In the Shadows of the City (1)

Gao Ting stood paralyzed for long seconds, staring at him as if expecting a turnabout and Long Ming to affirm that he was lying. But Long Ming's seriousness was not fake, and Gao Ting was forced to admit it.

"Poisoned!? W-what do you mean?!" he spoke, shocked. In his opinion, even if they could be in danger due to retaliation from the Li clan, when they arrived in that city, they would be completely safe. After all, after so many weeks, they had not encountered any danger or interference, so why now? And precisely in the residence of a family of cultivators?

It's worth noting that even though the Li clan is powerful, their authority is still limited to Cui Shi and its surroundings. In places as distant as Jianshang, they had no authority and, in fact, it could be considered a very serious offense.

Furthermore, even if it wasn't because of that, the Wu family had three cultivators in the Foundation Establishment realm who, although not at the peak of cultivation, are still a force to be reckoned with. And sending someone confident enough to infiltrate this city would be a very high investment even for the Li Clan.

"After finishing training, a maid appeared by my side and handed me a bowl of soup. But this bowl contained poison. Fortunately, I used resonance in time, so I think I'm no longer poisoned," he explained. Gao Ting knew about his cultivation method, and along the way, Long Ming mentioned that it also served to 'heal' him, although he didn't know how since his method was only external, making it impossible to know what was happening with his body.

"And then? Did you see her face? Where did she go after delivering the bowl? If there's a traitor, then we need to warn Wu Qinlao as soon as possible."

"Better not, old man. I believe it's better to keep this matter only between us for now. We have no way of knowing if that woman was acting alone or not, and not even if she's a family member or managed to infiltrate just to deliver that poison to me," Long Ming rejected the idea of ​​asking for help from the Wu family, or even alerting them about it. He feared that by telling this to Wu Qinlao, the mastermind behind this attempt would also be alerted and hide, or even erase all evidence of it.

Long Ming hated the idea of ​​having an unknown person trying to kill him, but what he hated even more was the possibility of not being able to find out who it was and why they were trying to kill them. So, he preferred to keep this matter a secret and make the possible mastermind hide again.

"So... why the hell did you break down the door of my room if I was supposed to stay quiet and do nothing?" Gao Ting questioned again, obviously still annoyed at having his wall broken.

Long Ming looked back and noticed a huge hole, the size of a door, in the wall separating their two rooms. Observing that, he felt ashamed because he was too worried to think rationally, and breaking the wall seemed faster than going all the way to Gao Ting's room door.

"...uh... I'll fix that, old man," Long Ming said somewhat embarrassed and, only slightly, guilty.

"Okay, how are you going to do that?"

Long Ming then took a knife from his spatial ring and approached those debris. He thought for a few minutes about how he should fix it, then, after ten minutes, he started inscribing several symbols on those wooden debris.

After almost half an hour, he finished the last symbol. Then he wiped the sweat from his forehead and began to inscribe other symbols on the wooden wall, this time it was faster and it took only five minutes.

"And then? Can you fix it?" Gao Ting asked after watching him spend almost an hour on this attempt.

"Hmm, maybe," Long Ming replied without much confidence, then closed his eyes and began to resonate.

Half a minute later, he opened his eyes and guided the elemental wood Qi to those symbols, turning them into runes and connecting them in specific ways. After all the steps were done, those pieces of wood levitated and returned to their previous positions.

"See? It doesn't even look like it was broken," Long Ming said with a smile on his face, then they discussed what they should do for a while, and Long Ming returned to his room. Not being sleepy, he began to study the books he had recently bought, as well as the ones he already had, noting down everything that seemed important to him in his notes.

The next day, as the sun rose on the horizon.

Long Ming, along with Gao Ting, walked through the city streets toward a specific place in the city.

Like every city, Jianshang also had its own underworld, where crime rules, using violence and poverty to dominate the city's most fragile population. It was a neighborhood known as Taoyuan, and it's a neighborhood dominated by several gangs of criminals, and its economy revolves around trafficking, smuggling, and prostitution.

It was a rotten and perverse place, the kind that would make any naive person lose hope in humanity. But it was also the ideal place to hire services that require privacy and, above all, discretion.

After walking through the streets of Taoyuan, they soon arrived at a very modest little bar. There seemed to be nothing special about its facade; next to the door were two windows that allowed a glimpse of its interior, where several customers were already drinking and eating.

"Is this it?" Long Ming asked Gao Ting, as he observed the bar.

"If they haven't changed location, or if my memory isn't failing me, then it should be here," Gao Ting casually affirmed, and entered the bar the next second. Instantly, all the customers stared at him seriously, their gazes threatening, but neither Gao Ting nor Long Ming were intimidated, and they walked straight to the reception.

Long Ming noticed that many of these bandits looked at him with greed written on their faces. He knew that this was partly because of the clothes he was wearing, an elegant and obviously expensive outfit. Furthermore, he didn't seem muscular, nor did he carry any apparent weapon, like a spear or a sword. And Gao Ting, due to his advanced age, also didn't seem to pose a great danger.

