C10 I Am Smart but I Am Not Smart

"Bastard!" Qu Ke, soaked to the bone, drew his longsword with a fury that consumed him.

As a member of the cultivator clan, Qu Ke had always had a smooth sailing life. He was unaccustomed to such humiliation, much less being manipulated like a mere pawn.

The man before him was going to pay with his life!

"Senior Brother, don't be rash!" The frail cultivator, Qin Che, quickly intervened, attempting to calm the enraged Qu Ke.

"Move aside!"

Unable to restrain Qu Ke any longer, Qin Che resorted to whispering something into his ear. The once seething Qu Ke now regarded Xiaoming with a wary expression.

As Qu Ke's anger subsided like the receding tide, the other three companions looked on with confusion, wondering what Qin Che had said.

With the conflict defused, a relieved Qin Che approached Xiaoming and bowed respectfully.

"Young Hero, the demonic beast's attributes are a rare match for our Senior Brother Qu Ke's own. We've pursued it all the way from the Li Continent to here. It was by chance that we encountered the Village Chief in Wild Sand City.

Hearing his account led us here. If the beast escapes beyond the city, all our efforts will have been for naught. Senior Brother Qu's impatience stems from this. We ask for your understanding, Young Hero, and hope you won't hinder our pursuit."

Qin Che played peacemaker while signaling the others to remain calm. The two women and the man glanced at Qu Ke, and upon his nod, they sheathed their weapons.

"Oh, really?" Xiaoming eyed them skeptically, scrutinizing each person as if assessing a suspect.

"Would we lie to you?" Qu Ke, his arms folded, turned away, his voice still tinged with irritation.

Xiaoming considered the group before him and then flashed a practiced, insincere smile. "Well, if that's the case, I assume you wouldn't mind including me in your number."

This remark was the last straw for Qu Ke, who was already struggling to contain his temper, and he erupted. "What are you implying? Are you planning to snatch my demonic beast?"

"Who knows if you have ulterior motives? Rest assured, I'm not interested in a mere demon beast." With those words, Xiaoming headed toward the rear mountain without looking back, completely disregarding their consent.

Xiaoming wasn't exactly eager to assist them in hunting demon beasts. As a transmigrator, he was currently plotting how to eliminate these cultivators cleanly and without leaving any evidence behind.

Transmigrators and cultivators were natural enemies. The war that targeted transmigrators five years prior resulted in the slaughter of ninety-nine percent of them. That massacre was a grudge Xiaoming held close.

Watching Xiaoming walk away, Qu Ke yanked Qin Che by the collar and pulled him aside. "Qin Che! What were you implying earlier? Is he from a family of cultivators?"

Confronted by an irate Qu Ke, Qin Che, collar still in Qu Ke's grip, mustered a wry smile. "Senior Brother, do you honestly believe he's just an ordinary person? Looks can be deceiving."

"He's merely at the peak of Qi Refinement. If we join forces, we can ensure he doesn't return," suggested Qin Han, making a throat-slitting gesture.

After being released by Qu Ke, Qin Che sighed. "Big brother, you still act without thinking. Haven't the teaching assistants taught us how to spot cultivators who feign weakness?"

"It's all about observing their martial skills and weapons, right? He's only wielding a spiritual weapon, and we wield those too. With his level of strength, he couldn't possibly use any advanced martial skills."

Listening to Qin Han's haphazard analysis, Qin Che, the team's brain, massaged his temples. With that kind of thinking, one wouldn't last long on the path of cultivation.

"Never mind his dagger. The fact that his martial skills could instantly overpower Brother Qu Ke suggests that he's using techniques beyond our reach."

"What does that prove?" asked the tall female cultivator, sheathing her sword with a puzzled frown. She was at a loss about Qin Che's point.

"It means he's not short on cash," blurted out the shorter female cultivator, assuming the obvious.

"That's a fair point. If he's not lacking money and possesses enigmatic martial skills, and considering his young age, he must either be from a cultivator family or the recipient of a true legacy."

"In a nutshell, we mustn't provoke him. Our presence here to hunt demon beasts is already a breach of our sect's rules. If we go unnoticed, all is well. But to provoke other powers is out of the question. Brother, you have the backing of your family, but for us, death would be our only atonement."

Qin Che's face, along with the others, turned sour. Qu Ke hadn't anticipated the situation being this dire. It's likely that Xiaoming hadn't expected them to reach the fifth floor either.

