Myths Begin From Boys' Gong

The killings tonight made Meng Zhao feel even better. Looking at the room full of gold and silver jewelry, he was also troubled by the piles of silver notes.

The first challenge is where to hide this wealth. The second challenge is that he will not stay in the county town permanently, and this wealth will eventually have to be transported back to Xiaohan Village. How should he transport it, and where should he hide it after it is transported back to Xiaohan Village?

These are all problems.

However, although it is troublesome, it is not too troublesome. After all, the most troublesome and difficult initial accumulation has been completed. The so-called hiding and transfer are just tedious matters. With a little effort, they can be handled in the end.

Meng Zhao first searched for a vehicle in the two residences and actually found several large wooden boxes. He then began to pack all the gold and silver jewelry, various antiques, and banknotes from the secret room into them.

Afterwards, Meng Zhao stayed up all night, searching for farm tools. In Su Dinglun's house, he dug a deep pit, sealed all the treasures, and buried them inside. At the same time, he also cleaned up all the corpses.

The next morning, he changed his clothes and used his disguise skills to become a middle-aged man in his thirties, resembling a traveling merchant, and appeared in the bustling county town.

This time, he took the initiative and spent a large sum of money to first forge an identity. This identity was, of course, fake, but it was also real.

To say he's a fake is because this person never existed; to say he's real is because his household registration and identity are real and verifiable, and he's registered in the county.

As the saying goes, cats have their ways and mice have theirs. When Meng Zhao found out that there were brokers doing this kind of business, he immediately spent a lot of money to make the whole thing a perfect success.

Subsequently, using this identity, he purchased a relatively secluded house in Xiliu District near the city gate. There were only two households in the alley, one of which was impoverished and had only an elderly man on his deathbed barely clinging to life, while the other was Meng Zhao's.

During the day, he would pretend to be familiar with the affairs of the city and wander around Kaiyan County. At night, he would dress in black clothes and move the huge fortune little by little to his newly purchased home, where he dug a cellar to hide it.

So quickly, three days passed, and the Su family finally gave feedback.

In fact, Meng Zhao did not deliberately contact the Su family at this time, so the information was relatively delayed.

On the night he killed Su Can, the third branch of the Su family had already discovered that the hidden gold had been stolen and many of their subordinates had been killed. However, since this involved some secret matters, they only searched quietly and did not launch a large-scale search.

From this, we can see that the third wife must have done something shady, perhaps something that the first and second wives couldn't know about. That's why, even though she suffered heavy losses and lost such a huge fortune, she remained silent.

However, although the third branch may not have spoken out, the disappearance of Su Can, Su Dingyu, and Su Dinglun was a real and significant event that shocked the entire Su family.

At this moment, the third branch of the Su family suddenly realized that the ones who had taken their gold were none other than Su Can, Su Dinglun, and Su Dingyu.

But Su Dinglun and Su Dingyu aren't from the eldest brother's family, so when did they get involved with the second brother?
Strangely, the third branch of the family still did not reveal that the gold had been stolen. Therefore, the Su family was only searching for the three missing members of the Su family, including Su Can.

People don't disappear without a reason; either they've met with some misfortune, or they've been kidnapped.

Although the Su family was not the most powerful clan in the county, they were still a top-tier powerful family with considerable prestige. They considered themselves untouchable and spread the word that whoever captured Su Can should return him as soon as possible, and the Su family would not hold them accountable.

Otherwise, if anything happens to Su Can, the Su family will spare no effort to find the culprit and make him wish he were dead.

In short, the whole thing seems very bizarre.

Meng Zhao learned about this from someone next to him while he was pretending to be a merchant from out of town and drinking in a tavern.

He didn't have any particular reaction. The Su family couldn't find him, not entirely because of his own abilities. On the contrary, his abilities only accounted for a small part of it. The vast majority of the credit still went to Su Can and the other two.

Having stolen the gold, they would definitely want to clean up the mess and cut off all traces, which actually helped Meng Zhao.

It's estimated that Su Can and the other two didn't expect that what was originally a sure thing would turn out to be a disaster because of a sudden idea to add Meng Zhao. As a result, the whole plot started strong but ended weakly, or rather, it started strong but never ended, and there was no possibility of a future development.

