Stealing the Heavens

Late in the evening, within the backyard of Lu Cengfeng’s residence…

Steam was hovering within the bathroom, and the spacious stone pool was filled with hot water. Wu Qi was lying lazily on a stone slab in the middle of the pool. Two serving ladies were rubbing his body with some silk cloths. The exhaustion within his body was being squeezed out, bit by bit, by the forceful rubs of the two serving ladies. It was so comfortable that Wu Qi almost fell asleep.

Lu Chengfeng was sitting at one side of the pool, only his head sticking out of the boiling hot water. His face had turned red, and sweat kept falling from the side of his face. Two serving ladies had their arms and legs tangled around his body, feeding him some refreshing rice wine with a jade wine pot.

Heavily, he breathed out a long sigh. Then, he narrowed his eyes and gazed at Wu Qi while saying, “I’ll be able to protect myself as they don’t have the guts to hurt me openly. After all, my mother, Maiden Liyang, is the current Chief Lady of Lu Family. The only thing they can do is frame me or set me up. Even if they were to send some assassins to kill me, they won’t do it while they are still in Little Meng City.”

Drinking another glass of rice wine, Lu Chengfeng frowned and said, “But you have really offended that Marquis Liu. I’m afraid they will make you their first target.”

Wu Qi let out a doubtful snort, and replied with an indifferent tone, “Whatever happens, go with it. When they decide to take me as their first target, they should be prepared to be killed by me. If they were killed in Little Meng City, would it be a huge trouble?”

Lu Chengfeng raised his eyebrow and scolded him with a deep voice, “Don’t mess with them. Those men beside Marquis Liu and Lu Quyuan are really strong. I could barely keep myself safe. If we really want to kill them, it would require a military mission involving all the City Guards. Although we have newly recruited twenty thousand soldiers, we lack weapons and armor. Also, the new recruits are not fully loyal to me yet. I’ll need to work on them before they can be put to good use!”

Thinking for some time, Wu Qi breathed out a long sigh and said, “We’re still too weak. I have to find another way for us to get money. We’ll need to recruit more rogue hunters from other, more distant, places, and have them group into the City Guards.”

Lu Chengfeng remained silent. Was money really that easy to find?

As for recruiting more soldiers, Lu Chengfeng couldn’t agree more with the idea. But, there were merely two hundred thousand people in Little Meng City, and those twenty thousand new recruits included almost every single useful man within them. If they really wanted more soldiers, they would have to find them in other cities.

Reaching his hand over and grabbing on the serving lady’s butt, Lu Chengfeng pointed at two serving ladies beside Wu Qi and smiled, “These two girls now belong to you.”

Turning his head and looking at two serving ladies who were rubbing his body, Wu Qi shook his head and said, “I’m underage. For me, it is too soon for this kind of a thing! My teacher once told me that I can’t make love with any girl before adulthood, or else I will lose my pure Yang, and have trouble with my future cultivation!”

Standing up from the stone slab, Wu Qi grabbed a green robe beside the pool and gazed at Lu Chengfeng before he bursting out in a weird laughter, “Young master, enjoy your night with four queens! Turn your pressure into motivation. You’ll need to work hard tonight.”

Laughing out loud while avoiding a jade wine pot thrown by Lu Chengfeng, Wu Qi put on the green robe and walked out of the bathroom.

Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyuan would make him their first target? Wu Qi sneered. It looked like he had to find a way to let these two bastards ‘accidentally’ die outside Little Meng City!

Wu Qi walked to the empty courtyard, throwing an examining look around. With a leap, he hid under a shadow at the corner of the courtyard. Foggy water vapor spread out slowly, and his body twisted, fading under the cover of the water vapor. Wu Qi swiftly jumped over the wall, quickly moving around the familiar courtyard towards the place where Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyan were staying.

Along the way, he found that the guards of the Mayor’s Mansion had been chased away by Liu Suifeng’s personal guards, who were now patrolling in full suit armor and red war robe. On the high point of some of the walls, a few of Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyuan hanger-ons were on guard, keeping surveillance on the perimeter and making sure no threats approached.

Wu Qi could see those personal guards were carrying crossbows and bags of bolts on their back. When he took a closer look at the crossbows, he found out that they were the military-grade crossbows made for the army of the Lu Kingdom. The very powerful nine bolts crossbows. This crossbow could fire nine pure steel bolts at the same time, potentially impaling heavy armor from two hundred feet away.

If all one thousand personal guards were equipped with this crossbow and were fired at the same time, that would be a rain of nine thousand pure steel bolts. With the current strength of Little Meng City’s City Guards, most probably they would be completely defeated by just one round of this attack. It looked like Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyuan were really well-prepared before they came here, not giving Lu Chengfeng even the slightest chance of counter-attacking.

“Sure enough, this Marquis Liu really has a strong background!”

Wu Qi was lying flat on a rooftop of a building, staring greedily at the bags of bolts on these guards’ back. The City Guards of Little Meng City merely had one thousand crossbows, and they were all single bolt crossbows. Comparing to these nine bolts crossbows, the amount of damage they could deal and the deterrence they represented was disparagingly different.

Shaking his head, Wu Qi climbed down from a pillar like a wall lizard and sneaked into the courtyard, covering himself with the shadow of the corner of a wall. Stealthily, he ventured deeper into the courtyard. From afar, he could hear the wild laughter of Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyuan along with the sound of a girl crying.

