28: Chapter 28 Extraterrestrial Meteorite

The interior of the secret vault was about three zhang square. Niches were chiseled into the four walls, and the light from night-luminescent pearls bathed the vault in a ghostly green glow.

Jiang Yan's gaze first landed on a piece of pitch-black metal.

It was the size of a human head, with a rough surface covered in honeycomb-like holes.

It felt extremely heavy, several times heavier than gold of the same volume.

When he pressed his palm against it, the surface temperature of the metal was much lower than room temperature.

He probed with his Divine Sense.

The crystal structure inside the metal unfolded within his Divine Sense—Impurities were interspersed between the crystals, scattered like granules in the gaps.

Extraterrestrial Meteorite Iron. First Grade, High Grade.

The impurity content was no more than thirty percent; after refining, one could obtain about four or five catties of pure Meteorite Iron.

Meteorite Iron was different from gold essence—gold essence was stable and pure, while Meteorite Iron harbored uncertainty.

Using it to refine a Magical Artifact might result in unexpected attribute changes. Whether it was good or bad depended on the skill of the Artifact Refiner.

Jiang Yan tucked the Meteorite Iron into his robes.

He continued his search, his gaze drawn to a camphor wood chest.

It was two chi square, and inside, over a hundred pieces of jade were neatly stacked.

He swept it with his Divine Sense. Most were just ordinary jade, but seventeen pieces had a faint trace of Spiritual Qi flowing within them—extremely weak, like morning mist.

Unranked Spiritual Jade. It was not much better than the pieces in the Zhou Family secret chamber, but it had the advantage of quantity.

Seventeen pieces, combined with the Fire Jade as the array core, were enough to set up the Li Fire Killing Array twice.

The Fire Jade could be used repeatedly, but these unranked jade stones could only be used once.

Jiang Yan picked out the seventeen pieces of Spiritual Jade, wrapped them in cloth, and put them in his satchel. The other items in the secret vault—antique porcelain, calligraphy and paintings, jade Guanyin statues—were all Mortal objects, and he did not touch any of them.

After exiting the secret vault, he closed the bronze door and snuck toward the isolated courtyard.

The Restriction was as clear in his Divine Sense as words written on paper.

He found the weakest node of the Restriction, tapped it with his finger, and injected a strand of Spiritual Qi, severing the connection of Spiritual Qi at that node.

The Restriction silently cracked open a slit.

Jiang Yan slipped inside.

The main room was brightly lit. The sound of string and bamboo instruments drifted out from the gaps in the lattice windows; it was a duet of pipa and flute, the melody soft and languid.

A man in his thirties was reclining on a soft couch.

He wore a moon-white silk robe with the collar open, revealing a gaunt chest.

His features were decent enough, but his eye bags were swollen and bluish-purple, and his gaze was murky and unfocused.

His left arm was wrapped around a woman dressed in thin gauze, who was peeling a grape and feeding it to him.

His right hand rested on the waist of another woman whose clothes were half-undone.

On the wool carpet in front of the soft couch, three naked women were crawling on the ground.

They wore exquisite leather collars around their necks, connected to thin silver chains, the other ends of which were held in the man's right hand.

They crawled on the carpet like dogs, making deliberately muffled whimpering sounds.

Occasionally, the man would lift his foot, and the woman dragged to his side by the silver chain would lower her head to lick his toes. The action was practiced and mechanical.

The man laughed heartily, his laughter coarse and wanton, echoing throughout the room.

Jiang Yan watched all of this from the shadows, his gaze calm as water.

He circulated his fourth-rank Divine Sense Cultivation Technique and swept his Divine Sense over the man. The fluctuation of Spiritual Qi in his Dantian was clear—Qi Refining Stage 2.

That vortex of Spiritual Qi was larger than his, at least twice the diameter.

But that Spiritual Qi was loose and unsubstantial, like a clump of cotton soaked in water.

The spacing between the Spiritual Qi was uneven, and the color was a pale grayish-white, lacking any sense of solidity.

A Qi Refining Stage 2 built up by Medicinal Pills. The Foundation was ridiculously unstable.

Jiang Yan evaluated in his heart: in a head-on confrontation, he could take his life within three moves.

But this was not the place to act. He wanted to take this person down silently and pry information out of him.

He pulled three golden needles from his sleeve. On the dark gold needle bodies, the patterns of the paralysis Restriction glowed faintly.

He waited.

The man threw his head back and laughed—the woman who had been licking his toes seemed to have done something wrong, and he yanked the silver chain violently, dragging her across the carpet.

Watching her wretched appearance, the man removed both hands from the women beside him to slap his own thighs.

Now.

