Chapter 63: Blind at the sight of money
Xuanyuan looked at the little thief carrying a bronze halberd on his shoulder, and at his back as he ran down the mountain in a panic on the rugged path, and suddenly he felt as if he had really recognized the wrong person.

The other party rolled up his sleeves and carried a bronze halberd like a shoulder pole.

How does this look like a warrior?
If Chen Ji was that person, even if the opponent was weaker than the giant halberd warrior, he could easily win with his natural fighting instinct. But now, he can only flee all over the mountain in a panic...

If that person were there, he would not run away no matter how powerful the enemy was.

Even if there is a towering mountain blocking his way, he will move the mountain away.

But the one in front of me... will take a detour.

At this moment, Chen Ji was panting while carrying the bronze halberd.

He turned around to investigate, and saw the giant halberd warrior running in the mountains. His black armor made a rustling sound, his red cloak fluttered behind him, and his body was as big as a chariot.

Chen Ji thought, this kind of fierce general is only one level higher than himself? Brother, the one level higher you mentioned is probably the difference between the acquired realm and the innate realm, right?

No, no, if Si Cao was here, how would I have the chance to run away with the bronze halberd?
It doesn’t have to be the innate realm.

The two men went down the mountain one after the other. Chen Ji, carrying the bronze halberd, ran slower and slower, becoming more and more out of breath, and Xuanyuan's eyes became more and more disappointed.

However, at this moment, Chen Ji suddenly stopped panting, and his steps were no longer heavy, but his eyes became serious and he suddenly turned around!
Chen Ji twisted his waist, turned around, and raised his hand in one smooth motion, and the bronze halberd in his hand stabbed behind him with the force of thunder.

The stab came at just the right time. When the Giant Halberd Warrior rushed forward, it was as if he was crashing into the tip of the halberd. Even the armor could not withstand the huge collision force. The black armor was pierced by Chen Ji's halberd and pierced into the Giant Halberd Warrior's abdomen!

Chen Ji heaved a sigh of relief, but Xuanyuan's mouth curled up slightly, as if joking: "In vain."

The next moment, the giant halberd warrior didn't care about the injury in his abdomen at all. He grasped the sharp blade of the bronze halberd with both hands and pulled it out fearlessly.

But he saw his hands tremble slightly, and Chen Ji felt a huge force coming, which made his hands numb, and he couldn't help but loosen his hands holding the bronze halberd.

The giant halberd warrior let the blood gush out from his abdomen, raised the bronze halberd high, and then chopped it down vertically like a mountain falling down!

From beginning to end, the Giant Halberd Warrior showed no sign of pain, and he didn't even frown, as if being pierced in the abdomen was just a trivial matter.

"hiss!"

Chen Ji woke up in the small courtyard of the clinic, panting greedily.

"Having a nightmare again?" The prince asked curiously, "You've had several nightmares in just a short while. Did you get scared by the bad guys you met earlier? You..."

As he spoke, the prince saw Chen Ji's eyes.

The young apprentice clearly didn't even look at him, but he felt his heart tremble, as if a ferocious beast was breathing beside him, emitting a strong smell of blood.

Liang Maoer walked out of the kitchen carrying the food. The boiled white porridge was paired with hot and sour cabbage and pickles, which was light and delicious.

He looked at Chen Ji: "Eat first and then sleep."

Chen Ji shook his head and slowly closed his eyes: "I'm not hungry now, thank you."

The prince came back to his senses and looked at Chen Ji carefully again, only to find that the other party was just lying on the bamboo chair tiredly, and there was nothing unusual.

I must have seen it wrong.

At this time, Chen Ji had returned to the battlefield again, but saw that the giant halberd warrior was standing intact on the top of the green mountain and did not attack immediately.

Xuanyuan sat on a huge rock and looked at Chen Ji: "Did you learn your lesson?"

Chen Ji was silent.

