After the Immortals disappeared

When his son was attacked and left unconscious, He Chunhua had sent an urgent message to the West Mountain leopard clan. However, no response ever came back.

He sighed heavily. "In addition, communication with the interior provinces has been cut off for ten days due to the rebellion in Pingning. The area was hit by floods afterward, rendering the relay stations unusable. We've been busy reorganizing troops in Blackwater City these past few days."

He Lingchuan blinked in surprise. "Are we going to war?"

He had noticed some movement in the barracks recently but hadn't paid it much attention. Though there hadn't been any major wars in Qiansong County for a long time, small skirmishes in the vicinity of Blackwater City were common—usually government troops sweeping up bandits. The locals were used to it.

"It's hard to say," He Chunhua replied grimly.

He Lingchuan glanced at his father's slightly weary face. Though he had no particular fondness for this "cheap dad," he couldn't fault him either. Running a county was no easy task—managing food production, trade, border security, military affairs, and natural disasters, all while guarding against incursions by rebel forces from the interior.

He Chunhua rose earlier than the roosters and slept later than the dogs—a diligent and conscientious official.

Even so, the worst news always seemed to come from the heartland of the Yuan Kingdom.

This kingdom was plagued by internal strife.

"What did you call me for, Father?" He Lingchuan finally asked.

"This." He Chunhua pried open the massive leopard's jaws.

Its fearsome teeth were enough to send chills down anyone's spine, but He Lingchuan immediately noticed something odd. "Its fangs… are gone?"

All four canine teeth had been forcibly removed, leaving bloody cavities behind.

"The leopard that attacked you also used its canines to conceal something. Furthermore, the internal injuries of that leopard and this Leopard King are strikingly similar." He Chunhua paused. "Where is the item it had hidden in its fangs? Bring it to me."

When He Lingchuan had been found unconscious and covered in blood at the base of the cliff, the sand leopard was already dead.

Both had been brought back to Blackwater City: the living rushed to medical care, and the dead sent for dissection. Since He Lingchuan had only been out hunting rock goats, the leopard was deemed his "trophy" by default. After examining the item hidden in the leopard's fangs, He Chunhua had given it to his son as a keepsake.

Monsters often needed storage capabilities, but since most didn't wear clothes, they typically transformed parts of their own bodies into storage spaces. This required innate talent; crocodile demons, for instance, often turned their stomachs into treasure pouches, while predators like leopards, tigers, and wolves commonly used their canine teeth.

Humans familiar with this trait would remove the canines of slain monsters as trophies, knowing they often contained valuables.

Opening such storage spaces required spiritual energy. When He Lingchuan first arrived in this world, he hadn't known better and thought the leopard's fangs were empty.

"It's in my room. I'll fetch it shortly," He Lingchuan replied before pivoting to the real issue. "Father, there's something else I need to report."

He then recounted everything about the two Donglai Manor guards who had come to Blackwater City searching for the sand leopard.

The more He Chunhua listened, the deeper his frown grew. When he heard the words "Donglai Manor," he abruptly stood up.

"What did you just say?"

His expression darkened, and in a flash of anger, he swung his hand as if to slap his son, but it stopped mid-air.

After a few seconds, his open palm curled into a fist and came crashing down onto the table instead.

"Conducting unauthorized interrogations? Complete nonsense!"

He Chunhua's frustration was evident. He had long known his son was reckless and stubborn, ignoring countless admonitions. But he hadn't expected his boy to hit such a hard wall—and so quickly.

The Grand Marshal!

How could his son have provoked the Grand Marshal?

Known for his calm and composed demeanor in the political arena, He Chunhua rarely lost his temper. However, He Lingchuan had grown accustomed to his father's scolding and was unfazed. He even argued back:

"Those two were asking questions all over the city, and this place is full of loose-lipped gossips. If I hadn't intervened, they'd have quickly traced it back to us."

At that moment, he couldn't help but admire his father's caution. If He Chunhua hadn't ordered everyone to keep quiet about the leopard incident, word would have spread across the city by now, and the guards wouldn't have had to ask around—they'd have known exactly where to look.

Of course, no secret can stay hidden forever.

"Six years ago, the Grand Marshal launched the Zhang Hongbin Case, which implicated one duke, two marquises, and seven earls, involving over 2,600 people. Do you know how many of them survived?"

The look on He Chunhua's face was like a storm cloud pressing down.

He Lingchuan gulped. "Not… many?"

"Seventy-three!" His father spat the number out one word at a time. "That includes women and children. And even then, only seventy-three managed to scrape by!"

A chill ran down He Lingchuan's spine.

If even high-ranking nobles could be slaughtered like weeds, what hope did ordinary people have?

"Our family is fortunate by comparison…" He Chunhua muttered grimly before returning to the matter at hand. "When the Red and White gang informed you, why didn't you come to me immediately?"

"I wanted to get some answers out of them before reporting," He Lingchuan replied, his expression hardening. A sharp glint appeared in his eyes. "If they had no powerful backing, I could've avenged myself then and there. If they did, then it was even more important to make sure they didn't learn the sand leopard's whereabouts."

He Chunhua had been boiling with rage, but as he mulled over his son's reasoning, his expression softened, even showing a trace of approval. "Not unreasonable."

The crux of the problem wasn't whether those two guards had been captured or not—it was that the Grand Marshal believed the item he sought might be in the He family's possession.

He Chunhua looked at his son. "You're finally starting to use your head."

Facing his father's unexpectedly approving gaze, He Lingchuan grinned to deflect. "I'll go get the thing."

The Sand Leopard's Relics

Fifteen minutes later, He Lingchuan returned, carrying the items retrieved from the leopard's canine teeth. He spread them out on a small table.

"This is everything."

The haul included several demon cores of varying sizes and colors, a set of razor-sharp daggers, a few pieces of creamy white jade, a pearl necklace, some seemingly useless trinkets, and even a dozen gold and silver ingots.

Monsters weren't always brutish—they conducted trade just like humans. Gold and silver were universal currencies, so their presence didn't surprise the father and son.

"You think the Grand Marshal is after this pearl necklace?" He Lingchuan held it up to the light.

The pearls gleamed with a soft, enchanting luster, each one slightly larger than a melon seed. In the sunlight, they emitted a faint blue sheen. Merely holding the necklace caused droplets of water to condense in the air, creating a cooling mist that made the room feel as if it were near a refreshing seaside breeze.

"It has some minor water-condensation properties. Nothing special." He shrugged. "It'd make life more comfortable in the desert, but the Grand Marshal surely wouldn't be after this."

He Chunhua's gaze fell on the rest of the items. He had barely glanced at them the first time, but now he examined them carefully.

Most of it seemed random: dried flowers, half a block of musk, a gnawed bone, bloodied rings likely taken from human victims, broken hairpins, small bags of spices, feathers, half a comb, and…

A pile of dried insects, snakes, and lizards.