Chapter 149: Soul-Suppressing Bell

I rolled my eyes and asked the fat man again, "Does that mean your boss should be sending people over now?"

The fat man nodded. "Yes, we are just waiting for them to arrive."

I sneered. "They are never going to arrive."

"No..."

The fat man suddenly stopped in his tracks instead of walking forward. After uttering that single word, he slowly raised his head to look at me.

Under the moonlight, I noticed that all traces of fear had vanished from the fat man's face.

Instead, he wore the expression of someone whose malicious scheme had succeeded.

"Jiang Huai."

The fat man called my name softly. "The people sent by the boss are already on their way, because they have already arrived."

I looked at the fat man in confusion, only for him to suddenly let out a whistle directed at the pitch-black night sky.

Swish, swish, swish...

Several figures emerged from different directions, surrounding me tightly.

The fat man pointed a hand at me and said, "This time, our target was never anyone else—it was you!"

I narrowed my eyes. This was getting interesting.

No wonder this fat man had acted so terrified earlier, completely unlike what I knew of the Golden Cicada Society.

It now appeared that he had been putting on an act the entire time, with the sole purpose of luring me to this exact location.

Looking at the fat man, I couldn't help but start applauding.

Following that, I gave him a thumbs-up, then swept my gaze across his accomplices and said, "You lot must be the replacements for the people who were working here before. No, calling them people isn't quite right; they should be called corpse-howlers. You must be the same kind of creatures, right?"

I pondered for a moment, drew the telescopic baton from the small of my back, and then pulled out a Taoist talisman to wrap tightly around the shaft of the baton.

I spoke up again. "The previous seven of you couldn't handle me. Do you really think you lot can?"

"Of course not. We never planned on dealing with you; we are just here to watch the show."

Watch the show?

Hearing the fat man say this, my brow furrowed deeply, and an ominous premonition suddenly welled up in my heart.

The fat man suddenly grinned widely and clapped his hands.

I heard a flurry of hurried footsteps approaching from behind me.

Turning my head to look, I saw the fellow whom I had stripped of his night-caving garments running toward us in his underwear, leading another group of people.

Right behind him was Wang Zihao, accompanied by several others he had brought along!

A group of eight people in total!

The eyes of these eight individuals appeared as though they were covered with a layer of silver dust, and their movements were stiff and mechanical.

Clearly, they had been put under a spell. In other words, if the fat man and his crew weren't corpse-howlers, did that mean they were true members of the Golden Cicada Society?

"Hurry it up. The boss's people are going to be here to collect the goods any minute now."

The fat man stopped looking at me, waved a hand dismissively at the guy wearing only his underwear, and then led the rest of his crew toward the mountain cave.

Did he really believe that his underlings controlling Wang Zihao and the others would be enough to match me?

I ignored the fat man and turned my attention back to the fellow in his underwear.

He stared back at me without saying a word, merely letting out a cold snort.

Then, a bronze bell materialized in his hand.

A Soul-Suppressing Bell!

My mouth parted slightly. My grandfather had once told me that the Soul-Suppressing Bell could do much more than simply control corpses.

In the past, people often spoke of corpse drivers, and the corpse driver's greatest reliance was precisely this Soul-Suppressing Bell.

The Soul-Suppressing Bell guides the path of the dead, and their souls follow closely behind.

Yet the most formidable aspect of this bell was not merely its ability to control corpses, but its power over the living as well.

One only needed to drip corpse fat into the eyes of a living person to manipulate them entirely through the ringing of the Soul-Suppressing Bell.

With a single chime of the bell, Wang Zihao and the others began moving their bodies like marionettes on strings.

With a second chime of the bell, Wang Zihao and the others bowed three times toward the man holding the bell.

With a third chime of the bell, Wang Zihao and the others fixed their gaze upon me, baring their teeth and brandishing their claws as they lunged straight toward me.

My eyes widened in shock. To break this spell, I needed to snatch the Soul-Suppressing Bell from that man's hand.

Yet these eight individuals surrounded me impenetrably, and I couldn't afford to deal lethal blows to them.

Before even a few exchanges had passed, several footprints were already smudged across my clothes.

"Damn it! Brother Hao! You leave me no choice! Since you're being controlled, me hitting you is for your own good!"

The reason the fat man and his accomplices believed these eight could handle me was because they assumed I wouldn't dare strike Wang Zihao and the others.

However, in this life-or-death moment, standing still to let them beat me would make me nothing more than a fool.

Having made up my mind, I swung the telescopic baton in my hand with fierce, whistling momentum.

In less than a minute, the only one still standing before me was Wang Zihao.

I shook out my wrist and smiled at Wang Zihao, saying, "Brother Hao, don't hold this against me!"

The moment the words left my mouth, I leaped into the air, bringing the telescopic baton down hard across Wang Zihao's shoulder.

With a sharp *crack*, I seemed to have broken his collarbone.

Without holding back, I followed up by kicking him directly in the kneecap, then brought the baton down onto his jaw.

Wang Zihao spat out a mouthful of watery fluid before collapsing onto the ground, twitching uncontrollably.

I took a deep breath, turned around to face the man holding the Soul-Suppressing Bell, and said, "You people are far too naive."

"You... you actually went all out against them!"

"Of course. Otherwise, wouldn't I be the one dead?"

"Impossible! Aren't you all on the same side? Why would you attack them?"

"Is there something wrong with your head?" I said, running a hand through my hair. "If anything happens to them, that's your responsibility—what does it have to do with me? Besides, you lot are truly daring; you even dare to lay a hand on police officers."

"They... they are police officers?"

I grinned broadly. "What else? Did you think they were my relatives?"

This was something the members of the Golden Cicada Society had never anticipated. While Lin Feng didn't place many restrictions on them, harming police officers was an absolute taboo.

Yet this time, ignorant of the truth, they had assumed Wang Zihao and his group were just like me.

"Well, seeing as you're so terrified, if you tie yourself up right now, or help me take down the rest of your folks inside, I might put in a good word and ask them to show you mercy!"

"In your dreams!"

Realizing that without corpses and living puppets he was no match for me, he turned on his heel and prepared to flee.

If I let him run all the way back into the cave like that, wouldn't I lose all my dignity?

Without a second thought, I hurled the telescopic baton directly at his back.

My original intention was merely to strike his back, but my aim was slightly off, and the baton struck the back of his head instead.

He staggered on the spot, twitched twice, turned his head to glare at me, and then collapsed flat onto the ground.

I walked over to him and saw blood pooling steadily from the back of his head as he lay motionless on the floor.

Surely I hadn't accidentally beaten him to death, had I?

Never mind, I needed to figure out how to deal with the others first.

I squatted down and pried the Soul-Suppressing Bell from his grip.

"You have only yourself to blame. You tried to harm me, which just proves your cultivation isn't high enough. I'll gladly be taking this item off your hands!"