Xuanyuan sneered, "You are definitely not the only one in the world who dares to be cruel to you. Who among those who can charge into battle is not a warrior who has crawled out of a pile of dead bodies? Facing a warrior like the Giant Halberd Warrior, it is useless to just fight bravely and fiercely. We have seen many cruel men. You must learn to abandon all fancy ideas and master the true art of fighting."

Chen Ji pondered...the real fighting skills?
Xuanyuan said calmly: "You asked me to teach you the sword skills, but you don't even have the ordinary fighting spirit. Teaching you the sword skills is like putting a sharp sword that can cut hair in the hands of a child. It can not only hurt others, but also hurt yourself."

Chen Ji nodded: "Let's start, let's do it again!"

Xuanyuan said: "This time, you can't run down the mountain top. If you run away, I will not teach you the sword skills anymore."

Chen Ji was puzzled: "But in a fight, running away when you can't win is also a wise move."

"You are much smarter than before, but being smart is a good thing, but you can't just be smart," Xuanyuan sneered, "But there will always be mountains in this world that you can never get around. At that time, you need some fighting spirit and courage."

Xuanyuan walked to the giant halberd warrior and pointed his finger at his ribs: "The thirty-six fatal points of the human body are the temple, the Qimen point, the Fengchi point, the Tanzhong point..."

He pointed out the fatal points to Chen Ji one by one: "If the place where you stabbed with your halberd just now was shifted an inch to the left, the giant halberd warrior would not be able to use his strength even if he had great strength. This is the difference between having fighting skills and not having fighting skills. In addition, although the halberd you just stabbed looked good, it was useless. Killing people does not need to look good."

Chen Ji took a deep breath and said, "I understand."

He didn't know how many battles Xuanyuan had experienced, he only knew that this was the best teacher he could ever meet!

The giant halberd warrior did not wait any longer and swung his bronze halberd to attack.

Chen Ji no longer fled, but moved around on the top of the mountain, looking for a way to fight.

He stared at the direction where the bronze halberd was coming from, and slightly tilted his body to the right, and saw the bronze halberd passing by his face and chopping down from an inch outside the tip of his nose!
Xuanyuan's eyes lit up.

However, before he could boast, he saw the giant halberd warrior flip his wrist, and the crescent blade of the bronze halberd turned and cut into Chen Ji's abdomen.

This bronze halberd was like a living thing in the hands of the Giant Halberd Warrior. Although it was a bulky weapon, it became extremely tricky in the hands of the Giant Halberd Warrior.

When Chen Ji came to the top of the green mountain again, Xuanyuan said with a sullen face: "You dodged very well just now, why didn't you predict that the opponent might have other tricks after dodging? Fighting is like playing chess, you have to think ten steps ahead for the next step. With the same strength, whoever can predict the enemy's moves first will win!"

Chen Ji nodded seriously: "I understand, let's do it again!"

He fought from morning to noon, and then from noon to night. He never won, but he became more serious and excited the more he fought.

He never counted how many times he died, but the more he died, the rougher and more direct his fighting style became.

It is like a steel billet being fed into a furnace to be reshaped, and then forged into shape again and again with a heavy hammer to forge out all the impurities.

Chen Ji suddenly realized that the skills honed in this way had no routines, did not need to be performed for anyone, and were closer to the essence of killing skills.

Xuanyuan watched Chen Ji fighting again and again as if he was tireless. This young man did not have the same fighting instinct as him, but he had the same fighting spirit.

Paranoid.

Devil.

"Now I finally look a bit like you."

……

……

In the evening, Chen Ji opened his eyes in the small courtyard of Taiping Medical Clinic, and Xuanyuan asked him to rest for half an hour.

He slowly breathed a sigh of relief, as if he had returned from purgatory to the bustling world.

This time he fought with the giant halberd warrior for an incense stick of time, and the two were evenly matched. When he woke up, he was extremely exhausted.