Both of them were occupying the deepest inner courtyard of this part of the General’s residence. Right at this moment, a room at the north side of the courtyard had all its doors and windows wide open, and candlelight was illuminating the room brightly. An almost naked teenage girl was crying while being squeezed in the middle by both men. She was being tortured by both of them at the same time.

Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyuan were laughing in joy. With a nearly maniacal manner, they were scratching and biting this poor girl’s body. Especially Lu Quyuan, he was sticking out his tongue full of saliva and licking the girl’s face, acting just like a mad stray dog.

Wu Qi was hiding within a bush, staring at the two insane men quietly.

The clothes on this poor girl were made from rough weeds, not those fine silks worn by their serving ladies. While she was crying for her parents, Wu Qi could recognize her accent was from Little Meng City, very different from the soft and gentle official language spoken by their serving ladies. The poor girl must have been abducted from the street when they came into Little Meng City.

Wu Qi stared cruelly at two men, who were now waggling their body crazily. Inwardly, he had decided what their fate would be. No matter whether it was their malicious intention toward Wu Qi or their evil doing tonight, Wu Qi was determined to send them to the deepest depths of hell to have their sins cleansed while burning in hellfire.

Taking a last look at both men, who were laughing out loud, Wu Qi then threw an examining look around and checked the surroundings.

There were faded energy ripples coming out from a room to the west. The door and windows were tightly shut, but Wu Qi could still hear a subtle crying and begging noise of a teenage girl coming out from it. Soon, the girl’s life force became weaker and weaker, and her voice was also becoming lower and lower. On the opposite side, the energy ripple had become stronger. Eventually, it became like a powerful sword that was drawn out from its scabbard, projecting a sky-piercing energy.

With some cracking sounds, some roof tiles were launched high into the sky by the piercing energy, shooting away like arrows. The next second, the door was opened, and a long bearded old man wearing a red robe walked slowly out.

Letting out a mild cough, the old man extended his arm and grabbed something behind him. A naked girl then flew out from the room, being thrown onto the floor. Her privates were a mess, and her skin was so pale that it could frighten anyone looking at her. She was skinny, and her skin was loose, as if all her blood had been sucked out.

“Somebody, take this bitch away!” The old man in red snorted and said, “Next time, bring me those bright girls who can understand my words. Bitch, you dared to bite me? Hmph! Where did you guys find her? Send someone and kill her entire family. You dared to bite me? Now your family pays for your actions!”

A few fully armored guards quickly ran up, grabbing the dead body and dragging it out of the courtyard. The old man in red twisted his lips, glanced around and then rubbed his crotch a few times. Clenching his teeth tightly, the old man cursed, “How dare you bite me. Courting death!”

The door opposite from the one the old man had just left opened up. An old man wearing a white robe with flaming symbols stitched on it came out from the room. He took a deep breath and stared at the old man in red while sneering, “Old Devil, it was cruel enough for you to kill the girl, now you even want to kill all her family. Aren’t you worried you will be struck by lightning for all these sins?”

The old man in red, Old Devil, let out a strange laugh. With his head held high and laughing coldly, he said, “Making love is a natural order. But you, Lord Flame, by absorbing the Yang energy from young boys as a supplement, you need to kill at least a hundred kids each year. Your sins are not any less than mine. Don’t you agree?”

Both old men were disagreeable to each other, staring at each other like two fighting dogs. They started to curse each other like there was no tomorrow.

A sudden thought was brought upon Wu Qi’s mind. By using trees and bushes as cover, he moved stealthily to a back window of the East side room. Then he pulled out his low-level magical dagger and cut the lock on the window. Like a stream of water, he swiftly slipped into the room. Wu Qi took a quick glance and, with lightning speed, grabbed a red silk bag hanging on the side of the bed and left the room immediately.

The silk bag was emitting a subtle energy ripple. According to Scroll of Stealing, this was a unique energy ripple that belonged to a magical storage item. Wu Qi focused his spirit and took a look inside of the bag. He found that there was storage space equal to the space of three normal rooms. It was a low-level magical storage bag, precious but not rare.

There was a small pile of red energy stones lying within, along with a few talismans and a red longsword. Besides these items, there were also a few clothes and dozens of boxes of gold, silver, and jewelry.

After Wu Qi had stolen the magical storage bag of Lord Flame, he then sneaked his way to the West side room, and also stole the magical storage bag of Old Devil. Then, he left the courtyard at full speed. With his speed, he had soon caught up with those guards who were dragging the dead body of that poor girl and walking out of the Mayor’s Mansion.

Simply grabbing a cloth and covering his face, Wu Qi followed these guards and left the Mayor’s Mansion, walking toward the South side of Little Meng City.

Not long after that, two strong energies shot up into the sky. There was even a fireball that flared up from the courtyard.

The angry roar of ‘Lord Flame’ resounded within Little Meng City, “Outrageous! How dare you steal my treasures! You…! Damn you, I’ll burn you into ashes!”

The ear-splitting scream of ‘Old Devil’ could be heard at the same time, “It was all my belongings! I spent nearly a hundred years saving that up! Damn thief! A thousand curses upon you!”

When Wu Qi heard the screaming of both of the old men, he sneered, but remained silent. He then continued to follow those guards.