Chapter 369: Chapter 368: Witch Gu Sect, Finding a Breakthrough

It appeared that Chen Jing had already made a connection, Li Jing said.

"From what I understand, Uncle, you also dealt with a case involving the etching skill when you went to the capital many years ago. The confirmed offender was a non-blood member of the Sima family."

Saying so, he continued.

"Just recently, while I was helping the General Bureau to solve a case, I met a ’retired’ guardian from the Sima family. Before I came to see you, I had already asked him about some situations. According to his account, it seemed that the General Bureau wanted to deliberately hide something from that case?"

After hearing these words from Li Jing, Chen Jing replied indifferently.

"You really are getting bolder and bolder. Even though you’re hiding your true cultivation level, you managed to establish a relationship with a ’retired’ guardian from the Sima family."

Saying so, he continued.

"The General Bureau wasn’t really trying to hide anything during that case, it’s just that it involved some hidden world sects. It’s rather sensitive, so the information isn’t suitable for public disclosure."

Li Jing remained calm at these words, his mind only confirming his suspicion.

During his communications with Sima Yuxuan.

That person had tried to imply something to him frantically.

Not just implying, even showing clearly that he didn’t want to involve himself in it.

After realizing that Miao Region Witchcraft wasn’t something that could be mastered in a year or two, Li Jing guessed that it might involve a hidden world sect.

Only when it involved a hidden world sect, would the General Bureau start to hesitate.

Hidden world sects, while they don’t have special privileges in Longyu,

But by their very nature of being secluded, it is unwise to get the outside world too involved.

Especially the common people with their vast numbers.

Hidden world sects not only have unique heritage,

They also have access to endless resources in the Secret Realm, far away from the mortal world.

If this were widely known, people would inevitably become interested in the hidden world sects, and there would be a strong desire among ordinary people to join the hidden world sects in order to find a way out of their predicaments.

In today’s society.

Being unable to break through the One Realm signifies a permanent stop in their advancement.

Unless one possessed a special body constitution like Liu Sisi, there was no cure otherwise.

In cases like these,

Within the hidden world sects, those that have carried on their heritage for thousands of years, long before the establishment of Longyu, there might be a solution.

In this world, no one is willing to be ordinary.

The reason why they are ordinary is that they see no way out.

Once they see a possibility, some people will certainly go to great lengths.

The existence of hidden world sects, once exposed,

Cannot simply be settled by an explanation from the Longyu government or a member of a sect.

Perhaps the majority of people would be rational after learning about it, but there will always be extremes.

Never underestimate the blindness of people after they see hope...

In these times,

those who refuse to live a peaceful life and like to create troubles by spreading rumors are never in the minority.

Rumors are abhorrent because people truly do believe them.

Setting aside the ordinary people,

Knowing about the special heritage of the hidden world sects, those beyond the Second Realm will similarly harbor longing. And under the instigation of some ambitious individuals, there might be clamoring targeted at the sects, aiming for some gains.

Looking out for self-interest is human nature.

In conclusion,

The exposure of sects doesn’t do Longyu any good.

All it will do is bring endless chaos and suspicion to the currently peaceful society,

Setting those aside,

Getting confirmation from Chen Jing that the case he investigated back then involved a hidden world sect, Li Jing asked,

"The hidden world sect involved in the case you worked on, Uncle, was it from the Miao Region?"

"Hmm."

Chen Jing gave a definitive answer, saying,

"If you’re thinking about trying to delve into the sect involved in the case back then, I advise you to drop the idea. That sect is immensely difficult to deal with."

Saying so, he began to slowly explain,

"Since ancient times, the Miao Region has had witchcraft and Gu skill, two unique systems outside of the Orthodox Immortality Path. These two systems aren’t inherently evil, but their practices are undoubtedly the most vicious in the world."

"The sect involved in the case that year was called the Witch Gu Sect in the Miao Region. Just from the name, you should know that they practice both witchcraft and Gu skill. The offender I caught that year, who was causing havoc in the Sima family, turned out to be an inner disciple of the Witch Gu Sect."

"As he was not legally living in the world, and was secretly sent to the capital by the Sima family, the Witch Gu Sect dared not bother me, otherwise I would have had no choice but to deal with them. Hidden world sects generally protect their own, and for one that practices both witchcraft and Gu skill, like the Witch Gu Sect, nobody wants to provoke them."

Having said all that, Chen Jing continued.

"If you insist on investigating this matter, I won’t stop you, but you may need to change your approach. Practicing witchcraft involves feeding on raw flesh and blood as a basic requirement, and practicing Gu skill requires one to mingle with poisonous bugs daily. Those involved in these two systems are somewhat messed up in the head. It’s not that they don’t reason, but they only recognize the reason they think is reasonable. There is only one way to make them agree with you, and that’s beating them."

