Chapter 152: Bald Vulture II

The thunderous crack of the slap echoed through the spacious chamber like a whip striking dry leather.

The sheer concussive force snapped the Bald Vulture’s heavy head violently to the side. A spray of dark copper blood, saliva, and a shattered molar flew through the air, landing with a wet splatter against the polished floorboards.

The blinding spike of agony shattered the dark fog of his coma in a single, terrifying instant.

"AGH!"

The Bald Vulture gasped, his small eyes flying open as his lungs drew in a sudden, desperate gulp of air. His entire brain throbbed with a burning, nauseating pressure. Reflexively, his instinct was to roar, channel his heavy blood-Qi, and smash whatever had hit him into bloody paste.

He flexed his massive biceps, attempting to surge his dantians—only to be met with a cold, terrifying emptiness.

His meridian channels felt as though they had been filled with liquid ice, completely paralyzed and frozen shut. The moment he tried to force his internal energy to circulate, an agonizing, razor-sharp chill stabbed through his sternum and spine, bringing a guttural groan of pain to his lips.

Worse still, his thick limbs refused to move.

He looked down through his swollen, bloodshot eyes and realized he was seated in a heavy, high-backed chair. Coiled tightly around his chest, arms, torso, and ankles were thick, heavy chains forged from raw steel. Every time he strained against them, the cold metal bit deep into his flesh, locking his formidable physical strength in an absolute, unyielding hold.

When the dizzying red haze in his vision finally began to clear, the Bald Vulture took in his surrounding environment—and felt a deep, disorienting shock.

He was not in a dark, damp subterranean dungeon, nor was he hanging from torture racks in a shadowy torture hall.

He was sitting in the middle of an extraordinarily luxurious, pristine bedroom. The air was warm and smelled faintly of expensive burning sandalwood and spiritual herbs. High-grade lamps cast a soft, golden glow across intricate wall tapestries, hand-carved mahogany bookshelves, and polished marble side tables. Delicate silk curtains hung over dark wooden windows, and the floor beneath his ironwood chair was covered by a plush, hand-woven carpet.

It was, by every metric, the opulent sanctuary of a high-tier noble or a prominent young master of a major sect.

Sitting casually on the corner of a massive, carved mahogany desk just five feet away from him was Lu Feng.

The young master was dressed in immaculate robes of deep indigo and gold thread, looking completely relaxed and unbothered. He held a delicate porcelain teacup in one hand, his two colored eyes staring down at the battered mercenary with a look of quiet, detached curiosity.

Catching the Vulture’s wide, disoriented stare, Lu Feng offered a pleasant, faint smile and raised his teacup in a mock salute.

"Welcome to my humble estate, Master Vulture," Lu Feng said, his tone smooth, polite, and as light as a gentle spring breeze. "I do apologize for the somewhat crude transportation and the rather abrupt wake-up call. However, given your reputation in the lower districts, I felt it best we skip the pleasantries."

The Bald Vulture’s jaw throbbed painfully where the slap had landed. He spat another mouthful of blood onto the plush carpet, his small eyes narrowing into dark slits of malice.

"You... you little bastard..." the Vulture rasped, his voice sounding like two grinding stones. "You think some ironwood and steel chains can hold me? Do you have any idea who I am? The moment my boys notice I’m gone—"

"They won’t," a frigid, icy voice interrupted from his right.

The Bald Vulture’s breath hitched in his throat. He snapped his head to the side so fast his thick neck pop-cracked.

Standing immediately beside his chair was Ye Chenxue.

Her pristine dark silk robes fell around her slender frame like liquid shadows. She was holding her right hand casually at her waist, her porcelain fingers already coiled into a loose fist.

Swirling around her palm was a dense, visible ring of bright blue, freezing cold aura that made the ambient air around the chair crackle with frost. Her piercing blue eyes were completely devoid of human warmth, staring down at him as if he were a dead carcass waiting to be butchered.

She raised her hand by an inch, her gaze locking onto his unbruised cheekbone.

"Lu Feng," Ye Chenxue said softly, her voice carrying an arctic chill that made the hair on the back of the Vulture’s neck stand straight up. "He is awake, but his mouth is far too loud. Allow me to beat him unconscious again. I will make sure the next strike shatters his jaw completely so he can only nod or shake his head."

