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Sensing Xu Qing’s eyes on him, the young man rubbed his nose and then tried to make himself look a bit more imposing. There was something about this newbie that was different from ordinary newbies.

The female cultivator seemed to sense the same thing. Her eyes narrowing in curiosity, she licked her lips and said to the young man, “You keep an eye on the gate. I’ll take this little junior brother inside.”

Then, a beautiful smile appeared on her face as she beckoned at Xu Qing to follow her into the Violent Crimes Division.

“Come with me, little Junior Brother.”

“Thank you,” Xu Qing said.

The young man simply nodded. So, the tramp is trying to get a new boy toy? Well, this brat might seem different than the usual new recruits, but I’d be surprised if he lasts three months in the Violent Crimes Division.

Upon entering the complex, Xu Qing kept some distance between himself and the young woman. Walking through the main courtyard, he saw a host of other disciples clad, like himself, in gray robes.

At the minimum, they had cultivation bases in the fifth or sixth level of Qi Condensation. But there was no shortage of people in the seventh or eighth level. Some seemed cold and detached, others warm and gentle. Some reeked of blood, others walked around with their arms full of ordinary office supplies.

Taking it all in, he didn’t see anything that made the place seem like one cohesive department. What was more, everyone seemed to keep their distance from each other. Walking along silently, Xu Qing glanced at the throat of each passing cultivator and tried to judge whether or not his current level of battle prowess was enough to kill them. That was simply instinct by now.

Before long, he felt the need to keep his guard up more than ever. That was because he had trouble finding people he knew he could kill, and saw quite a few who seemed extremely threatening.

Simultaneously, he was paying attention to the layout of the place, and was starting to get an idea of its general structure.

Suddenly, the young woman leading him turned around and took a step toward him.

“Little Junior Brother, why do you seem so fond of looking at other people’s throats?”

As the words left her mouth, she reached out to touch his chest. But then, her expression flickered, and she lunged backward, while simultaneously taking out a generic antidote pill that she consumed. Then she looked at Xu Qing, her expression serious.

“I don’t like people getting too close to me,” Xu Qing said, looking at her calmly.

She gave him a deep look, nodded, and then abandoned her previous plans for him. By now, she realized that there was a lot more to this new recruit than met the eye.

“Interesting,” she said. “Someone like you should be able to last a long time in the Violent Crimes Division.”

With that, she continued leading him. And this time, he didn’t need to maintain distance between the two of them. She took the initiative to stay away from him. Nor did she attempt any more conversation. After taking him past seven or eight buildings, and through a number of different pathways, she stopped in front of a very large hall. Its exterior was pitch black, which created a stark contrast to the sunshine outside.

Looking very serious, she raised her voice and said, “Director, we have a new recruit reporting for duty. His name is Xu Qing.”

Xu Qing kept a similar serious expression on his face as he stood there with his head bowed.

Deep inside the grand hall, two bright lights appeared, like burning lamps. They were eyes, and their gaze pierced out of the hall and landed on Xu Qing.

Feeling the gaze land on him, Xu Qing shivered at the sense of immense pressure. It was like whoever was in that hall was a vicious beast whose mere presence could suffocate a person. Xu Qing’s hair stood on end, and he had trouble breathing. Without even thinking about it, his right hand inched to his side, and he tensed in preparation to take action.

Thankfully, the gaze retracted, whereupon Xu Qing breathed a sigh of relief. Then, he sensed an immense force wrap around the identity medallion in his left hand and pull it away.

With a whoosh, it disappeared into the hall.

He knew he couldn’t have fought back against that level of force. In fact, he had the feeling that if the force wrapped around him and not his identity medallion, then he would be inside that hall right now. Beads of sweat broke out on his forehead.

A moment later, a cold voice echoed out from inside. “Go report in to Celestial Bureau, Unit Six.”

Along with the words, his identity medallion flew back out from within the hall, along with some sort of badge. Xu Qing reached up to catch the medallion and badge. When they hit his hand, he felt so much force behind them that his torso swayed backward, and he was forced to put one foot back to steady himself.

His reaction caused the eyes in the hall to brighten momentarily. However, no words accompanied them. Then the eyes closed.

When the female disciple saw Xu Qing simply catch the medallion and badge, her pupils constricted.

He’s more cautious than many old timers in the sect. And he’s so strong.... She blinked a few times. Before, she’d sensed that Xu Qing was someone she shouldn’t provoke, and had thus decided to keep her distance from him. But now she changed her mind. This was a person she should make friends with.

“Junior Brother Xu Qing, I’m very familiar with Unit Six. I’ll take you there.” She also made a gesture to him indicating that he should put on the badge.

Xu Qing took a deep breath, put the badge on, then clasped hands and bowed in the direction of the grand hall. He also offered thanks to the young woman.