Furthermore, the matter concerning the Su family was not limited to the Su family; it began to spread to the county town.

For a time, families large and small, gangs and powerful figures all felt a sense of insecurity.

What does that mean?

In the past, within the larger context of the county town, the conduct of families, large and small, as well as their disputes and conflicts, were governed by a set of established rules. Everyone followed these rules, and no one dared to do anything out of line.

This wasn't a rule enforced by individual households, but rather a tacitly accepted rule among the top powers in the entire county.

One of the rules was that assassinations of members of any family, especially direct descendants, were forbidden.

Kidnapping is obviously not an option either; it's no different from murder, both of which involve trampling on the rules.

Therefore, given what happened to the Su family, most forces would likely guess that either someone broke the rules and wanted to be a lone hero, or an outsider had stepped in, like a dragon crossing the river, completely disregarding the rules set by the locals.

In fact, all forces tend to favor the latter.

However, if the outsider is powerful and lawless, he is a ticking time bomb. No one knows when he will explode or whether he will harm them when he does.

At the very least, based on the current understanding of these large and small forces and families, all members must be cautious in their words and actions, and minimize their outings. The curfew will be lifted only when Su Can is found.

Therefore, both the Fang family and the Cai family, which were Meng Zhao's targets, have increased their protection of their respective children.

This was indeed a slight anomaly caused by the butterfly effect. Meng Zhao never expected that the boomerang would pierce him so quickly, and he was reaping what he sowed.

However, things did not deviate significantly from Meng Zhao's predetermined course.

Firstly, this is just a temporary rumor. So many people and so many forces all have their own affairs to deal with. They can stay at home for a short time, but no one can stand it for long.

Secondly, the scions of these powerful families are not exactly obedient children; they won't just listen to whatever you say.

Just like Fang Laowu and Fang Zijun, even after Meng Zhao secretly investigated them, they remained incorrigible, spending their days indulging in women and never taking Su Can's kidnapping to heart.

Of course, the number of guards around him has definitely been increased by more than 10%.

Meanwhile, Meng Zhao's primary target recently, the Cai family, has also been largely astounded by this time.

Compared to the Fang family, the Cai family was much weaker and had far fewer members.

The current head of the Cai family suffered internal injuries during his early cultivation of the Wind Blade Tribulation, which are difficult to cure. As a result, he is weak and sickly and has long since stopped managing affairs.

He has two sons and two daughters who manage the family business for him.

The eldest son, Cai Xun, and his son, Cai Kang, also practiced the Wind Blade Tribulation, but both practiced a reduced version, which did not cause as much damage to the body. Of course, correspondingly, the power was also much weaker.

Both women were already married, through arranged marriages in the county town, to powerful families. Meanwhile, the head of the Cai family also had a nephew named Cai Qi, the posthumous son of his younger brother, who was also raised by the Cai family head from a young age.

However, compared to his two cousins, Cai Qi seemed cynical and carefree. He enjoyed eating, drinking, and having fun, but he wasn't very interested in running the family business or practicing martial arts.

These past few days, he's been going to the largest brothel in the county, Xiaoxiang Garden, every day, chatting with the beautiful women there, writing poems and painting, having a great time. The other young men from powerful families who accompanied him were doing the same thing.

Meng Zhao's primary target was Cai Qi.

He is a member of the Cai family. Although he is not the biological son of the Cai family patriarch, he is undoubtedly of Cai blood. He is likely to be proficient in the Wind Blade Calamity. I wonder if I can obtain this martial art from him.

In addition, as Meng Zhao had always worried, the Cai family was hiding a powerful force or a powerful person who was protecting the Cai family.

Over the years, there have been those who tried to take advantage of the Cai family, but none of them fared well. This should have been enough to dissuade many people from such ideas.
Is this person, or this force, secretly protecting Cai Qi?

This is what Meng Zhao is worried about.

He knew nothing about the power of the Wind Blade Calamity, and although his current martial arts skills could be described as superb, they were far from invincible.

There are still quite a few risks involved in this trip.

As the old saying goes, the greater the risk, the greater the reward. Meng Zhao finally decided to take the risk.

Therefore, in the following period, Meng Zhao began to frequently visit Xiaoxiang Garden, firstly to figure out the ins and outs of the place, and secondly to observe who he could use to see if he could use gold and silver to bribe Cai Qi for information.

