West Market, Qingshan County.
As the sun rose, the streets gradually filled with people.
The quiet West Market started its noisy day.
Tianyi Studio antique shop.
The white-haired and bearded owner, Jie Jia, opened the doors punctually.
He first carefully swept the already clean and tidy ground.
Then he meticulously wiped the shiny and new-looking curio shelves.
His back hunched, his movements were slow but steady.
He exuded a sense of tranquility that contrasted sharply with the noisy crowd outside the door.
Chirp chirp!
A flash of black light zipped by.
A fist-sized, pitch-black bird had unexpectedly landed on Jie Jia's shoulder at some point.
Jie Jia seemed accustomed to this.
He ignored the bird on his shoulder until he had wiped every last corner of the curio shelf. Only then did he reach out to grab the black bird, removing the small bamboo tube from its ankle and pulling out the slip of paper inside.
It was a string of numbers with an inscrutable meaning.
"Chen Mu, Chen Family Village, one hundred taels. Big business," Jie Jia remarked expressionlessly.
Pinching the slip of paper between his thumb and forefinger, he rubbed it lightly.
Accompanied by a whiff of black ashes swirling in the air, the paper vanished without a trace.
A young man in a gray robe entered the shop, nodded respectfully to Jie Jia, and then walked honestly behind the counter.
He took out a brand-new piece of gray cloth from his bosom, carefully laid it on the chair, and cautiously sat down.
Jie Jia glanced at him and walked out of Tianyi Studio without a change in his expression.
The young man in gray breathed a sigh of relief.
"Who knows which unlucky soul is so fortunate to deserve the respected Jie Lao's personal handiwork," the young man in gray clicked his tongue in amazement.
His arm subconsciously reached out to rest on the counter, but froze just before touching the surface.
"I heard that Jie Lao has a cleanliness obsession. I... I better just sit still," the young man in gray quickly put his hand back on his knees, still shaken.
He sat as if he was standing in punishment, meticulously behind the counter, doing his best not to touch anything there.
Jie Lao was one of their top assassins at Zhu Yi Building.
If he was killed just for dirtying the counter, that would be truly unjust!
...
Behind Chen Family Village on the mountain.
A red-scaled snake dangled its body from a tree branch, stretching towards a nest on the limb.
Whoo whoo... puff!
The snake's head burst open unexpectedly.
The next moment, a figure shot out from beneath the tree.
Chen Mu ran through the mountains like a leopard.
He threw pebbles from his hands from time to time.
A palm-sized leaf thirty meters away suddenly had a hole pierced through it.
A centipede on the ground nineteen meters away was cut in half abruptly.
A wasp forty-three meters away was instantaneously crushed into pieces.
Twenty-three meters away, a cheerful rabbit had just sprung into a leap.
Puff!
A pebble appeared out of nowhere and pierced through its head with force.
"This really can be used for hunting!" Chen Mu emerged beside the rabbit, joyfully picking it up.
After testing that the mountain forest environment could improve his Shape Cultivation Technique, Chen Mu attempted hunting with the Flying Locust Stone.
"With this skill, I can at least ease the pressure of eating meat a little," he thought.
It wasn't just at Zheng Tu's place; the price of meat was rising all over Qingshan County.
Returning to the hunter's cabin, Chen Mu began to clumsily process the rabbit.
"I'll probably be dealing with the division of wild game from now on, so I might as well start practicing with this rabbit," Chen Mu thought cheerfully.
...
In the mountain forest above the hunter.
A tree thick enough to require two people to wrap their arms around it.
Jie Jia hunched over, with hands clasped behind his back, stood on a tree branch as thick as an arm.
Through a gap in the leaves, he quietly observed Chen Mu busy in the clearing from afar.
"Found him."
There was no ripple in Jie Jia's heart.
He had been an assassin all his life, and killing no longer caused any psychological fluctuation.
He was just a bit curious.
What could a frail scholar have done to offend someone to the point that they would spend a hundred silver taels to take his life?
"Forget it, he's just a target."
"Should we make it look like an accidental fall to his death or a mistake in consuming poisonous fruit?"
"Dying from a poisonous insect bite doesn't seem too bad either."
