Chapter 365 - 348: Infernal

Chapter 365: Chapter 348: Infernal

"Ugh, it hurts!"

Peng Anmin’s eyes flew open. His head was ringing, and he was seeing stars, as if someone had brutally smashed his skull with a sledgehammer.

He instinctively tried to raise a hand to his temple but found his arm too heavy to lift. He could only lie helplessly on the cold ground.

His vision was a dim, blurry mess. The air was thick with a nauseating stench of damp and decay.

With great effort, he turned his neck to look around.

It was a dilapidated temple, long since abandoned. The main hall had mostly collapsed, with only a few crooked pillars and the broken base of a statue barely holding it up.

On the walls, large patches of mottled plaster had peeled away, revealing the blackened, moss-covered bricks beneath.

In the corners, thick spiderwebs trembled in the faint breeze.

"Where... is this?"

Peng Anmin’s mind was a blank slate. An intense wave of dizziness left him momentarily dazed.

’Who am I?’

’What happened?’

He struggled to remember, but all he found in the depths of his mind was a searing, tearing pain.

He gasped and wheezed.

He took deep, ragged breaths. The sharp pain helped to clear his jumbled thoughts slightly.

Gradually, blurry images and a clamor of sounds washed over him like a tide.

’This is Jiangzhou, Nanjiang County.’

’My name is Peng Anmin.’

’I’m the Vice Gang Leader of the Xinyi Bang.’

’And I have another identity, one buried deep in my heart that can never see the light of day: a secret agent for the Jiangzhou Riverway Office.’

His fractured memories were like scattered pearls, now being strung together by an invisible thread.

Then, more fragments of memory flooded his mind.

Ten days ago, the Gang Leader of the Xinyi Bang had summoned him to their headquarters and told him the gang had landed a huge deal.

The client had a massive appetite, asking for two thousand boxes of Opium right off the bat. He wanted Peng Anmin to personally handle the meeting, inspect the goods, and negotiate the price.

’Two thousand boxes?!’

Peng Anmin had sucked in a sharp breath.

’Who the hell wants that much Opium?’

’Are they going to eat it for dinner?’

That amount was enough to send every addict in Nanjiang County to an early grave.

’Are they trying to stockpile it? Or... is this a trap set by the Government Office?’

Peng Anmin immediately pressed the Gang Leader, asking about the client’s background and whether they could be trusted.

The Gang Leader shook his head, saying the client was using an old channel from the time of the Hidden Emperor Castle’s Pig Emperor. The contact signals and methods were all from that era, so they didn’t seem like new customers.

But their specific identity remained a mystery.

Hearing this, Peng Anmin was even more surprised.

’Ever since the Hidden Emperor Castle was uprooted by the Celestial Sword Sect, the largest and most stable sales channel in the Jiangzhou Black Market has been all but severed.’

’Although the Celestial Sword Sect later took over the Hidden Emperor Castle’s Black Market and would occasionally buy some Opium on the sly, they had to maintain their public image. Their purchase volume was extremely small, and they didn’t dare move large quantities like before.’

’Could it be... that sanctimonious bunch from the Celestial Sword Sect finally caved to the temptation of immense profits and decided to get into the business themselves?’

’Or had some other power set its sights on the lucrative prize of Jiangzhou and managed to get their hands on the Hidden Emperor Castle’s old connections?’

Peng Anmin voiced his doubts and unease, but the Gang Leader grew impatient and told him to just follow orders. So, he didn’t press the matter further.

After all, given the Xinyi Bang’s current situation, they were in no position to be picky.

Three years ago, Mu Hongyuan had become the new Nanjiang Admiral.

The first thing Admiral Mu did after taking office was to mobilize a large force and launch several rounds of swift and fierce extermination campaigns against the Water Bandits entrenched in Nanjiang’s waterways.

The Xinyi Bang had always been deeply intertwined with the various Water Bandit groups, and many of its members were bandit leaders themselves.

