Killing a person, do you need to hesitate?
If it were the first time he was to act... Fan Wu might have hesitated for a moment.
But this was not the first time.
Yes.
Fan Wu had killed before.
In his first year after crossing over to this mysterious and strange world, he had already killed.
It was when he was helping his swindler master to escort some valuable items that they encountered bandits on the road.
Those few bandits were probably not locals from Qiulong County.
Because the locals from Qiulong County had long since been hoodwinked and incapacitated by his swindler master.
It was also because they did not know of the "reputation" of Qiulong Temple that they were bold enough to consider a robbery.
Unfortunately.
They encountered Fan Wu, who had inherent divine power, and before long they turned into several corpses.
That was the first time in Fan Wu's two lifetimes that he had personally executed evildoers.
With such an experience as a basis, Fan Wu had no psychological burden about killing again.
And he would not hesitate.
Fan Wu did not use the Demon-slaying Sword in his hand. Under Xuan Shizi's terrified gaze, Fan Wu's palm clasped like a tiger's clamp, deathly tight around Xuan Shizi's neck.
In front of Fan Wu's palm, Xuan Shizi's neck was as slender as a twig.
Xuan Shizi's face turned red from being strangled, and a sensation of suffocation surged into his brain.
As Fan Wu's arm slowly lifted.
Xuan Shizi's feet left the ground.
His emaciated legs shook unconsciously, and his hands, thin as old kindling, desperately grasped Fan Wu's forearm as if he wanted to pry Fan Wu's hand open.
But Fan Wu's arm was like welded steel, immovable!
"Eh..."
Xuan Shizi's eyes were already bulging wide as he was choked by the neck and lifted.
With a dull thud coming from the back of his head.
Xuan Shizi felt the back of his head hit the wall of the chamber.
And to his immense horror, he realized that Fan Wu in front of him was exerting force towards the wall!
Under that tremendous power, Xuan Shizi felt as if his head was going to fuse with the wall.
His entire skull throbbed painfully as if it was about to split!
Crack—
That was the sound of the chamber's wall cracking, small stones fell onto Xuan Shizi's back and then dropped to the ground.
The chamber wall behind Xuan Shizi's head had already developed fine cracks and was visibly caving in.
Thud!!!
The sudden sound like a watermelon bursting. Xuan Shizi's unconsciously shaking legs kicked out fiercely at that moment! Then they drooped down lifelessly, hanging three feet above the ground.
His head had become a bloody, indistinct mass, his twisted face frozen in fear and despair.
Xuan Shizi's entire head was embedded in the solid wall.
At first glance...
It was as if a human-shaped piece of art had been nailed to the chamber wall.
Fan Wu looked at the "art piece" in front of him and shook off the bloodstains on his palm.
He no longer needed to deliver another blow.
Because the system had sent a notification.
[You have successfully killed "Evil Xuan Shizi (empowered by The Great Revered One's malevolent force)." Congratulations, you have received Free Attribute Points: 4 points!]
[You have burst a skill that matches 95% with your own—Star Lodging Sword Technique lv1 (0/10)!]
[Star Lodging Sword Technique: You will master this skill with unmatched proficiency! Upon leveling up the skill to lv2, the skill's effect will be activated—permanently enhance your 'Power' attribute by 20%!]
"You can burst out attribute points from killing someone? Or, is it that after this guy was possessed by that 'The Great Revered One,' he's no longer classified as human and belongs to the demons and devils... thus allowing him to burst out attribute points?"
"And a skill burst out? Star Sutra Sword Technique... I remember seeing it before in Xuan Shizi's attributes. It's just that Xuan Shizi did not have the chance to use a sword to fight me."
Fan Wu murmured to himself with astonishment.
Bursting out a skill was definitely a huge profit; his [Skill] attribute would finally not be labeled with a "none."
Just at that moment...
An overwhelming amount of information about the Star Sutra Sword Technique began flooding into his mind.
He didn't even need to memorize the sword technique to master it directly!
What a deal!
So convenient!