"In the southern mountains of Qingshan County, there are twenty-three kinds of lethal insects. The injury from a silver ring snake is too apparent, and Copper Coin spiders move too slowly, unlikely to harm anyone proactively."
"Hmm, the sting of the golden winged bee is fine and its venom potent. Tainted with poison on a silver needle, disguised as a bee sting, one could indeed create chaos within the semblance of normality."
Whoosh!
A Gentle Breeze blew past, and Jie Jia vanished.
Only a spinning leaf fluttered down in his stead.
...
"Young man!"
Chen Mu, who was awkwardly skinning and gutting a wild rabbit, couldn't help but turn around.
He saw an old man, hunched over, approaching along the path.
The old man's hair and beard were white but meticulously groomed, his steps slow yet steady.
His clothes were clean and tidy, clearly not the attire of a hunter or farmer.
"Young man, could you give me some clean water?" the old man asked, bending over and slowly walking towards the front of the hunter's cabin along the path.
"Elder, at your age, why are you still heading up the mountain?" Chen Mu asked, perplexed.
"Don't be fooled by my age, my body is quite sturdy," the old man retorted.
"I am a doctor, here in the mountains to gather herbs," the old man explained with a chuckle.
A doctor? Gathering herbs?
Then why isn't he carrying a basket for herbs?
Forget it, it's just a cup of water.
"Just a moment." Chen Mu agreed and washed the blood off his hands.
He went inside the wooden cabin to dry his hands and returned to Jie Jia's side with a water flask in hand.
"Here you are, sir," Chen Mu said, offering the bulging flask to the old man with both hands.
Jie Jia watched Chen Mu approach with a smile, the silver flash in his right hand behind his back disappearing in a moment.
He reached out his right hand towards the water flask.
Suddenly, a dark shadow descended from the sky.
Squeak squeak!
A fist-sized black bird landed abruptly on Jie Jia's shoulder.
Jie Jia's eyes narrowed involuntarily.
The dark bird was a messenger bird from Zhu Yilou.
Its sudden arrival meant that there must have been a change in the mission.
The smile that was feigned on his face immediately disappeared.
Reaching out, he took off the bamboo tube and pulled out a paper note.
"The employer is dead, the mission is cancelled?"
Jie Jia looked at Chen Mu expressionlessly, "You're very lucky."
Chen Mu looked at him, utterly baffled, "What do you mean, elder?"
"Don't play dumb," Jie Jia said expressionlessly, staring at Chen Mu, "You're hiding Lime Powder in your sleeve, aren't you?"
"You've got it all wrong, elder. It's just a sachet," Chen Mu earnestly said, pulling out a cloth bag from his sleeve.
"I was using Lime Powder to kill people before you were even born," Jie Jia snorted coldly.
"You've really got the wrong idea, elder. If you don't believe me, I can open it and show you," Chen Mu insisted seriously.
"If you dare to open that cloth bag and sprinkle it on me now, I'll kill you immediately!" Jie Jia said coldly, his gaze fixed on Chen Mu.
"Sigh, you have such a deep misunderstanding of me, elder. I'm truly not that kind of vile person," Chen Mu said, his face full of helplessness as he put the cloth bag back into his sleeve.
"You're very lucky, the one who wanted you dead is no more. I don't do business at a loss. You can rest easy," Jie Jia stated indifferently.
Chen Mu looked at Jie Jia, shocked, "Kill me? Elder, you really have quite the sense of humor. I'm just a straightforward scholar; who would want to kill me?"
"Straightforward? What kind of straightforward scholar carries Lime Powder around to harm people?" Jie Jia said, with a disdainful snort.
Saying this, he reached out to take Chen Mu's water flask.
He had rushed all the way here, dealing with locating the target and preparing assassination methods, and he was indeed a bit thirsty.
"Forget it, a person's prejudice is like a mountain that can't be moved. No matter how I explain, you won't believe me," Chen Mu said dejectedly as he carried the water flask back to the wooden cabin.
Jie Jia's hand came up empty, "Hey... this stubborn scholar."
"Could I really have been wrong in my suspicion?"
"That smell was Lime Powder, wasn't it?"
"No, not right!" Jie Jia's face darkened, "This little bastard couldn't have poisoned the water, could he?"
So prejudice is like a mountain?
He sure acts the part damn well!