Yin Mo shifted back to human form and crouched down beside Li Hongda's corpse, getting to work.
Qibao: "What are you doing?"
Yin Mo unclasped Li Hongda's wristband and waved it at Qibao. "Guess how many Credits he has?"
Qibao understood. It reminded her of how Cultivators would claim their opponents' Storage Treasures after killing them—including those so-called righteous Contractors she'd had over the years.
Qibao wouldn't kill indiscriminately, but Li Hongda had clearly harbored ill intentions toward her. He simply couldn't follow through because he was no match for her. Now that he was dead, his possessions rightfully became her spoils of war.
Besides the wristband, Yin Mo also found a gold necklace around Li Hongda's neck. Hidden inside the pendant was a Spatial Crystal Core with a capacity equivalent to a football field, packed nine-tenths full of supplies—clothing, food, fruits and vegetables, medicine, machinery, weapons, all sorts of things. So much that even if Tan City were destroyed, Li Hongda could have used these resources to establish a small base with his followers.
Whoever held the Spatial Crystal Core could use it, but Li Hongda's wristband was password-protected, and… fingerprint-locked as well.
Yin Mo smiled as he grabbed Li Hongda's right hand and pressed the thumb against the sensor. It worked.
What made Yin Mo's smile falter was that Li Hongda's account balance was only a little over eight million Credits—highly inconsistent with his status as an S-Rank Powerhouse.
He checked Li Hongda's recent chat history. There was a message from a woman—a picture showing several pieces of jewelry, followed by a voice message.
Concubine Eight—Big Ass: "Hubby, I want all of these. When you come home tonight, I'll put them on and show you, okay?"
The saccharine voice made Yin Mo's skin crawl.
Qibao also broke out in goosebumps—a completely unfamiliar reaction that made her stare at her own arms in fascination for a moment.
Seeing that Li Hongda had indeed transferred a million Credits to the woman, Yin Mo looked disgusted. "No wonder that's all he had. He spent it all on his harem of little wives."
He stood up, first transferring Li Hongda's Credits to his own account. After the transfer, he tossed the wristband back onto Li Hongda's corpse, then transferred the round-number portion of his newly acquired Credits to Qibao.
Qibao glanced at the incoming transfer notification but didn't ask why he'd kept the odd remainder of over eight hundred thousand Credits for himself.
Yin Mo was in high spirits. He rinsed the thick gold chain necklace Li Hongda had worn before handing it to Qibao.
Qibao found the necklace ugly and casually tossed it into a corner of the Stupa Space. It wasn't like she needed those supplies right now anyway.
With that settled, the two got back in the car.
Before Qibao could start watching a movie, Yin Mo said with considerable satisfaction, "Li Xin used to rely on Li Hongda and offended a lot of people—including A-Rank powerhouses like me. Now that his backing is gone, those A-Rank Ability Users will definitely come for payback. Even the teammates around Li Xin might not be loyal to him."
Birds of a feather flock together. Li Xin was no good, so what kind of people would willingly call him brother?
Qibao thought, this is karma.
.
With Qibao's pagoda casually deflecting troublesome Aberrant Beasts along the way, Yin Mo drove smoothly and arrived at River City as planned around 4 PM the next day.
Because the two cities were close enough to trade with each other, their city walls were similar in height, and their management methods were much the same.
By the time they queued up and entered the city, it was already 5 PM.
Yin Mo: "Find the person first, or eat first?"
Qibao: "Let's eat. Rest for the night, and start searching tomorrow morning."
The six Great Demons had been on the run for five years already—one more night wouldn't make a difference.
Yin Mo now had nearly two million Credits to his name and generously took Qibao to the inner ring.
The inner ring's atmosphere was the closest to a pre-apocalypse city center—shopping malls, hotels, and private kitchens were all available. It was Yin Mo's first time here, so he first searched online for the best restaurant in the inner ring, then drove over. Fortunately, with the population drastically reduced after the apocalypse, they only waited in line for about ten minutes before being seated.
Yin Mo ordered five signature dishes in one go: steamed Wuchang fish, braised crayfish, Wangji chicken soup, Zhuru triple-steamed platter, and Huangpi three delicacies, plus a serving of the specialty hot dry noodles.
Yin Mo: "We'll save what's in the space for later. When we're here, we have to eat the local famous dishes."
Qibao was looking forward to it too.