After several rounds of encirclement, the gang suffered devastating losses. A few of its crucial aquatic revenue streams were completely cut off, leaving it severely crippled.

The Opium business, once the gang’s biggest source of profit, had ground to a halt due to the fall of the Hidden Emperor Castle and the Celestial Sword Sect’s timidity.

The Xinyi Bang of today was a far cry from its former glory. It could only scrape by on the meager income from small gambling dens and hidden brothels at the docks. In reality, they were bleeding money and were flat broke.

Even so, they were constantly hounded by the Government Office, forced to live in constant fear.

So, when faced with this sudden, massive deal worth one hundred thousand taels of silver, they had to take a closer look, even if it was poison.

Peng Anmin went to the appointed meeting place as scheduled.

There, he met the three people who had come to make contact.

Their leader was a slightly portly, middle-aged man dressed in gray cloth, his face hidden behind a wooden mask.

Of the two men behind him, one was skinny and shifty-eyed. His eyes darted about constantly, always sizing people up with a prying gaze, looking for all the world like a common thief.

The other was a gaunt little old man with a sparse goatee, his eyes always narrowed to a slit.

’Unfamiliar faces!’

Peng Anmin quickly ran through his mental list of all the known underground figures and smugglers in Jiangzhou, but he had no recollection of these three.

’Are they greenhorns, new to the trade?’

’But if they were rookies, how would they know the contact channels and codes from the Hidden Emperor Castle era?’

Suspicion swirled.

Peng Anmin didn’t dare to trust a party with an unknown background involved in such a massive transaction. He knew he had to test them repeatedly, sound them out, and maybe even conduct a few smaller deals to build trust before diving into a deeper partnership.

However, before he could speak, another person standing beside the Gang Leader spoke up.

This man was dressed like a scholar and held no official position in the Xinyi Bang, yet the Gang Leader listened to his every word. Everyone in the gang respectfully called him Mr. Hai.

This Mr. Hai was known for his superior intellect and strategy, but his performance this time stunned Peng Anmin.

He made almost no attempt to probe or haggle, directly asking the other party where and when the transaction would take place.

Peng Anmin was both shocked and suspicious.

’But on second thought,’ he mused, ’if Mr. Hai is taking this attitude, why should I, the Vice Gang Leader, make things complicated?’

Happy to pass the buck, Peng Anmin kept his mouth shut and watched coldly from the sidelines.

In the end, the two sides finalized the deal in just a few words.

The time was set for midnight in three days, and the location was this very wild temple, which had been abandoned for many years.

Back at the gang’s headquarters, Peng Anmin reported the details of the deal to the Gang Leader.

As the Gang Leader listened to his report, he showed little sign of doubt. He simply nodded and gave the final approval for the transaction.

The situation was abnormal, but Peng Anmin knew he couldn’t just sit back and wait for disaster.

No matter who those three mysterious men were, and regardless of what the Gang Leader and Mr. Hai were plotting, if this deal for two thousand boxes of Opium went through, the consequences would be unimaginable.

And for an undercover agent like himself, it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

If he could use this to wipe out the core members of the Xinyi Bang in one fell swoop, he could finally escape this perilous life of an undercover agent—a life of constant fear, lived on the edge. He could return to the light and perhaps even secure a future for himself.

He made a snap decision and passed the intelligence to his handler as quickly as possible.

On the day of the transaction, the Gang Leader, who was taking the deal extremely seriously, brought more than half of the gang’s elite members.

The three men appeared on time. It was the same trio: the middle-aged man in the gray clothes and mask, the shifty-eyed man, and the gaunt old man with the goatee.

Both sides inspected the goods and counted the silver taels.

Just as the exchange was about to be completed...

"Kill them!"

"Show no mercy to those who resist!"

Furious roars suddenly shattered the dead of night.

Countless torches flared to life from all directions, illuminating the desolate temple as if it were day.

