Strongest Cultivation Swordsmanship System-Chapter 43: Three Captains of Lu

"Count Lu is a wise, astute, and strategic man," Elder Yan said suddenly. "But he has a reputation for being very cautious, sometimes bordering on paranoid."

Xiaotian frowned. "What do you mean?" he asked.

"Have you heard of the Three Captains of Lu?" Elder Yan asked.

Xiaotian shook his head, he had no idea.

"The Three Captains of Lu are very high-ranking individuals in the service of the Count. It is said that they are his three arms, and when Count Lu makes a move, it is because those three have already cleared the way for him," he said.

"He is a careful man," Xiaotian said thoughtfully.

"He is." Elder Yan nodded. "The first arm is known as Lin Tang."

Xiaotian blinked a couple of times... that name. He recognized it.

"The Hammer Man?" he asked.

"Yes, the Hammer Man from Oak City. Even though he looks so rough, he’s one of the most bloodthirsty men in these lands. It’s deadly to mess with him."

"Really?" Xiaotian was shocked.

That man didn’t seem like it at all. Even he had spoken to that man once, and he was kind.

"The second arm is Wei Liang. I’ve heard you’ve been investigating him recently."

Xiaotian nodded. "The Baron of the Lower Province," he said.

"Yes. He administers the entire lower province on behalf of the Count. I don’t know exactly what he does, I just know that he’s dangerous and not to be messed with. He has practically a private army. You should avoid investigating him further."

"That’s where the third arm comes in. The danger in investigating them is precisely this man," said the Elder, continuing, "His name is Shen Tao, commonly known as ’The Butler.’ He’s the man who’s always with Count Lu."

"What does he do?" asked Xiaotian, puzzled.

"Who knows?" Elder Yan shrugged. "I heard he leads an intelligence organization for the Count. They have arms everywhere, being one of the largest organizations in the entire empire."

"That big?"

"For one of the largest in the empire to be under the service of a mere Count... Hehe, I think that guy is the most powerful of the three arms. At least in intelligence, he is far above any of them," he said.

’Even the Count himself,’ thought Elder Yan, although it was something he was not going to say. There were things even he had to keep secret to avoid trouble.

But Count Lu’s power was astonishing, and with the help of those three Captains in the field, he could practically walk around here without any fear, with just a few elite guards.

The other Counts were usually protected by hundreds of elite soldiers, and once, one was even seen being protected by two thousand elite soldiers and powerful cultivators.

Count Lu was different. His army consisted of about 10 to 15 elite soldiers and a "butler."

Sometimes he even has only three soldiers, but the butler is always there. This not only demonstrates perfect control over his own territory, but also shows confidence in his subordinates.

Thanks to this, he is one of the most respected Counts.

’He’s a really dangerous man.’ Xiaotian thought, though he decided not to dwell on it.

Attracting trouble was his specialty now that he had transmigrated, but he didn’t want to take advantage of it.

They talked for a while longer, until Mu Tao Lei and Mu Ruxue left, for different reasons.

Elder Yan and Xiaotian went to the Drunken Swordsman Tower to train a little, but when they arrived, they didn’t train.

At that moment, for the first time in a month, Xiaotian saw Elder Yan take out a jug of wine.

The Drunken Elder did not live up to his title, honestly. Even though he always carried a bottle of wine with him and had a whole collection in his office, since Xiaotian came here, he had not seen him drink even once.

He did see him with a flushed face as if he were drunk a couple of times, but he did not see him drink directly.

He always wondered, why?

Elder Yan read his expression and smiled. He poured wine into two glasses and placed them in front of them, on the windowsill where they looked out over the city.

"Wine is not only a delicacy for me, it is also the root of our training," he said casually, taking a sip of wine.

"The root of training?" Xiaotian stared at him and then looked at the wine. Was this wine some kind of miracle juice?

Elder Yan laughed at his confused expression. "It’s not a miracle juice." He said, guessing his thoughts. "It’s ordinary wine. It’s just that our Legacy Technique is trained under the influence of wine."

"For us, it is strength, it is power. It is cultivation and constant improvement. But all constant improvement needs to be done carefully; that is my motto. Suffering is right and necessary, but it is one thing to suffer and another to become addicted to that development. There are no good excesses, and the path of cultivation is the best example of this. Everything must be done in a sustained manner to avoid future problems."

Although Xiaotian didn’t understand his words very well, he nodded. "You avoid drinking wine too often to avoid becoming addicted to it..."

"Basically, that’s right. Just as you can’t always raise your cultivation infinitely without affecting your body," he replied.

Xiaotian understood that better than anyone. His broken bones were the perfect example of that.

Silence reigned between them for tens of seconds, until Xiaotian broke the silence.

"Elder Yan, why did you decide to help me?" he suddenly asked. "Is it your intention to obtain my father’s technique?"

Elder Yan stared at him for a while.

It was a complicated question to answer. But he smiled a moment later and looked at the city below them.

"If this had been when I had the duel with your father, I would have answered that I wanted that technique as payment," Elder Yan said and suddenly laughed. "If it had been a little earlier, I would have forced you to hand it over to me."

Xiaotian raised an eyebrow. "And now?" he asked.

"This time I did it just on a whim." 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝒆𝔀𝒆𝙗𝓷𝒐𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝓶

"A whim?" Xiaotian laughed. "I’m sure nothing in this world is free."

Elder Yan smiled coldly and gently breathed in the aroma of the wine in his hands. It was a light grape wine, not fermented at all. But it smelled delicious.

That smell calmed him more than he expected. It had been a long time since he had drunk such a light wine with such a low alcohol content.