The steamed Wuchang fish arrived first. Yin Mo reminded Qibao, who often had accidents while eating, "This one has bones. Eat slowly."
It was almost laughable—this person who wasn't afraid of even an S-Rank lightning-type ability had actually shed tears over burning her tongue or biting it.
Qibao carefully picked up a piece of fish with her chopsticks, poked and prodded it on her plate, and only put it in her mouth once she was sure there were no bones.
When it came to the crayfish, Qibao didn't want to dirty her hands or wear gloves, so she had Yin Mo peel them for her.
Spicy and numbing—Yin Mo peeled one, and Qibao ate one.
Yin Mo watched her red lips and her dark eyes fixed unblinkingly on his hands as he peeled the shrimp, and said with exasperation, "You're so lazy that I seriously doubt that even if you eventually believe I've reformed, you won't let me go—you'll want me to wait on you for the rest of your life."
Qibao: "You should be grateful you still have the chance to serve me. Otherwise, you'd already be a dead snake by now."
Yin Mo paused mid-motion, then deliberately popped the freshly peeled shrimp into his own mouth.
Qibao kicked him under the table.
Yin Mo: "You've already eaten over a dozen!"
Qibao glanced at the three remaining shrimp on the plate, then picked up her chopsticks to reach for the steamed vegetables beside them.
Just as she brought a piece over, Yin Mo's gloved right hand reached out and placed another shrimp onto her plate.
Qibao looked up; the Snake Demon across from her lowered his eyes with a snort.
Qibao smiled and ate the shrimp first.
After the meal, Yin Mo checked the map on his wristband and discussed with her: "The hotel I booked is only a kilometer from here. Should we walk back? Every day it's either riding in a car or sleeping—you need to move around more, or you'll gain weight."
The fattest person Qibao had seen in this world was Li Xin. She loved wearing pretty clothes and had no desire for a belly that round.
"Let's go."
Late June—the days were hot, but when the wind blew at night, it carried a coolness tinged with that unique summer dampness.
Qibao had indeed gotten used to riding in cars. A short stroll in her small heels was fine, but after walking several hundred meters straight, the soles of her feet were starting to ache. She asked Yin Mo to summon the phantom.
Yin Mo materialized the Ducati, mounted it, and said: "I'm not sleepy yet. Come on, I'll take you for a ride."
As long as she didn't have to walk, Qibao was happy to follow his arrangement—and she did enjoy these rides.
Swinging her leg over the motorcycle, she tucked her skirt in under Yin Mo's watchful gaze, then expertly wrapped her arms around his slender waist, closed her eyes, and pressed her cheek against his back.
Yin Mo glanced at the hands around his waist, twisted the throttle, and shot off.
The roaring motorcycle thundered through the inner-ring streets. Yin Mo did one full loop and wanted another, but was stopped by a traffic officer in owl beast form. Since the two had just arrived in Jiangcheng and it was their first offense, the owl officer only fined Yin Mo 100 credits, gave them a lecture, and let them go.
This time, Yin Mo had no choice but to put away the motorcycle and summon the phantom instead.
Once in the car, Qibao said with a serious expression: "Drive another loop—just now I think I sensed the demonic aura of the Carp Demon."
The motorcycle had been going too fast; the faint carp demonic aura had flashed by in an instant. Qibao had called for Yin Mo to stop, but he hadn't heard her. She pinched his waist, and the guy only sped up.
The Carp Demon?
A fair-skinned, handsome, frail scholar-like face surfaced in Yin Mo's mind. As a Millennial Great Demon, Song Chao couldn't possibly be genuinely weak—he was surely pretending to be docile. With only his Water-Control Divine Ability remaining, Song Chao was the weakest of the seven Great Demons. Though Yin Mo also only had Water-Control Divine Ability left, his serpent body was far more formidable than a carp's—Yin Mo could swallow Song Chao's mere dozen-meter-long carp form in a single bite.
Harboring the thought that once they caught Song Chao, he could offload all the dirty and tiring work onto him, Yin Mo cooperatively slowed the car down to make it easier for Qibao to sense.
At a little past eight in the evening, the black phantom came to a stop outside a detached three-story villa.
Yin Mo gritted his teeth inwardly. Both were A-rank in strength—he'd been robbed of his luxury car by a rich brat while living in seclusion in the inner ring of Tancheng. How could Song Chao, who was weaker than him, afford a villa in Jiangcheng's inner ring?
