Stealing The Heavens
Chapter 15: Recruitmen

When Wu Qi arrived at the other side of the bend in the road, he saw a group of men in black who had dispersed the guards who were supposed to be escorting the coaches. These men in black were now charging toward Lu Chengfeng.

The leader of these men in black was shouting loudly, ordering his men to chop off Lu Chengfeng’s left hand!

Wu Qi was standing ten feet away when he saw the leader of men swing his blade at Lu Chengfeng, He took a deep breath and dashed forward. As he gave a quick gaze at Lu Chengfeng’s fleet of coaches, he saw the coach that Lu Chengfeng was sitting on. His vision paused as he stared at it for a moment.

Those six leading coaches could only be described as luxurious. However, there was obviously a Floating Array underneath Lu Chengfeng’s coach, which allowed it to hover in midair. Only those who were either extremely wealthy or young masters from influential families could have this kind of a coach.

What did being a wealthy man or a young master from influential family mean to Wu Qi? It meant resources, power, and implied they had a lot of stuff that interested Wu Qi! He had inherited the Scroll of Stealing, and there was nothing that could interest him back in Meng village, but there must be something this wealthy young master had that would bring him benefits!

A bright blue light shined within Wu Qi’s eyes after he circulated some innate water Qi into them. He quickly glanced at the men in black.

The cultivation level of these men in black was quite good. However, Wu Qi didn’t think it was that big of a deal. The only one of note was the leader, whose cultivation was close to the peak of the Houtian grade. The rest of the men were just barely above average, being at par with the cultivation levels of Zhuang Hu’s barbarian hunters.

On the contrary, Lu Chengfeng, who was panicking when he saw the blade thrusting toward him, possessed thirty percent more Qi than Wu Qi! There was even a fist-sized red glowing object hidden close to his chest, from which even Wu Qi sensed some danger.

While laughing out loud, Wu Qi grabbed dozens of trimmed prickles in his hand and shouted with a stern voice, "How dare you rob travelers in broad daylight? Do you consider yourself above the law?" While shouting, Wu Qi had thrown out the trimmed prickles in his hand in the direction of these men in black. Sharp noises of prickles piercing through the air echoed out as they were shooting toward those men in black in an unorganized manner.

Both of Lu Chengfeng’s hands were hiding in his sleeves and about to take out the Great White Golden Dagger formation. Nevertheless, his expression relaxed a little bit when he saw Wu Qi, then he shouted, "Help, help! I am the eldest son from Lu family of Liyang, and am also the new General of Little Meng City! Save me and I’ll reward you handsomely!"

The trimmed prickles were approaching fast with a sharp noise, forcing the men in black give up attacking Lu Chengfeng and defend themselves.

There were some good fighters among these men in black, they were able to touch the prickles with their blade. However, these prickles carried a force that spun at a high-speed like a vortex. When the blades touched them and before they could knock them away, the prickles would spin around the blade and fly past it.

Dozens of miserable cries rang through the air. Except for the leader of men in black, who managed to knock the prickle away, the prickles had pierced through the body of all his subordinates.

While laughing out loud, Wu Qi dropped his beast skin bag and charging forward. Both his hands brought forth a strong wind as he leaped toward the leader.

Intentionally, Wu Qi didn’t inject the innate water Qi onto the prickle that he threw toward the leader, because the leader himself cultivated a water elemental skill. With the innate water Qi in his eyes, Wu Qi could clearly see a fist-sized white color Qi vortex residing in the leader’s dantian. He also saw a light blue colored Qi flowing through his meridians.

Wu Qi used the ‘Hand of Web’ skill which brought together countless circulating forces as he struck out towards the leader’s head. The cold breeze contained within the innate water Qi burst out from his palm at the same time. The cultivation level of the leader was close to Wu Qi’s, but when the cold breeze covered him, he was instantly frozen and unable to move even the tiniest bit.

Pressing one of his hands onto the leader’s dantian and another hand onto his ‘TanZhong’ acupuncture point while using the’ Palm of Picking Stars’, Wu Qi twisted his palm and initiated the force of absorption. The Qi of the leader, which he had cultivated for dozens of years and was approaching the peak of the Houtian grade, turned into a cold stream and started to flow aggressively out into Wu Qi’s palm.