[Name: Fan Wu]
[Life: 89+]
[Power: 10+]
[Skill: Star Lodging Sword Technique lv1 (0/10)]
[Free Attribute Points: 4]
Fan Wu glanced at his personal attribute panel, and indeed, there was an additional "Star Sutra Sword Technique" listed under the Skill attributes.
As for the lv1 behind "Star Sutra Sword Technique" and the experience bar-like thing inside the parentheses, Fan Wu wasn't curious.
Because when he first activated the system, he already knew about these things.
lv1 refers to the level of the skill.
The parentheses do indeed represent the experience bar, and as soon as the experience is filled up, the skill would upgrade to lv2!
It's very simple to add experience, that is, to invest Free Attribute Points into it.
Currently, he only had 4 Free Attribute Points, which were insufficient to upgrade it to lv2, temporarily preventing him from obtaining that 20% Power attribute bonus.
Moreover, his base Power attribute was so minimal that even if he spent 10 Free Attribute Points to upgrade the skill, it would only bring him a meager increase of 2 points in the Power attribute.
That is to say, when the Power attribute is too low, it's impractical to prioritize upgrading skills.
Wait until the Power attribute is higher, and the 20% increase from lv2 can be most effectively utilized.
For now,
It's better just to look.
...
Fan Wu turned around.
Looking behind him,
The giant tendril made of flesh tumors had now turned into a pool of foul-smelling pus.
A bizarre statue.
Still lay on the ground.
This statue was the one Xuan Shizi had held in his arms just a moment ago, and it should be "The Great Revered One" Xuan Shizi mentioned.
"What a patchwork monstrosity?" After examining the statue, Fan Wu gave such an evaluation.
Disgusted, he kicked it aside and began searching around in this underground chamber.
This Xuan Shizi was able to construct an underground chamber in Gou Lan's gathering place, and he could even enslave so many spirits and fierce ghosts related to Gou Lan.
To say he wasn't the mastermind behind Gou Lan... would be hard for anyone to believe.
The man must have been in control of Gou Lan, a place tremendously laden with Yin Energy and resentment...
Engaged in some unknown underhanded dealings!
"Running a Gou Lan venue for an entire county, even if one is indifferent to money, there's no way there won't be a single coin in his pocket." Fan Wu had begun to rummage through the room.
He was looking for valuable things, after all, what kind of person kills a monster and doesn't loot the corpse?
After searching around,
Fan Wu found a pile of strange talismans, some weird-looking items suspected to be Magic Artifacts, and a heavy box with a lock on it.
He wasn't too familiar with talismans and Magic Artifacts.
He didn't even know how to use them.
He was more interested in the box.
At that moment, Fan Wu's hand was tightly gripping the iron lock on the box.
The next moment, his palm suddenly exerted force!
The terrifying grip strength caused the iron lock to emit the twisting noise of metal fatigue!
Crack——
The iron lock on the box was actually twisted off by his bare hands!
Upon opening the box,
Fan Wu found it hard to look away.
Silver!
Gold!
Inside the box before him, stacks of Gold Ingots and Silver Ingots were neatly arranged!
The majority were Silver Ingots.
There were fewer Gold Ingots.
This must have been the treasure Xuan Shizi had accumulated, right? There were at least two thousand taels of silver, and quite a bit of gold, too. If the gold were also converted into silver, the total might be well over four thousand taels of silver!
Hm?
This number...
Sounds familiar!
Fan Wu's expression became slightly odd, recalling that his swindler master had left him a similar amount of silver, not much different from this figure.
Could it be that the over four thousand taels of silver "eaten" by the True Martial Great Emperor were now, in a way, "retrieved" from Xuan Shizi?
Fan Wu didn't take the Magic Artifacts and talismans from the secret chamber; he worried that carrying such things could serve as a tracking device.
Xuan Shizi obviously worshiped something strange.
Since that thing had followers, it meant that there must be more than just Xuan Shizi as a believer.
Shit!!!
Then you definitely should not carry these broken things on you!
Who knows if it would attract a crowd?
...
...