The Empress’s Gigolo

“I am not threatening you guys by mentioning all of this, but I am just explaining one thing,” Ren Baqian said after pondering for a bit.

There was more than one person who felt that he was placing a knife at their neck.

“I’m not threatening you—I’m simply performing a demonstration! My objective isn’t complicated either. I just want to be able to talk to you!” He added, “Of course, it’s also to give you people some confidence.”

Li Fu looked uncertain. He didn’t feel optimistic about Ren Baqian’s words, but Li Fu had never expected him to put on such a big show!

As Ren Baqian looked at the crowd, everyone’s background information flashed through his mind.

There were people from both orthodox and unorthodox ways, but none who had been really guilty of terrible crimes.

He reckoned that there wouldn’t be any of those violent monsters among the crowd as they would easily get beaten up!

There was no need to mention the orthodox sects, but he would have to observe further to see if there were people like Yue Buqun among them.

For the unorthodox sects like Righteous Sect, even though they were said to have done many bad things, Lin Dong was considered pretty trustworthy.

As for Blood River Demon, he seemed to be pretty neutral.

In order to take revenge more than 20 years ago, he fought a reputable sect. His reputation of being one of the world’s top experts was built on all the fighting from those years.

At first, he was just an Earth Wheel expert when he bore a grudge against one of the disciples of another sect as the other party kicked people around. Later, both parties faced many conflicts, causing their hatred for each other to intensify. Blood River Demon continued honing his skills along the way until he attained the Spirit Wheel level and eventually became one of the world’s top experts. At the same time, his temperament became more extreme while his methods grew more intense. In addition to the origin of his martial arts, he got the nickname Blood River Demon.

He was quite reputable, but if one were to count the number of bad things that he had done, there weren’t many.

Most importantly, he didn’t have time to commit any crimes as he was always fighting with his enemy.

His cycle had always been fighting his way to his enemy’s gate, getting beaten up by the group, going back to recuperate, chancing upon miracles, retreating to practice, and going out to look for fights.

Ren Baqian felt that Blood River Demon was suited to being the protagonist of a novel given his past experiences.

If he were someone else, he would have been killed long ago.

That big sect still existed, but their reputation had plummeted compared to before.

“Does anyone know about the human race’s past?” Ren Baqian asked.

Everyone was stunned, but there were five people who had looks of uncertainty on their faces.

One of them was Li Fu. Before he could gather his thoughts after witnessing the explosion of the nuclear warhead, he heard Ren Baqian’s words and immediately thought of Xu Wuming as well as the scene of what had happened in the past.

Another was Li Yuanzhu, who had just heaved a sigh.

Like Li Fu, she knew Ren Baqian’s objective from the start. Although she was stunned by the earlier explosion as well, she was one of the first to recover from it. If things were to go as Ren Baqian planned, then what she witnessed just now was actually a good thing.

The other three people were Lin Dong, Blood River Demon, and Lin Yue, a woman dressed like a young lady who looked to be in her twenties and was also known as Jade Ripple.

Ren Baqian was pretty curious about this woman.

While the others were sleeping the night before, she picked up a dozen stones and squeezed them with her hands. A layer of dust fell off the stones as they became cubes with rounded edges. She then tossed them up and used the back of her hand to catch them.

Lin Yue threw one the first time, two the second, and so on.

This little game was considered very simple even for a Man Wheel expert, but she played it with great interest.

Ren Baqian remembered her because of this.

Another thing was that there was very little information about Lin Yue. The Rearguard Commandery had collected information about some of the less secretive experts. Most of them had records of a number of deeds, but not her.

She had only taken action once.

However, she definitely didn’t look her age. She had probably looked the same for at least 20 years.

Ren Baqian shifted his thoughts back to Li Fu and asked, “Why don’t you tell everyone about it?”

“Forget it. You do it, kid!” Li Fu sighed. He always felt bitter whenever he thought about the things that had happened in the past.

He thought that he couldn’t resolve this problem in his lifetime, but after witnessing that scene, he felt that it could be done, though it required a little more time.

Li Fu also needed to meet a particular person.

“Chief Lin, Mister Blood River Demon, and Miss Lin, it seems like you guys know something.” Ren Baqian smiled.

Lin Dong’s face twitched as he replied, “The human race came from the Lancang Region.

Ren Baqian raised his eyebrows. He had never heard of this name before.

“The Lancang Region consisted of the Wan Tribe, (TLC. Is this the same as the foreign races?) which occupied 237 square districts, and the human race, which occupied 10 square districts,” Lin Dong continued.

“After a war 6,000 years ago, there were less than 100,000 survivors of the human race who made it through the Sixty Thousand Mountains. A portion of them stayed in the mountains and became the aboriginals. The remaining 40,000 people wandered around and made their way to Xun Yang.”

Xun Yang is the name of a hinterland in Great Xia

Everyone was shocked after hearing what Lin Dong said. All of their old impressions had been subverted after what they saw and heard today.

This was also the first time that Ren Baqian learned exactly when that war had happened.

6,000 years was a little longer than the 5,000 years of history in China.

The human race had grown from a population of 40,000 to hundreds of millions during this time.

“Righteous Sect originated from Apex Sect, which was located in a place called Ansu in the 10 square districts.” Lin Dong explained with a smile, “The ancestors of my sect had dismissed the thought of returning to the mountains. I actually discovered this when I was young and sneaked into a forbidden place in my sect. I found it carved on the inside of a coffin. The ancestors of my sect probably wanted to bury this matter with him forever.”

Zhuo Chi, Yun Zhongyue, and Xu Jiaojiao were already terribly startled by the nuclear explosion earlier. When they heard this, they almost spurted blood.

Ren Baqian’s eyelids twitched. Did Lin Dong mean that he had opened the coffin of his sect’s ancestor?

Cough, cough. Lin Dong coughed lightly and concluded, “In any case, this is all I know.”

Although Lin Dong only said this much, he caused the others to feel an extremely huge shock.

“Thank you, Chief Lin!” Ren Baqian smiled and asked, “What about you two?”

“When I fought with that bunch of bastards in the past, I accidentally broke into an ancient tomb after getting injured. I saw some things that are similar to what Lin Dong said,” Blood River Demon replied. “However, there were more visuals to it. That scene… Oh my god! It scared the sh*t out of me!”

Ren Baqian nodded and glanced at Li Fu, thinking that there was another person who accidentally dug up graves like he did.

It seemed like these people were either digging up graves or opening coffins…

He then turned to Lin Yue and was eager to know whether she had dug up graves or opened coffins…

She had a pensive look, but he wasn’t sure what she was thinking about.

Everyone waited patiently for her to speak as they were digesting all the information they had just gathered.

“Pffft! Hehehehe!” Lin Yue suddenly started laughing uncontrollably and pointed at Lin Dong, saying, “You actually opened your ancestor’s coffin! Did he jump at you? How hilarious!”

Everyone was surprised. How long was her reflex arc exactly?

The originally solemn atmosphere was shattered by her.