The three golden needles shot out silently. Wind Rising Style—the trajectory of the golden needles was erratic, carving three elusive arcs in the night sky.

One pierced the Fengfu acupoint on the back of the neck. One pierced the Mingmen acupoint on the waist. One pierced the Jianjing acupoint.

The paralysis Restriction activated simultaneously.

The man's laughter stopped abruptly, his body frozen in place, maintaining the posture of throwing his head back and laughing.

His eyeballs could still move, and his pupils were filled with terror.

He wanted to scream, but a clucking sound came from his throat.

The women had not yet reacted, and the music continued for another two breaths before stopping.

Jiang Yan flashed out from the shadows. Several strands of Spiritual Qi shot out silently, striking the slumber acupoints of the women.

Their bodies slumped down softly, falling into a deep sleep.

He grabbed the man by the back of his neck. The neck was thin, the skin smooth and greasy, and a few beads of blood seeped from where the golden needles had pierced.

He cast the Wind Control Technique. With a tap of his toes on the roof ridge, his body shot up, sweeping across the layers of the Marquis's residence like a night owl.

Carrying the man, Jiang Yan moved with a few leaps in the night, silently disappearing into the mountains and forests outside the Marquis's residence.

Downstream of the Luo River, there was a dilapidated River God Temple.

The temple gate was long gone, leaving only two dark, gaping holes in the door frame.

Moonlight leaked down from the broken roof, casting mottled silvery-white patches of light on the ground. When the wind blew, the light patches swayed.

Jiang Yan threw Zhao Xuancheng onto the ground.

His body hit the blue brick floor with a dull thud. The back of his head struck the bricks, bouncing once before coming to a stop.

The effect of the paralysis Restriction was still ongoing; his limbs could not move, and only his eyeballs could turn and his lips could twitch.

His murky eyes were filled with terror, his eyeballs darting left and right, trying to see his surroundings, but he could not move his neck and could only see the leaking broken roof above and Jiang Yan's silhouette against the light.

Jiang Yan flicked out two strands of Spiritual Qi, sealing Zhao Xuancheng's Dantian and Meridians.

Zhao Xuancheng's body stiffened violently, as if something had been ripped out of his body.

He was too familiar with that feeling—his Spiritual Qi sealed, turning from a Cultivator back into a Mortal, empty, weak, and powerless.

Jiang Yan squatted down. He withdrew the three golden needles from Zhao Xuancheng's back of the neck, waist, and shoulder; the needle tips were stained with a few beads of blood, glistening with a dark red luster in the moonlight. He tucked the golden needles into his sleeve.

"I ask, you answer." Jiang Yan's voice was not loud, but it was exceptionally clear in the empty, dilapidated temple; every word was like a pebble dropped into a well.

Zhao Xuancheng's lips trembled as he struggled to squeeze out a few words: "Do... do you know who I am..."

Jiang Yan did not speak. With a flick of his finger, a strand of Spiritual Qi struck Zhao Xuancheng's right knee.

Crack.

A crisp sound, like stepping on a dry branch. The kneecap shattered, shattered completely.

Zhao Xuancheng's mouth snapped open, a scream welling up from his throat—but before it could escape, Jiang Yan's large hand of Spiritual Qi had already covered his mouth.

The scream was stifled in his throat, turning into a muffled whimpering sound, like a dog being strangled.

His face instantly flushed purple, and tears and snot gushed out simultaneously, mixing together and flowing into his mouth.

The excruciating pain of the broken leg made his whole body tremble like chaff, his back scraping back and forth on the blue brick floor, his shoe soles grinding against the floor with a creaking sound.

Jiang Yan let go.

Zhao Xuancheng gasped for air, his throat making a wheezing sound, like a drowning person who had just been pulled out.

The purple on his face slowly faded, turning into a sickly, ashen pale.

The excruciating pain of the broken leg persisted, surging up in waves; every time it surged, his body would twitch.

"I ask, you answer."

This time, Zhao Xuancheng nodded desperately. His chin bobbed up and down like a pestle pounding garlic.

"Who are you, and why are you at the Marquis Zhennan residence?"

Zhao Xuancheng's voice was intermittent, filled with suppressed cries of pain and fear that he could not hide: "I... my name is Zhao Xuancheng... Marquis Zhennan is my father..."

Jiang Yan's brow moved slightly.

The offspring of a marquis; this was unexpected.

He had originally thought he was just a Loose Cultivator patronized by the Marquis's residence, not expecting him to be of the Marquis's own bloodline.

"Continue."

Zhao Xuancheng swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing, his voice hoarse: "When I was ten... I was tested and found to have a Spiritual Root. Although it was the worst Low Grade Spiritual Root... I was still sent to the Jinyang Sect to Cultivate..."