Steam Era: The Lord of 'Puluo' Chapter 1459: Harmony of Qin and Se (3)

First line: Tan Jinxiao.

Second line: This guy has never backed down.

Li Banfeng looked at the shape of the slab: “This is a tombstone, isn’t it?”

Tan Jinxiao nodded: “Picked some decent material for it, right?”

“What are you doing with this thing, it’s bad luck.” Li Banfeng wanted to smash the tombstone.

Tan Jinxiao moved the tombstone behind him: “Come on, Seventh Master, didn’t we already talk this through? I’ve had this thing prepared for ages. Just now I wanted Xiao Shan to learn Tanxiu ’cause I wanted to take on a gatekeeper for myself, settle one nagging thought—but the kid still wouldn’t give me the time of day! Look down on me, fine, whatever. But Seventh Master, there’s one thing you gotta promise me: you have to help me stand this stone up, and on my stone this line has to be carved: I really have never backed down. I went to that restaurant to stir up trouble with Zuo Wugang, and got shut down by that Brother Tang. That fight counts as a loss for me, sure. But you don’t actually think I really chickened out, do you?”

After all this time together, Li Banfeng understood Tan Jinxiao’s strength: “If you’d really gone in for the kill, Tang Changfa wouldn’t have even had the chance to show up. The second you faced off, Zuo Wugang would’ve been dead.”

Tan Jinxiao laughed at that, a bit bitter: “You think that highly of me, that clears a lot of shadows out of my head. I’ve been a street punk for so many years there aren’t many folks willing to look me in the eye. Like hell I ever wanted to be like this. Back in the war, I was someone with a name, someone that mattered. I racked up plenty of battle Gong. I fought in a lot of battles; my head took hits. It’s been decades, so some of it’s fuzzy. But this Underground City—I’ve never forgotten it. That was carved out with a whole city’s worth of Brothers’ blood. When the war was won, I went off somewhere else to enjoy my days. I had my own territory, and my cultivation level kept climbing steady and solid. But I never imagined some Boss would pop up out of nowhere and snatch the Underground City. I heard my old Brothers were down here suffering, taking punishment. I couldn’t swallow that, so I came running back, wanted to pull my Brothers out. I scraped together a few hundred Brothers, first talked with the Boss, then fought the Boss. We only fought one battle, and half my Brothers died. If they’d died in the field, fighting to the last, we could’ve accepted that. But guess how those Brothers died?”

Li Banfeng thought for a moment: “Because of the Mark?”

“That’s right, the Mark. I really never saw it coming. We held one round of talks at Qing Garden, and all of us got tagged by that Mark.” Tan Jinxiao stretched out his right hand, clenching it into a fist. “That Boss and a few of his people, right in front of us, just clench their fists like this, and Brothers drop in rows. That Mark of his is that vicious!”

“I got dropped too. The Boss has a man called Guan Huodong, a Peeping Cultivation from Above the Clouds, now a Leader over in Sea City. And another Above-the-Clouds Farming Cultivation named Bai Miaosheng, Leader over in Earth Market. The two of them just twitched their fingers at me and I damn near died from the pain. Die then, fine. Dead is quiet. But the Boss wouldn’t kill me—insisted I stay in the Underground City. He said if I left, he’d slaughter all these Brothers. I don’t know what exactly he meant by that, but all these years I’ve been waiting, waiting for another chance. I have to avenge those Brothers. Now the chance is here. Seventh Master, I’m counting on you for all of it!”

“Back then I tried to talk you out of going to Qing Garden ’cause I was afraid you’d get stained by that Mark. Now you’re already marked, so we gotta think of another way. These years I’ve been working on a killer move, made just to counter their Mark. It’s a Tanxiu Technique called adhesive skin and bone. As soon as the Boss shows up, I can hawk up three mouthfuls of Old Tan and stick him down. I can glue down Guan Huodong, Bai Miaosheng, all those Bird People. I’ve done the math: I can hold them for a bit over one minute. In that one minute plus, they’ll definitely find a way to kill me. That part, you don’t need to worry about. As long as you can use that window to kill them, then this life of mine will have been a damn good bargain! I’ll kowtow to you on the Yellow Springs Road, Seventh Master. I’ll kowtow one right now as a down payment!”

As Tan Jinxiao was about to kneel, Li Banfeng yanked him back up: “Stand up and talk. First tell me, is this Boss Mr. Kong Fang from Snowflake Beach?”

Tan Jinxiao nodded: “I figure it’s him. But I don’t think the Underground City has anything to do with the Peddler.”

“It really has nothing to do with the Peddler. Remember this: all of Snowflake Beach has nothing to do with the Peddler.”

Tan Jinxiao said: “Isn’t Snowflake Beach run by the Peddler?”

“It actually isn’t. I’ll explain that to you later. Do you know what the Mark looks like?”

Tan Jinxiao shook his head: “All these years I’ve been trying to get the Mark taken out. I’ve looked for plenty of masters and paid plenty of fees, but not a single one could help me pull the Mark off. In Greenwater City there’s a He Jiaqing, you should know him. The guy’s a top Thief Cultivation, and he’s got quite the knack for stripping Marks. I went to him for help the other day, and he could clearly see the Mark was on us—but he just couldn’t find where the hell it was! Tell me that’s not some twisted shit?”

Even He Jiaqing couldn’t find it?

He could even strip Boss Lu’s Mark.

Then again, it makes sense. The Mark Boss Lu put on Du Wenming was probably left on a whim.

The Mark Mr. Kong Fang planted in the Underground City—no telling how much thought went into that.

So how did I manage to get the Mark out?

Li Banfeng carefully recalled what had happened earlier. With the help of the High Pillow Worry-Free Skill, Li Banfeng only remembered vomiting up some foreign object. The process had been extremely difficult, the memory very clear, but he genuinely had no idea where that Copper Coin had been hidden.

Li Banfeng asked Tan Jinxiao again: “Can each of this Boss’s men use that Mark to attack you all?”