When Chen Ji looked up, he saw the prince, She Dengke, Liang Gou'er, and Liu Quxing playing Pai Gow at the dinner table, while Princess Baili and Liang Mao'er were standing aside watching the game.

There was a pile of copper coins in front of Liu Quxing, as well as a silver peanut that he won from the prince.

Princess Baili looked at Chen Ji and said in surprise: "Oh, you're awake, are you hungry? Do you want to eat something?"

Chen Ji smiled and said, "Why didn't the princess play with them?"

Bai Li shook his head: "I don't gamble, and my father doesn't allow me to gamble."

"Ah? Isn't the prince gambling?" Bai Li smiled and said, "It's okay. I'll report him later."

Chen Ji: "...What a deep brother-sister relationship."

He felt hungry, but before he could say anything, he heard several people from the underworld outside the door shouting, "Prince, Prince, get ready to go to Baiyi Lane!"

The prince's eyes lit up: "Today is the day when Liu Xingshu from Qinhuai River comes to Luocheng. I heard that this Liu Xingshu is an expert in poetry, calligraphy, chess and music, and he is also beautiful like a fairy. We must go and see him!"

Liang Gou'er clapped his hands and cheered. He hadn't drunk alcohol for several days and was feeling the urge to drink.

However, Princess Baili poured cold water on him: "Chen Ji is still injured. Who will take care of him if everyone leaves? Brother, you keep saying that you want to be friends with him. Are you still a human being if you treat your friends like this?"

The prince scratched his head, feeling a little embarrassed.

Liu Su is also the top star on the Qinhuai River in Jinling. She is coming to Luocheng today to cut the ribbon for the newly opened embroidery building in Baiyi Lane. How can I miss it?
Liang Gou'er whispered, "Prince, why don't we go and leave Mao'er and the princess in the clinic tonight."

The prince was a little embarrassed: "The money is with Baili."

Liang Gou'er: "..."

Chen Ji: "..."

As expected, Bai Li is the real financial sponsor, which is why the prince takes her with him wherever he goes.

The courtyard fell silent, and no one was interested in playing Pai Gow anymore.

For a moment, everyone was thinking about countermeasures, only Chen Ji was gathering his strength and preparing to continue fighting on the battlefield.

At this time, Liang Gou'er on the side suggested: "Prince, why don't we take Chen Ji with us to take care of him?!"

Chen Ji: "...I am injured and cannot go."

The prince looked at Liang Gou'er and said, "Yes, he is injured on his chest and legs. He can't even carry himself."

Liang Gou'er had no bottom line in order to get a free drink, and immediately patted his chest and said, "Mao'er and I will carry his bamboo chair away, and after we finish drinking, we will carry it back for him!"

Chen Ji: "..."

You're such a fucking genius, you can do anything as long as you can drink.

The next moment, Liang Gou'er called Liang Mao'er, lifted the bamboo chair and walked out the door, as if carrying a bamboo sedan chair.

Chen Ji sat up on the wobbly bamboo chair: "Eh? I don't want to go!"

Liang Gou'er didn't care at all: "It's not up to you now, come with us! If you want to sleep, just lie down on the bamboo chair and don't worry, you won't fall! That's Baiyi Lane, that's Liu Xingshou, are you a man? Are you not interested in this kind of thing?"

Chen Ji was helpless: "I'm still injured!"

The prince followed beside the bamboo chair and said, "I heard that it's not easy to meet Liu Xingshou. You have to hand over some poems. Only if Liu Xingshou likes them can he let you in... Do you have any new poems written in the past two days? I'll buy them!"

Chen Ji calmed down. He still had ninety-four taels of silver hidden in the cracks between the bricks under the bed, enough to buy three ginsengs at most and light six fires.

But if you want to kill Si Cao, I'm afraid it's far from enough.

Chen Ji was silent for a moment: "I just came up with a few more sentences, maybe they can be useful."

Princess Baili's eyes lit up: "Let's go to Baiyi Lane!"