Nanjiang Admiral Mu Hongyuan and two Hundred Households from the Nanjiang Jingwu Bureau appeared with several hundred elite government soldiers, instantly surrounding the members of the Xinyi Bang.

"It’s a trap!"

The Xinyi Bang members descended into chaos.

Peng Anmin, hidden in the crowd, prepared to coordinate with the Court’s forces.

However, just when he thought victory was assured, the situation took another unexpected turn.

"Hahaha! Mu Hongyuan! I’ve been waiting for you!"

A wild laugh erupted from the temple’s shadows.

Immediately after, battle cries exploded from the darkness further out.

Countless men in varied attire but with ferocious eyes emerged like phantoms, their numbers far exceeding those of the Xinyi Bang.

It was none other than the Gang Leaders of the Sanhe Bang and the Chaotian Bang, along with their elite fighters.

They had been lying in ambush all along.

That wasn’t all. To Peng Anmin’s utter terror, the seemingly unremarkable aura of Mr. Hai suddenly exploded with power.

His figure moved like a ghost, instantly crossing the crowd to strike at Mu Hongyuan with his palm.

BANG!

Caught completely off guard, Mu Hongyuan was sent flying as if struck by a heavy blow. His face turned pale, and he coughed up a large mouthful of blood.

The two Jingwu Bureau Hundred Households tried to come to his aid but were forced back in a sorry state by a casual wave of Mr. Hai’s palm, suffering significant injuries.

’A Divine Hall Grandmaster!’

Peng Anmin’s mind reeled.

He never would have imagined that this Mr. Hai, who seemed to have no power at all, was hiding such terrifying strength.

The tables turned in an instant.

The Court’s forces were surrounded, attacked from all sides.

With the Xinyi Bang, Sanhe Bang, and Chaotian Bang joining forces, and with a powerhouse like Mr. Hai leading the charge, their morale surged, and they launched a frenzied counterattack.

Although the government soldiers and Jingwu Bureau experts were elite, they were severely outnumbered and suppressed by a superior master. They quickly suffered heavy casualties and were forced into a steady retreat.

A chill ran down Peng Anmin’s spine.

He understood everything in that instant.

’This was all a setup.’

’The Gang Leader had long suspected there was a mole in the gang and might have even identified me.’

’The goal wasn’t just to get revenge for the encirclement at Black Crocodile’s Mouth two years ago. It was to root out the mole and cripple, or even annihilate, Mu Hongyuan.’

’The involvement of the Sanhe Bang and the Chaotian Bang suggested that the Seven Kills Association might even be pulling the strings from behind the scenes.’

Seeing the dire situation, Peng Anmin felt a wave of despair. It seemed he was going to die here today.

At that critical moment, another completely unexpected event occurred.

The invincible Mr. Hai suddenly froze. The color drained from his face, replaced by a strange, ashen gray.

With a sudden "GACK," he vomited a huge mouthful of blood.

Like a puppet with its strings cut, he plummeted from mid-air, having clearly suffered a bizarre and severe injury.

The sudden turn of events stunned everyone.

Although Mu Hongyuan didn’t know what had happened, he instinctively seized the fleeting opportunity. The remaining Court forces took advantage of the moment to fight their way out.

Thrown into disarray by Mr. Hai’s mysterious and grave injury, the three gangs’ forces were unable to stop them. A gap was torn in their encirclement, and the government troops escaped in a sorry state into the vast darkness of the night.

As the Court’s forces retreated, silence fell once more before the desolate temple.

After a brief, dead silence, the Gang Leaders of the Xinyi Bang, Sanhe Bang, and Chaotian Bang surrounded Peng Anmin with their men, their angry questions echoing relentlessly.

Peng Anmin knew he had no hope of survival, but he still clung to a sliver of it.

He pointed at the three mysterious traders who had remained in the shadows of the ruined temple the entire time and roared, "Bullshit! If I were the mole, why would I have waited until today? The real cops are those three! They’re the bait the Government Office sent!"