"..."

Li Jing.

When it comes to fighting people, he never hesitated.

Hesitate about what?

Just do it.

But asking him to pick a fight with a hidden world sect, he hadn’t inflated his ego to that point yet.

Chen Jing’s explanation made it very clear.

The Witch Gu Sect, there’s no one with a normal brain there.

Unless you can beat them into submission, there’s no reasoning or negotiation to be done.

After a moment of silence, Li Jing asked.

"Uncle, the offender you caught that year was illegally living in the world, did Longyu punish the Witch Gu Sect?"

"Indeed, they were penalized with a several-year doubling of their production of special goods."

Chen Jing shrugged and said.

"Although the incident caused quite a stir in the capital back then, on the whole, it was actually due to my personal style."

Li Jing couldn’t help but smirk upon hearing this.

What a remark about a personal style.

So, he was perfectly aware of his aggressively fierce approach to handling cases.

Slightly annoyed, Chen Jing continued.

"At that time, the essence of the incident was not that the Witch Gu Sect indulged its disciples, but that, accustomed to their freedom from worldly concerns, they overlooked disciplining their disciples. Faced with Longyu’s accusations, they naturally wouldn’t dare contradict their rationale. Throughout the world one can hardly find a place not ruled by the king, and on Longyu’s territory, no matter how capable they are, they have to obediently comply. When here in Longyu’s realm, it’s not easy to criticize them too severely."

Having said that, he added.

"If we impose a heavier penalty, the Witch Gu Sect will certainly refuse to accept it. It’s not justifiable to escalate the individual behavior of one disciple up to the entire sect."

Li Jing listened to Chen Jing’s words and nodded silently. After pondering for a while, he stood up and said.

"I only had these questions. I will remember your advice, uncle, but this time I may have to make an attempt to deal with the people from the Witch Gu Sect. I have to fulfil my obligations to those who trust me. Since I have promised Director Jiang to investigate this matter, I certainly have to do my best. And the death of Director Jiang’s wife was due to the Etching Skill, I have reason to suspect that it was the people of the Witch Gu Sect who made the move."

"Hmm."

Chen Jing responded.

I know what kind of person he is.

Since Lu Qifei indeed died due to the Etching Skill, the Witch Gu Sect indeed has major suspicion.

It’s necessary to investigate.

"Be cautious about this matter,"

He said lightly, then Chen Jing stood up and continued,

"If you really encounter someone from the Witch Gu Sect who is not sensible, flash your Patrol Certificate first to gain some leverage, then beat them up for their non-cooperation. At least based on my personal experience, it’s much easier to explain afterwards once the beating’s done."

"..."

Li Jing.

This round of personal experience shared by Chen Jing was indeed rather enlightening.

Apparently, he must have had some altercations with people from the Witch Gu Sect in the course of his investigations back in the day.

He was about to say something when Chen Jing spoke again.

"Remember one thing, if you fight, you must conquer them thoroughly face-to-face; otherwise, you or someone close to you might be targeted by witchcraft or Gu Skill in secret. To talk about morality with those who wield witchcraft and Gu Skill is quite foolish. The nature of witchcraft and Gu Skill is to harm others behind their backs. Direct confrontation is not their strength, if they even cared about morality, they would not resort to such means. Not all people from the Witch Gu Sect dare to commit murder, but that doesn’t mean they won’t do other harmful things."

Upon receiving such advice, Li Jing nodded silently.

He personally didn’t care much.

Witchcraft.

It has common features with Western curse art, both being somewhat sinister means.

The weaknesses of the two are quite obvious.

They are ineffective against entities with strong flesh.

Li Jing, with his physical strength surpassing that of a Seventh Realm Monster, was not afraid of witchcraft.

As Chen Jing had said,

Witchcraft is not a means to confront people directly, but a clandestine and backstabbing method.

As for the Gu Skill....

Li Jing was quite interested in it.

Gu Skill.

It couldn’t leave the extremely special Gu worms.

A small worm that could easily be crushed, when cultivated by a person knowledgeable in Gu Skill, could easily become a terrifying entity.

If he had the chance, Li Jing really wanted to see it.

Mainly because he wanted to find out whether Gu worms might have a health bar.

Yet, since Chen Jing pointed out that the people from Witch Gu Sect might target the people around him, this was something Li Jing absolutely would not tolerate.

"Uncle, if there’s nothing else, I’ll head to the capital."

Li Jing said.

Just as he was about to turn towards the window to leave, Chen Jing spoke.

"Hold on, there’s something I need to tell you."

?

Li Jing stopped and turned back.

"A few days ago Yuran sent a message saying that she had a sudden realization while cultivating at the Taoist school, and has successfully stepped into the Fifth Boundary. She asked me to pass the news onto you."

Chen Jing smiled with pride shining in his words.