Xu Qing was young, but he had years of experience in life, and had long since learned to read people. He could guess the reason why this female disciple’s attitude had suddenly changed. His judgment was correct. As the girl led him along, she provided a self-introduction.

“Junior Brother, I’m Xu Yanhong, from Earth Bureau, Unit Nine. By chance, I was assigned to watch duty at the main gate today. I guess it’s just destiny that the two of us met.” [1]

As Xu Yanhong led him through the Violent Crimes Division, she pointed out different buildings and explained what they were.

“That’s the deputy director’s office. It extends to that building as well.”

“Elder Sister Xu,” he asked, “how many deputy directors are there in the Violent Crimes Division?”

Upon hearing Xu Qing call her Elder Sister, the girl smiled and went into an explanation. “There’s one director and four deputy directors. They lead the four bureaus of Heaven, Earth, Celestial, and Terrestrial. Each bureau has nine street units. You’re assigned to Celestial Bureau, Unit Six. You actually got lucky. The deputy director of Celestial Bureau spends most of his time in seclusion, so you won’t see him often. In other words, you’ll be able to relax a bit.” [2]

Eventually, she had led Xu Qing to the Celestial Bureau, which was in the southwestern part of the Violent Crimes Division compound. There were a few dozen buildings there, with numerous cultivators about, hustling and bustling.

The bureaus maintained a high level of security, and thus Xu Yanhong didn’t go inside. Before sending him through the entrance, she gave him her contact information, then bid him farewell.

Stepping inside, he quickly found the captain of Unit Six.

It wasn’t his first time seeing him. He was the very same young man who had given Xu Qing such a threatening feeling of danger the previous night. Once again, Xu Qing felt his guard going up.

The young man saw Xu Qing, looked him up and down, and immediately recognized him. He didn’t seem very surprised to see him.

Intrigued, Xu Qing quietly backed up a few steps.

“I talked to the director today,” said the captain, “and asked him to assign you to me. I honestly had no idea that dirty face of yours would clean up so well. You look completely different compared to last night.”

His guard going up further, Xu Qing said, “Well met…”

“Captain. You can just call me Captain.” Smiling enigmatically, he continued, “So… you aren’t surprised I wanted you in my unit?”

“No, I’m surprised,” Xu Qing said.

“If you’re surprised,” the Captain replied quizzically, “why are you acting so calm?”

Xu Qing had to admit that what the Captain said made sense, so after some thought, he plastered a surprised expression onto his face.

“....” A moment passed, then the Captain continued, “The reason I asked for you to be assigned to my unit is that we’ve lost a few constables over the past few days. We’re short-staffed, and we have some important assignments coming up.” As he spoke, the Captain kept his eyes on Xu Qing.

Upon hearing that constables had died, Xu Qing’s heart sank a bit. However, he didn’t jump in with any questions, and instead kept his eyes on the Captain and waited for more details.

Seeing Xu Qing react this way, the Captain smiled broadly.

“Excellent. You seem a lot stronger than past new recruits. Xu Qing, you’re the first person to show up today, and you’re not familiar with how things work. How about this? I’ll take you on patrol with me. Along the way, I’ll tell you all about your duties in the Violent Crimes Division.”

Captain was a swift and decisive person who struck like lightning and moved like the wind. Not bothering to mention who else was in the unit, he took Xu Qing out to the street.

As they walked slowly through the crowd, the Captain would occasionally call out greetings to shop owners. He seemed warm and kind, but Xu Qing hadn’t forgotten the dangerous look in his eyes from the night before. He certainly had not seemed very warm and kind then. Because of that, Xu Qing kept as much distance as he could.

From what Xu Qing could tell, the Captain’s cultivation base was somewhere in the ninth or tenth level of Qi Condensation. In Seven Blood Eyes, disciples of that caliber were far superior to the old version of Xu Qing.

“You don’t need to be so stiff,” the Captain said. “Around here, you need to practice having two dispositions. If you don’t, you won’t survive long.”

After thinking about the words, Xu Qing realized they made sense, so he tried hard to make himself seem a bit more relaxed. However, after all the things he’d been through during the past seven years, it wasn’t very easy.

“Forget it for now,” the Captain said, laughing. “You’ll figure it out eventually.” Stopping to buy a few apples, he thought, I recruited a real freak, didn’t I?

Seeing that the Captain didn’t offer him an apple, Xu Qing bought two for himself.

“Okay, let me explain what the Seventh Peak Violent Crimes Division does. Basically, we have one responsibility. And that’s to kill people.” Walking along, the Captain noticed a homeless person on the side of the road. He tossed two spirit coins to the man, who caught them and offered thanks.

Xu Qing noted that the homeless person wasn’t a cultivator. Then, he thought about what the Captain had just said, and asked, “You kill violent criminals?”

