Chapter 294 - 290: Uprooting (Part 2)
He kowtowed three times before the coffin.
Having done this, he turned to leave.
However, just as he crawled out of the robber’s tunnel and looked back at Hidden Emperor Castle, a thought suddenly began to grow wildly in his mind.
’If all the Celestial Sword Sect disciples are truly dead... then what about the gold and silver in Hidden Emperor Castle from last year that hasn’t been handed over to the Sect yet?’
’Did... did they take it?’
He remembered that last year’s various revenues for Hidden Emperor Castle had resulted in a surplus of 6.5 million taels of silver.
At the start of spring, they had paid two million taels in tax silver to the Court as was customary.
’The remaining four and a half million taels, converted into gold and silver, should still be stored in the castle’s most secret Silver Vault.’
Once this thought appeared, it spread like a wildfire, impossible to contain.
His heart began to pound uncontrollably.
He fell silent for a moment, his expression shifting dramatically.
He whirled around and re-entered the robber’s tunnel.
Then, following the secret passage, he pushed open the heavy Stone Gate, slipped into Hidden Emperor Castle, and returned to his master’s now-empty, luxurious bedroom.
He held his breath and carefully scouted the area.
The entire castle was deathly silent.
’The servants and some of the lower-level disciples must have either fled or died last night.’
After confirming it was safe, a terrifying glint flashed in his eyes. Unable to hold back any longer, he confidently made his way to a seemingly ordinary storage room on the castle’s second floor.
He moved a heavy wardrobe in the corner, revealing a smooth stone wall behind it. Channeling his Inner Strength, he pressed a spot on the wall.
"KLIK... KREEEAAAK..."
The sound of a mechanism turning echoed as the stone wall slid to one side, revealing a stone staircase leading down.
Following the stairs, he reached a completely sealed storeroom on the fortress’s lowest level, built entirely of thick granite.
The storeroom was enormous, filled with over a hundred neatly stacked, iron-banded wooden chests that were half a man’s height.
He walked to the nearest chest, focused his strength into his fingers, and with a "CRACK," crushed the bronze lock and threw open the lid.
Inside the box, government-issued silver ingots were stacked in perfect rows, reflecting a tempting luster in the faint daylight filtering through an air vent.
Four and a half million taels!
It was still here!
’This... is all mine now! Luo Hanfeng’s!’
’All of it, for me alone!’
Luo Hanfeng stood frozen on the spot, his body rigid, only his chest heaving violently.
The knuckles of the hand gripping his sword hilt turned white from the excessive force, trembling slightly.
He, a True Disciple of the Celestial Sword Sect, received a monthly stipend of a mere five hundred taels from the Sect.
Everything else he needed had to be earned by completing the Sect’s various missions, risking his life in exchange.
But what lay before him... was a staggering fortune he couldn’t earn in several lifetimes.
After a long while, he barely managed to recover from the immense shock.
His gaze refocused, but it had turned cold and ruthless.
’This fortune must not be known to anyone! It absolutely cannot!’
He quickly left the vault. Instead of moving the silver himself, he headed for the dungeons deep within the castle.
In the dungeons, dozens of various Jianghu outlaws were still imprisoned, captured by the Celestial Sword Sect for violating the Ruins Market’s rules.
Luo Hanfeng expressionlessly opened a cell door and walked in.
A flash of his sword appeared without warning.
"PFFT!"
"Ah!"
Blood splattered as a ferocious, cursing prisoner was killed instantly.
The dungeon fell deathly silent. The remaining twenty-some men stared in terror at the Celestial Sword Sect disciple who had burst in like a malevolent star, too scared to even breathe.
Luo Hanfeng flicked the blood from his sword’s tip, his cold gaze sweeping over the crowd. "If you want to live, you’ll do as I say. Otherwise, you die."
How could the prisoners dare to refuse? They nodded furiously.
Luo Hanfeng, sword in hand, escorted the twenty-some men back to the Silver Vault.
"Move all of these boxes to the place I designate. Be gentle, and don’t make a sound. Anyone who so much as glances at them or says a word will be executed on the spot!"
Under the threat of Luo Hanfeng’s Longsword, the prisoners began moving the chests, two men to a box.
Trip after trip, they carried the silver boxes into the deep, secret passage, finally stacking them in the Pig Emperor’s hidden chamber.
When the last silver box was pushed into the secret room, Luo Hanfeng’s gaze swept over the prisoners, and a cold sneer formed on his lips.
The light of his sword flashed again, without warning.
Like the Grim Reaper’s scythe, it reaped madly within the narrow confines of the secret room.
Screams, curses, and pleas for mercy erupted in an instant, only to be just as quickly extinguished.