The Bald Vulture’s heart did a violent backflip against his ribs.

Memory flooded back like a torrent of icy water. The destroyed pub, his ultimate attack being effortlessly blocked by her delicate frost lotus, and her terrifying Glacial Heart Palm that had frozen his entire cultivation network in a single microsecond.

This woman was an absolute monster. A stronger cultivator hiding her true power in the body of a cold fairy.

Seeing her raise her frost-coated palm again, the Vulture’s hard-earned mercenary pride completely shattered into dust.

The ruthless, arrogant killer known throughout Crimson Vale’s underbelly vanished, replaced by a desperate, cornered animal who desperately wanted to keep his head attached to his shoulders.

"WAIT! Stop! Hold on!" the Vulture yelled frantically, pulling his head back against the ironwood headrest as far as his chains would allow. "Don’t hit me again! I’m awake! I’m lucid! I’ll talk!"

Lu Feng chuckled softly, setting his teacup down onto the desk with a quiet click. He raised a gentle hand, signaling Ye Chenxue to hold her strike.

"See? I told you he was a reasonable man, Chenxue," Lu Feng said pleasantly, leaning forward slightly with his elbows on his knees.

He looked at the trembling giant with an expression of sharp, undivided attention. "Now then, Master Vulture. We have already established that you are an independent rogue cultivator. My prisoners down in the cellar were kind enough to identify you, and they assured me you do not belong to the Iron Fang Gang."

The Vulture swallowed hard, his throat feeling like sandpaper. "Iron Fang? Hell no! Those zealous cultists don’t pay enough silver for the trouble they cause!"

"Good," Lu Feng replied, his eyes narrowing into dark, razor-sharp slits. "So let us get straight to the point. A man of your reputation does not spend nights lingering near my outer gates pretending to be a drunkard, nor does he deploy his personal scouts to track every carriage entering and leaving my compound out of curiosity. Someone hired you."

Lu Feng paused, letting the silence in the noble chamber stretch into a suffocating, heavy weight.

"Who gave you the order?" Lu Feng asked softly. "Who paid for your services, how much were you offered, and what was your exact assignment regarding my estate?"

The Bald Vulture hesitated.

For a rogue mercenary in the underworld, selling out an employer was the ultimate sin. If word got out that the Bald Vulture broke under interrogation and leaked his client’s name, his credibility in Crimson Vale would be ruined forever. No shadow broker or wealthy patron would ever hire him again.

"Look, Young Master Lu..." the Vulture stammered, trying to adopt a tone of professional negotiation. "In my line of work, confidentiality is everything. If I give up my employer’s identity, I might as well be a dead man walking in this city. How about we make a deal? You let me go, I pull all my eyes off your compound, and I swear I’ll never set foot within three streets of your estate again—"

CRACKLE!

Before he could finish his sentence, Ye Chenxue stepped forward and pressed two frost-covered fingers directly against the side of his neck.

"AAAAGGGHH!"

The Vulture let out a blood-curdling scream. The sub-zero Ice Qi invaded his flesh instantly, instantly freezing the skin, fat, and muscle tissue on the side of his throat. A patch of dark blue, necrotic frostbite spread rapidly across his neck tattoos, threatening to penetrate his carotid artery and freeze his brain stem.

"You are misunderstanding your current situation," Ye Chenxue whispered coldly into his ear, her voice sounding like the whisper of a reaper. "You are not negotiating terms. You are begging for the privilege to breathe. Answer the Young Master’s question, or I will freeze your neck until it crystallizes, and then snap your head off your shoulders like a dry twig."

"STOOOP! I’LL TALK! IT WAS MA GUIREN! IT WAS MA GUIREN!" the Vulture screamed at the top of his lungs, his entire body shaking violently in his ironwood chair as tear-stained dirt ran down his bruised cheeks.

Ye Chenxue withdrew her fingers, leaving a patch of white frost steaming against his swollen skin.

The name echoed through the quiet room.

*Ma Guiren.*

Lu Feng’s eyes flickered with a sudden, dark flash of realization. His posture straightened on the edge of the desk, a cold, calculating expression washing over his handsome features.

