DLWAV CH113

The next day, Ao Ruize specifically woke up bright and early.

By the time he arrived at the Seven Treasures Pavilion, Sun Jianhong and the others were already there.

“Come, come, come, let me introduce everyone. This is Brother Zhang, Zhang Ruize.”

“This is Boss Li Guodong, the owner of the Gathering Treasures Pavilion in Hai City.”

“This is Professor Zheng Qian from Hai City University.”

…

The four people Sun Jianhong brought along all politely shook hands with Ao Ruize.

They had all heard about Ao Ruize’s deeds from Sun Jianhong.

However, they didn’t think Ao Ruize was able to snag that white-glazed bowl with carved dragon patterns at such a low price because he had an incredible eye for antiques.

They simply felt Ao Ruize had stepped in dog shit and gotten lucky.

After all, how long had he even been in the industry?

Pulling any random apprentice from under their wings would be enough to serve as Ao Ruize’s master.

But since Sun Jianhong had spoken up, it wasn’t their place to say much.

After all, this team had been formed under Sun Jianhong’s leadership to begin with. Moreover, over the years, the vast majority of the old houses they went out to clear were found by Sun Jianhong.

Not to mention, they all quite appreciated Ao Ruize’s character.

So they didn’t expect Ao Ruize to actually be of any help this time around; as long as he didn’t drag them down, it would be fine.

Only when they were nearing their destination did Sun Jianhong reveal to them where they were going—this was an old rule within their team.

Because the quality of the old houses they found was always very high, there had been incidents in the past where Sun Jianhong had told the team members the destination in advance, only for a bribed team member to turn around and leak the location to other antique shop owners, resulting in them being beaten to the punch several times.

Sun Jianhong said, “Our destination this time is Lihe Village on Mount Dawang.”

Normally, Boss Li and the others would have already started asking about the situation in Lihe Village.

But this time, the moment Sun Jianhong’s words fell, Professor Zheng’s voice rang out: “Lihe Village? Isn’t that the legendary plague village?”

Over the past few decades, a few people in Lihe Village would inexplicably die every single year.

But oddly enough, even after investigating for decades, the government had never been able to help them find the cause of the disease.

The most crucial detail was that all the villagers who died suddenly had every drop of blood drained from their bodies.

So everyone knew that this plague village wasn’t actually a plague village at all, but a ghost village.

It was absolutely haunted.

Who knew that upon hearing Professor Zheng’s words, Sun Jianhong would actually nod: “That’s right, it’s that plague village.”

“But two months ago, the Special Affairs Bureau of Wu Province, in order to completely resolve the issue of Lihe Village, drafted a large number of cultivators from the neighboring Li Province and Geng Province, and they’ve already taken care of the problem.”

“You guys definitely won’t believe me when I say this, but the ghost haunting Lihe Village turned out to be their own family’s ancestor…”

As he spoke, he didn’t forget to turn his head to look at Ao Ruize and say, “Brother Zhang, you’ve only just entered this circle not long ago, so you might not know this, but ghosts truly do exist in this world…”

But right after saying that, he turned his head straight back and continued his story. The others’ attention was completely focused on Sun Jianhong, so they didn’t notice that after hearing Sun Jianhong’s words, not a single ripple disturbed the surface of Ao Ruize’s face.

Sun Jianhong: “…The largest surname in Lihe Village is the Qian family. It’s said that the Qian family used to be prominent, respected figures in the local area of Qian City. During the late Qing Dynasty, their family’s ancestor even reached the rank of a fourth-grade prefect.”

“It’s just that later, when the Qing Dynasty fell, their family ancestor acted too pedantically, so the new government drove him out of office.”

“Although he was unwilling to accept it, in the end, he could only return to his hometown.”

“But after he returned to his hometown, the unwillingness in his heart only grew stronger and stronger. Later, he met a Daoist priest. That Daoist priest told him that he would never be able to turn his fortunes around in this lifetime, but he had a way to ensure all his descendants could.”

“The method the Daoist priest came up with was to have him find a piece of treasured fengshui land. Then, after a hundred years of life, have his descendants bury him there to gather fortune for the future generations, allowing their family to prosper once more.”

“This method sounded fairly reliable, so he believed it entirely.”