Secondly, Cai Qi is a regular customer of Xiaoxiang Garden, visiting more often than going home, so there is a high chance of bumping into him here.

As for Xiaoxiang Garden, it is nominally a brothel that sells art but not sex, but in reality, it is a wolf in sheep's clothing.

how to say.

Xiaoxiang Garden is like a platform where people come from time to time to perform songs and dances. These people are all quite talented in the arts, and some are even quite famous!

This is the fundamental reason why Xiaoxiangyuan is famous throughout Kaiyan County. It has certain resources and can invite people who are usually never seen to perform.

However, performances require appearance fees, and it's impossible to hire them every day. Naturally, it's necessary to cultivate a group of our own star performers.

Therefore, Xiaoxiang Garden also has courtesans, all of whom were bought by the owner when they were young and trained little by little, or poached from other places and hired at high salaries.

At first glance, Xiaoxiang Garden seems to be relatively respectable, but in essence, these courtesans are the ones being exploited and used.

It's not that they refuse to sell themselves; it's just that they wait until they gain fame and attract someone of value before they are sold.

Moreover, this kind of sale is a one-time transaction, and the purchase is essentially a contract of servitude. One-time transactions often incur exorbitant fees.

For example, take the woman Cai Qi is currently pursuing, a singer named Qiuyue.

Her singing voice was melodious and clear, like that of a nightingale.

That's not all; the key is that she is also extremely beautiful, with bright eyes and white teeth, making many young men infatuated with her.

Cai Qi and others also specially hosted an Autumn Moon Society, which was essentially a fan organization for the Autumn Moon singer. The people in it were all wealthy and powerful, and they were all from prominent families in the county. Cai Qi was not even ranked first in the group.

When the people of Xiaoxiang Garden felt the time was right, Qiuyue's indenture was put on the auction schedule.

At that time, these so-called rich young men from the Autumn Moon Society will become the main competitors in the auction, and Cai Qi is one of them.

All I can say is that Xiaoxiangyuan's methods are truly sophisticated, and they make a fortune, but that's what they deserve.

Just take the expense of lifting up the autumn moon; it's not a small amount, but it's a case of high investment and high return.

For the past two days, Meng Zhao has been disguised as a merchant who is quite obsessed with Qiu Yue. Although he has some wealth, he has only spent a little over two hundred taels of silver, barely meeting the standard for entering the Qiu Yue Society.

Indeed, it was during this membership application process that Meng Zhao met Cai Qi for the first time in a private room at Xiaoxiang Garden.

How to describe this person? He's very young, around twenty years old, with a long, thin face, fair complexion, no beard, and bright eyes. His eyebrows are rather light, but he's still a fairly good-looking person.

His personality is also very free and easy, with a carefree attitude towards the world.

However, for some reason, Meng Zhao vaguely sensed a strange threat from him.

This surprised him greatly.

It wasn't that he didn't trust his intuition; on the contrary, Meng Zhao's martial arts skills weren't particularly high, but his realm was indeed unparalleled in the world, and his spiritual sense was also quite sharp, so he wouldn't make baseless accusations.

Therefore, the direct message conveyed by this threat is that Cai Qi is actually a hidden master.

This is a bit strange.

The Cai family is not without experts, but the expert is the young Cai Qi. No matter how you look at it, it just doesn't feel right!

Firstly, he has never shown any interest in learning martial arts, which is a consensus among everyone, including the Cai family members themselves.

Secondly, even if he is truly gifted, how could he have become the guardian of the Cai family all these years? In his earlier years, he was still young and could not possibly have such martial arts skills.

Unless, besides him, there is another master, and this master is the one who trained Cai Qi into a martial arts master.

That's how it makes sense.

However, Meng Zhao's initial plan was not going to work.

Regardless of Cai Qi's martial arts skills, the fact that he could subtly and intuitively pose a threat to Meng Zhao is quite remarkable.

At the very least, this shows that Cai Qi has the strength and ability to injure or even kill Meng Zhao.

Meng Zhao originally only wanted to pick the easy target, but who would have thought that this easy target was only soft on the outside, but hard on the inside, harder than a rock.

For a moment, Meng Zhao was also caught in a dilemma. (End of this chapter)