"Tell your boss that I want to buy some information," Gao Ting asserted as he tossed some gold coins on the reception table. The attendant looked at him seriously, then asked, "What drink would you like, sir?"

"Tsk, I don't remember the codes, just send me down there," Gao Ting spoke quickly, his voice somewhat irritated and impatient. The attendant continued to look at him seriously but soon sighed and with a simple, "Please, wait," entered a door behind him.

The other customers continued to stare at them in a threatening manner, but they did not act and remained quiet. A few seconds later, the attendant returned and said, "Only one can go downstairs, please." The two looked at each other, and with an unspoken agreement, Long Ming took a step forward and began to follow the attendant, passing through that door.

They descended a long flight of stairs until they reached another door. The attendant knocked three times on the door, the first two knocks were long, while the third was short. In

response, a small knock sounded from the other side of the door, then the attendant opened it and turned to Long Ming, "You may enter," with these words, Long Ming passed through the door.

"So, you must be Long Ming, right? The young man who is accompanying Mr. Gao Ting," in front of Long Ming was someone hooded sitting in a simple chair.

"It seems you are already well informed; it seems it was the right choice to come here," Long Ming commented as he observed that room. It was a small place, with only a few candles for lighting and no other furniture other than the chair where the person was sitting and another chair in front of them.

"The Wu family is known for not accepting many guests, so whenever someone passes through those doors, our senses are already alerted. In addition, old Gao is quite well-known for his talents. And if a family invites a blacksmith of this caliber, it means they may be in need of quality weapons. And when we talk about the need for weapons, the first scenario that comes to mind is...," the hooded figure spoke enigmatically, although Long Ming could understand the conclusion of this figure even with their unfinished speech.

"Well, I didn't come for that. I want you to find out some things about a specific poison," Long Ming spoke, while pulling out from his sleeve a sheet full of writings and a small sealed container containing the contents of that soup. Long Ming obviously didn't finish drinking the rest, so he kept a portion of it in this small container and threw away the rest.

"And what do you need us to find out? Its properties, origin, and places of purchase? Or do you want to know which assassin groups usually use such poisons?" the figure questioned. Their voice was monotone and neutral, preventing knowing what their true thoughts were.

"Everything you can find out. The deeper your research, the better. I want to know even those innocent details that can easily be overlooked," he replied as he handed over the sheet and the container. After that, he put his hands back into his sleeve and withdrew five gold coins.

"Consider this as an advance payment," he responded as he tossed the coins toward the figure.

"Five coins? Unfortunately, we require a prepayment of 50%. And that amounts to twenty gold coins," the figure stated, Long Ming noticed a kind of mockery in their tone, which slightly irritated him.

'Twenty coins? What absurd price is this? Are they going to deliver the report on gold-plated sheets? Are they going to travel to another continent to find out the origin of this poison?' Long Ming grumbled internally, but he didn't let his dissatisfaction show and handed over another fifteen coins.

"Come back in a week," the figure said, gesturing for him to leave. Long Ming bid a brief farewell and left that room.

Shortly after, he returned to the upper floor, where Gao Ting was waiting for him sitting at a table, with a bottle of drink on the table, and drinking alone.

"So, lad? Did they accept the job?" Gao Ting asked curiously, and then took a sip of his drink.

"Tsk, are you already drinking at this hour, old man? Come on, I'll tell you on the way," Long Ming spoke in reprimand, then grabbed the bottle and forced Gao Ting to let go of the cup, which was still full of drink, and they left that bar.

A few seconds after they left, a group of men also left, all sharing the same malicious intention, and walked towards where Long Ming and Gao Ting were going.

"Hey, why are you drinking my alcohol? Didn't you say not to drink at this hour?" Gao Ting spoke shocked and indignant upon noticing that Long Ming was drinking all his drink. It was a reasonably expensive drink, and he had to pay about nine copper coins for the whole bottle.

"It's because you're old, old man. At your age, you can't drink alcohol, otherwise, you'll shorten your life expectancy even more, which is already short. And I'm a cultivator, so even if I drank nine bottles of this, I would remain sober. And I'm also young, so I can drink a lot," Long Ming replied casually as he took a long sip.

In a few minutes, he had already finished drinking all the alcohol and slightly praised, satisfied with its taste and quality, then put away the bottle and spoke aloud, "Alright, you can stop following us now," as he spoke, he turned his body, just in time to notice about ten men armed with knives approaching him. They all had hideous and threatening smiles.

"I think you came to the wrong place, young master~," one of the men spoke mockingly as he walked towards him.

Really? I tried so hard not to kill all these bastards, and they happily offer their lives? These guys are like flies flying towards the fire!' Long Ming thought in exasperation, puzzled by the confidence of this group of men in approaching him. Long Ming would understand this if they were in a mortal city, where the concept of cultivators is unknown to most.

but they're in a city run by several cultivators, where anyone can be a cultivator. especially those who seem rich and arrogant!