A person sacrifices himself to become a saint in a chaotic world of martial arts.

Lao Liu felt a cool sensation in his throat, followed by the sensation of warm liquid gushing out.

He opened his mouth wide, but could only let out a series of gasping sounds, unable to utter a single clear word.

Blood gushed down his neck, quickly staining his front red.

"Spare...my life..."

His pupils dilated, his eyes filled with the despair of impending death and a humble plea, and he managed to squeeze out two barely audible words.

He didn't understand.

Who exactly is this person in front of me?

Why were the methods so ruthless and decisive?

He was just a street urchin who bullied the weak and feared the strong. When had he ever offended such a scoundrel?

Even if other gangs wanted to deal with the Fierce Tiger Gang, why would they send such a master specifically to kill such an insignificant nobody like him?

As consciousness began to fade and vision blurred,

He saw the masked man suddenly raise his hand, grab the black hood on his head, and lift it up—

The hood slipped off, revealing a young but cold face.

This face...it looks somewhat familiar?!

Lao Liu's heart felt as if it had been gripped tightly by an invisible hand, and he suddenly convulsed.

His cloudy eyes suddenly widened to their limit, staring at that face in disbelief. His lips trembled as he tried to say something, but only more blood and foam gushed from the gash in his throat.

It's...it's him?!

That temporary constable... Su Bai?

How could that be?

"I'll let you die knowing why." Su Bai slowly squatted down, his voice extremely low, yet each word as clear as ice beads falling onto a plate, "If you dared to plot against me, you should have expected this day to come..."

As soon as he finished speaking, he stopped looking at Lao Liu's wide-open eyes, filled with horror and regret, and ignored the slight rise and fall of the other man's chest. He then reached out and began to skillfully search for his clothes.

His fingertips quickly touched a hard object and pulled out a bulging black coarse cloth bag from Lao Liu's arms.

Tucked the cloth bag into his pocket, Su Bai's eyes remained unwavering. He raised the dagger in his hand again and delivered a precise stab to Lao Liu's chest.

He stood up expressionlessly only after the other person's body stopped convulsing for the last time.

He turned around and strode back to the dilapidated house, its lights flickering and filled with the stench of blood.

Four corpses lay scattered inside the room, each in a different pose, and the floor was stained with a sticky, dark red blood.

Su Bai's eyes were cold as he squatted down and began to examine each item one by one.

He found some loose copper coins, a few coins, and a cheap jade pendant on the men.

Then, he quickly searched through the messy room of the sixth brother.

Lifting the tattered quilt and moving the crooked cabinet, I found a heavy little cloth bag behind a loose brick in the corner.

Untie the rope, and inside are several silver ingots of varying purity and some copper coins.

Without having time to count them, he stuffed all the money into his pocket, making his clothes bulge.

Finally, his gaze swept over the five corpses inside and outside the house.

He walked to the corner of the courtyard, picked up a few heavy bluestones used as stepping stones, and returned to the body.

With a blank expression, he pressed the stones one by one onto the fatal wounds—especially the throat and the heart—the rough stone surface quickly becoming soaked with sticky blood.

After doing all this, Su Bai scooped half a ladle of cold water from the water vat and rinsed the half-congealed bloodstains on his hands and the dagger.

He tore off a relatively clean corner from the sixth brother's tattered clothes, wiped the dagger clean, and put it back into its sheath.

He took one last look around the courtyard, which was filled with the aura of death. With a flash, he disappeared silently over the low wall, like an ink droplet blending into the night, and vanished into the deeper darkness of Tongming Alley.

After leaving Lao Liu's place, Su Bai did not immediately return to his own home.

The night was as dark as ink, and he slipped silently into a nearby, more secluded dead-end alley like a ghost.

The alley was narrow, with towering, mottled brick walls on both sides. Slippery moss grew at the base of the walls, and the air was filled with a faint musty smell and the stench of urine drifting from afar.

There was only a sliver of dark night sky overhead, fragmented by the eaves on both sides, with no stars or moon in sight.

He leaned against the cold, rough brick wall, slowly exhaling a breath of foul air tinged with the smell of blood, and only then did his tense nerves relax slightly.

He squatted down and dumped the heavy cloth bags he was carrying onto the drier ground at his feet.

The silver ingots and broken pieces collided with each other, producing a dull yet alluring "clinking" sound that was particularly clear in the quiet alley.

Su Bai listened intently for a moment, making sure that only the faint sound of the night watchman's clapper and the barking of wild dogs could be heard from afar. Then, by the extremely dim light and the cold touch of his hands, he began to quickly count the items.

He fiddled with the silver coins, moving as gently as possible, silently counting them in his mind.

When the final figure settled at over forty taels, he closed his eyes, his chest heaving slightly, as if he had breathed a sigh of relief, or perhaps suppressed some turbulent emotions.

Without lingering, he quickly rewrapped most of the silver and put it into his innermost pocket. The weight of the silver gave him a sense of security and made his heart race.

The remaining few cloth bags were empty and stained.

Using the dim light, he hastily dug a shallow pit in a corner where the loose soil was thicker, buried the cloth bag in it, and then carefully smoothed out the loose soil with his feet, kicking some gravel and withered leaves on top to cover it until no obvious trace could be seen.

Having done all this, he once again disappeared into the shadows, leaving the alley without a sound.

……

The next morning, the sky was overcast, and Su Bai went to work as usual.

He changed into his faded official uniform, and his complexion looked no different from usual, except for a few barely noticeable shadows hidden deep in his eyes.

Throughout the day, as he, Sun Hou, and Lao Wang strolled through the familiar streets and alleys as usual, carrying their fire sticks, Su Bai was somewhat absent-minded.

His thoughts would always drift away involuntarily.

On one hand, there was the heavy forty-odd taels of silver in his arms, a reminder of the most crucial part of his plan.

The purchase of expensive sacrificial offerings has finally been secured.

Meanwhile, the brief, bloody conflict from last night, and the frozen gazes of Lao Liu and the others, kept flashing through his mind, bringing a chilling sensation.

After all, this involved killing five people in the city, not in the chaotic black market, and the victims weren't complete strangers.

Those guys from the Fierce Tiger Gang, especially the sixth one, had dealt with him more than once.

If an investigation were to be launched...

Thinking about this, Su Bai even felt a little regretful.

But the Tiger Gang wouldn't give him any time!

Fortunately, Su Bai had developed excellent facial expression management skills over the years.

He tried to suppress his turbulent thoughts, listening to Sun Hou's jokes and occasionally echoing Old Wang's complaints about neighborhood trivia, adding a few harmless remarks.

Throughout the entire day, neither Sun Hou nor Lao Wang noticed anything unusual about their colleague.