In just a blink of an eye, all the Qi in the leader had depleted, and a fraction of his qi essence was absorbed by Wu Qi at the same time. Wu Qi retracted his hand and immediately struck the leader’s face. A force burst out from it suddenly, crushing the leader’s brain. Blood exploded out from all seven apertures of the leader; he was dead meat now.

Swiftly drawing a circle in front of himself, Wu Qi had searched through every single part of the leader’s body and transferred over all the items he found in a little leather bag tied around the leader’s waist. Wu Qi was a disciple of the Underhand Sect and also a future cultivator who had inherited the Scroll of Stealing. There was no way that he would leave anything behind for others to benefit from.

For ordinary warriors, after they cultivated their internal Qi for ten years, they would reach a level called the Ten-years Stage.

Those who possessed extraordinary talents, they would have reached the peak of the Houtian grade after cultivating their internal Qi for sixty years. With that, they could try to break through the "Governor and Conception" meridians, reaching the level of ‘Xiantian’.

Wu Qi had inherited Scroll of Stealing, and all the energy in the Sect Leader Token made from Innate Water Soul Stone had been injected into his body. However, most of the energy was used to protect his body in the Great Universal Dimensional Portal. Therefore, the cultivation of innate water Qi he had right now was only at the level of peak Houtian.

After absorbing all the Qi of the leader, which was equivalent to the Qi obtained by ordinary warriors after over fifty years of restless cultivation, Wu Qi immediately felt the increase of coldness in his arm. Within the Water Meridians of Seven Stealing Heaven Meridians which were located in his arms, the innate water Qi had turned into a whirlpool. It kept devouring the water elemental Qi that came from someone else.

In a short moment, Wu Qi’s internal qi almost doubled.

When a peak Houtian warrior had his qi doubled and was cultivating with any other skill, he would have broken through to Xiantian stage. But the Scroll of Stealing was no ordinary skill. It couldn’t be compared with any ordinary skill. The suddenly increased Qi followed the Water Meridians and circulated three rounds. Half of the innate water Qi was merged into Water Meridians, making them even more resilient.

The Seven Stealing Heaven Meridians residing within Wu Qi’s arms were the foundation of the magical power and skill from Scroll of Stealing. Therefore, when he was in the foundation stage, his priority was to strengthen the Seven Stealing Heaven Meridians. Now that the Water Meridians had been strengthened, the limit of the Qi it could store and the speed of Qi circulation had doubled. Wu Qi felt a refreshing smoothness in his arms, and a comfortable feeling spread throughout his entire body.

It all happened in a very short time, Wu Qi breathed in comfortably, cupped his fist, and bowed to Lu Chengfeng while saying, "Greeting, young master. I am Wu Qi."

Lu Chengfeng’s eyes flickered as he gave Wu Qi an examining glance, then he gazed at those men in black who had been killed by Wu Qi like they were nothing. He hurriedly jumped off the coach and tightly grabbed onto Wu Qi’s hand.

"There’s no need for such politeness. Warrior Wu Qi, if not for your help, I would be a dead man right now!"

Lu Chengfeng kicked on the leader’s corpse and threw a look of hatred at the scattered bodies. He shouted with a stern voice, "Xiaohei! Go and get those useless fools who left their master behind to flee, and bring them back here!"

The dark skinned coachman answered with a deep voice. He gazed at Wu Qi with an alarmed look in his eyes, then he stood up slowly, took out a tiny bone whistle and blew into it.

The high pitched sound of whistle reached far. After a little bit of time, some survived cavalrymen poked their heads from their hideout and looked towards this direction. After nearly fifteen minutes, only twenty over cavalrymen ran back with a long face, standing in front of Lu Chengfeng while having their body trembling.

Lu Chengfeng refused to look at these ‘guards’. He just showed his dissatisfaction by coughing a few times and sneering.

While holding Wu Qi’s hand, Lu Chengfeng expressed his gratitude repeatedly, but his hand kept holding on Wu Qi, never showing a sign of letting go.

