System: I Can Open Martial Arts Chests-Chapter 82 - 74: Night Raid
Chu Qing’s movements were faster than his voice. At the moment he uttered, "Who’s there?" he had already dashed out.
But he didn’t rush far.
About ten yards away, he stopped in his tracks as Gentle came up behind him.
"Did you smell anything?"
Chu Qing asked.
"Still just the scent of a blade..."
Gentle replied softly.
Chu Qing frowned slightly. No human scent, only the scent of the blade.
Did he see wrong?
Impossible!
Chu Qing was an assassin, extremely sensitive to gazes and killing intent.
White Chess once said that his talent in this area far surpassed that of ordinary people.
Just now, he clearly felt a surge of killing intent quietly settle on him. When he turned to look, he vaguely saw a blurry figure.
But the figure came and went too quickly, disappearing into the mist the instant he rushed out.
This layer of mist became the natural camouflage for the opponent.
Chu Qing frowned slightly and glanced back at Dong Xingzhi:
"Did Senior Dong see anything just now?"
Dong Xingzhi slightly shook his head:
"I saw nothing..."
Seeing this, Dong Yubai snorted:
"If my second uncle didn’t see anything, how could you see anyth... mmph mmph mmph..."
Before he finished speaking, his mouth was covered by Dong Xingzhi.
Chu Qing cast a brief glance at Dong Yubai, ignoring him, and continued wandering around the village with Gentle.
The more he looked, the tighter Chu Qing’s frown became.
In every aspect, this village seemed very ordinary.
If there was anything to say, it was that the village had very few fields, and combined with the forges and anvils in the middle of the village, it could be deduced that this village likely made a living by forging weapons.
So the fields were less than those in a normal village.
This was not out of the ordinary.
But why would such a village have an Illusion Array set up around it?
Chu Qing and Gentle first strolled around the village’s roads and then randomly chose a household to inspect.
The most eye-catching thing in this household was an altar table.
On it were two ancestral tablets.
But they weren’t for this family’s ancestors; they were for the offspring.
White-haired elders sending off their children, indeed a human tragedy.
But in this era, it wasn’t unusual... Yet when Chu Qing and Gentle entered the second house, they realized something was amiss.
This household also had ancestral tablets, four in total, all for their offspring.
"This..."
Chu Qing and Gentle exchanged a look and then stepped into the third household.
The same again!
They visited each household; some didn’t have offspring tablets, but most did!
This didn’t make sense.
"Qingxi Village has not suffered from Martial World disasters, and there are no traces of conflict here.
"Why are so many young and strong men dying mysteriously?"
Chu Qing glanced at Gentle.
Gentle rubbed his nose, then said:
"It’s almost dark."
They had spent the entire afternoon wandering the village, and now indeed the sun was setting in the west.
Chu Qing and Gentle temporarily didn’t find answers to the problem, so they returned to the center of the village.
Du Hanyan and the others had already returned, and Chu Qing saw the white horse named Brother Bai standing distinctly apart from the Mist Rain Tower girls.
The girls eyed the horse covetously, while Brother Bai dejectedly pawed at the ground.
Not far away, inside a main house, firelight flickered.
Chu Qing and Gentle went straight into the main house and saw that Du Hanyan, Cao Qiupu, and the Dong uncle and nephew were all present.
Seeing Chu Qing and Gentle, Du Hanyan smiled:
"You’ve returned? Any findings?"
Gentle glanced at Chu Qing, who then asked:
"Miss Du, do you have a way to extricate us?"
Du Hanyan didn’t mind his lack of an answer and simply nodded:
"This array is not too strange. Give me some time, and I should be able to break it.
"However, it’s getting late, and with the mountain mist added to the night, it will be pitch black, making it hard to break the array. We’ll have to wait until tomorrow."
Upon hearing this, Chu Qing breathed a sigh of relief:
"If so, then we’ll all rely on you, Miss Du."
"No need to be so formal, Young Master."
She didn’t know Chu Qing’s name. Gentle called him Third Brother, but she couldn’t follow suit.
Even though she didn’t know his exact age, she could tell he was a few years younger than her, so she called him ’Young Master.’
Dong Yubai was originally gazing at Du Hanyan with infatuation, but she paid him no attention.
Seeing Chu Qing striking up a conversation with Du Hanyan as soon as he returned, Dong Yubai felt a pang of jealousy and couldn’t help saying:
"Miss Du is racking her brains to break the array, while some people just say polite words without actually helping.
"Just playing tricks... Did you find that so-called ’person’ this afternoon?"
As soon as these words came, Cao Qiupu suddenly looked up at Chu Qing:
"Young Master saw someone?"
Chu Qing sat down, nodding slightly:
"I felt someone watching from the shadows earlier, but when I pursued, they had already hidden in the mist.
"In that fleeting moment, I only caught a glimpse of a gaze and a blurry shadow."
Cao Qiupu was about to say something when Dong Yubai spoke again:
"At this late hour, you’re still playing tricks here!
"Aside from us, who else is here?"
Chu Qing didn’t mind his words, and even Gentle found it hard to listen, shooting him a glare.
Chu Qing picked up a branch from the ground and fed it into the fire: 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶
"No, even if what I saw in the day wasn’t a person, there are others here."