In just a dozen breaths, all twenty-some prisoners lay in pools of blood. Not one survived.
The only things left in the secret passage were the thick, inescapable stench of blood and Luo Hanfeng’s own ragged breathing.
He expressionlessly flicked his Longsword clean, not even glancing at the corpses littering the floor. After confirming all the silver boxes were inside, he sealed the mechanism completely.
He exited the way he came, crawling out of the robber’s tunnel. He then spent some effort to carefully conceal and pack down the entrance until no obvious trace remained.
His taut nerves suddenly relaxed, only to be immediately replaced by an even more intense ecstasy.
"Heh... heh heh..."
In the end, he couldn’t hold it in and began to laugh softly.
’I did it!’
’This silver, this immense fortune... it finally, finally all belongs to me, Luo Hanfeng.’
However, just as his laughter died down and he turned to leave, he saw a gray figure standing silently in the shadow of a nearby tree stump. He didn’t know when the person had appeared.
It was as if the person had been there all along, and he had only just now noticed them.
Luo Hanfeng’s laughter cut off abruptly. He stared fixedly at the person, a mixture of shock and rage in his voice. "You... Who are you?!"
’When did he get here?’
’How much did he see?’
’Has he... been waiting here this whole time?’
Luo Hanfeng’s mind roared.
’Could it be... that everything I just did—moving the silver boxes, killing the witnesses—my supposedly perfect plan to take it all for myself, was seen by this person?!’
The thought that the staggering fortune might be exposed instantly transformed his boundless fear into hysterical killing intent and rage.
"You’re courting death!"
His eyes nearly splitting from their sockets, Luo Hanfeng let out a furious roar and, disregarding everything, channeled all his Power to charge madly at the gray figure.
’I can’t let anyone know this secret!’
’Absolutely not!’
However, faced with this desperate, all-out attack...
...the gray figure simply raised a hand slowly and, from a distance, pointed a finger at him.
There was no earth-shattering display of power.
Luo Hanfeng’s charging figure froze abruptly. The furious expression on his face solidified, the light in his eyes instantly dimmed and scattered, and his body fell backward, stiff as a board. With a "THUD," he crashed onto the cold ground, silent forever.
The newcomer was, of course, Chen Li.
After killing the members of the Celestial Sword Sect last night, he had hidden on the outskirts of Hidden Emperor Castle to see if any fish had escaped the net.
He never expected that his wait would yield such an unexpectedly huge reward.
Originally, he hadn’t been able to find the Celestial Sword Sect’s vault. He hadn’t thought the other party would so dramatically help him find it.
After disposing of the body, Chen Li’s figure flickered. He once again slipped into Hidden Emperor Castle and thoroughly searched it inside and out. Confirming there were no other living souls, he vanished into the twilight.
...
「As night fell, a quarter past five.」
On the various paths leading to Hidden Emperor Castle, figures began to appear in twos and threes.
This was the usual time for the Hidden Emperor Castle’s Black Market to open.
Unaware of the previous night’s incident at Hidden Emperor Castle, many Black Market merchants and regular customers still headed there as usual.
However, this surface-level calm did not last long.
The first few groups to arrive slowed their pace almost simultaneously.
The area near the entrance, which should have been manned with sentries and patrolling disciples, was now completely empty.
Then, something even more horrifying appeared.
Corpses.
"Is that... someone from the Celestial Sword Sect?"
"They’re dead? Why are they all dead?!"
"Heavens... this is..."
After the initial shock, a complex mix of emotions began to spread quietly through the crowd.
Among them, some merchants who had personally experienced the lockdown—and even near-conflict—the night before now looked pale, their hearts still pounding with lingering fear.
They had returned today, feeling resentful and hoping to gather some information, but they never expected to find such a hellish scene.
Could the Celestial Sword Sect have been wiped out overnight?
Otherwise, why would the bodies of Celestial Sword Sect disciples be left exposed in the wilderness?
After a brief, deathly silence, someone mustered their courage and cautiously walked into Hidden Emperor Castle.
The brightly lit halls and bustling crowds they expected were nowhere to be found.
Inside the castle, it was even more silent.
Hidden Emperor Castle was finished.
Looking at the empty Ruins Market, the people exchanged glances, each seeing the same terror reflected in the others’ faces.
"Hidden Emperor Castle... The Celestial Sword Sect fought so hard to conquer it, and now it’s been uprooted overnight. How can they possibly let such a bloody loss go?"
"The Jianghu... I’m afraid a great storm is coming."
It was foreseeable that before long, news of Hidden Emperor Castle being wiped out overnight would sweep across the Jianghu of Jiangzhou, shaking countless factions.