The Captain took a bite out of an apple, swallowed it, and seemed to relish the sweet flavor. Then he said, “The Patrol Division protects common citizens from illegal behavior of both disciples and criminal elements, and makes sure they can pay their bills and taxes. In a word, they maintain law and order. But when they run into situations that they can’t handle, the Violent Crimes Division steps in. For instance, if they encounter outlaws or murderous cultivators.

“Because of that, the Violent Crimes Division always goes on dangerous missions with a high casualty rate. Unit Six has gone through a lot of new recruits lately. Some died on missions, others were assassinated. Going forward, you need to be very careful.

“There are upsides to being in the Violent Crimes Division. The pay’s good. And we’re the only division that gets to hand over wanted criminals and keep the bounty.” With that, the Captain took another bite of apple.

Xu Qing looked at the apple for a moment, then asked, “After you kill someone, do you get to keep their belongings?”

“Hmm?” The Captain looked back at Xu Qing and saw the serious look on his face. He smiled. “Interesting. You’re the first new recruit to ever ask that question at this point in the introduction. Well, let me explain. If you single-handedly kill an outlaw or murderer, then you get to keep everything. If it’s part of a team effort, then it gets split up. By the way, in this city, there are some people who, if you see them, you should simply walk the other way.”

As he spoke the words, he pointed across the street to a young man wearing a pale violet daoist robe, walking through the crowds with an arrogant look on his face. When he stepped into one of the shops, the shopkeeper called out a respectful greeting. Everyone on the street who saw the color of his daoist robe looked at him with expressions of reverence, and most of them bowed their heads. Even the constables from the Patrol Division did the same thing. It was almost like he was the child of a god strolling through the mortal world, a being that no one dared to look at directly.

Xu Qing’s pupils constricted.

“Remember this,” the Captain continued. “In the Seven Blood Eyes capital city, people who wear dark daoist robes, and people who wear pale daoist robes like that, should never be provoked. The former... are senior-ranked Onpeak Foundation Establishment disciples. The latter are Onpeak conclave disciples. Conclave disciples aren’t in Foundation Establishment, but they lead charmed lives nonetheless.

“When it comes to people like you and me, a hundred could die and the sect wouldn’t care. But if a single conclave disciple dies, it’s a major event.”

Xu Qing looked over at the distant Seventh Peak.

“Jealous?” the Captain said. “Just stay alive and keep working on your cultivation. Once you reach Foundation Establishment, even the conclave disciples will have to bow their heads to you.” He took another bite of apple.

“By the way, I should probably remind you that sect rules prohibit gray-robed disciples from fighting and killing each other. But those are just the rules as written. Fighting and killing actually happens all the time. You just need to figure out a good way to dispose of the bodies. Honestly, the best way is to take their merit points and spirit stones, and then, because their balance is at zero, the spell formation will take care of them....” Chewing his apple, the Captain gestured with his chin and said, “Like him.”

Xu Qing looked over to see a young man in a gray robe, covered in wounds and gasping for breath, his eyes burning with rage and indignation.

His lips were busted and his limbs broken, making it impossible for him to speak or even walk. His identity medallion lay on his chest, and even from a distance it was possible to see that his merit point balance was at zero.

Even as Xu Qing looked at him, a black beam of light shot down from above and incinerated the young man out of existence, leaving behind only a bit of drifting ash.

Xu Qing’s pupils constricted. However, the passersby seemed to take the event as a matter of course, and most didn’t even look over. They just hurried along, cold and detached.

“That fellow made a practice of robbing and killing fellow disciples. It was to be expected that he’d end up like that eventually.” The Captain smiled and was about to keep talking when, all of a sudden, his expression turned serious, and he looked further down the street.

Xu Qing followed his gaze, and noticed that, further down in an alley, were mutagen fluctuations.

He and the Captain were on a busy street, but that alley looked shadowy and dark, and most people seemed to be avoiding it.

The Captain sighed. “I can’t believe this is happening in broad daylight. Wait here for a moment, Junior Brother.”

With that, the Captain finished his apple as he walked over to the alley.

Xu Qing watched as the Captain then disappeared into the alley. About ten breaths of time later, he emerged, eating another apple, but smelling like blood.

Xu Qing eyed the alley.

“Some poor idiot who had transplanted mutant beast body parts onto himself ran into a problem and started mutating. I urge you not to do anything like that. It can boost your cultivation base, but will ultimately cause no end of trouble for you.” With a broad smile and an innocent expression, he led Xu Qing onward down the street.

Xu Qing nodded and then followed silently. The man he’d killed the night before also had transplanted mutant beast body parts. Before, Xu Qing didn’t even know it was possible to do that.

Seeing the Captain enjoying the sweet apples, Xu Qing finally took a bite out of one that he’d bought. It really was very sweet.

