Do you know what mythical life is?

The sun gradually rose higher, approaching noon.

Su Yongfu and Su He walked down the mountain carrying hoes, both with a thin layer of sweat on their foreheads and looking somewhat tired.

As Su Yongfu passed the square in the village where people practiced martial arts, he paused slightly.

A large crowd had gathered in the square.

At a glance, there are probably twenty or thirty of them.

Among the crowd, besides the people he knew from the village, there was also a stranger standing there.

He was a young man dressed in a dark blue short jacket and belt, with a sharp and imposing presence.

The young man had a dark complexion and sharp eyes. A large, muscular black dog with glossy fur was crouching at his feet.

The dog sat quietly, head held high, its brownish-yellow eyes scanning its surroundings, its nose twitching slightly from time to time.

"Senior Brother Zhang, thank you for your trouble. We need to see him alive or dead!" Li Yun, the second son of the landlord Li family, said to the dark-skinned youth.

"Don't worry, Junior Brother Li." The dark-skinned young man, addressed as Senior Brother Zhang, spoke in a low but very confident voice, "My pet Black Wind has a very keen nose."

"In the past few days, no matter where the missing person has gone, we will definitely find some clues for you."

"Thank you very much, Senior Brother Zhang!"

Li Yun expressed his gratitude.

Zhou Hu and Tian Wei's family members, who were standing nearby, also expressed their gratitude repeatedly.

Seeing the commotion from afar, Su Yongfu's expression changed slightly, and his heart skipped a beat.

He immediately lowered his head and grabbed Su He's arm: "Come on, let's go home."

The haunting of the back mountain, the loss of the Li family's giant tortoise, and the disappearance of Zhou Hu and Tian Wei all happened in the last few days.

These past two days have been the time when Lu Ping'an has recovered his health, enabling him to go into the water to catch big fish, go up the mountain to catch wild rabbits, and even started practicing martial arts yesterday.

He's lived most of his life and experienced a lot; it's impossible for him to say he has no thoughts or opinions.

Su He also saw the scene over there.

The big black dog, in particular, made her feel uneasy. She quickly lowered her head, quickened her pace, and followed closely behind her grandfather.

Not long after, the two returned home.

Pushing open the courtyard gate, the courtyard was quiet.

Only Su Shi ran out of the house: "Grandpa, sister, come back! It's so noisy over there in the square, and there are dogs barking..."

"It's nothing, just some things happening in the village." Su Yongfu didn't want to say more, put down his hoe, glanced at the empty yard, and asked, "Where's your Brother Lu?"

"Brother Lu said he's going to take a walk in the back mountain to see if he can hunt some wild game for a late lunch," Su Shi answered honestly, his face showing anticipation. "He said he'll try his best to catch a rabbit for me."

Su Yongfu nodded without saying anything, but he felt a little uneasy.

But he couldn't tell these things to his two children.

……

"Tap tap!"

On the dirt road leading to Xiaoshi Village in Yunxi County, dust rose slightly as two magnificent black horses galloped towards them.

On horseback were two figures, one old and one young.

The old man was wiry and strong, with sharp eyes, while the young man had a straight back and a resolute face. They were Liu Cang and Qin Zheng, the subordinates trained by the Lu family.

"Once we pass this point, we should reach Xiaoshi Village."

"I wonder if it's a good thing or a bad thing that the patriarch has arranged for the young master to become a disciple of that person in Yunxi County."

"Although that person is very strong, it is said that most of the martial arts techniques learned by the disciples who joined the Four Symbols Martial Arts School are only ordinary."

"We don't need to worry about that. Even if you can't learn good techniques from that person, you can still learn the clan's Twelve Mountain-Suppressing Fists."

The two men rode their horses while talking in hushed tones.

……

Behind Xiaoshi Village, in the woods.

After entering the mountains, Lu Pingan did not immediately look for prey. He glanced at the clearing in the forest, bent down and picked up a few stones of a suitable size.

His strength had increased dramatically in a single day, but he still needed to practice how to utilize it effectively.

"Give it a try!"

He picked up a pebble, aimed at a dark scar on the trunk of an old pine tree more than 20 meters away, bent his waist and twisted his body, and swung his arm.

"Whoosh!"

The pebble flew out of my hand at a considerable speed, but grazed the edge of the tree scar and embedded itself in the soil behind it.

"It's off-center."

Lu Ping'an was not discouraged when his attempt failed.

If it doesn't work the first time, try a few more times; you can practice slowly.

Compared to the Strength Refining Realm, the increase in strength is secondary in the Condensing Strength Realm; the main advantage lies in the control over oneself.

Whoosh!

Whoosh!

He kept throwing the pebbles he had just picked up, one by one.

When the pebbles ran out, he bent down to pick them up again.

Most of the time, he missed his target.

Only occasionally, with a bit of luck, can you hit the mark.

But the next time I tried, it still didn't work.

However, with practice, he gained more and more control over his body.

Gradually, they began to focus their thrown stones on a specific area.

The number of times the target was hit was also increasing.

Then he began to change his targets, throwing the stones at farther, closer, higher, or lower targets.

"Try again!"

After practicing countless times, Lu Pingan calmed himself down and picked up another stone.

This time, he focused his mind on his arms, carefully sensing the process of the force rising from his waist and hips, passing through his spine, over his shoulders and elbows, reaching his wrists, and finally condensing at his fingertips.

At the moment of striking, he deliberately slowed down, enveloping the stone with the condensed energy within his body before sending it out.

