Building a Martial Dao Celestial Family by Laying Low

Chen Li felt a subtle sense of unease. The signal had been changed, but its meaning was unclear. He immediately asked, "Do you know the location of the rendezvous point?"

"I do." Gossip nodded.

"Lead the way." Chen Li stood up.

"Now?"

Gossip glanced at the pitch-black, rainy night outside the window, but he didn’t dare to delay. He answered in the affirmative and immediately blew out the flickering oil lamp on the table.

The fish stall was instantly plunged into darkness.

The three of them quickly put on their straw raincoats and conical hats, melting into the night and disappearing silently into the dense, cold curtain of rain outside.

Under the rainy night sky, the streets of Thunder Shock County were empty and desolate.

Before long, they arrived at an open, empty field.

In the center stood a small, solitary temple. It was only about ten feet square, with green bricks and black tiles, looking exceptionally squat and dilapidated in the downpour.

The temple door was ajar, and a faint, pea-sized halo of dim yellow light shone from within, flickering stubbornly in the wind.

"Huh? Where’s Peng the Kid?"

Gossip lowered his voice, scanning their surroundings warily.

He was the first to tiptoe around to the back of the temple. His expression changed slightly, and turning back to Chen Li, he whispered, "Master, the signal... it’s been moved again! The arrangement has changed!"

Chen Li didn’t go to look at the signal. He stood still, slowly extending his Divine Sense outwards.

Within a hundred-foot radius, there was nothing but the sound of wind and rain and the breathing and heartbeats of the three of them. There was no sign of any other living creature.

His Divine Sense continued to expand, reaching a thousand-foot radius. He could sense many auras, some strong, some weak, but most were faint and steady. They likely belonged to the ordinary people sleeping soundly in the nearby residences. There were no hidden Martial Artists or any unusual movements.

If there were any powerful experts nearby, they would never escape the perception of his Divine Sense.

But right now, apart from the wind and rain, there was only dead silence.

"Let’s go back."

Chen Li retracted his Divine Sense. There was no point in staying any longer; it would only increase the risk.

The three of them silently retraced their steps back to the fish stall.

They rested for the night.

The next morning, the light rain continued to fall.

But Peng Anmin was still nowhere to be seen.

Gossip’s voice was tinged with anxiety. "Master, Peng the Kid didn’t come back all night. I’m afraid something’s happened to him! Is this place no longer safe either? Should we find another place to hide, quickly?"

Chen Li shook his head and changed the subject. "The Black Market on the Netherworld Ship—do you know how to get in touch with them?"

Gossip was taken aback, not expecting Chen Li to suddenly ask about this. "I do. There’s a contact point right here in Thunder Shock County. Master, you mean...?"

Chen Li said, "You and Bai San go and sign us up. We’re going to take a look at the Netherworld Ship."

"What?!"

Gossip cried out in alarm, "Master, you can’t! Those people are looking for us everywhere right now. If we go to them, aren’t we just walking into a trap?!"

Bai San curled his lip. "Old Bao, look at you, so spineless. Have you really been scared witless by that bunch of thugs? The Master is here, what the hell are you afraid of?"

Choked up by Bai San’s retort, Gossip opened his mouth but didn’t say anything further.

After all, the man before him was the ruthless expert who had single-handedly taken down the Seven Kills Ancestor. His own worries were probably insignificant in such a person’s eyes.

He calmed down a little and chuckled sheepishly. "I was being foolish. With the Master here, there’s truly nothing to fear."

"Take Bai San and go sign up," Chen Li instructed.

The two of them gathered their things, put on their conical hats, and pushed open the door of the fish stall.

Chen Li paused for a moment, then picked up a half-worn oil-paper umbrella from behind the door and followed them at an unhurried pace.

To Chen Li’s slight surprise, the contact point for the Netherworld Ship was actually a bustling teahouse on the main street.

Chen Li waited for Bai San and Gossip to enter the teahouse and head to the back courtyard. He then took a seat by himself at a table near the entrance, ordered a pot of tea, and began to sip it slowly.

About half an hour later, Bai San and Gossip emerged from the back courtyard.

Seeing Chen Li, they quickly walked over.

Bai San lowered his voice. "Master, it’s done. Tonight at 7:30 PM, at Thunder Shock Pier, a boat will come to pick us up. They gave me this. We board with this token. They won’t wait."

His fingers twitched inside his sleeve, showing Chen Li a small black token he had just received. It was made of a material that was neither metal nor wood and was engraved with a wave-like pattern.

Chen Li nodded.

The three of them got up one after another and left the teahouse. They found a breakfast stall nearby, had a simple meal, and then returned the way they came.

They returned to the fish stall.

Unexpectedly, when they opened the door, they found someone was already inside.

Peng Anmin was squatting by the stove in the corner, trying to light some damp firewood. When he saw the three of them return, especially Chen Li, he was visibly stunned for a moment before scrambling to his feet to bow. "Master Chen! What are you doing here?"

"Peng the Kid, where the hell did you run off to?"

Gossip was both shocked and overjoyed. "The Master went to look for you himself last night, but we couldn’t even find a ghost of you! We thought you’d been done in!"

An apologetic look appeared on Peng Anmin’s face. "I’m sorry to have worried you, Brother Bao, Master Chen."

"Where were you last night?" Gossip asked curiously.

Peng Anmin’s expression grew complicated. "I got to the area near the Earth God Temple last night, but before I could check the signal, I noticed someone else was there. It wasn’t Hall Master Feng or Hall Master Hua. It was Liu Dahu, the wealthy landowner from Heitan County who first brought me into the Seven Kills Association."

"Liu Dahu?"

Gossip was stunned. "You mean the Dean from the Jiangzhou Riverway Office?"

"Yes, that’s him!"

Peng Anmin nodded and gave a bitter smile. "He somehow found out that we have tens of thousands of boxes of Opium Paste. He came looking for me specifically to persuade me to hurry up and hand over this hot potato for him to deal with. Otherwise, he said, even he wouldn’t be able to protect us."

As he spoke, he snuck a glance at Chen Li.

The matter of the Opium Paste was something Chen Li had specifically instructed him on, so he naturally didn’t dare to make a decision on his own.

’The Government Office is involved now, too?’

Chen Li listened quietly, a flash of surprise in his eyes.

This was indeed beyond his expectations.

He hadn’t expected that these eighty thousand boxes of Opium Paste would end up entangling so many different factions. The situation was far more complex than he had initially anticipated.

These waters were far deeper and murkier than he had imagined.

For a moment, even Chen Li found it difficult to completely see through all the connections and stakes involved.

But his intuition told him that things were far from simple.

"This is getting more interesting..."

Chen Li muttered to himself.