lotus rebels…”
“Who says?”
Chen Haoyan pointed toward Qian Village not far away. “Aren’t they all right there? We discovered the White Lotus Cult plotting to gather the masses for a rebellion. This is a massive contribution!”
“Do you want me to report to the County Magistrate that our suppression failed and all the rebels escaped? Or should I report that we thwarted the rebels’ plan to rebel? The former is a complete failure and might result in a severe punishment for all of us. The latter will definitely satisfy the County Magistrate, and we brothers will claim the bounty together.”
Having said this, Chen Haoyan pulled out a silver throwing knife.
“This is the White Lotus rebel leader’s Lotus Blade, which we have now confiscated. It serves perfectly as evidence. We will report that he fled in a panic after being severely wounded by us.”
“With both witnesses and physical evidence present, everyone will be happy.”
“No… that’s not right!”
Lin Sheng shook his head violently, his jaw clenched tight. “That’s personal interest! You clearly didn’t solve the problem, yet you pretend you did. Where does public duty come into play in such actions?”
“Good question.”
Chen Haoyan nodded. “Why do you think we go through all this trouble, publicizing it everywhere, making such a grand display of going out to suppress rebels?”
Faced with such a simple question, Lin Sheng answered almost without thinking, “The White Lotus rebels plague the villages. Our actions are naturally meant to protect our borders and secure the peace for our people.”
“You are wrong. Dead wrong!”
Chen Haoyan scoffed coldly. “We have the White Lotus Cult here, and the neighboring county has the Luosheng Cult. In this world, you can never finish killing all the rebels.”
“Then…”
Lin Sheng was bewildered. If suppressing rebels wasn’t to protect the borders and secure the peace, what was it for?
Chen Haoyan provided the answer in the next second. “It is to make the noble families and scholars in the county town—make everyone—believe that we are protecting the borders and securing the peace.”
“Then they will spend money to support us.”
“Only when they spend money will the County Magistrate have money. When the County Magistrate has money, we will get our bounty and live a good life instead of starving.”
“When they believe it, the county town is secure.”
“When the county town is secure, the world will not fall into chaos.”
“This is the public duty.”
“Therefore, what we are doing this time, both publicly and privately, is completely justifiable in the grand scheme of things. As for the rest, as the saying goes, do not fret over trivial matters.”
“This… trivial matters?”
Hearing this, an immense sense of absurdity flooded Lin Sheng’s heart. He looked around, only to see the surrounding constables fall into silence one by one.
“Killing civilians to claim military merit, slaughtering the villagers outside the city… Human lives are at stake, yet these are trivial matters?”
“You seem to be misunderstanding something.”
Chen Haoyan’s voice drifted over, carrying a cold, chilling indifference that struck fear into Lin Sheng.
“When we talk about human lives, we refer to those living inside the county town—the noble families and the scholars. As for the peasants outside the city walls… do they even count as human?”
Having said his piece, Chen Haoyan immediately turned on his heel and walked away.
Before leaving, he didn’t forget to glance at the corpses littering the ground. His gaze lingered on one particular body for a moment, and he shook his head inwardly.
What a pity for this man.
This encirclement of the White Lotus Cult was actually a hasty operation.
The reason was simple. After meeting with Wang Ping, he turned back to gather men to set up an ambush at He Village—only to accidentally discover that the information had leaked.
But the men were already assembled. If he did nothing and abandoned the original plan, the result would only be the death of their undercover agent and the White Lotus Cult making a fool of the county yamen. Once the news spread, as the Head Constable, he would have to shoulder all the blame. The County Magistrate would also highly likely deem him incompetent afterward.
Damn it, this would seriously affect his career.
Therefore, Chen Haoyan eventually came up with a terrible solution out of a lack of better options. Although he didn’t have the ability to eradicate the White Lotus Cult, he definitely had the ability to kill civilians and claim military merit.
And lots of it.
As for that undercover agent… A mere peasant born in the countryside, a life cheaper than dirt. Dead is dead; he had no reason to care.
It wasn’t like the man could come back to life and seek revenge against him anyway.
…………..
Wang Ping opened his eyes once more.
“…Huh?”
The drastic change in the scene before his eyes made it hard for him to process. His brain couldn’t keep up with the visual feedback.
This time, what entered his vision was a boundless expanse of darkness and a high platform towering within it. A closed tome, as massive and majestic as a towering building, rested on the platform.
This sight left Wang Ping, who thought he was undoubtedly dead, completely dumbfounded. It took him a long time to recover his senses.
“Where is this?” Wang Ping looked around in bewilderment.
Right then, the towering tome right in front of him abruptly opened. The rustling sound of turning pages lingered in the air until it finally stopped on one specific page.
【The Taiping Classic】
【Volume One: Otherworldly Heavenly Demon】
【An entity from beyond the heavens, wandering in the netherworld, yet lacking a soul body. It is the sole anomaly in heaven and earth, transcending all expectations.】
【Upon death, you can resurrect once. After resurrection, a seven-day cooldown period is required. Upon resurrection, you can randomly enter a new world or enter a world you have already visited. Simultaneously, within a specific world, consuming ‘destiny’ upon rebirth can grant you a new identity. The more ‘destiny’ you possess, the higher the status of the new identity you obtain.】
“…I see.”
Twenty years after his transmigration, right at the bitter end.
After slapping himself hard, feeling the sting, and confirming this wasn’t a hallucination, Wang Ping stared at the towering tome before him with only one thing to say:
“Dad, what took you so long!”