Wu Qi stared at Lu Chengfeng embarrassedly. He thought that maybe this was the way Lu Chengfeng expressed his gratitude and friendliness. But having his hand held by a man intimately, no matter Wu Qi, Wu Wang, or Le Xiaobai, who had their souls merged with Wu Qi, none of them had this experience, and they felt disgusted with such behavior. Back on Earth, it was very easy to create a misunderstanding if two men held each other's hands for a long time.

However, when Wu Qi gazed at the floating coach behind Lu Chengfeng, he forced himself to give up the idea of slapping Lu Chengfeng and robbing him of all his belongings. Wu Qi thought to himself, he had just come to this world and had to maintain a low profile. Before he understood the background of Lu Chengfeng, he couldn’t just take away all his belongings.

Letting out a hoarse laughter, Wu Qi chatted reluctantly with Lu Chengfeng.

Zhang Hu had long arrived with his barbarian hunters and villagers from Meng village while Wu Qi was talking with Lu Chengfeng hypocritically. He and his barbarian hunters were tidying the corpses of the men in black. They placed fifty corpses in a line while all the belongings including their bows and blades were gathered aside.

Wu Qi was dragged by Lu Chengfeng in front of these corpses.

Except for the corpse of the leader of men in black which had a rather ‘pretty’ death, the rest of the men in black were killed by Wu Qi’s prickles. Their bodies had shrunk into a small meatball, a thick, black blood stain covering them, and their faces barely recognizable.

Lu Chengfeng pulled off the mask on the face of the leader. When he saw his face, a weird expression appeared on Lu Chengfeng’s face. Both dark-skinned men, the burly Xiaohei and the old man Laohei, saw the face of the leader too, and they too had strange expressions on their faces. Xiaohei even spat on the corpse to express his anger.

With a sneer, Lu Chengfeng grabbed a blade and chopped continuously on the face of that leader, making mashing it up so no one would able to recognize him anymore.

Breathing out a sigh of relief, Lu Chengfeng threw the blade aside, and again grabbed on Wu Qi’s hand, staring into Wu Qi’s eyes with a serious expression.

"Warrior Wu Qi, we’ve really hit it off. Can I ask you something?"

Wu Qi glimpsed at Zhang Wu, who was playing with a bow afar. Without raising his head, Zhang Hu shook his head continuously.

Wu Qi understood what Zhang Hu was trying to tell him. Lu Chengfeng was the young master from some wealthy and influential family and was ambushed on his journey. This simply pointed at a pool of deep water. Zhang Hu understood how bad the consequences would be if Wu Qi got his feet wet in this matter. That was why he suggested Wu Qi to not involve himself any further.

However, how would Zhang Hu ever understand what was in Wu Qi’s mind?

Holding on to Lu Chengfeng’s hand, Wu Wi asked with an indifferent tone, "Please enlighten me, young master."

Lu Chengfeng breathed out a long sigh. He glanced at the trembling guards beside with a sneer, and said, "The purpose of Chengfeng for the trip was to attend my job. However, I was escorted with a bunch of useless fools. I felt really insecure by having my safety taken care of by them. Wu Qi is a mighty warrior, you have killed all the enemies by yourself. Therefore I, Chengfeng, wish to recruit you, Wu Qi, as my hanger-on."

Lu Chengfeng let go of Wu Qi’s hand and bowed deeply in a sincere manner and said, "With utmost sincerity, I hope warrior Wu Qi can agree to my request."

"Hmm, to become your hanger-on..."

Wu Qi placed his fingers on his chin.

Wu Qi remained silent briefly, then said with a smile, "I agree to become your hanger-on. My master once told me that it is actually a good career to become a hanger-on for a wealthy family!"

Zhuang Hu, who stood aside, shook his head and gently stamped his feet.

Lu Chengfeng was overwhelmed by great joy. He then grabbed on Wu Qi’s hand again.

"Obtaining support from warrior Wu Qi is like a good rain after a long drought!"

Wu Qi let out a loud fit of laughter and shook Lu Chengfeng’s hand repeatedly.