“But how could he recognize what a piece of treasured fengshui land looked like? So he spent a hefty sum to hire that Daoist priest to help him find one.”

“As a result, a few years later, that Daoist priest really did find him a piece of treasured fengshui land, which eventually became Lihe Village.”

“Then he took his family members and servants and moved entirely to Lihe Village. Today, aside from those surnamed Qian, the rest of the villagers in Lihe Village are all descendants of the Qian family’s former servants.”

Professor Zheng immediately stated, “That Daoist priest scammed him—”

Sun Jianhong: “Exactly.”

“That burial plot he found for the Qian family ancestor wasn’t some treasured fengshui land at all; it was a corpse-raising ground—”

“The Qian family eventually realized that the Daoist priest had tricked them, because after decades passed, not only did the Qian family fail to prosper again, but after the founding of the Huaguo Republic, they were thoroughly purged. Not only were all the family members who had committed crimes dragged out and executed by firing squad, but all the family’s farmland was divided up as well.”

“Having figured this out, they immediately prepared to relocate the Qian family ancestor’s grave.”

“But to their shock, the moment they dug the grave open, the Qian family ancestor flew right out of the tomb.”

“It turned out that over those decades, the Qian family ancestor had long since turned into a White Zombie.”

“Three of the Qian family members present were killed by him on the spot.”

“But he stopped after that. Because that Daoist priest never came back later—perhaps he died in the chaos of war—and for some unknown reason, over those decades, the ancestor slowly regained his sanity.”

“He knew that if he was discovered, the government would definitely send people to hunt him down. So he coerced the Qian family into hiding him, and demanded they offer him a batch of living humans and livestock every year for his cultivation.”

“As it happened, there was a particularly ruthless member in that generation of the Qian family. Encountering such a thing, not only was he unafraid, but he audaciously negotiated terms with the Qian family ancestor, hoping the ancestor would protect them.”

“As soon as the Qian family ancestor heard that the descendants of his Qian family had now fallen to the point where they were being ridden over and bossed around by the descendants of their former slaves, he was instantly enraged and agreed to the matter of protecting the Qian family.”

“After striking a deal with the Qian family ancestor, that man began his path to establishing dominance and ruling over Lihe Village. It took him five years, borrowing the hands of the Qian family ancestor, to eliminate over half the villagers who spared no effort in oppressing the Qian family, as well as anyone within the Qian family who opposed him.”

“When the villagers started trying to flee, he began spreading rumors that there was a plague in Lihe Village. He also had the Qian family ancestor go out and kill a few of the fleeing villagers and the people who took them in, fabricating the rumor that the people who took them in had been infected by them and died because of it. This forced the outside world to actively drive the villagers who had escaped back in, and intimidated the remaining villagers inside into never daring to flee again.”

And naturally, outsiders wouldn’t dare to go to Lihe Village either.

This also meant that this village hadn’t yet been visited by antique dealers.

And this was precisely the main reason why Sun Jianhong had set his sights on Lihe Village.

“Just like that, step by step, he secured the position of village chief of Lihe Village.”

“I heard that over these past few decades, he embezzled over eight million just from the relief funds allocated by the government and donations from kind-hearted people.”

“This is also the main reason why, for so many years, the government was never able to clearly investigate exactly how the ‘plague’ in Lihe Village was occurring.”

“And it was precisely during these few decades that the Qian family ancestor, who was originally just a White Zombie, was nurtured by them straight into a Flying Zombie.”

A White Zombie was merely a low-tier zombie, whereas a Flying Zombie was already a high-tier zombie.

Speaking up to this point, Sun Jianhong sighed deeply: “In order to exterminate him, the Special Affairs Bureaus of the three provinces suffered disastrous losses this time. Half of the elites from the Geng Province Special Affairs Bureau died, and the Director of the Li Province Special Affairs Bureau was also killed in action.”

Professor Zheng and the others were utterly furious: “Those Qian family members deserve to die.”

Sun Jianhong: “Therefore, the country has no intention of letting them off the hook either. Every single member of the Qian family involved in this matter, without exception, has been arrested. What awaits them is either a lifetime of prison food or a bullet.”

“It’s just a pity that the Qian family ancestor was ultimately blasted into powder by the people from the Special Affairs Bureau. Otherwise, the country would absolutely summon his soul back just to make him take a bullet too.”