"I've done some digging; this guy's name is Wang Xiaoming, and the commander of Dragonslayer Keep also carries the Wang surname. There could be a connection between them."

The saying goes that being too clever by half can be one's downfall, and Qin Che might be the perfect example of that—perhaps he was too cautious for his own good.

"What if we just..." Qu Ke's words were cut short as he slapped his lackey across the face for suggesting murder as a solution.

"Fool! Dragonslayer Keep is a mere twenty miles from here, and this isn't the safety of a city. Even if we managed a surprise attack, do you think you could outrun a master of the Oneness Realm?"

Qu Ke held his face, regretting his choice of such a fool for a lackey.

Dragonslayer Keep was on high alert, and any disturbance would trigger a full-scale response. Without a magical formation to hide them, they'd never escape detection.

"Sigh, we don't know what this person wants. We'll have to play it by ear," Qu Ke said, before leading the group in a hurried trek towards the rear mountain.

Cultivators tend to be a suspicious lot. However, if Xiaoming were privy to their thoughts, he'd probably laugh himself awake. What a bunch of nutcases.

The villagers, peeking through the cracks in their doors, watched the cultivators climb the mountain and breathed a sigh of relief. No conflict was a good thing—if a fight had broken out, the village wouldn't make it through the winter.

The village chief, who had guided the cultivators to their village, lamented how quickly cultivators could turn on you.

...

The group traced Xiaoming's deep footprints all the way into the dense mountains, the impressions seemingly left intentionally to guide them.

They arrived at a hollow in the mountainside and found Xiaoming squatting under a tree, clad in clothing fashioned from leaves. Without seeing him with their own eyes, they would have been none the wiser to his presence.

This garment is a treasure too!

Suppressing his greed, Qin Ke was simultaneously struck by a chilling thought—if they had ambushed him with this treasure earlier on the road, they surely wouldn't have lived to see the midday sun.

"You all are dragging your feet," Xiaoming said with a dismissive glance at the group.

"Young hero, how did you manage to track down this monster so quickly?" Qin Che asked with a warm, eager smile, knowing they couldn't afford to alienate Xiaoming at this point.

"Keep it down!" Xiaoming admonished, removing a palm-sized cage from his waist, which housed a cluster of fireflies, each the size of a peanut.

"This little creature can identify various monsters and guide us to their location. Unlike the Illusory Demon Forest, where monsters are rampant, this area allows for greater efficiency."

"This is the lost art of Gu Technique! Wasn't the Whispering Hive eradicated by an external demon five years ago?" Even Qin Ke, who prided himself on his broad knowledge, had only read about it in books. Now, he was witnessing it firsthand.

"The breeding method for the Demon-Distinguishing Insect hasn't been lost, at least," Xiaoming remarked, parting the tree branches to point at the monster below.

"Is that sword wound on its hind leg your handiwork? You certainly have the patience to have chased it from Li Province to Qian Province..."

While Xiaoming kept up a casual front with the cultivators, his mind was busy trying to guess their true intentions.

Crossing thousands of miles just to kill a mutated monster? Unless they were mad, they must have had an ulterior motive. Yet, in this desolate wilderness, he couldn't fathom what that could be, leaving him perplexed.

The cultivators, too, were struggling to adjust to Xiaoming's shift in demeanor. Though their minds were on different tracks, they oddly reached a tacit agreement.

Qin Han parted the underbrush to reveal a monster as large as a truck, sprawled out on the ground, fast asleep. The leopard-like creature was covered in black, fish-scale-like armor, with sparks of electricity flickering through the gaps in its armor.

"That's the one." Recognizing the slender sword wound on its hind leg, he was certain it was their quarry. The others also cautiously unsheathed their swords, ready to dispatch the monster in its slumber.

Unexpectedly, as Qin Han neared his target, his foot carelessly snapped a dry twig underfoot.

Crack!

The sharp sound startled the slumbering Demon Beast awake. Its four eyes, each the size of a goose egg, snapped open, and it leaped from its resting place like a cat spooked by a cucumber.

"???"

Bombarded with a barrage of question marks from his teammates, Qin Han was utterly baffled. Despite their loud conversation earlier, the creature hadn't stirred, yet a simple step on a twig had roused it. Talk about bad luck.

The Demon Beast perched atop the mountain surveyed the group with a wary gaze. Upon recognizing them as the same people from before, it bolted away.

Bursts of electric light surged from its body, and with an acceleration akin to a nitrous boost, it left them in the dust, moving faster than ever.