Stopping Qibao, who was about to get out immediately, Yin Mo cautiously opened the Jiangcheng Ability User Forum and searched "Song Chao."
The projection appeared before him, and Qibao couldn't help leaning toward Yin Mo to look together.
The search results were displayed by post popularity. The first title read in bold: "S-Rank Generals' Secret Lovers Exposed!"
Yin Mo: "…"
Qibao's first thought was: had the Carp Demon recovered his strength, not only worming his way into becoming a Jiangcheng general, but also keeping several human lovers like Li Hongda?
Back then, this Carp Demon had stirred up waves in a great lake in the mortal realm, drowning countless fishermen before being suppressed by a passing Female Cultivator. With such vicious character, it was entirely possible he'd forcibly seized common women!
Qibao couldn't hold back anymore and reached for the door again.
Yin Mo grabbed her with one hand while rapidly tapping open the post with the other. To his surprise, the first general-lover pairing revealed already featured Song Chao's photo—a solo shot of him in a white shirt on the right, and on the left, a photo of a woman in a general's uniform. Her looks weren't particularly outstanding, but her gaze was clear and upright, giving the impression of someone on the righteous path.
Qibao forced herself to read the text below the images.
As Yin Mo had expected but contrary to Qibao's assumption, Song Chao was the "lover" in the title. The poster only noted his A-rank carp Spiritual Entity and water-type ability, then gave a fairly objective high-level assessment of Song Chao's appearance—nothing more. The female general was presumably already well-known to locals, so her introduction was brief: Tu Jian, S-rank fire-type ability user.
Yin Mo sneered: "No backbone at all—selling his looks for wealth and status."
Qibao: "It's also possible he's practicing the evil art of yin-yang cultivation."
Yin and yang didn't discriminate by species. Among cultivators, there were normal male-female dual cultivation and heretical methods of extraction; demonic beasts surely had them too.
Yin Mo: "…Only low-level lesser demons would extract from ordinary humans. Once you've cultivated to a certain level, if you're going to extract, you'd extract from cultivators. The ability users here don't have a cultivation base connected to the Cultivation Continent—Song Chao extracting from her would be useless."
Moreover, the cultivation base gained through dual cultivation was insubstantial and inferior to what one could achieve through personal practice. A proper Great Demon would never seek such a path—only those lecherous Great Demons would capture humans to toy with for amusement.
Yin Mo had nearly caused the deaths of a group of mortals because he regarded them as ants, but he had never entertained the shameless notion of toying with humans. Whoever offended him, he simply killed them.
Qibao fell silent. So, was Song Chao really trading his body for wealth and security in this apocalyptic world?
A minute later, the two stood side by side outside the villa's main gate, with Yin Mo stepping forward to ring the doorbell.
A middle-aged female housekeeper answered the door. Seeing two unfamiliar faces, she asked warily, "Who are you?"
Qibao looked at Yin Mo.
Yin Mo had a cold, sinister face, and his voice was equally gloomy to ordinary ears: "I'm a friend of Song Chao, your general's lover. I have business with him."
Housekeeper: "…"
Who was he trying to fool? What decent person would refer to their own friend in such a contemptuous tone?
"Please show some respect. Mr. Song is our general's officially dating boyfriend." The housekeeper corrected him with displeasure.
Yin Mo: "Say whatever you want. Just call him out and tell him his true master has come to see him."
Qibao wasn't his master, but she could be the master of the other six Great Demons.
The housekeeper's expression shifted, and her gaze fell upon the stunning beauty she had noticed earlier. Master? Could this woman be Song Chao's ex-girlfriend? Well, if Song Chao could attract General Tu, he naturally had the ability to draw in others as well.
"Wait here. I'll go inform the general."
Closing the door, the housekeeper hurried inside.
On the third floor of the villa, Song Chao was diligently serving his powerful girlfriend, right at the critical moment, when he heard the housekeeper knock on the door, saying something about a man and a woman claiming to be his "friend" and "master" coming to see him.
Song Chao had no damn friends, and a master was even more absurd—he had never had a master in his life!
Tu Jian's gaze shifted slightly, but she still indulged Song Chao in completing this "service" before calmly getting dressed, cutting off Song Chao's earnest assurances: "Let's go. We'll take a look together."