“So since we’re going over this time, we can appropriately raise our prices a little.”

“As for the future profits, I’m also planning to donate a portion to the families of those martyrs.”

Professor Zheng and the others: “Mr. Sun is truly righteous.”

As they were talking, they arrived at Lihe Village.

Upon learning the purpose of Sun Jianhong and his group’s visit, the villagers couldn’t sit still anymore.

After all, who didn’t know that antiques were valuable items? If they could find a few valuable antiques at home, they basically wouldn’t have to worry for the rest of their lives.

So in an instant, countless villagers rushed out holding all sorts of bottles and jars.

And then Sun Jianhong and the others couldn’t sit still either.

Although they knew Lihe Village would definitely be a massive goldmine, they still hadn’t expected the villagers to have this many old items in their hands.

In just a short hour, they had already collected seven or eight antiques, ranging from bottles to jars.

Right at this moment, Ao Ruize, who had been assisting them on the side the whole time, saw a Qing Dynasty teapot that Professor Zheng was preparing to acquire and spoke up: “Professor Zheng, that teapot doesn’t quite look like it’s from the Qing Dynasty to me…”

Professor Zheng’s brows immediately furrowed together.

Because he had already carefully examined this teapot inside and out several times, he was absolutely certain that this was indeed a Qing Dynasty teapot.

His area of greatest expertise was porcelain, so he never liked others questioning his professionalism—especially when this person was just a total novice who had only recently entered the trade.

And the original owner of that teapot had an even more drastic change in expression on the spot: “Are you saying my teapot is fake?”

“This was left behind by my great-grandfather.”

“If I dared to deceive you, may I be struck by lightning and die a horrible death…”

Seeing the atmosphere turning tense, Sun Jianhong, who was off to the side, immediately called out: “Brother Zhang, could I trouble you to come over here for a second and help me appraise these copper coins?”

After all, this was not the time to get into an argument.

Taking a ten thousand steps back, that teapot was only worth around ten thousand yuan. Even if it really was fake, as Ao Ruize had said, it wasn’t a big deal.

Ao Ruize also didn’t want to get into an argument with Professor Zheng in front of a crowd, so he said nothing more and went directly over to Sun Jianhong.

By the time evening arrived, they still hadn’t finished appraising all the antiques.

Even though it had only been half a day, they had already spent over four million.

Sun Jianhong and the others didn’t want to let such a golden opportunity slip away, so they immediately decided to stay overnight in Lihe Village. They would wait until tomorrow, finish looking at all the antiques, and then head back.

However, considering that the number of antiques they had acquired was simply too large, just in case, someone had to keep watch over the night.

So they immediately split everyone into two shifts.

Ao Ruize, Sun Jianhong, and three others were responsible for the latter half of the night.

To stave off fatigue, they had no choice but to engage in idle, disconnected chatter.

Who knew that right at this moment, the sky suddenly went pitch black.

Xiao Li, the driver, immediately stood up: “I’ll go turn on the car headlights.”

Sun Jianhong: “Alright.”

It wasn’t long before Old Li, sitting beside him, suddenly felt a chill running down his spine.

On such a hot day, even if the wind was strong, it couldn’t possibly blow with such a chilling cold.

So he just thought it was Xiao Li, who had stepped away, playing a prank on him.

Right at that moment, an ice-cold hand rested on his shoulder and rubbed against his neck.

So he immediately swatted that hand away: “Stop messing around.”

But when he raised his head, he realized that Sun Jianhong and the others across from him were all staring unblinkingly behind him. Their eyes were wide open, and the terror on their faces was almost palpable.

He subconsciously turned his head to look, and found himself staring straight into a pair of blood-red eyes and a sharp fang.

Looking again at the long fingernails of varying lengths on the hand he had just swatted away, only two words remained in his mind.

Zombie—

Who else could this zombie be?

“The Qian family ancestor?”

But wasn’t he already blasted into powder by the cultivators from the Special Affairs Bureau?

Right, he escaped. The people from the Special Affairs Bureau couldn’t find his corpse, so didn’t they just assume he was blasted into powder by them?

“Run—”

But this was no longer the time to think about these things. Sun Jianhong screamed hoarsely, immediately grabbing the water cup in his hand and hurling it at the zombie, buying Old Li a few moments to escape.