And thus, the two of them strolled through the city, enjoying apples. The Captain ate quickly, Xu Qing ate slowly. Eventually, the Captain ran out of apples, and looked over at the second apple Xu Qing had bought. Xu Qing looked back at him and took a bite out of the second apple. The Captain rubbed his nose and pulled a tangerine out of his sack.

“Let me tell you about our current mission. We have one main goal for now, and that’s to capture members of Night Dove.”

“Night Dove?” Xu Qing said.

“They’re a massive criminal enterprise that operates all over South Phoenix. They specialize in kidnapping children and cultivators and selling them to be living treasures. Normally speaking, they carry out their vile business outside of our borders. But nowadays they’ve expanded operations into Seven Blood Eyes territory. The populace is on edge, and if things keep going as they are, the Onpeak bigshots are going to see a dip in profit. And they won’t be happy about that.

“What you saw last night was our director killing one of the Night Dove leaders. It was a joint operation with the Violent Crimes Divisions from all seven districts, the goal being to devastate their base of operations here.”

Xu Qing’s eyes glittered coldly as he thought back to the caravan leader he’d killed back in the basecamp. Eyes narrowing, he nodded.

The Captain was a smart person, and could guess what the look in Xu Qing’s eyes meant. However, he didn’t ask any questions. Instead, he continued to lead him through the city and explain things.

At a certain point, Xu Qing noticed a homeless child at the side of the road, and thinking back to what the Captain had done earlier, he tossed the boy a spirit coin.

The Captain blinked a few times, then looked at Xu Qing with an enigmatic smile and said, “Oh, you already have informants in the city?”

Xu Qing didn’t say anything in response. However, he was surprised to realize the reason behind the Captain’s action before. At the same time, he almost felt like he’d been pranked.

Eventually, as the sun started to set, they reached the harbor. As they walked past an area filled with piles of cargo, a gruff voice rang out.

“Say one more thing, and I’ll rip your jaw off your face.”

Xu Qing looked over and saw that, squatting next to a huge pile of cargo, was a Seventh Peak disciple. He was middle-aged, and didn’t seem out of the ordinary in any way. In fact, he seemed like an honest, good-natured person.

However, he was the one who had just spoken.

In front of him was an old man in expensive clothing. He looked angry, and had apparently been arguing with the Seventh Peak disciple.

“Whose jaw are you going to rip off, huh, Zhang San?” said the Captain, finishing a tangerine and then taking a pear out. He took a bite. [3]

When the old man saw the Captain, his expression flickered and he hurried away. Meanwhile, the Seventh Peak disciple looked around with a silly smile on his face. After calling out a greeting to the Captain, he looked at Xu Qing with the same smile.

“This is our latest addition to the Violent Crimes Division, Xu Qing,” the Captain said. Then he pointed at the middle-aged disciple and said, “This is Zhang San. He used to be in Violent Crimes Division, but turned out to be a big coward so he transferred to the Transportation Division. Don’t be fooled by his friendly appearance. He’s killed so many pirates and rogue cultivators that there’s hardly enough room around here to pile them up.” He gestured at the piles of cargo by way of comparison.

Xu Qing’s guard went up. What was most intriguing was that he didn’t sense any powerful fluctuations on this Zhang San. If what the Captain said was true, then there must be something very unusual about him.

“Come on, those are just rumors,” Zhang San said, rubbing his hands together. “I killed a few small-time crooks, that’s all. Ai. I still feel bad about that down to this day.” All the while, the silly smile never left his face.

From what Xu Qing could tell, there wasn’t an ounce of remorse on the man’s face.

“Junior Brother Xu Qing, don’t listen to the Captain’s nonsense. You have to watch out for yourself.” With that, he stood and offered a small bone to Xu Qing. “Here, take this. A gift to mark the day we met.”

1. Xu Yanhong’s surname is a different Xu than Xu Qing’s (it’s actually the same as the other female character we met earlier, Xu Xiaohui). Yan means “colorful” and Hong means “red.” ☜

2. Those of you who’ve read A Will Eternal might remember a ranking system in that novel that also used heaven, earth, celestial, and terrestrial. The bureaus in Violent Crimes Division used the same pattern of Chinese characters. The first two are the common characters for heaven and earth. The second two are characters with a variety of meanings, but when paired with the first two, create a four-character grouping in which the latter two are also describing heaven and earth. ☜

3. Zhang San: Zhang is #3 on the top 100 most common Chinese surnames. San means “three.” Zhang San is a common “generic name” like John Doe. Madam Deathblade confirmed this and said it sounds "almost like nothing." Also, in Northeastern China "Zhang San" is apparently a name often applied to wolves. Given that Er Gen is from Northeastern China, I have to wonder if that played into the name. Zhang starts with a J sound and rhymes with long. San rhymes with fawn. ☜