Upon hearing that Chen Yuran had a realization and stepped into the Fifth Boundary, Li Jing was astonished.

A realization.

It was a rare opportunity.

Some have realizations.

They breakthrough on the spot, saving years, or even decades, of hard cultivation.

Some have realizations.

They grasp the method to control certain special powers, or even create a new system.

How long had it been since Chen Yuran had gone to the Heavenly Dao School?

She had already encountered this good fortune of realization?

With a slight smile, Li Jing said.

"Well, I should really congratulate Yuran then. What are her plans next? Is she coming back or...?"

"She has no plans to come back for now. She said she’s planning to try and see if she can make a breakthrough to the Sixth Boundary."

Chen Jing shrugged and said, then he continued somewhat awkwardly,

"She asked me to pass on a message to you, urging you to work harder. Otherwise, if she has another realization, her cultivation level might catch up with yours."

"Ah, this..."

Li Jing was taken aback.

Regardless of Chen Yuran possibly coming to some grand understanding twice in succession...

Even if she really had another epiphany, it wouldn’t make a difference...

He coughed a bit, then said,

"Uncle, I’d appreciate it if you could keep my cultivation level from Yuran for now."

Chen Jing clicked his tongue reluctantly.

"Do I look like I enjoy intruding in others’ affairs?"

Without waiting for an answer, he waved his hand dismissively.

"Alright then, go do your own thing."

Upon hearing this, Li Jing nodded, swiftly whipped out a Spirit Soldier and flew out of the window.

Watching him leave, Chen Jing walked over to the window, then glanced outside. He contemplated for a moment before pulling out his cellphone.

...

After leaving the North City Patrol Branch, Li Jing decided to head home instead of rushing to the national capital.

As he hovered over his villa...

Before Li Jing had a chance to land, he saw his house gates wide open. Aided and Ji Qing each were sitting on a bench in the yard, soaking in the sun with a cellphone in hand.

Seeing both of them engrossed in their game, he assumed they were playing together online.

Such a sight greeted him upon returning home that it made Li Jing laugh and cry at their antics.

Considering the mechanical body...

And the fact that he wasn’t home...

It was actually predictable that Aided would kick back and relax.

What he didn’t expect was for Ji Qing to abandon her hot pot restaurant business to come here and goof around with Aided.

Shaking his head in amusement and slight annoyance, Li Jing alighted on the ground.

The instant he landed, Ji Qing, who was engrossed in her game, perked her ears and looked up.

Seeing Li Jing out of the blue, she was surprised for a moment, before quickly tugging Aided’s sleeve.

Puzzled, Aided looked up.

Upon seeing Li Jing, she hurriedly put away her phone and stood up in a very well-behaved manner.

"Master, why are you back so suddenly?"

Seeing Aided behaving so smartly, Li Jing silently shook his head, saying,

"I was handling some affairs and just dropped by."

Having said this, he turned to Ji Qing and asked with a smile,

"Ji Qing, how did you find the time to come here?"

Under Li Jing’s gaze, Ji Qing became inexplicably guilty and coughed before saying,

"I came over a couple of days ago to charge Aided’s mainframe. I figured she must be bored alone, so I decided to stay with her."

"Is that so?"

Li Jing nodded in approval.

Aided’s core needing a charge was unavoidable.

He had instructed her before.

If the power was running low, she should find Ji Qing.

Chen Yuran had secluded herself behind the gates of the Immortal Path, and he and Liu Sisi were in the national capital. The only one who could recharge Aided’s power was Ji Qing.

Ji Qing just decided to stay over.

She claimed it was to keep Aided company.

Li Jing had no comment to make, nor did he feel like making one.

This formidable Meow, his feedback didn’t matter.

That said, Ji Qing had already reached the mid-stage of the Four Realm, with a whopping 5009 health points.

Given this staggering improvement, it was safe to say she had been putting in considerable effort.

"You play with Aided. You don’t need to mind me. I’m just stopping by and I’ll be leaving shortly."

After casually remarking that, Li Jing turned and entered the house.

Seeing this, Ji Qing blinked a couple of times and then guiltlessly sat back down with her phone, saying to Aided,

"Let’s go on."

Hearing this, Aided hesitated and looked back, saying,

"Well...should we...should we wait until the master is gone before we continue?"

"There’s no need."

Ji Qing replied, huffing,

"Didn’t Li Jing tell us to go on playing? If he dares to reprimand you later, just tell me. I will scold him."

As she spoke, she puffed up her face in a "I’m super fierce" sort of expression.

Aided was left speechless.

As for whether Ji Qing would dare to scold Li Jing, she didn’t know.

But she did know...

This woman didn’t have much of a deterrent effect.

However, if she refused to accompany Ji Qing now, she was afraid Ji Qing would be displeased and wouldn’t choose to stick around and play with her.