After effortlessly dodging the water cup, the Qian family ancestor looked at Sun Jianhong and the others fleeing wildly and let out a sinister cackle: “Did you really think you could escape the palm of my hand?”

No, he should say, it wasn’t just Sun Jianhong and the others; all the descendants of those lowly slaves in Lihe Village had to die—

He originally thought that as long as he hid obediently in Lihe Village, those righteous path cultivators wouldn’t discover his existence.

But he never expected that after less than fifty years, he would be discovered by the people of the Huaguo government.

If he hadn’t luckily escaped through a fissure underground when the Special Affairs Bureau cultivators besieged him, he probably would have died at the hands of those righteous path cultivators long ago.

He had hidden underground for so long, wasn’t it all for today?

As for those people from the Huaguo Special Affairs Bureau—just wait. Once his strength fully recovered, he would definitely slaughter every single one of them too.

Only in this way could he relieve the hatred in his heart.

Thinking of this, he immediately whipped up a violent gale and surged toward Sun Jianhong and the others, intent on killing them.

Over here, the terrified Sun Jianhong and his group ran headlong into Ao Ruize, who happened to just be coming out of the washroom.

“Run quickly—”

Sun Jianhong instinctively grabbed Ao Ruize’s hand to continue running forward.

As an outstanding graduate of the Male Virtue Academy, Ao Ruize also instinctively swatted his hand away.

It was just that because his reaction was a bit strong, Sun Jianhong was sent flying straight backward.

Furthermore, exactly at this moment, the Qian family ancestor happened to lunge over. So this scene, falling into Sun Jianhong’s eyes, instantly morphed into Ao Ruize not hesitating to shove Sun Jianhong out as a shield to stall the Qian family ancestor, all to save his own life.

Thinking of this, Sun Jianhong’s eyes instantly turned red.

He never expected that when he kindly wanted to help Ao Ruize out, Ao Ruize would repay him like this.

Consider him blind for trusting the wrong person.

But none of this mattered anymore. What mattered was, he was going to die—

After all, the Qian family ancestor was an entity that even the Special Affairs Bureau couldn’t handle. Unless a heavenly god descended to earth, no one could save him now.

He was wrong.

If he had known this would be his fate today, he would have listened to his son’s advice no matter what, and stopped running to poor, remote villages every single day to clear out old houses.

But right at this moment, Ao Ruize also reacted.

He remained calm and unhurried. With another wave of his hand, the small pickup truck beside them, packed full of antiques, immediately took flight. Grazing right over Sun Jianhong’s scalp, it slammed directly toward the Qian family ancestor.

The Qian family ancestor froze.

Because he hadn’t expected there to be a cultivator among this group of people.

But did he really think such a petty trick could hurt him?

The Qian family ancestor casually raised a hand, intending to block that small pickup truck.

But the next second, his pupils suddenly contracted.

Because as the small pickup truck drew closer and closer to him, he acutely sensed the boundless, terrifying force wrapped around it.

Dodge it—

The Qian family ancestor hurriedly tried to dodge to the side.

But it was already too late.

The next second, that small pickup truck smashed directly into his hand, instantly crushing his palm into powder, followed by his arm, his shoulder…

The Qian family ancestor let out a miserable shriek: “No—”

However, before the sound of his voice could fade, his entire body had already been pulverized into dust by that small pickup truck.

Finally, with a loud boom, the small pickup truck crashed to the ground.

And as the security door was smashed open, the shattered fragments of the antiques inside all rolled out.

Now, the Qian family ancestor was truly blasted into powder.

Sun Jianhong: “…”

Old Li and the others: “…”

From the moment they spotted the Qian family ancestor to the moment he was killed, not even a minute had passed from start to finish.

And the one who killed the Qian family ancestor was actually—Ao Ruize.

They couldn’t even bother to calm their breathing before whipping their heads around to look straight at Ao Ruize.

Only to see Ao Ruize suddenly lift his foot, walk toward the small pickup truck, and then, from a pile of fragments, pull out half of a shattered teapot.

As if he saw something, he smiled: “I told you, this teapot is fake, isn’t it?”

Sun Jianhong and the others: “…”

Okay, but could you maybe look at the people who just narrowly escaped death first—

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