When they arrived at the door, a group of martial artists were already waiting there, each with a sword or a knife on their waist.

When they saw Liang Gou'er and Liang Mao'er carrying Chen Ji, they were immediately surprised and whispered to each other, "Who is so majestic that he has Liang Gou'er and Liang Mao'er carrying the sedan together?"

Chen Ji hurriedly smiled awkwardly and said, "It has nothing to do with me. I didn't want to go because of my leg injury, but Brother Liang Gou'er insisted on taking me to Baiyi Lane to broaden my horizons. It wasn't me who asked him to carry the sedan chair."

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief...

Along the way, more than ten people were laughing and joking. The prince did not seem like a prince, but more like a playboy who ate meat and drank wine in the rivers and lakes.

Chen Ji sat on a bamboo chair, and passers-by would glance at him from time to time. He was not thick-skinned enough, so he simply closed his eyes and sank into the battlefield again, returning to the fight.

He felt that he was about to reach a certain threshold, and that the Giant Halberd Warrior was not invincible.

……

……

The front of the "Xiu Lou" in Baiyi Lane was filled with flower baskets, stretching for hundreds of meters and even occupying the gates of other houses.

On the spacious second-floor terrace of the Embroidery Building, wooden railings are hung with red silk, which looks particularly festive.

The owner of the embroidery building was named Zhang Chang, a little-known person. But some people said that he was once a servant in the second branch of the Xu family in Shanghai, which made everyone look up to him.

The Xu family, the Xu family of Xu Gong, the chief minister of the cabinet.

The noble families would not touch the business of Baiyi Lane, Hongyi Lane, and Qinhuai River, which had a bad reputation, but they all had their own white gloves in private. Everyone knew who was behind Zhang Chang, and everyone knew it tacitly.

Therefore, as soon as the embroidery building opened, not only Liu Mingxian from the Liu family came to show his support, but also many sons of aristocratic families came with their literary friends. Some came to see Liu Xingshou, and some came to promote the business of the Xu family. Each of them had his own thoughts.

In front of the embroidery building, two girls in plain white skirts and white mink coats stood in the cool autumn breeze and said to the visitors with a smile: "Dear gentlemen, our embroidery building welcomes guests tonight. There are many elegant seats on the first floor, which are spacious and bright. But if you want to go up to the second floor to see my girls, you must have a poem to show. If my girls like it, one poem can bring three people. There is a table and writing brushes in front of the door, please come in."

A young scholar immediately took up his pen at the desk, quickly wrote a poem and handed it to the two girls.

One of the girls ran upstairs with rice paper in her hand, and came back in a moment, smiling coquettishly, "Sir, my Liu Xingshou said that your poem is not good."

This Liu Xingshou didn't give any face at all. He said no and that was no, and he was not willing to be tactful at all.

The young scholar blushed with shame and lowered his head to blend into the crowd.

After this test, many people who had no real ideas immediately decided to give up.

Outside the door, Liang Gou'er and other gangsters were murmuring to each other, not knowing how to get into the embroidered building.

Some said to climb in, some said to kill their way in, none of them were serious.

At this point, the prince backed off and whispered, "Bai Li, we only have half a poem, can it work?"

Bai Li thought for a moment and said, "If she knows what she's talking about, this half sentence can be worth a hundred or so other people's poems. It will definitely work."

Liang Gou'er came over and said, "But one poem can only be read by three people, and there are twelve of us here."

After saying that, the prince and Princess Baili looked at Chen Ji who was sleeping on the bamboo chair...

"Chen Ji, are there any other poems?"

"Chen Ji?"

"Chen Ji, wake up."

No matter how the prince called, Chen Ji did not wake up.

The prince was almost dying of anxiety, but there was nothing he could do. Without the poem, how could they get in?

At this time, Bai Li thought for a moment, took out a golden melon seed from his small purse and put it into Chen Ji's palm.

Chen Ji opened his eyes: "I got it."

(End of this chapter)