After hesitating for a moment, Aided chose to take out the cell phone she had just put away.

...

In the villa.

Li Jing heard Ji Qing talking outside the house. He found it both amusing and annoying but didn’t take it seriously.

He walked straight into the guest room and softly called out.

"Xiao Ai."

"I’m here."

Xiao Ai’s main body responded.

The supercomputer screens, both horizontal and vertical, lit up simultaneously.

The holographic projection system was activated, projecting her virtual image.

Xiao Ai’s mechanical body was outside, playing a game with Ji Qing, which had no impact on the use of her main body and the supercomputer.

Li Jing hadn’t brought Xiao Ai inside mainly because of this.

Sitting down in front of the supercomputer, he thought for a while and then spoke.

"Retrieve information regarding the former family head of the Sima family, one of the Seven Great Families in the capital city. I want all the detailed information on his direct descendants."

"Understood."

Xiao Ai responded.

Within two seconds, the supercomputer’s horizontal screen popped up one after another identity information.

Upon seeing this, Li Jing raised his eyes and focused.

The former head of the Sima family.

His name was Sima Tuowen.

He served as the head of the Sima family for more than ten years, bringing a lot of development to the family.

He stepped down twenty-seven years ago and then left the capital city.

In the information retrieved by Xiao Ai, there was no mention of Sima Tuowen appearing in other cities in Longyu after leaving the capital city.

The information wasn’t much and was basically consistent with Sima Yuxuan’s narration.

Then he examined the information about his family.

Sima Tuowen had three wives, three sons, and two daughters.

The information about these eight direct family members all stopped at the time when they left the capital city twenty-seven years ago.

Seeing this information, Li Jing rubbed his eyebrows.

It seemed that it was no longer possible to get any leads from Sima Tuowen.

Sima Tuowen disappeared after leaving the capital city.

Apparently, he took his entire family to join the Witch Gu Sect, heading to the sect’s secluded Secret Realm Space.

Sima Yuxuan had strongly hinted at this.

Since Sima Tuowen and his family had all gone to the Secret Realm Space where the Witch Gu Sect resided, Li Jing certainly couldn’t just go looking for them.

He could find out the coordinates and location of the sect’s Permanent Secret Realm through Jiang Liao.

To find out the truth about Lu Qifei’s death, that man would definitely spare no expense.

But actually going there.

Finding the Sima family in such a vast Secret Realm Space was extremely difficult, not to mention the possibility of the Witch Gu Sect harboring them.

This was not feasible.

This clue was broken.

Sitting in front of the supercomputer, Li Jing lowered his eyes and reminisced.

He had received a list from Jin Ruixin, stating how many sect disciples there were in the capital city and which sect they belonged to.

With his extraordinary memory capable of the Seventh Realm, he still remembered very clearly.

However, recalling all that, Li Jing didn’t find any disciples from the Witch Gu Sect who were officially serving in the sect.

At present, he was stuck in a bit of a stalemate.

Just as he was wrestling with this dilemma, his cell phone in his pocket vibrated a bit.

Li Jing noticed the movement, took out his cell phone, and found a message from Jiang Yini.

He opened the message.

"My father has agreed to everything you asked. You’ve been authorised to access a portion of the Administration Bureau’s classified archives. The documents about my mother in the Patrol Bureau and the main office have also been declassified for you."

Finally receiving this message, Li Jing perked up and took out the Management Bureau’s tablet to access the confidential files.

The authorization Jiang Liao gave him was limited to the files he had personally signed and the series of decisions he had made during the year of Lu Qifei’s death.

The content was quite extensive.

It ranged from changes in the Administration Bureau’s policies to personnel transfers in various local management bureaus, and all the measures approved by Jiang Liao were recorded.

After glancing through a large amount of information in one go, Li Jing frowned.

As previously mentioned.

Sitting in Jiang Liao’s position, it’s hard not to offend people.

That year, the various decisions and measures he made infringed on many people’s interests.

During this period, Jiang Liao offended many higher-ups in Longyu.

Including the Liu family, all the other six of the Seven Great Families made the "honorable list".

This confidential document had very limited reference value.

Li Jing couldn’t determine.

Who, because of the decisions and measures made by Jiang Liao, had suffered a loss of interests, would retaliate by harming his family members.

All the people on the list could be potential culprits.

After going through the confidential document twice, Li Jing took out a data cable to connect the Management Bureau’s tablet to the supercomputer, and instructed Xiao Ai.

"Xiao Ai, read this confidential document and search the internet to see what impact all the decisions and measures made by the Chief of the Management Bureau have had in the past year. Compile a list of all relevant interest parties, and specifically find out what the residents of the Jiang family mansion have lost due to these measures." 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

"Understood."

Xiao Ai responded.