"Whoosh!"

The pebble slipped from my hand, and this time, its trajectory was unusually stable.

"Snapped!"

About twenty paces away, a black boulder the size of a bowl, exposed on the ground, was struck and made a clear, crisp sound.

The stone he threw bounced away and rolled several times on the ground.

"That's about it."

Lu Pingan dusted off his hands, assessing his throwing ability. Within twenty-odd paces, he hit the target five out of ten times, which was barely acceptable.

He looked up at the sky; the sun was high in the sky, and it was clearly noon. He had to hurry.

He stopped practicing, slowed his pace, and headed deeper into the back mountains to search for birds and animals.

"Puff puff puff!"

About half an incense stick later, a colorful shadow suddenly rose from the dense bushes a dozen meters in front of Lu Ping'an.

It was a plump pheasant, startled by Lu Ping'an's approach. It flapped its wings in panic and flew towards a gap in the woods diagonally ahead.

"call out!"

Lu Ping'an reacted extremely quickly. The moment the pheasant took to the air, the pebble he was holding shot out like lightning!

However, shooting at a fixed target and shooting at a fast-moving living thing are two completely different things.

The pebble grazed the edge of the pheasant's startled tail feathers and disappeared into the distant bushes.

"pity."

Lu Pingan shook his head, but he wasn't too disappointed.

He knew that pheasants, as birds, were not good at continuous flight and would usually fall down after flying only a short distance.

He immediately sped up and chased after the pheasant in the direction it had flown off to.

After chasing for a hundred or two meters, he noticed a few slightly swaying leaves at the edge of a clump of ferns about half a person's height.

There, a faint, vibrant color stood out from the surroundings.

It was that pheasant.

Lu Pingan held his breath, hid behind a tree, and slowly peeked out.

About fifteen meters apart, there are several clumps of low thorns in the middle.

The target is stationary.

Lu Pingan slowly adjusted his breathing, bringing himself to his best state, and fixed his gaze on the pheasant's wings.

The arm is raised, the muscles are slightly tense and then relaxed, and a subtle strength flows through the fingertips, contained but not released.

"go!"

With a thought, his arm snapped open like a bowstring, and the sharp-edged pebble at his fingertips instantly transformed into a blurry gray shadow, tearing through the air!

"puff!"

A muffled thud.

The pebble veered off course, but it struck the pheasant squarely on the lower part of its neck. The immense impact sent it tumbling away without even a cry. It collapsed to the ground, twitched a couple of times, and then stopped moving.

Become!

A hint of joy flashed in Lu Ping'an's eyes, and he quickly stepped forward.

Lifting this plump pheasant, which weighed at least three or four pounds, I felt its weight; its neck was a bloody mess, a complete disaster.

"Lunchtime snack is ready." He weighed his prey in his hand, a satisfied smile spreading across his face.

Looking up to check the sun, Lu Ping'an realized he had been out for a while. He didn't venture any further.

He carried the pheasant, turned around, and walked briskly down the mountain along the path he had come from.

As he walked, he thought to himself that he should practice this flying stone technique properly in the future.

With this technique mastered at the Condensation Realm, even if there are more than a dozen martial artists below the Condensation Realm, he can remain invincible as long as he keeps his distance.

Lu Pingan pondered this in his heart, but his steps never faltered.

The fallen leaves rustled underfoot, and the light in the forest seemed brighter than when we arrived.

Before long, he walked out of the back mountain.

"Um?"

Just as Lu Pingan caught a glimpse of the outline of the Su family's courtyard in the distance, he suddenly stopped in his tracks.

Looking around, one could see that outside the Su family's simple courtyard gate, there were twenty or thirty people gathered, completely blocking the entrance.

Amidst the crowd, the faint sounds of a heated argument could be heard, along with a few barks from dogs.

"What happened?"

Lu Ping'an's face darkened, and the joy of his successful hunt vanished instantly.

Without thinking twice, he pushed off with his feet, carrying the still-bleeding pheasant, parted the roadside weeds, and hurried forward.

"Old Su, I've already smelled the Black Wind from my senior brother Qin. The last place Zhou Hu and Tian Wei disappeared was right by the river."

"And in that area, the person who left the strongest trace of their presence was the one you saved!"

"Even if you don't say where he went, Black Wind will find him. Let me tell you, if it's discovered that Zhou Hu and Tian Wei's disappearance is truly related to him, your whole family will be implicated!"

In front of the Su family's courtyard, Li Yun coldly looked at Su Yongfu. Both families had given him money in order to find Zhou Hu and Tian Wei.

He naturally had to contribute.

Su Yongfu stood blocking the doorway, his face pale, his lips trembling. He wanted to say something but was too overwhelmed by the imposing presence of the group to speak.

Su He gripped the back of her grandfather's clothes tightly, her fingertips turning white. Su Shi was so frightened that his face turned pale, but he still stood firmly by his grandfather's legs.

"Hey Su, if you don't hand over the person and give us an explanation today, believe me, we'll tear down this dilapidated house!"

In the crowd, a burly man from the Tian family suddenly stepped forward, his eyes fierce, as if he would attack Su Yongfu if he spoke again.

"Are you looking for me?"

Just then, a calm voice suddenly rang out from behind the crowd.

The voice wasn't loud, but it reached everyone's ears clearly.

Everyone instinctively turned around.

Lu Ping'an was already standing on the outskirts of the crowd, casually holding a pheasant with blood on its neck in his left hand, quietly watching them.