Chapter 3697 — A Bizarre Background

"True enough. You're from the secular world, Leader Wei Zhao, so there's not much you'd know about local affairs here on Cloud Terrace Island. Have you ever heard of the Qiushui Manor massacre from sixteen years ago?" Li Zhengming fixed his eyes on Wei Zhao's expression.

Wei Zhao's expression stirred ever so slightly. "You mean Qiushui Manor in Qiushui Town, on the northern island? I've heard a thing or two."

When he chatted with Miserable Senior Brother and the others in his spare time, they never tired of discussing the local customs and ways of Cloud Terrace Island, and among it all the thing that had left the deepest impression on him was the Qiushui Manor massacre that Miserable Senior Brother had recounted over drinks a couple of days ago!

The affair had taken place sixteen years earlier, when Qiushui Town was still one of the few great towns on the island, and among its powers Qiushui Manor had been the mightiest by far. Rumor had it that in its most prosperous days, even high-ranking figures of the Tri-Stack Pavilion had come in person, bearing lavish gifts to offer birthday congratulations to the old master of Qiushui Manor.

In those days, across the entire northern island of Cloud Terrace Island, apart from the Tri-Stack Pavilion, Qiushui Manor was indisputably among the foremost of all the family powers in the north. Yet this very colossus in the eyes of countless people came crashing down overnight, at the very pinnacle of its glory.

The whole of Qiushui Manor—more than fifteen hundred souls, from the family head down to the servants—had been slaughtered to the last, not one left alive, and the luxurious manor, sprawling over hundreds of mu, had been put to the torch in a single night. Such was the legendary Qiushui Manor massacre that had caused a sensation in its day.

In the aftermath, the Tri-Stack Pavilion was shaken to its core. To uncover the truth and hunt down the culprits, they even dispatched the top-tier force of the Law Enforcement Hall, yet after months of investigation they came up with nothing at all, and the matter simply fizzled out.

No one knew who the culprits were, nor why they had wiped out the mighty Qiushui Manor in a single night. As time passed, though people still often brought up that sensational tragedy as mealtime conversation, that was all it amounted to.

Li Zhengming gazed at Wei Zhao with burning eyes, his voice choking in his throat. "My name wasn't always Li Zhengming—that's merely an alias to throw people off. My true name is Qiu Jiming, and my father was Qiu Zhengtang, the family head of Qiushui Manor in those days. I am the sole survivor of the fifteen hundred and forty-one souls of Qiushui Manor. So the only meaning in my life is revenge, and until that's done, I absolutely cannot die!"

Wei Zhao was struck dumb on the spot. He truly had not expected that Li Zhengming carried such a sea of blood and hatred on his shoulders. No wonder he had always felt an inexplicable weight in this man's presence; he had assumed it was simply a deep schemer's nature, never imagining that the source of it all was the aggrieved resentment of fifteen hundred and forty wrongfully slain souls.

"I understand. You have my deepest sympathy for your tragic plight—but that is all." Wei Zhao nodded, yet the killing intent in his eyes did not diminish in the slightest.

The reasoning was simple: whatever sea of blood and hatred Li Zhengming bore, what did it have to do with Wei Zhao? Was he to spare the man simply because he had a great vengeance yet unfulfilled?

Wei Zhao had fought his way up from the secular world and seen too much of the treachery of human hearts to soften so easily.

In a cultivation world where the strong prey on the weak, once your life is in another's hands, surviving on sympathy alone plainly will not work—at the very least you must show that your life is worth something. This self-evident truth Wei Zhao understood, and so, naturally, did Li Zhengming.

"Leader Wei Zhao, I'm not telling you all this to win your sympathy—I'm telling you the reason I must live."

Li Zhengming's expression returned to calm, and he paused before continuing: "If you let me live today, I will serve you from now on, go through fire and water for you without a second thought, and I can even act as your mole, watching every move Meng Jueming and his lot make. This is the greatest stake I can think of. If you still won't trust me, Leader Wei Zhao, then I have nothing more to say."

"A mole for me?" Wei Zhao raised an eyebrow, stroking his chin. "That is worth considering."

By his own reckoning, even though he now stood at the peak of the early Foundation Establishment stage, for some time to come he would still need to lie low in the Welcoming Pavilion, quietly cultivating to build up his strength—and his greatest trouble in the Welcoming Pavilion at present was Meng Jueming and his crew.

True, with his current strength, Meng Jueming's lot could hardly do anything to him openly. But if they set about plotting dirty tricks in private, that would still be a nuisance for Wei Zhao, more or less.

If, however, he could plant a mole among them, everything would be different. Any so-called dirty trick, once uncovered in advance, was bound to lose much of its effect—and handled well, it might even backfire, letting him turn a profit from it.

Li Zhengming's proposal had struck precisely the itch Wei Zhao could not scratch.

Looking over Meng Jueming's crew, a diehard like Meng Zhou was plainly beyond bribery or control, while the other newcomers stood too far on the periphery and often could not hope to fathom Meng Jueming's plans. By contrast, Li Zhengming was a more fitting mole than anyone could ask for.

Seeing Wei Zhao waver, Li Zhengming was overjoyed and pressed his advantage. "A spear in the open is easy to dodge; an arrow in the dark is hard to guard against. Your strength is great, Leader Wei Zhao, and openly you need fear no challenge from any one of them—but what if Meng Jueming strikes at you from the shadows? After all, as the steward senior brother, he holds far more information than you or I. If you cannot see it coming, you may dodge it once or twice, but sooner or later there will come a moment of carelessness, won't there?"

Wei Zhao shot him a glance. "That much is true enough. But why should I believe you? Since you can betray Meng Jueming, you could just as easily turn around and betray me, couldn't you?"

Li Zhengming had anticipated this misgiving. At once he drew a jade tablet from his bosom and handed it to Wei Zhao. "This is my identity tablet from Qiushui Manor. My identity details are carved into it, and apart from the late jade-carving master of Qiushui Manor, no one in this world can counterfeit it. This is the greatest secret I carry—the moment this tablet is exposed, I am certain to die without even a grave to be buried in."

Wei Zhao took the tablet and examined it closely. The material itself was fine spirit jade, carved into the likeness of a manor; more wondrous still, inside the jade were carved several dozen tiny characters, so minute as to be nearly imperceptible—a set of birth characters, headed by Li Zhengming's original name, Qiu Jiming.

Such craftsmanship was truly uncanny. Li Zhengming's claim that no one in this world could counterfeit it was indeed no lie.