Ma Guiren. One of the prominent, wealthy, and arrogant merchant lords operating within Crimson Vale. A man who held significant sway over the city’s trade routes and local syndicates, and someone who had previously shown subtle hostility and deep envy toward Lu Feng’s rising influence and lucrative trade ventures.

"Ma Guiren..." Lu Feng repeated, his voice dropping into a low, dangerous register. "Explain everything. What did he pay you to do?"

The Bald Vulture panted heavily, his chest heaving against the spirit-steel chains as the agonizing burn of the frostbite slowly subsided. He dared not hesitate for another second.

"Ma... Ma Guiren approached me under a disguise about a week ago," the Vulture gasped out, his bloodshot eyes fixed entirely on Lu Feng. "He was furious and deeply paranoid about something that has happened between you both and felt the need to put you in your place!"

"So he hired a killer like you to keep tabs on me," Lu Feng deduced calmly.

"Yes!" the Vulture confessed frantically. "He paid me a down payment of approximately two thousand gold coins to deal with you and so I set up a full surveillance perimeter around your compound! My intention was to log every single person entering or leaving your gates—identifying your suppliers, your guard rotations, your carriage routes, and your business associates!"

"And what was the ultimate goal?" Lu Feng asked, his dark eyes fixing onto the captive’s soul. "A man doesn’t gather that much intelligence just to admire my architecture."

The Vulture swallowed hard, his bruised face twitching with fear. "Ma... Ma Guiren told me to deal without you however I saw fit. So I decided that once we mapped out your weak points and identified your primary supply lines, I would choose to strike. I didn’t want you killed immediately—I wanted us to ambush your incoming carriages, slaughter your perimeter guards, and burn down your outer storage facilities!"

The Vulture took a ragged breath, finishing the revelation. "He said... he said he wanted to teach you a severe lesson. He wanted to break your momentum, terrorize your servants, and show you that a young newcomer like you cannot survive in Crimson Vale without bowing your head to the established lords like himself!"

Silence descended upon the luxurious bedroom once more.

Lu Feng sat on his desk, his expression unreadable. He slowly raised his hand, resting his chin on his knuckles as he absorbed the full scope of Ma Guiren’s plot.

It was classic, arrogant merchant lord behavior. Ma Guiren was too timid to confront Lu Feng directly in broad daylight, nor did he want to risk his own reputation by launching an official feud after the warning from Big Sister Su Rong.

Instead, he had hired a ruthless, lethal rogue mercenary like the Bald Vulture to act as his shadow blade—testing Lu Feng’s bottom line, destroying his assets, and driving him out of the city through terror and attrition.

A low, quiet chuckle escaped Lu Feng’s lips. It was a cold, soundless laugh that sent a shiver down the Bald Vulture’s spine.

"Teach me a lesson..." Lu Feng murmured softly, his eyes glittering with cold, deadly amusement under the golden light of the lamps. "Ma Guiren truly believes he has the authority to play chess with my estate."

Ye Chenxue turned her head toward Lu Feng, her hand resting casually on the hilt of her sword. "Lu Feng. Ma Guiren is a direct threat to our operations. Shall I go to his estate tonight and eliminate him as well?"

The Bald Vulture gasped in horror, looking between the two of them as if they were discussing killing a chicken for dinner.

Lu Feng shook his head gently, a slow, brilliant smile spreading across his face.

"No need to rush, Chenxue," Lu Feng replied smoothly, standing up from his desk and smoothing out the front of his robes. "Eliminating a prominent merchant lord in his own home overnight would draw too much unnecessary attention from the city authorities right before the Grand Mercantile Auction next week. Ma Guiren wants to play games in the shadows? Then we will give him a show he will never forget."

He looked down at the Bald Vulture, who was shivering in his chains, looking like a thoroughly broken dog.

"As for our guest here..." Lu Feng said softly, gesturing toward the ironwood chair. "Keep him sealed and secured in the cellar alongside our Iron Fang friends. He may prove to be a very useful witness when the time comes to collect Ma Guiren’s debt."

Ye Chenxue offered a solemn, respectful bow. "Understood."

Without another word, Lu Feng turned and walked toward the bedroom door, leaving Ye Chenxue to deal with the captive as the silent, dangerous machinery of his counter-strategy began to turn.